THE TRAVELS OF ME AND FREE MONKEY

At the moment, both Free Monkey and I are on the road. He is in LA, and I am in Georgia, spreading the word of Girl At Sea.

First, the Monkey report.

FREE MONKEY is now in Los Angeles for the first stop of his World Tour. (The visit to Hank was a pre-tour stop to prepare.) You can see his activities by going to Little Willow’s site.

I flew to Atlanta on Monday night, and I am there now, sitting in the Georgia sunshine. Last night, I did a fantastic event at Little Shop of Stories in Decatur, where I spoke to a an amazing reading group.

That much is good. But the getting here, friends . . . that was not so good.

I have to preface everything below by saying that I am used to traveling internationally, so flying inside the US can be confusing. I don’t mean this in a “I only fly to fancy, faraway places!” I mean this in an “I expect the worst in terms of long lines and strict security” kind of a way. I expect my body to be x-rayed, my passport to be checked every six minutes, my shoes to be blown up, and my comings and goings to be ruthlessly questioned. On international flights, they make you show up days in advance so they can do all of this. They even board you a full hour before you take off just to make super-super sure that you are belted in snug and secure so they can seal the plane and check it fifty more times.

All of which I LIKE, because I am nothing if not pro-safety.

Comparatively, when I arrived at La Guardia (New York’s domestic airport), things seemed pretty relaxed. I checked in without showing ID. The security check seemed normal enough, but then I walked through the terminal, looking for my gate, and found that it was not so much a gate but more of a dark hallway in the back with about three hundred people crammed in it with nowhere to sit. The board behind the counter was not a digital display—it was one of those old fashioned boards where they stuck up plastic numbers.

Frankly, it looked shady, like some guys had quietly backed up to an unused corner of the airport, maybe one that had previously been a bathroom or something and was under renovation, parked their plane, and tried to stir up a little business.

The problem was, there didn’t seem to be a plane. They weren’t even acting as if there was supposed to be one. The flight was supposed to take off at 7:00. It had read 7:00 on the board, but since they didn’t know when we would be leaving, they simply removed the last two numbers and left it as 7:

After about 45 minutes of standing there, slack-jawed, staring at the 7: . . . I decided this was getting a little old, so I walked around and around until I found one seat, recently vacated, in the middle of a crowded row. I was just happy to be sitting down, and I barely registered the strange objects that were across from me, which were: a pair of black high-heeled fur boots, a sealed bag, and a plastic tub marked “chemical de-icer.”

Let me just put that into perspective . . . you can’t even bring water past security. You can’t bring bottles of shampoo. I once had my lip gloss taken from me and put into a small sealed bag. (I’m not sure what that was supposed to accomplish, aside from not getting the lip gloss on my stuff.) One time, when my flight to England was delayed, I had to leave the terminal and use the ladies room. They held my passport while I did this, and when I came back, they gave me one of those full body patdowns, they examined my shoes, and took the battery out of my computer to examine it.

So, that someone had come in with a tub of suspicious-looking chemical stuff was weird. What was even MORE weird was that that stuff had been sitting there unattended for TWO HOURS. I knew this from my seatmates, who had seen the pregnant woman who had come and left it there so long before. By the time I came on the scene and collapsed into the seat, there was quite a buzz about it.

Because the only thing more disturbing than a random tub of chemicals in an airport is an UNATTENDED tub of random chemicals in an airport left next to furry boots and a scary bag.

There’s always one woman who takes control of the situation, and we had one. She went to security. In fact, she went to FIVE PEOPLE, begging them to come and take away the Incredibly Suspicious Packages.

Again, this comes in sharp contrast to international travel—or anything in England. If you leave a bag for more than five minutes in England, they swoop in with an entire team, take it away in a big machine, and blow it up. The English have a lot of experience dealing with bombers, and they don’t mess around.

But at La Guardia, they really could not have cared less. They shrugged her away.

“No one will listen to me,” she said. By now, we were all involved in the story of the boots, bag, and de-icer and everyone was waiting for news.

This is when the staff of "I Can't Believe It's An Airline" sprang to life. The guy at the desk came on and said, “Who wants to go to Atlanta!”

You know, like it was a surprise trip, and not an airplane that we all had tickets for. But everyone was so excited that there was A PLANE that cheers and clapping broke out.

It was only as we were quickly scrambled back into line (it was a big rush now, of course, further confirming in my mind that this plane was not actually supposed to be here and we were getting into the equivalent of an unlicensed taxi) that the police showed up with the bomb sniffing puppy. It was definitely a puppy—he was sort of a shaggy German Shepherd, with huge paws, clearly delighted to be at work. I don’t know exactly what he found, but he went a little crazy with delight for the de-icer. The sealed bag turned out to contain large cheese puff balls.

So if you heard any stories about weird stuff being found at LaGuardia airport the other night, I was there. And if it was some scary germ or something, drop me a line and let me know, because I was sitting next to it for a while. Unlike that guy who flew all over the world with an infectious disease, I will turn myself in immediately. I think I might like quarantine.

So we got on the plane, and I eyed the contents of my seat pocket. (I’m always hoping that some day I will find something wonderful in there, like a first edition Harry Potter or a baby bunny.) Instead, I saw that my safety card had been ripped into pieces. The only other thing in there was a barf bag.

“Who ever uses those?” I thought to myself. I am lucky enough to have a very strong stomach, and the idea of throwing up on an airplane is pretty much the worst thing I could imagine.

And then we took off, and the girl across from me barfed into her barf bag.

Things started to look up once we took off and were flying along peacefully. We landed very suddenly (everyone down! down! down! we're landing!), and then I thought things were really on the move. But they had had a storm in Atlanta hours before, and for some reason this messed everything up, and we sat on our spot on the runway for well over an hour.

When I finally got to my rental car, I breathed a sigh of relief, and then I looked down at the ground next to it and saw this, which I had to pick up and take with me:



Would you take this as a sign?

I really could not have asked for a better way into my LIST OF THINGS TO BE AFRAID OF IN THE SUMMERTIME. And this story also proves why DRAGON TRAIN is so appealing. (Dragon Train is appealing for many reasons, but now more than ever.)

That’s coming next, just as soon as I complete something I have to turn in, pretty much now. (Not a book, but another writing project.) Deadlines call! FREE MONKEY travels!