Got Liquids and Gels?
Get a 1-Qt Ziploc bag. And just to be sure, make it a "Ziploc," with a capital "Z," not the generic "ziploc." The airport security people don't like it when you get smart with them and ask if they work for Johnson Co. It doesn't matter if your overnight bag is see-through either (as mine is) and you have nothing significant in the "liquids and gels" category (as I didn't). It still has to be in a 1-Qt Ziploc bag. If you expect to carry your bag onto the plane (as I did), and you forgot your 1-Qt Ziploc bag, be prepared to open your overnight bag for all to see (in front of your co-workers should you be fortunate enough to be traveling with people whom you know well enough to talk tax law, but not well enough to share information on what you carry in your overnight bag...not that I had anything to hide...just sayin this has all the potential for being an embarrassing situation). Also, be prepared to receive the cold piercing stares of those standing behind you in the security lines. Just how the 1-Qt Ziploc bag improves airport security is beyond me.I just saw a news story about 20-something test (fake) "bombs" making it through security and how security folks needs to do a better job. Perhaps that would be possible if they weren't so busy marketing Ziploc bags and rummaging through our bags of toothpaste and mascara.
posted by Gwynne @ 9:23 PM
6 Comments:
Gotta go to the store anyway, your post reminds me to buy some 1 Qt Ziplocks and put them in my 'puter bag. The travels of an oilfield gal from a small town like Midland always reap new hair products, etc. That way, I'll be prepared. Thanks, Gwynne!
i could go on about this for hours, everytime something happens, they do the knee jerk reaction, and make all the innocent people suffer. it will die down, just like all the other times. if someone really wants to get a you know what on a plane, they will do it, ziplock bag check or not.
they talk about security doing a better job, how about if security just uses some common sense, and instead of wanding the 10 yr old boy, go check that guy with the trenchcoat on?
Erm.. what are you supposed to be doing with the 1-Qt Ziplock bag?
Glad I didn't I carry anything that required a zip lock bag :). After the snow globe thing...
"I just saw a news story about 20-something test (fake) "bombs" making it through security and how security folks needs to do a better job."
Let's be realistic, here. Half the TSA employees I've seen are barely capable of speaking in any language, much less English. They're so bored and have so little self esteem that it "does it for them" to screw people over. Maybe—oh, I don't know—sending the woman in a wheelchair through the special handling lane and forcing her husband to stay in the long, stationary line carrying both his bags and his wife's. And then when he points this out, moving him to the front of the line for treatment that falls just short of a high colonic.
<this is a lie>Not that I've ever experienced this sort of treatment firsthand.</this is a lie>
And then there was the time when Turtle and I were trying to get married, and one of our readers—a long-time friend of mine—didn't show up for the rehearsal and was late for the rehearsal dinner. It turned out that a packet of artificial sweetener had leaked in his briefcase, causing him to be detained ("It's Sweet 'n' Low. Look... I'll taste it!") for a sufficient time for him to miss his flight.
The matter of his rental car is a whole 'nother story.
Janie, I was hoping to be of service to somebody...I had to throw away my hair products...I forgot to mention the 8 ounce limitation. ;-)
Susie, well, you see, we wouldn't want to be accused of "profiling" or anything, so it's much better to search the least suspicious so as to keep up the appearance of being fair. <*/end sarcasm> ;-)
Mis Nomer, the 1-Qt Ziploc would be where the liquids and gels go(at least they are allowing them now so long as you don't exceed the 8 oz limit). Somehow, they have determined that this makes them safe? Easier to see? I'm not sure what real purpose is served by putting them in the baggie. Happy flights to Sydney!
Rach, there's always one who tries to get a snow globe through the system. ;-)
Foo, I hear you. There is not much common sense being exercised in the TSA department. Maybe next time, you'll get the full colonic. ;-) And offering to taste Sweet & Low straight? Well, I'm not sure I could do that. ;-)
I will say that it could be much worse. On the way back, I was entertained by the story of a co-worker (the same one who got to see what I carry in my overnight bag) who traveled to Russia back in 1986. He was carrying gifts for family members, along with his own travel gear, and had all of his property confiscated at the airport. They detained him and made him wait (missing his connections, of course) while they wrote down every item he carried, in triplicate, no carbon paper! And then they released him, but not his property.
So while we're not at the mercy of such violations of privacy and property rights, we are subjected to extreme cases of stupidity which is still brutally painful at times.
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