D. Patrick Caldwell on The Joys of Flight

I've been doing some traveling this week to go to the Visual Studio Live conference in Orlando (for the programmer side of life). The TSA was in full force because the current Department of Homeland Security threat level is orange!

Based on the number of people complaining about the minor nuisance of standing in line for over an hour trying to get through screening and having some stranger in a booth look at a little bit of millimeter scanner porn of you, your spouse, or your daughter (which the TSA says isn't being stored, and then says it is being stored), I figured there just aren't enough people out there who understand just what it means to be at a threat level as high as orange.

I mean, if you knew what orange really means, you wouldn't care if your terrified and screaming 3 year old girl gets a pat-down by a TSA agent, because it's for the good of the employment of thousands of undereducated TSA agents who otherwise would be relegated to not pretending to have authority over upstanding and law abiding citizens?

Frankly, if we're being honest, I never can remember where orange fits either (and I've even written a blog post about it which makes me something of an expert on the subject). I think that red is the highest, but I never can remember what's between orange and the highest or where orange goes between the middle and the high. I just don't know. Even if I did, I never can figure out why "significant risk" is lower than "high risk." I mean, it seems to me that a high risk may not necessarily even be significant.

In any case, I set out to devise a better threat level system for the Department of Homeland Security, to make them immediately recognizable, even by the colorblind. We could name our threat levels after animals! Here's the new and improved Terrorist Threat Level System I recommend for the DHS:

Threat Level: Otter Awwww, I can't be scared of you!

Threat Level: Puppy Terrorists have threatened to chew your shoes and pee on your carpet but will also love and adore you for many years to come (unless you are Michael Vick)

Threat Level: Wolf Terrorists have threatened to come here and consume our small prey!

Threat Level: Tyson Terrorists have threatened to eat our children.

Threat Level: Tiger Recent communications intercepted by American intelligence indicates that the terrorists are planning on attacking Vegas magicians!

Threat Level: Bear So, we're pretty much screwed. Based on information we don't have from an organization we can't trust, it turns out our best bet is to turn over any last rights we have and put our destiny in the hands of the federal government. Let's all just lie down and play dead.

Threat Level: The Transportation Safety Administration All your privacy and human dignity are belong to the TSA! We are pretty much effing effed. The only real option we have now is to stop flying altogether, but if we did that, the TSA would stop tricking the DHS into thinking bad things are happening on airplanes and will start calling in threats on trains, busses, and cars. Next thing you know, we'll have to get probed by TSA before we back out of our driveways. These terrorists are already living among us.

Have fun. Be safe. Happy Piloting.