October 8, 2004

Random Airport Thoughts

DULLES, Va. – Random airport thoughts of the past couple of weeks.

• It’s pointless to dress before going through airport security. One should simply go through security before one’s tied his shoes, buckled his belt and filled his pockets.
• People lose at least 10 IQ points when boarding an airplane. Short-term memory fails miserably when some read their boarding card and then forced to look up at the seat numbers along the base of the overhead bins. Never fails.
• Random carry-on inspections aren’t going to find anything threatening to the airplane. It might, however, save some children from the cardboard cookies made by the rare grandmother who couldn’t cook if her life depended on it.
• There should be a full time law enforcement officer for every two or three lanes of security checkpoints trained in how to spot suspicious, potentially threatening people regardless of profiling fears.
• People are oblivious to the things and people around them when in crowded spaces.
• Airports should all have free, wireless internet access points all over its terminals.
• I reserve the right to add to this list at a later time.

- Rich