Getting through security
Feb. 23rd, 2009 10:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
indigo_rose99Do TSA agents travel? Do they ever pack their own luggage? I think: No.
The lady at the scanner decided my bin of jacket/liquids/shoes and my carry-on was suspicious. I turned on my cooperative-person attitude and was friendly to the woman who pulled me and mine aside. She pulled my liquids out of the bin, did not even glance at them, and told me I could take the rest of the bin.
Then she took my carry-on and started emptying it.
Ok, first a few facts:
(1) I have been traveling regularly for years.
(2) For anything less than 1.5 weeks of travel, I do not check luggage.
(3) This is 6 day domestic trip.
(4) I pack REALLY tightly. Just exactly what I need and want. Big solid things first, then smaller solid things, with squishy items in the between spaces. Then, if there is extra space, I fill it with the would-like-to-haves. When I am done, there IS no space in my luggage for anything extra.
As the TSA agent pulled out shoes, food bars, a thick packet of printed instructor notes, my first pack-it cube and started digging for the second pack-it cube, I suggested she just lay everything out and I would repack it. As she pulled the second pack-it cube out of its position (to look under it?), she said, "Oh no, I'm not taking this one out. You can just put this stuff back."
Ah... No. No, I cannot. When you pull the three single biggest items in a packed piece of luggage out of their careful positions, no. You cannot just somehow magically fit all three of them back in again, must less everything else! She left the bottom pack-it cube in a diagonal across the bag!
I can only think that she is one of those people who packs and arrives at her destination to find her suitcase contents has 6 inches of empty space at the top.
*mutter, mutter, grouse*
The lady at the scanner decided my bin of jacket/liquids/shoes and my carry-on was suspicious. I turned on my cooperative-person attitude and was friendly to the woman who pulled me and mine aside. She pulled my liquids out of the bin, did not even glance at them, and told me I could take the rest of the bin.
Then she took my carry-on and started emptying it.
Ok, first a few facts:
(1) I have been traveling regularly for years.
(2) For anything less than 1.5 weeks of travel, I do not check luggage.
(3) This is 6 day domestic trip.
(4) I pack REALLY tightly. Just exactly what I need and want. Big solid things first, then smaller solid things, with squishy items in the between spaces. Then, if there is extra space, I fill it with the would-like-to-haves. When I am done, there IS no space in my luggage for anything extra.
As the TSA agent pulled out shoes, food bars, a thick packet of printed instructor notes, my first pack-it cube and started digging for the second pack-it cube, I suggested she just lay everything out and I would repack it. As she pulled the second pack-it cube out of its position (to look under it?), she said, "Oh no, I'm not taking this one out. You can just put this stuff back."
Ah... No. No, I cannot. When you pull the three single biggest items in a packed piece of luggage out of their careful positions, no. You cannot just somehow magically fit all three of them back in again, must less everything else! She left the bottom pack-it cube in a diagonal across the bag!
I can only think that she is one of those people who packs and arrives at her destination to find her suitcase contents has 6 inches of empty space at the top.
*mutter, mutter, grouse*
