"it's like college, with guns!"

"tell your friends about it! you were in the belly of the beast! where the man lives!"
- my brother, on our reactions to visiting him on the army base.

we did spend a lot of our time being like, huh. so this is the army. interesting.

there's a sign there that says "no hat, no salute." it took me a while, but apparently when you're in that particular covered walkway, you don't need to wear a hat, nor do you need to salute. it's not, like, you can't salute if you don't have a hat.

i recently discovered that you can take contact solution on the plane. like, a big bottle of it. did everyone know this? it's totally changing my life. and it bears on the rest of this story.

i got to the airport really early this morning, and i went up to the southwest counter and was like, "hey, would it be helpful if i got on an earlier flight? like, does someone need to be on my flight?" and i was about to tell them about all the grading i have to do, and how i could do it there or at home, and the lady goes, "um, you were supposed to fly out yesterday?" and i was like, oh. so, never mind that.

please ONLY fly southwest from now on, guys. they didn't charge me for missing my flight and having to get on another one. and i still got home earlier than i was supposed to.

but then, going through security:
b: [holding bottle] this is contact solution. is that going to be okay?
security guy: [all flirty] well, seeing that it's you, i guess it's okay this time...
b: aww, thanks!

wait a second. did i just flirt my way past the TSA? i don't think i'm okay with that.

[i'm not trying to be all, "ohhh, i'm super hot. even the TSA can't resist me." but really, it was weird.]

--

and, some things i've been saving up for you all.

"chivalry is merely mortally wounded."
- guy on plane, helping with bags.

"they have the best salad in the fucking WORLD."
- southwest guy, at potbelly.

thoughts on this last one:
1. well, he should know.
2. best salad in the FUCKING world? or the non-fucking world? i'm just asking.