I Just Remembered Why I Hate Air Travel - rant

Fueled by Caffeine wrote:

dyintorace wrote:

wae wrote: After about 7 minutes, I went through security and got to my gate -- took plenty of time, I walked up to the gate with about 18 minutes to spare before the flight's departure time.

I travel almost weekly for work. Gun or no gun, it sounds like you cut it way too close. 18 minutes is really only 8 minutes, given that they generally close the door 10 minutes early.

Op seems like a bit of a travel newb. I've been out for three weeks at a time and never checked a bag.

i was wondering when ignorant would be back...

Xceler8x wrote: Without TSA harassment in this case the OP would've made his flight, gun or no gun. Let's remember where the problem is here. Remember when you could get on a plane and fly without being felt up? Remember when you could walk to the gate and meet or see off your family members or loved ones? Remember when you could take your kid to the terminal and watch planes land and take off? Remember when you could fly without being treated like a criminal? It wasn't terrorists that took those positive experiences away from you. It's the TSA. Remember where the problem lies.

The TSA is just the smoke and mirrors in this equation. The root cause is even more scary!

You need to stop, focus, and follow the money trail. The money trail always leads to the truth.

WHO benefits from this whole thing? Besides Al Qaeda?

WHO needs the public to be distracted by fear while they make off with a stash of cash?

Let me give you a hint, the country is in debt to the tune of 17 trillion bucks and they are collecting money right now for not being able to do their job. If I were these characters, I sure as E36 M3 would be trying to distract the boss so he kept paying me. Feeding him a straight diet of perceived threats might work especially if I could get him to provide MORE money so that I can skim some gravy from the trough.

Lets give credit where it is due; if someone can get you to give them money, so that they can use it to extort MORE money from you, and keep repeating this in an ever growing cycle, I have doff my hat to them. It IS an elegant scam.

It is also what happens when you populate Washington with predator personalities.

Boy this thread de-railed quickly.

My only comment is for Lesley. Sometimes the priority line isn't as fast. I've had that race with folks.....everything is a race isn't it. I've been able to get through the commoners line quicker many times. It's hit or miss. Sometimes you might have to walk a little further, but you can get through quicker by hitting a security checkpoint that is at either end of the airport if they are set up that way. The middle ones are always the busiest. Drives me nuts when people aren't ready to go through security either. People should have the procedure down by now and know how to have their stuff together and packed for a faster screening. They need a 10 items or less line like the supermarket.

Yes! A line just for those who don't get to the bins and go "gee whiz, what are these for honey? Should I take all of the E36 M3 out of my purse? What, oh, I have to take off my shoes? Now, where DID I put that baggie for all my gels..." By the time I hit the line, my belt is off, my laptop's in my hand and I'm ready to go. It's work for me.

My actual take-away from the whole experience was actually completely different from where we have wound up, actually :)

As I was driving up to Indy to get my new flight I was thinking about this, and in my job I have to give advice and reccomendations to customers and my employees all the time. We certainly all make mistakes, but sometimes those mistakes cause problems that can't really be undone. The TSA guy should have known his job better and if he didn't know, he should have asked his supervisior not his buddy. But it was just an honest mistake -- I talked to him for about 5 minutes as he was apologizing and he was genuinely contrite. His genuine concern and apology, however, didn't mean that I was going to be able to attend the first day of the conference - I was well and truly hosed with absolutely no recourse. Yelling at the guy wouldn't have done anything for me and it wasnt like the phone company made a mistake and charged me too much for my cell phone and could make it better by just issuing a credit. So I took it as a reminder that even when I make an honest mistake in my job, it can have lasting consequences on my customer, coworker, or employee that I just cannot make right no matter what I do. My silver lining was that I got a reminder of a very important lesson and nothing really serious happened.

That's not to say that I don't hate airtravel, though. My United flight in Indy got all boogered up due to a maintenance issue so they had to shunt me over to a couple airborne sardine cans operated by Delta and I didn't get in until really late. I totally second that airtravel sucks but flying is fun :-)