[vmiwoulfe]

Philly sometimes suprises me. Caught a taxi to the airport with my somewhat new 1911 on my hip and walked up to the counter to check my luggage. This is the first non-military flight I've taken with a firearm so I did my research but didn't really know what to expect.

Told the lady at the counter I needed to declare my firearms (the one on my hip and my O/U--planning on doing a lot of skeet shooting after work--).

The lady gives me a dirty look and says "do what??"...here we go...

Me: "I need to check my firearms and i need the form to sign saying they're unloaded."

Her: "Oh, well um, are you checking them or taking them on with you?"

Me: Sigh..."I'm checking them"

Her: "Ok"

Me: "And I'm going to take this one off [pointing to my hip], unload it and put it the case"

Her: [nervous look] "Ok, let me get my supervisor"

Me: [to myself, "This is why I show up 2 hrs early" as i unload, case and lock the 1911]

Supervisor (30 sec after she walked off): "Are those things unloaded?"

Me: "Yessir"

Supervisor: "You know in the future you shouldn't carry that thing to the check in gate, you should unload it in the car"

Me: "Thanks for the tip..." (sorry folks didn't have any flyers on me, after all I am going to Albuquerque)

So besised the humor in being asked if I wanted to carry it on the plane with me, the process went nicely. And I'm now wicked early sitting in the terminal enjoying the free Wi-Fi.