UPDATE OF PREVIOUS POST:

DAMN, DAMN, DAMN, DAMN!

TSA RESCUES MY LOST CELL-PHONE
AT SAN DIEGO AIRPORT

BOMB SQUAD NOT INVOLVED

Yes, friends, the saga of the velvet glove continues: following a small Perrier water accident which caused me to shuffle my shopping bag, I shuffled my cell-phone into the seat cushions at Gate 22 -- a fact I did not discover until we were landing back in T.O. five hours late,r when the assembling of my travel goods did not yield the phone in any of my carry-ons.

I had been back in the house less than an hour, having dumped out all relevant bags and faced the horrible truth, when the phone rang and a sort of Grandpa McCoy voice* on the other end was asking me if I knew anything about this phone they had found at friendly Lindbergh Field. When I laid claim to it, the man said he would be taking it directly to the Lost and Found, and that I could call them on Monday at the number he provided.

Damn, he was cordial! How dare he?

When I phoned Lost and Found the next day, the gentleman was cordial-plus, retrieved my phone and asked me the skill-testing question: When I open the phone there's a picture -- what is it? A brand new baby!, I reply. We then exchange all the pertinent information, and they will hold the phone for 90 days until the designated family member can pick it up.

Cell phone found abandoned at airport gate -- probably by cleaners or another passenger, turned over to authorities, and probably x-rayed and examined. Not hammered to bits, blown up, or put into the crusher. Just sent to Lost and Found with a "Please look after this bear" tag on it.

This is not your father's TSA. It isn't even last week's TSA. I would have understood completely if they thrown a bucket of cold water over my phone instead of using it to call me. I'm inclined to believe that the bucket of cold water has been thrown on the infamous gropers and peepers of the San Diego security screeners.

My phone, by the way, is a 2003 model that was obsolescing even as I bought it. I was planning on getting a new one sometime this fall anyway.

Not to put too fine a point on it, the phone is junk.

Can we hope that the TSA in San Diego has gotten the message?: Don't touch my junk.


*[watch the clip -- it's a classic]