2002-02-06 - 1:30 p.m.

On the internal soundtrack: "Put Your Head on My Shoulder"

So, here we are out west, on the first part of our vacation. We're staying with Poindexter's friend from college and his wife, who are tremendously nice people that I like immensely and I'm ecstatic to be here. And to think I was so nervous about meeting them. I should have known better. If somebody is a close friend of Poindexter's for a long time, it figures I'm going to like both him and his wife.

They were in college together, so I've been hearing a lot of fun stories about that. It's fun to hear the other side of the stories Poindexter's been telling me over the last six years or so.

On the flight out here, at National Airport, they confiscated my tweezers.

We were in line at the check-in counter, and there was a big sign that said "This is okay" and "This is not okay". Scissors were not okay, tweezers were okay. I had all my most essential items in my carryon, and my tweezers were in with my makeup kit (I spent $250 on that Bobbi Brown makeup crap; I'm not letting the airlines have any of it).

At security, there was another sign that said tweezers were okay. But they pulled my bag out for inspection, and the guy went right for the makeup bag and started digging around in it.

He pulled out the tweezers, and started inspecting them very closely. Looking at them, and tapping the end of them. Poindexter said, "The sign out there says tweezers are okay." The guard said, "Yeah, but these are kind of pointy."

They are -- the tweezers come to a point, which makes it easier for me to single out individual hairs. I think there might be a rough spot at the very end that pokes your finger a bit when you feel it. But to call them "sharp" in comparison to ordinary tweezers is just ASININE. The top of it is rounded off, and it's not as sharp as the flat edge of a normal pair of tweezers.

The guy had to call over his supervisor, who looked at them, felt the tip, and said, "No." They were going to keep them. So -- and I don't know what possessed me to do this, except that I was astounded at the stupidity of the whole thing -- I held out my hand and said, "Fi'dollas". The supervisor was NOT amused. Bitch.

I was SO MAD. Not because of losing my tweezers, although I was sort of sorry about that, since I bought them in Florida and will probably have to hunt around for another pair like them. I was made because they were so STUPID. There was no LOGIC in their decision.

If I'd known they were going to be so ridiculous about it, I would have put them in our other bag. But there were signs everywhere saying that tweezers were okay, and here they're taking my favorite tweezers because the ends are too POINTY. What about my goddamn PEN!?!?! I could gouge somebody's eye out with that!

So the rest of the time we were at the airport, I was grumbling about it. Poindexter started pestering me about something, and I said, "If I still had my tweezers, I'd stick them up your nose."

I was emptying a takeout bag (chicken fingers!!) onto my lap, and a plastic knife fell out. "Oh look, a knife!" I said. "Too bad I can't tweeze with that."

Stupid fuckers.

At National Aiport, supposedly there is an air marshal on every flight. So I amused myself by playing "Spot the air marshal".

There were a bunch of people that I ruled out because they looked very weenie-ish, or they were obviously out of shape. Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems that you'd want an air marshal type to be rather fit.

I had my eye on one guy in his late 40s/early 50s wearing slobby shorts and a Packers jacket, but who looked extremely clean-cut (good haircut), fit, very alert, and was sitting in his chair looking at every other passenger in the area.

When we were boarding, he was sitting right up next to the flight attendant checking boarding passes, and looking at everybody who was getting on. I don't mean glancing, I mean looking at them, up and down, as if trying to memorize them. If he wasn't an air marshal, he was certainly an overly vigilant flyer.

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