30,000 feet somewhere over the northern Rockies

We were up bright and early, around five, to pack the misc stuff, get ready, and then ride to the airport. Why five, no one sleeps soundly when there is an impending trip. The brain just does not turn completely off.

The TSA was quite thorough with our bags. They were either bored or German-Americans are the ethnic target d'jour. After opening our bags, the one officer (can I call them that?) swabbed the inside of every corner, nick, and crann of the bag and contents using twelve test pads in all.

She then proceeded to repack the bag enitrely different than we had it. It made me rething the choice of buying an older bag from good will for our SCUBA gear and non clothes. The well worn zipper looked tighter than we wanted, but some federal law prohibited us from touching, muchless repacking our own bag.

The first leg was uneventful--a good sign for a plane trip. The best luck is that this second plane--thirteen and a half hours to Japan was only HALF FULL! Leslie and i have three seats to ourself, and could have snagged 3 each, wanted to stay together for the first portion of the flight and most the set of three empty are taken by the travelers that know better. We leave at 10:30 and arrive tomorrow in Japan at 3:00--we miss and entire night of sleep.