Friday, February 16th 2007

Now seated on a Delta flight bound for Tampa I can honestly say this is the highest I have ever been while making a blog entry. In Tampa I will be performing at a club called “G Lounge” but the real excitement for me will be seeing my cousin Joe for the first time in about 12 years. Our family had a ridiculous argument that resulted in a division on my mom’s side that left some of the cousins at a loose end. The kid has grown up and is one of the most well adjusted 25-year-olds that I have ever seen. He reminds me of myself at that age! Well, give or take a few minor details…

It amazes me that after all the hype about “Homeland Security” and all the airport dramas with restrictions on shampoo and mouthwash that people still carry on as if they’ve never flown before; much less switched on the news this century. I mean how do people expect to walk up to a METAL DETECTOR with about a pound of metal distributed on them from head to toe in the name of fashion? I heard the attendant exclaim twice in a very slow, condescending tone “You are walking through a metal detector that detects metal, please remove all metal objects.”

When it came to my turn I had my lap top removed and placed in its own basket – just like the numerous signs indicated it should be. I had removed my shoes, even though they were flip flops (what else?). There was no metal on me anywhere and all I had in my hands was my boarding pass. The woman in front of me had missed the signs and apparently the last two years. She shuffled up to the detector clad in armor; a belt that wrapped around her waist four times, and several bracelets on each of her wrists. She had not removed her shoes or the shoes of her offspring that was drooling onto the floor. I knew exactly what was going to happen as if I were watching a TV show that I had seen a thousand times again.

She was asked to remove her gladiator issued belt, her shoes, accessories and the slobbering child from her person and put them all through the X ray. He asked her to put he child through just for fun and in the hopes to disarm the disgruntled people that were standing behind her barefoot waiting for her to comply with TSA regulations. She was not amused although I sure as hell was. She, of course, did not have her boarding pass with her as she went through the detector and had to flag down her equally unaware husband who had her pass in his back pocket. It would be so great if people could get it together just enough to stop impeding my every move.

On my way to the terminal I came across a man with those wireless Bluetooth headphones that double as a phone. He was talking to somebody jokingly in the middle of the walkway, pacing back and forth, laughing and smiling. He was dressed rather outlandishly with sunglasses on and he looked like he was a shizophrenic comedian. I sat down behind him on a bench and had my morning coffee watching all the people walking past him with confused and sometimes alarmed looks on their faces. I don’t know why they looked that confused or concerned, this was after all LA.

Hopefully this gig in Florida will be fun. At least I know I’ll have a great time catching up with my cousin. I’m a bit fed up with traveling for now and look forward to getting back home again. This time for more than a few days.

This entry was posted by Johnny on Friday, February 16th, 2007 at 10:02 PM and is filed under It's All Relative, Pet Peeves, Planes, Trains & Automobiles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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