Do I look like a terrorist to you?

No really, do I?  I spent over 50 minutes having my carry-on bags searched (and re-searched) by TSA agents at LAX.  Now sadly, since I am such a terrible procrastinator, it's my own darn fault.   Here's the scoop:

Because of the variety of places I am going and the length of time I will be gone, I needed to bring hot weather clothes, cold weather gear, water filters and a boatload of electronic items, of which none of them have the compatible cables or plugs.  I got to the counter at Jetblue and found my checked bag to be 2 lbs too heavy so they could not book it straight through to South Africa.  No brainer!   I opened my bag and pulled out my pump style water filter and a big Ziploc bag that held all the electronics cables, power converter - all the things I need for the electronics to work and to be recharged.   I put these items in my carry-on and  Jetblue checked my bag all the way through to Johannesburg. Off to TSA I went.

I had  the backpack I normally carry to work and a small pouch style bag that held the odds and ends that you want to keep at your seat and not have to get into the overhead bins for every little thing.   The TSA agent asked to check both of these bags.  No problem because of course I know I'm not a terrorist.

We head over to a table and he starts in on all the exterior pockets, he pulls each item out and I explain what each item is or does.  And you know what a chatterbox I am,  I tell him my story, I'm off on an excellent round the world adventure and all the things I plan on doing or seeing...  He empties the pockets and says he didn't find what he thought he was looking for - possibly a pocket knife but not a Swiss army knife b/c it didn't have a corkscrew.

Now I know that my Swiss army knife is in the checked luggage but okay.  We take  the backpack still half full, the stuff pulled out and spread out in another bin and the little pouch is a third bin.  Now I can't touch any of my stuff or carry any of the bins because they suspect I'm a terrorist.  So now, me, the guy searching my bag and two other TSA guys carrying my stuff are going back to the X-ray machine.  They still see something suspicious so  we go back to our table and pull the rest of the stuff out of the backpack and repeat but now we call for a senior  TSA guy with better eyes and so now 5 of us repeat the above process.  We finish up with the back pack and the pouch and no, they never found what they were looking for but they were able to determined that I had nothing that was not allowable.  They finally let me go.

I stuffed everything back in the backpack and got to my gate with only 10 minutes to spare. I was one of the last handful of people to get on the plane.   But I made it, so no harm, no foul!   We jetted off to JFK where  I had a 5 hour layover before my flight to Johannesburg, South Africa.  Knowing what a problem it was at LAX,  I carefully repacked the items in my backpack and pouch so that it would be easier to search when I get pulled out of the line again at JFK international terminal.  I headed over to the International terminal early, just in case.

While I was repacking I think I figured out what the problem was.  Remember that beautiful pen and pencil set you gave me at my going away party?   They were still in the backpack clipped in an interior pocket  but completely visible when you knew what  you were looking for!   So I'd like to thank you all again not just for the pen and pencil set but for helping me be profiled as a terrorist with TSA.   Thank you very much...

With much trepidation I walked up to TSA at JFK and I went through without a second look.

Shari