Once upon a time, two sisters went for a little trip on an airplane. It was a short two day trip and so the girls only packed 7 or 8 outfits, and figured it was no big deal. One of the sisters is a self-proclaimed globe trotter and lives in many other delusions, but the other sister, who maybe doesn't fly as often, forgot about some of the rules, and had a big old bottle of lotion in her purse which caused the TSA guys at the airport a lot of stress and turmoil. In the end, after searching through her bags for a Very Long Time, as if they weren't sure that the lotion wasn't the only contraband she had, and as if they weren't sure what to do about the threatening lotion, the TSA guys took the bottle away and the sister was slightly disgruntled.
As the sisters sat at the gate, waiting for the plane to board, the sister who didn't travel as much started digging through her purse looking for something (obviously not lotion). She looked up at the other sister with big eyes.
"I have two box cutters in my purse."
The traveling sister gasped. "How did the TSA guys not find those? Was the lotion so overwhelming that they were paralyzed by it's discovery? More importantly, WHY?"
The other sister said she didn't know, but something about hay bales and cardboard at the County Fair in September.
The traveling sister, being savvy in Pretty Much All The Things, and after contacting a friend in Law Enforcement who knows All The Other Things, told her to go to the bathroom, wipe her fingerprints off of the contraband, and throw them away. Because if the box cutters were taken back to TSA to be turned in, either out of incompetence or embarrassment for incompetence, the TSA guys would surely call a full security airport shut down and the sisters would never be able to get on the plane. And if they were taken on the plane and say, fell out of her purse in the aisle, there was no question that both sisters would be flying leap-tackled by well-meaning citizens and probably killed vigilante style before landing.
The non-savvy sister trusted the traveling one and so she went to the bathroom and huddled in the corner near a sink, suspiciously washing the knives and wiping them until an innocent bystander happened in, at which the girl panicked and threw the boxcutters into the trash.
Moments later the sisters were on the plane, waiting for the inevitable moment that the airport janitor found the incriminating evidence in the trash and launched a full security airport shut down. While they waited, they texted most of their friends and family to tell them goodbye, in case they went straight to prison without a chance to call people.
Just then, the captain of the plane announced that the flight would be delayed because someone's oxygen mask had deployed spontaneously and had to be contained, and then documented. The sisters just knew it was a ruse, allowing the TSA time to contact the National Security Administration SWAT teams and raid the plane. They held their breath for the entire oxygen-mask-containment time, which was a very long time, as maintenance men who looked rather well-muscled and heavily armed came and went from the cabin of the plane.
Luckily one of the sisters had to share half of her entire seat on the plane with a Very Large Man who was selling some sort of Adult Stem Cells that would cure anything. Not only did he occupy half of the seat which was not his, he was a leaner, so that was a useful distraction from the girls' impending doom.
At long last the flight left, but the sisters knew that it was only because the SWAT team would be meeting the plane at the destination airport, which was larger and had more armed responders nearby.
The worst part was that the flight didn't even have free beer and wine, like some flights do - at least the ones on the small rattly planes that make you need beer and wine. And the girls could have used some beer and wine. Even if it was only 9:50 in the morning.
When the girls landed they had to wait on the tarmac for a Very Long Time. Presumably for the SWAT team. They never showed up though, so the girls went along with their short trip feeling watched the entire time.
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| Never know WHO you're flying with... |
