No Travel Excitement is a Good Thing

[kevin_standlee]

I was at the train station with ten minutes to spare, as is my usual practice. I noticed that the Fremont station's older Amtrak signs (the ones with the pointless arrow logo like my icon on this post) have been replaced with newer-style blue-and-white ones. I wonder how long ago that happened. I usually notice these things.

The travel up to Oakland Airport was utterly routine, which is just the way I like it. Having plenty of time, I didn't have to rush. Walking from the airport shuttle bus stop to the terminal, I saw a luggage scale not in active use and weighed my one allowed piece of checked luggage. As I feared, I was slightly over weight because I'm carrying some heavier than usual things this trip, particularly video tapes bought at BASFA auctions to give to Lisa. Fortunately I was only three pounds over, so taking out my jacket and one hardcover book brought me down to 49.3 pounds.

The folks at Terrorization remarked, as they have before, about my having two identical laptop computers. Redundancy, don't you know? They wanted to look through my computer bag, which surprises me not one bit, given all of the miscellaneous electronic bits including my ham radio handset. The TSA guy asked, before opening it, "Do you have a banana in there?"

I said, very straight-faced, "Yes, I do. I know humor is prohibited here, so I won't make any jokes." He laughed at that, and was pretty easy going about everything. I went off to one side to put my shoes and belt back on while he ran tests to make sure my backpack wasn't explosive. I still find the Security Theatre regime intrusive, but friendly, polite people make it less irritating.

Terminal 1's remodeling continues apace. The not-very-good smoothie stand has been replaced by a Starbucks, where I bought a coffee and walked down to my gate. I even found a seat next to a working power outlet, so I wouldn't need to run my batteries down to get back online.

The free wi-fi connected eventually, but required that you watch a "30-second" ad that took about three minutes due to how long it took to download the video before it would allow any other connections. Oh, well, I understand needing to pay the bills.

I'm glad I was able to get online again, though, because there are work-related e-mails that I needed to answer this afternoon. Nothing critical, but things that are better answered today than Monday.

Comments

[rono-60103.livejournal.com]

The TSA guy asked, before opening it, "Do you have a banana in there?"

I said, very straight-faced, "Yes, I do. I know humor is prohibited here, so I won't make any jokes."

In September when we flew back to Illinois briefly, I was flying on my California drivers license for the first time. My license photo has me without glasses (they were reflecting badly) and makes my nose look very red. As I handed the license to the agent, I took off my glasses, and made some comment about not being able to make my nose red enough. She smiled and seemed to appericate it.

[johno.livejournal.com]

The commercial is in flash, so it wouldn't run on my iphone.

I got the little forlorn "flash content goes here' block and the continue to the internet button.

[edgreen86.livejournal.com]

A tad over 30 years ago, while stationed in the Phillipines, I had two calls involving morons making jokes about explosives as they were either on an aircraft, or preparing to board one.

Both ended up with the mooks getting arrested.

It wasn't funny years ago, less funny now.

Although I can't disagree about the level of searches going on.

[kevin-standlee.livejournal.com]

Honestly, I understand why jokes about guns, explosives, etc. aren't very funny at the security checkpoint, so I generally try to be all business. Because the TSA guy seemed to be pretty cheerful, I did make eventually explain what I would have said "if humor was permitted" was "No, I'm just happy to be here." He did dutifully laugh at what I know isn't a particularly funny joke.

If the airline allowed more than one free piece of checked luggage (at least Alaska still allows one), I would have put most of the bits of electronics except for the computer in a second checked bag, because I need almost none of it except the Bose headphones while I'm in the airport or airplane.

[marahsk.livejournal.com]

Like everywhere else, TSA employees are all different. Some are even ok with jokes. One guy had a bunch of questions about my cpap, not because it might be dangerous, but because he may need one (I tried to convince him to get tested).

I was annoyed by the one who dumped out most of the contents of my knapsack, then complained that was taking too long to repack. Harumph; in my world, you can either create the problem OR complain about the solution. I keep hearing announcements about the various items left at security; I am going to take an extra couple of minutes to make sure I have everything, and if you don't like it, don't dump out all my possessions.
/grump