We left Ottawa on Friday a week ago, at a ridiculous seven or so in the morning. Now, for international flights that means being there at five. So perhaps this was the source of my verbal ineptness.
When countries do as much trade as Canada and the US do, they do certain things in unusual ways. One of those unusual ways is that at the Ottawa airport, you go through US customs (with uniformed customs agents and everything) right in Ottawa. By the time we got to US customs, we'd done the usual baggage screening, shoe removal, etc. that is the normal part of flying these days. So you'd think I'd be on my toes.
When we walked up to the custom's inspector, my dog-eared passport would not scan, because I'd basically warped the scannable piece beyond use (my passport is five years old, and I carry it everywhere.)
"You know your passport is a month from expiring?" He asked me.
"Yes, it has just been impossible to get one right now with how busy it has been," I said, referring to the new western hemisphere initiative requirement that everyone have passports.
So the inspector asked me questions manually that I guess he'd normally pull up on screen.
"Have you ever been denied entry into the United States?" He asked.
"Not that I know of," I replied, and immediately thought, idiot! What kind of an answer is that? Why couldn't you have just said, 'No sir'? You would know if you'd ever been denied entry! He must think you're a terrorist or a dimwit!
Anyway, he didn't think my answer as odd as I did, and we got off on our way.
4 comments:
Y know, it never fails that I answer questions to the authorities in such a manner as to feel like I should have done it differently.
I'm a perpetual verbal clutz too, when it comes to authority figures. :-)
Congrats on the little 'uns first birthday BTW!
Thanks.
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