Gatwick Airport

I am writing this post from Lemming's house back in good old Pasadena.

First, I need to say that I am "awesome". Some of you have seen me accidently wear shirts backwards before. This was especially memorable with my xml shirt. In that case, one way to tell the shirt was on backwards was to see the incorrect syntax. Today, however, I soared to new heights. I happen to be wearing a Somerville shirt that clearly identifies me as being affiliated with both Somerville and Oxford. Of course, I didn't put it on backwards; instead, I accidently put it on inside-out! I didn't realize it until I was in line to check in my luggage. (The check-in at that stage was craptacular. The line wasn't that long, but that didn't stop things from being ridiculously slow. I was at London Gatwick airport 2.5 hours before my flight, and it turns out that I needed the entire time. One advantage of the slow line, however, was that I had plenty of time to ponder things -- like the fact that I had been wearing my shirt incorrectly for the past several hours.) I don't remember ever having done that before, and I'm a bit surprised that it took me so long to notice. When I finally reached the security person before checking in my luggage, she altered the normal line of questioning and started out with, "Are you tired?" (I'm guessing she asked because of the shirt, although my eyes and body language probably also gave it away.)

It turns out that in the UK, only one carry-on is allowed. This was somewhat annoying, as I had prepared to be able to bring the two small items I had always been allowed to carry on everywhere. Apparently, for about a year, it's been this way when going outbound in the UK. It hadn't been that way the last time I flew out of the UK, so I didn't realize this had changed. I obviously would have prepared differently, but as a short-term solution, I basically stuffed necessary things like my iPod, DS, and wallet into my computer bag (which has taken a lot of abuse during it's 9+ years in my possession). The security person even asked me how long I've owned each of my bags. Why does that matter? (I'm surprised they still have the whole bit about 'Did anyone else give you anything to put on?' here. Maybe terrorists are supremely honest folks? Or perhaps they always pack their bombs and knives on their own?)

One couple in the check-in line had to open and "disarm" all of their Christmas crackers, which are a traditional part of Christmas in the UK. They were going to bring them to other people after their flight, and they were unsurprisingly displeased about this.

Once I had checked in my luggage, the rest of security was thankfully trivial. I guess each airport has a different rate-limiting step? I'm used to the check-in being faster (and typically much faster) for lines of comparable size and the x-ray part of things being slower.

By the way, this was my first experience with London Gatwick airport. Among the UK airports, I had only sampled London Heathrow in the past.

On the flight from Dallas to Burbank, one passenger almost managed to get herself thrown off. She settled for delaying the flight by 10 minutes with her shenanigans. Otherwise, the trip was basically uneventful, which is good. (At the Dallas airport, I did walk past the area where we camped out many moons ago.)