The Tired Green Bag

I’ve flown a lot: Mexico, Germany, Brazil, Portugal. Over the past few years, I’ve been through more security checkpoints than a drug-sniffing dog. Through it all, I’ve carried my green computer bag and never had a problem. At least, not until I traveled to Minnesota. 

We were taking the early flight from Minneapolis to Tucson – my wife, my grandson, my green bag and I. After passing through the x-ray, I was getting dressed when I noticed two burly Homeland Security guys hauling my green bag away for secondary screening. Within moments, there was a loud beeping noise and I heard them tell the supervisor “we’ve got a big hit!” Those Homeland Security guys were practically peeing themselves with excitement. A big hit!

 They began asking me all sorts of questions – where I’d been, why did I have so many electronics, what line of work was I in, where was I going? Boy, were they thorough. I received a very intimate pat-down, and they quickly had my bag stripped down to nothing. I was left with three grey bins full of equipment – two cameras, a network cable, four power adapters, a magazine, two pads of paper, five pens, eleven spare batteries, an iPod, headphones, a laptop computer, two cell phones, and a stack of business cards – while they ran my bag through the x-ray machine again and again looking for the C-4 explosive which was surely sewn into the lining.

 And did they get worked up when they found all the foreign currency I was carrying! They started looking at me sideways like I was some sort of international Lutheran Jihadist. They searched me again, stopping just short of a body-cavity check, and one of them carried my passport around to everyone in the department to show off the immigration stamps from Romania and China. I don’t think those Minnesota guys had ever seen so much action, and it wasn’t even 5:00 AM yet.

 In the end, they admonished me to wash my bag thoroughly with a 50% alcohol solution, or better yet, make it 80% just to be sure. I was left to re-pack and go home.

 This weekend, I’m shopping for a new green bag.