OT: Kind of, regarding airline food 189

Blair P. Houghton

My imagination was going more in this direction.

The last time I flew, the lines at security were long, and people were impatient, but everyone knew the score and was cooperating as best they could. I watched with my usual detachment as each person went to the appropriate line, stooped to remove shoes, took off belts, emptied pockets, raised arms to be wanded, stepped into a blower/sniffer machine, etc., then put shoes and belts back on, combed hair and rearranged clothes. This was all done with a minimum of fuss and noise and all with a quiet, matter-of-fact, mind-your-own business, air though it was in public.

I don't consider myself prudish, but I have ordinary modesty for a middle aged woman. I don't normally undress in public (the beach is different), and I look away when someone else does. I try to have my hair and clothing arranged before I go out, and if I need an adjustment, I try, within reason, to duck into the ladies room to do it, and yet there I was, in a great crowd of people, tucking in my shirt, putting my things away, and basically getting dressed in front of a great crowd of people-- who were all doing the same thing.

The new regulations about no liquids or personal items on board made me imagine the same scene, the same idea of private activity done in public, only now people would be stripping down to their privies, lifting their shirts, lowering their trousers, loosening their bras, opening their zippers, removing their girdles, walking through security, being felt up, and then dressing again, all with the same pre-occupied, shoulder shrugging, lack of concern as before.

Jim suggested that the whole thing was a plot on the part of the cosmetics industry to make people buy more sunscreen, lipstick and hand lotion, as they wouldn't put it in their checked luggage for fear of spillage, would just buy more at their destination, and then leave it in the hotel when they got there.

--Lia