the time my husband tried to convince the airlines I was a threat…

In honor of my brother and sister’s traveling woes (a missed flight, a cancelled flight, and visits to six different cities on their quests to get to their homes), I’m going to share my most recent airport experience with you. Because it was a doosey.

Date: Saturday, January 3, 2009.
Time: Saga begins at 4:00 a.m.
Location: Bristow, VA and Ronald Reagan National Aiport, DC

The alarm went off at 4:00 a.m. This was my first inclination that the day might not be a great one. We packed our things and headed out to the Suburban. Mom and Dad drove us to the airport.

We arrive at the airport around 5:15. And it's already busy. Lovely.

We make our way through the AirTran line. We get up to the agent. I try to hand him our drivers licenses, and he won’t take them. “You have to use the screen in front of you,” he says. I respond, “But I don’t know my A+ number and I don’t have the credit card I used to make the reservations.” “It doesn’t matter. Do you have any credit card? Use that,” says the rigid agent. So, I dig through my purse to try and find my debit card. Mind you, he could have pulled up our tickets quite easily in the amount of time this whole ordeal took. We find the card and pull up our tickets.

Next it’s time to check luggage. Ryan goes first. He thinks his bag might be a few pounds over the 50 pound limit. It’s four pounds over. So we put my bag up. It’s one pound underweight. We transfer a sweatshirt from Ryan’s bag to my bag, and then put his two pairs of shoes in my small carry-on bag. Meanwhile, the agent, who I’ve grown to dislike, says, “Ma’am, you’re bag is oversized.” “Huh?” I say. “Well, 62 inches is regular size. Your bag is 63 inches,” he says, with (I kid you not) tape measure in hand. I say, “You’ve got to be kidding me.” “That will be $39.” I mutter some not-so-nice words under my breath and ask for a comment card. After paying $39. It really was ridiculous. Don’t fly AirTran.

So, once we’re checked in and our bags are gone, we head to security. Which was another mess. We finally get everything up on the belt and walk through the metal detectors. I clear with no problem. Then a TSA agent says, “Ma’am, is this your bag?” It was my bag, and he informs me they need to check it. I couldn’t think of anything that I would have packed that could be a weapon and am confused, but we move over to the screening area. He opens the bag and digs around a little bit. He then pulls out one of Ryan’s boots. (You know, the ones we had to put in my carry-on because his bag was four pounds overweight?) And out of Ryan’s boot he pulls a big old knife that my dad gave Ryan as a Christmas present.

Crap.

So, long story short, they didn’t arrest me and we FedEx’ed the knife to ourselves. (We still haven’t received it, now that I think about it.) We arrived to our home in Mpls a mere nine hours later, and I think I’ve nearly recovered from the emotional trauma. Nearly.

I still ask Ryan why he tried to frame me, though.