for your security
can anyone tell me whatever happened to ‘crazy’? dude tries to light his shoe on fire….crazy. dude burns himself up in his seat…..crazy. al qeada claiming responsibility for sending self-immolating crazy guy……crazy. c’mon. nine years since 9/11 and that’s all they’ve got? and the entire media picks it up and broadcasts it 24/7? well that’s a special blend of crazy and retarded. if john lennon were still with us he wouldn’t be saying, ‘violence begets violence, you know.’ he’d be saying, ‘stupidity begets stupidity, you know.’ it’s like an exponentially increasing vortex of dumb-dumb. example. i’ve been traveling with the same nail clipper in the same see-through plastic bag since the tsa decided that toiletries were a threat to security. my shoes were off. my jacket off. my hat was off. my toiletry bag was in the bin next to my laptop. i don’t carry change in my pocket and i leave my cellphone in my carry-on bag where i had also previously placed my belt.
‘do you have any change or metallic objects on your person?’
i shake my head no.
‘what about your cellphone?’
‘what about it?’
‘is it in your pocket?’
i point to my backpack rolling through the xray machine.
‘and your belt?’
i lift up my shirt to show i’m not wearing it.
i go through the metal detector and am waiting for my my bag and my bin to come through.
‘is this your toiletry bag, sir?’
‘yes it is.’
‘i need to look through it. i’ll wait for you down here.’
i put my shoes on. i put my hat on. and my jacket. i pick up my laptop and put it in my backpack and walk over to the waiting security specialist.
‘what’s this?’ he’s holding up my nail clipper.
‘umm…….a fingernail clipper?’ i reply.
he takes out a pen and pushes the cuticle cleaner out.
‘it’s a knife!’
‘really. since when?’
‘since always.’
‘well, you are the first of dozens of security experts in a half dozen years of thousands of miles of flying to say so.’
‘sir, you can go back to the ticket counter and check it with your checked baggage or you can surrender it.’
i hold both my hands up.
‘you got me. i surrender.’
