Saturday early morning just might be the best time to catch a flight.   The America West ticket counter was almost deserted when I arrived at 5:10 this morning.  It took me about 30 seconds to check my bag and get my .  I got selected for “additional screening,” meaning that I got to participate in a little training exercise for the TSA staff.  They gave me a card that I had to carry through and set off the metal detector.  Then they ushered me over to the pat down area where a too-chipper young TSA employee (I hesitate to call these folks security officers) went through the routine of wanding me, giving me the pat down, and going through my carry on.  I was surprised that he didn’t look everywhere.  All he did was run the nitrate test and check that the laptop was real.  Five minutes and I was done.

Somehow I managed to lose the rest of this entry.  I’ll have to reconstruct it.