I seem to be doing a lot of work up front to make this trip as trivial as possible. But coming into Jamaica and sailing through the airport is very seductive. In a pinch, I could do the purse in the garment bag thing, I hope. I mean, it's only three days of clothes, plus dresses for the wedding.

I miss flying prop planes. The loading/unloading is so much easier.

I think it depends on the size of the plane, too

I think newer planes tend to have bigger overhead compartments. At least for the 777 and the yet-to-enter-service 787.

36" means all three dimensiions. So for example 2X2X9 would 36 total.

I think it depends on the airport and on the security guard. In the Tucson airport, I had a backpack and another bag that my laptop sleeve fit into, but I had taken my laptop out of the bag in order to be ready for the xray machine, and the first security guard, the one whose only job is making sure you are a ticketed passanger, wouldn't let me past her until I put it back in the bag so that I only had two items.

Bitch.

I mean, they certainly aren't going to make you check a laptop or camera.

Ha! If it gets too crowded, they can make you check everything. My ex was once forced to choose between checking his laptop and checking a Zero Halliburton case with our camera equipment in it. He picked laptop because he needed to finish a presentation. We never saw the cameras again.

Ha! If it gets too crowded, they can make you check everything. My ex was once forced to choose between checking his laptop and checking a Zero Halliburton case with our camera equipment in it. He picked laptop because he needed to finish a presentation. We never saw the cameras again.

How awful. I can't imagine losing my camera equipment.

Monkey on the lam would be a great band name.

Big-ass Seymour Hersch article about the military and the administration's current plans for attacking Iran: [link]

Well, at least they're not considering nukes anymore. And more people in the military are standing up to the administration....

A senior military official told me, “Even if we knew where the Iranian enriched uranium was—and we don’t—we don’t know where world opinion would stand. The issue is whether it’s a clear and present danger. If you’re a military planner, you try to weigh options. What is the capability of the Iranian response, and the likelihood of a punitive response—like cutting off oil shipments? What would that cost us?” Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his senior aides “really think they can do this on the cheap, and they underestimate the capability of the adversary,” he said.

In 1986, Congress authorized the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to act as the “principal military adviser” to the President. In this case, I was told, the current chairman, Marine General Peter Pace, has gone further in his advice to the White House by addressing the consequences of an attack on Iran. “Here’s the military telling the President what he can’t do politically”—raising concerns about rising oil prices, for example—the former senior intelligence official said. “The J.C.S. chairman going to the President with an economic argument—what’s going on here?”

I can't imagine losing my camera equipment.

The worst part is that one of the cameras was a Minolta XK that we got in one of the great yard sale finds of all time.