I have heard it said time and time again that “getting there is half the fun.”  All I have to say is that whoever coined that tired, old pithy bit-o-wisdom probably did not do a whole heck of a lot of traveling by plane!  While I am not so sure that I would call it fun, I would definitely label it as interesting.  However, the opportunity to spend time with like-minded folks, sharing stories and meeting new friends certainly out weighed any sort of negative.  But what fun would it be to skip over the “fun” part? 

Well let me put it to you this way; getting up pretty early to drive to the airport sucked.  Driving for three hours in Sunday traffic sucked.  Trying to find a parking space at the airport sucked.  Walking half the length of the airport only to find out that if I just went 50 feet the other way, I could have rode a bus, sucked.  Waiting in line for more than 30 minutes while holding up two very heavy bags sucked.  And getting through airport security really sucked!

Having taken a few flights since 9/11, I know the drill.  Before I even left the house I made sure that I had a minimum of things in my pockets, wore shoes that are easy to take off and put back on, as well as hiding all sorts of things I normally have in my pockets, such as change, keys, gum, etc.  Well as I was going through the line, they pulled my bag back through the x-ray/chemical sniffer thingy.  After the second trip through, this nice TSA lady that looked like she just gave up drinking and smoking that morning, told me that she had to inspect my bag.

Anyway, long story short, she pulled just about all of my stuff out of the bag, then puts it all back except for my toothpaste, my deodorant, a little thingy of mouthwash and my baby powder.  She then asks me what the powder is for, I tell her to keep me dry and fresh.  She scowls at me so I pointed to my private region - her facial expression did not change, but at least she put my powder back in my bag in a hurry.  She then looks at both my mouthwash and deodorant - both very small containers - and she places them back in my bag as well.  Surprisingly enough, she didn’t ask me where I put any of that stuff; I guess she had a better idea of what you use deodorant and mouthwash for.  But then she tells me that she is going to confiscate my toothpaste.

By now I am thinking to myself, you have got to be kidding me and I said to her that I really needed my toothpaste - I am heading to Atlanta to speak to a group of professionals and the last thing I want to do is to have dragon-breath while I am doing it - it’s not like I’m gonna try to hijack the plane with it.  Well she didn’t like that too much, so she called this other guy over who looked meaner than she did.  He gave me the same line of crap about my toothpaste and I said you gotta be kidding me, my deodorant could be used as a makeshift flame-thrower, I’ll trade you.  Well he didn’t have much of a sense of humor either and I ended up spending a lot of time in this small white room answering a lot of questions - I thought I was going to miss my flight!

Once I finally got out of there I had to walk clear to the opposite side of the terminal to get my plane - which sucked.  I got on the wrong plane - which would have sucked even more if it took off with me in it.  I had to use a step ladder to get on the right plane, which you guessed it, sucked carrying heavy bags.  Then I was crammed into this seat that even most teens would have been uncomfortable in for the next two hours, which of course sucked too.  Come to think of it, it took longer to get to the airport and get to the plane than it did for the actual flight…  That sucks!

But the bright side of it is that I was heading to Atlanta for the 6th Annual Computer DJ Summit and I was so looking forward to getting back there again!  So read on, the saga continues in Episode 2.

Tags: aiport security, computer dj summit, humor

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 5th, 2008 at 21:26 and is filed under Computer DJing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.