A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to experience one of the top-5 trips of my life. Let me give you a little background: In its bid to grovel its way to the top, in 2004 United launched a domestic, premium service brand flying between two high revenue markets. Dubbed simply "p.s." (for premium service), United has pulled out all the stops to make the new product a success.

They retro-fitted narrow-body 757's into three-class aircraft: adding next generation bed seats in first class, a business class cabin that surpasses the comfort of its international service (leather seats, 165-degree recline), and a coach class completely "EconomyPlus", with an extra 5 inches of legroom and free meals (until August anyway). Every seat on the plane is equipped with a two-prong power plug, even in coach! (Although back there it's 2 plugs for every 3 seats.) The amenities don't stop with your tush. In the two front cabins, menus with lavish gourmet selections like goat cheese salad appetizers and filet mignon entrees, should delight most flyers. The brand even has its own signature drink -- the "bellini" -- light sparkling wine with white peach pureee. Delightful! Likewise, the airline distributes personal DVD players and your very own movie library with about 10 selections. Very classy. And just recently, the once-troubled airline company pronounced that onboard Wi-Fi would be piloted on the p.s. planes. The icing on the cake is the occasional celebrity sighting as they move and shake between the coasts.

Like all things that seem too good to be true, the four 757s that make up p.s., shuttle only between New York-JFK and the airline's west coast hubs in San Francisco and Los Angeles. So, unless you're going to/from New York, you won't be pampered on these planes. Last year, I was eager to fly p.s. and forced a routing through JFK from Raleigh (Raleigh to Washington DC to New York JFK to San Francisco to Seattle)! Unfortunately, my flight from Raleigh to DC was delayed and I was relegated to a non-stop to Seattle.

Now that I lived in New York and had a planned trip to the Bay Area, I was determined to soak it up. I burned upgrade certificates and landed a seat in business class. From the moment I got seated, I could tell the flight attendants were enjoying the flight too. Immediately, they came by with pre-departure drinks and offered eye shades, earplugs or in-flight socks. The level of professionalism and smiles exhibited was on par with world-reknowned Asian carriers. Waves of drink service, steak sandwiches, ice cream and other amenities landed on my tray table, and 5 hours later as the plane desceneded into San Francisco, I wished I had more time. One more bellini please?