8.10.2006

The Terrorists Ruined My Family Reunion

Everyone, please commence feeling bad for Dean and Annette Carpenter. The Terrorists are depriving their poor Texan family of homemade jam.

At the entrances to security lines, agents announced the new restrictions and offered to take people's newly banned items and throw them out. Lip balm, mascara and skin creams and even muscle rub piled up in their hand-held trays. One man, told that, yes, mouthwash spray was now prohibited from the cabin, took four last sprays and tossed his canister into the agent's tray.

Just after 7 a.m., Dean and Annette Carpenter of Isanti, Minn., on their way to a family reunion in Corpus Christi, Tex., were forced to leave several jars of homemade jelly in their car.

"It's too bad," Dean Carpenter said. "It affects the whole event."


(See entire article here.)

Now, I fully understand the havoc that has overcome air travel in the United States. My husband flies upwards of 100,000 miles per year. I've had to dig lighters out of the bottomless-pit that I call My Handbag. I get it. But when my local newspaper finds it necessary to make homemade jelly a national tragedy, I struggle to find the right level of sympathy.

Closed circuit to Douchebag Carpenter (who not only had to throw away his precious jelly, but also had to dig through a number of trash cans looking for his wife's license because she was sure she threw it away with her lip gloss accidentally, only to discover that it was in his fucking pocket the whole time)....you know what, nevermind. I don't even have the energy to closed circuit him.

Save travels to everyone out there in the skies. God speed to whoever had to fly with the Jellyless Carpenter's.