True story: One night, some guy was being questioned for some very questionably placed sharp silverware, and it turned out he had driver's licenses from 3 different states. Why, I don't know, and it didn't turn out to be any great ordeal, however he was not allowed on the plane. Point is, suspicious ID's can get you into trouble. Security has the full authority to look through your wallet and anything else in your cargo pants or your bags.

So if you're a freshman in college and you pack a fake to get your hallmates Beast Light on Thursday nights, don't bring it with you into the security checkpoint. It's a felony, and getting it jacked by airport security is a very easy way to get in trouble for it.

Can I be honest? I'm talking about the same guy from number 7. This guy was drunk the night after Christmas, and hid a bunch of steak knives in a cell phone box (in his luggage). Now I tell everyone who's scared of flying or nervous or what-not to get crunked up before a flight, but being blatantly intoxicated going through security can sometimes give you problems, especially if it causes you to cause them problems.

I won't lie to you; these days I have to drink a grande Starbucks' cup of straight Kahlua before the plane starts taxiing in order not to start mewing like a cat, in horror. But I play it cool; actually, I usually don't start throwin' back until I find my seat. What I'm trying to say though, is that if you have anything suspicious in your bags, and they notice you are drunk at the checkpoint, it's only another strike against you.

Please double-check what you pack before you get to the airport, because not even nail clippers and nail files are allowed in your hand baggage. You can't even bring plastic knives, so if you're bringing your aunt a set of Cutco blades, tuck those in your suitcase. I once saw an old lady get her pair of antique scissors confiscated, so be mindful of what you pack. You won't get arrested for making a mistake, but you may lose something of value.

Post scriptum - I actually heard about some guy, and I can't remember if he was going on a hunting trip, or if it was some government agent, I heard two like stories and I think I got them twisted, but he brought a loaded gun through the checkpoint, apparently without realizing it. Either way he had it for legitimate business, and had honestly completely forgotten that it was on his person and the safety was off. True story. Although I think he wasn't seriously reprimanded for it in court, he was arrested on the spot and hauled off to jail, crying. That earned him the "dumb ass" award, for that week anyway.

This also happens to be a federal offense. Getting all "Busta Rhymes" with the guys in the blue blazers can get you locked up, and so can simply cursing at the security checkpoint. Obviously the latter is not very strictly enforced. I think it's one of those secondary offenses that they can tack on a laundry list if they don't like you, like when cops bust you for speeding, and you give them shit so they write you up for having no seat belt and a crooked side view mirror.

Getting rowdy with the staff will not get you on the plane any faster. You might as well grin and bear it, because the only way you will catch your flight once they're convinced the dogshit on your shoes is C-4, is by staying quiet and answering their questions without copping an attitude. Screwing with the screeners is only going to increase the already glycerine-high level of them going Robert DeNiro on you. As it were, I don't mean as in "Goodfellas" or "Heat," but rather as in "Meet the Parents." ("I will bring you down. I will bring you down to Chinatown.")

I have some personal experience with this. First I want to say, when you have something like a coffee machine or a DVD player in a box, and they ask you if they can search it, don't tell them what it is. They're not stupid, and they're going to find out for themselves. It's their job and they're following protocol. There is no possibility that they will ask you to search a box or package, and then decide not to after you assure them it's only a PlayStation 2. I guess if you have to be corny to make yourself feel more comfortable about flying, go right ahead, but don't expect to make anyone's day who works there. It's not the most glamorous job, so asking a security screener if it's alright for you to lie on the x-ray conveyer is not in your best interest.

Making silly remarks will only heighten the chances of the screener taking three times as long to go through your things. It may make you look more suspicious, or it may just give the screener a chance to take out his hidden rage by proofreading every page of your Ayn Rand novel, searching for traces of explosive material, thereby making you miss your plane. Once I had this woman who forgot to put her Swiss army knife in her checked baggage. As I was going through her things and pointed out to her she couldn't bring it aboard, she giggled and said, "Oh well, I am from Switzerland so I guess I'll just get another one when I get back, ha ha." This only caused me to stare at her blankly, blinking at regular intervals, for about 4 minutes, before proceeding to check the contents of even her tube of toothpaste to punish her for the unforgivably dumb-ass comment she just made.

An interesting point indeed, for many reasons. First off, airport security cannot really give anyone the benefit of the doubt anymore, and are strictly commissioned not to, so their immediate reaction to someone wearing sunglasses trying to do the cabbage patch through the metal detector in order not to set it off is, "what are they trying to hide?" An evident yet useless rebuttal by passengers and the like is that they aren't carrying anything and it's a big hassle; they just want to get to their plane on time. This causes people to try to shimmy on through faster or slower, thinking this makes them okay to board the plane. Uh, no. Now screeners can choose passengers at random to scrutinize further with the hand-held metal detectors. Also, there are additional screeners at the boarding gates and chances are even if you get through the main checkpoint without being "wanded," you can still get caught before you board the plane. The bottom line is that airport security cannot and will not assume anything or take any observation or situation for granted, so ideally they try to screen everyone as thoroughly as possible, with no exceptions. There are no V.I.P.'s when it comes to airport security.

I used to work a fair amount of shifts at the employee checkpoint, which was the place to find the most frustrated people, believe it or not -- they all thought they were above being screened. Screeners themselves who had to enter and leave the checkpoint several times a day (or even several times within an hour) had to be screened every time, and found it quite annoying. Most would think that "if I didn't go off last time, what makes you think I will now?" Again that was not for the screeners to assume or debate, seeing as there was nothing stopping aforementioned employee from getting some kind of weapon or contraband since leaving the checkpoint.

So sometimes employees would try to do the "security shuffle", and some even had the audacity to comment on it to the screeners; some would even cheer. Now I can only hope that I've made it evident why this would peeve a screener such as myself. So as soon as the directive was issued that all screeners had full authority to randomly select anyone to get "wanded," you better believe every smart ass who did the Hammer dance through the metal detector, or gave themselves a little "woo-hoo!" as they passed through got a personal invitation to my ten minute surface search.

I'm really not sure why people do this, or find this so funny. I've seen so many people take pictures, incidentally at airports, dressed like al-Qaeda terrorists. They have scarves or sheets and tie them around their faces to mimic certain Persian customs. I find this awfully disturbing.

I was actually in Europe in September, and I was flying home only 2 weeks after the attacks. I have always hated flying, and this was the megaton icing on the cake (for me, at least), after singer Aaliyah's plane crashed the previous summer and the same summer my plane from London almost crash-landed due to a landing gear failure. Needless to say, this flight home was not a pleasant experience for me.

Yet these Dutch kids, who were outrageously gay (as in "Just Jack" meets the "MC for the drag queen parade at Mardi Gras" gay) and dressed as if they were scheduled at the club in ten minutes; not only were they dancing to the awful, awful music playing through the overhead speakers, but one had this silk scarf and decided it was hilarious to wrap it around his face and pretend to be an Islamic Fundamentalist. They were taking pictures of themselves and laughing like little girls at their first slumber party. Many an American was burning a hole through their heads with his/her eyes. Personally, I probably would have gotten up and bitch-slapped the little Susies if I wasn't too concerned with thoughts of plane crashes. I also realized that starting a fight (rather, handing out an ass-whipping) at an airport would get me treated like a terrorist, and delay this flight I desperately wanted to get over with.