so i drive to work every day at about the same time; who doesn't? imagine my astonishment this workweek that EVERY DAY i have been trapped in the tunnel behind Zippy the Wonder Slug, chugging away at under 50 mph in a 55 zone. and every day, Zippy is driving a different car. he was even heading northbound yesterday after work. what privilege, to crawl through the tunnel for no other reason than someone lost their cahones! this morning, we were flying at a spectacular 35. so i broke the law. i crossed the double solid line in the tunnel and passed that bastidge like a pork barrel extension on capitol hill.
once upon a time, there was a mommy and a daddy and a baby. mommy and daddy loaded up a stroller and several bags with everything they would need on a five-day wilderness hike and headed to the airport. at least that is what it looked like. mommy pushed the baby in the stroller through the metal detector. kate watched while the metal detector screeched. "um, ma'am? you'll need to take the baby out of the carseat and put the carseat face down on the x-ray belt, fold the stroller and send it through as well, and carry the baby through the metal detector."
'you're kidding.' mommy turned to daddy. 'well. i don't know how they expect us to do all that.'
kate thought to herself: did you not take all of that out of your car this morning? hm. there's two of you. i'm sure you can figure it out. you're not the first mommy to come through. you're not the first mommy of a newborn to come through. you're not the first mommy of a newborn with someone along to help out. you're not the first mommy of newborn twins to come through by herself; you whine far more than she. grow the eff up. pack less. enable yourself.
a man emptied his pockets into a bin, tossed his laptop into another. next he threw his coat and belt into a third. he appeared to be in a tearing hurry. i looked him over and asked the x-ray operator to take a good look at all the shoes coming through. and to test them. the man kicked his shoes off and bent to pick them up... paused... smacked his own forehead and looked at me. "i did not do that," i giggled.
he was wearing one red and grey tennis shoe and a brown business shoe.
looks like someone will be making a stop when they land.
people who travel often want a 'checkpoint-friendly' laptop bag. these bags are ones which have a SPECIAL separate laptop compartment. SPECIAL means that in that part of the bag, ONLY the laptop goes there. you may be able to put cords and files and magazines and your ipad there also, but then, you have defeated the friendliness. this SPECIAL compartment can be laid flat on the x-ray machine, usually via a pair of zippers that enables the bag to butterfly open. imagine a butterfly with a laptop sitting on one wing and the rest of the bag sitting on the other and the body of the butterfly is the only part of the bag that connects the two together. you have imagined a checkpoint-friendly bag.
there are pictures out front in the queue area. pictures of bags that ARE checkpoint friendly are drawn in green. pictures of bags that are NOT checkpoint friendly are drawn in red. (association of red = bad and green = good have been instilled in us through our public schools since the beginning of time. or, at least since the beginning of public schools.) regular backpacks, briefcases, satchels, purses, grocery sacks, diaper bags, and MANY office-in-a-bag bags are not checkpoint friendly. let's put it bluntly: if you open the zipper all the way and can't see the entire laptop lid..... you are not in possession of a checkpoint friendly bag. with my flagging language skills, i was simply unable to communicate this today. at. all. especially to the guy who insisted that his briefcase was checkpoint friendly because "the laptop IS in it's own compartment. look for yourself." i just might. and indeed, there was nothing in between the pieces of cloth but the laptop. but.... on the other side of the little cloth divider.... was the rest of the office. thank you. have a seat.
No comments:
Post a Comment