I Don’t Have Time For Your Blog

I guess they’re still checking for gels and liquids even on domestic flights in the US. But I made it to and from Fort Wayne without incident.* Just in case, I had put all of my three-ounces-and-under toiletries into a Ziploc™ bag. I did not, however, write “Kip Hawley is an idiot” on the bag. Oh well — maybe next time.

I wonder how appreciative the Dow Chemical company (Ziploc™ division) is of the new rules. I’ll bet there was a spike in Ziploc™ sales.

It reminds me of the bad old days just after 9/11 when we were supposed to protect ourselves from the terrorists with duct tape and plastic sheeting. Remember that? I always wondered if the duct tape and plastic sheeting guys put them up to that.

Maybe next year they’ll make another announcement:

There is an imminent terrorist threat that requires that all Americans stock up on… mayonnaise. Yes, mayonnaise and bubble wrap. You can ward off the terrorists with mayonnaise and bubble wrap.

Now, it just so happens that we’ve known about this threat for a couple of weeks. But the reason we chose not to announce it is that we wanted the chance to announce a new partnership between the Office of Homeland Security and America’s biggest retailer, Wal-Mart.

Our partner Wal-Mart is now offering a special on 5-gallon jugs of mayonnaise and 10-packs of bubble wrap. We call it our Homeland Security Patch. Just pick up our latest patch and your home will be secure against this latest threat.

What? Will there be other patches yet to come? Well, terrorist threats are unpredictable, so we can never be sure.

* Well, without a security incident. There was the incident where my plane was delayed by over two hours so I ended up driving from Chicago to Fort Wayne. But that wasn’t Kip Hawley’s fault. I think.

So naturally, a day after I start the blog my laptop dies.

I’m hard on laptops. I probably ask too much of them, keeping them running under heavy load 24/7 when I decide to try to convert my entire DVD collection for use on my iPod, or whatever. The laptops I own die ugly, brutal deaths, the kind of deaths that would make the most battle-hardened figure say, That’s no goddamned way for a laptop to die.

So here I am on the emergency backup laptop I had stashed at work just for reading email and other such nonsense. It’s no match for that dualie MacBook that they wheeled into the back of the Genius Bar with the promise, “We’ll do everything we can for her, sir, but it’s touch and go.”

In particular, its Wi-Fi card is flaky, so I’m tethered to the frigging cable modem with a bright yellow Ethernet cable. Nobody uses a cable to connect to the web anymore. I hear that the Amish are allowed to websurf now, as long as they promise not to use wireless.

Trust me, this backup laptop is old. It can’t even play video without stuttering. My iPod has better video playback than this goddamn thing.

But of course I soldier on, using it anyway so that I can keep in touch with you, dear readers. I do it all for you.