6: Appy Ourth Uly!
Made it!
I made it home, after being only slightly delayed and gaslit by TSA, to attend a party with some old family friends, then hang out with some of my best friends from home and set off fireworks; a perfect fourth of July if you ask me.
Two TSA agents this morning tried to insist that the rules had changed and I was no longer allowed to take my safety razor (without the blade) through TSA, telling me I had to throw it away. I took them at their word, and after discussing it, they said I could go back out of the checkpoint and take it apart to keep the part I made myself (I made this razor blade with a kit and some acrylic that I turned on a wood lathe into a cool custom handle and stand, so I could easily enough remove the acrylic and simply replace the kit parts later). While I was outside the checkpoint, though, I decided to double-check the rules changes, because I didn't remember anything like that, and had flown into DC with that razor handle only 3 weeks prior.
The rules had not changed. I pulled up the tsa.gov site on my phone, put the razor handle back in my pocket, and got back in the security line. The line wasn't long (it was 5:30 in the morning), so I got back to the scanners relatively fast, I put the razor handle outside my bag with my phone and wallet, and then it didn't even get flagged. There was no rule change, two TSA dickheads had simply lied directly to my face about a prized possession of mine. Not a high point for my trust in the system; I'll definitely push back more against the rules the next time I chafe against them.
After landing in Salt Lake though, today was great. I had fun at the family friend's party, got to talk to a lot of people that I hadn't seen in years, and was asked a lot of genuinely interesting questions about my status and opinions on various topics relevant to me (AI, renewable energy, solar panels, building stuff). It was fun.
After that (around 8) a couple of my very best friends came over (Shout out to Alli and Shu), and we played card games. Once it was dark, we set off fireworks that my family had bought earlier today. Nothing crazy or massive, we hadn't driven to the Wyoming border, but enough that it was fun. I had the great idea to duct tape some of the fireworks to the top of my RC car and drive it around while it was going, and that worked incredibly well. I don't have any photos of it in action, as I was driving, but I know Shu got video, so I'll get those from her and maybe put them in a future post.
I've been told that my grandparents require me for various tech support things tomorrow (and have been coyly asking my parents when I would be home and how much spare time I would have for that kind of thing), which is a role I am happy to fill, and I'm going to go shopping for a new backpack! Current backpack was a birthday present last year, but this May the main grab handle on top tore clean off on one side, which is really disappointing, and it's a relatively small bag, so I need a larger one to complement it (and I will get the grab handle fixed too, I do really like that bag, I won't be discarding it).
In this time zone and the one I was in this morning it's technically tomorrow, but I will count these posts as needing to be completed by when I sleep, not necessarily the chiming of midnight in my current time zone, because that's more in line with my experience of time and its passing than simply assigning numbers. I also enjoy doing these posts at the very end of the day, so I can talk about the things that happened and how I'm feeling.