I Gotta Be Less Serious

I'm back in San Diego for a few days and the kids will be here soon. It has been a particularly volatile couple of weeks at work, with a new department reorganization announced plus some new major programs launched. A friend sought my legal advice yesterday about the dissolution of his domestic partnership, which made me sad. I'm sitting in on meetings to lend my legal shield to discussions so they don't have to be turned over to the other side in litigation. More new program documents and contracts to draft and negotiate. So I am running out of steam a little bit early this week. This is not a good thing because much remains to do. But I'll force myself. Sometimes a sense of responsibility is really inconvenient.

Looking back over the last few weeks' worth of blog posts, I'm thinking again OMG I seem like some relentlessly serious somber depressing existential philosopher or something. Probably the result of not having any decent vacation to speak of in the last year. I've gotta change the mix. So I've got Mika going on iTunes and will probably take the kids out to dinner. Then IDK, go find the stupidest silliest movie we can to watch. Or maybe go get a bunch of rainbow flag stickers and plaster them all over the back door of the church? (don't worry, they peel off). I need another run on the beach is what I need. And a serious workout. And a vacation that's more than just a 3 day weekend. And a hand to hold. It'll happen sometime.

Something hysterically funny did actually happen a week or so ago. Anybody with no tolerance for slightly ribald humor had better stop reading here. And some of you saw this briefly on FB so forgive the re-run.

So I'm up in the city one evening and decide to stop in at Hot Cookie on Castro Street to buy a gag gift. Hot Cookie sells what I will diplomatically call "anatomically correct" coconut macaroons on a stick, coated in chocolate. You figure it out.

I don't want this thing to break on the flight home, so I put it in my computer bag to carry on. I go through security and wait for my shoes and bag and laptop to emerge from the x-ray machine. Now, some of these people recognize me on sight, I go through there so often. But this crew didn't. So I'm standing there, waiting. My shoes emerge from the machine. But the screener reverses the belt and sends my computer bag back for a second look. She stops. Her brow furrows in puzzlement. I know it's my bag she's looking at. She calls over a supervisor, a tall thin guy, probably 60-something. He looks at the screen. Uh oh, I think, what's wrong?

The guy grabs the grey bin with my computer bag and says "Sir, we're going to have to do a visual inspection, please follow me." Okay, whatever. He opens up the bag and starts to search. He sees the white paper bag with the cookie inside. I say "That's a cookie from a bakery." He says "Oh, okay." He feels it, can tell it's nothing dangerous. He continues to search the bag, obviously not finding his target.

"What are you looking for," I ask. "The screener thought she saw a bottle of liquid in your bag." Oh boy, well, guess there's no way around this. So, starting to laugh, I said "Ah, that would be the cookie. Have a look. It's a gift, I didn't want it to get broken in my suitcase." He opens the bag and looks. A smile breaks across his face. "Yep, that's it! I'm going to have to re-screen this, please wait here."

So back he goes. And what does he do? He shows the bag to the young woman who thought she saw a bottle of liquid. Her eyes get very big very fast. He runs the bag through the machine again and brings the bin back as I stand there laughing out loud. Sotto voce, he volunteers that he "had to be very politically correct when [he] explained it to her." I'm still laughing out loud and clearly he was straining every rivet not to do the same. I thanked him for taking good care of my cookie, closed up the bag, and headed for the gate.

Maybe next time I'll get two and give one to the screener.