Greetings all,

I had a wonderful time recently flying from Indianapolis, Indiana in my new "Ancient MacBeth" 8 yrd wool kilt to Gainesville, Florida via Atlanta, Georgia to attend a seminar on Qigong from Grandmaster Wong. I admit that I was a little nervous since I have not flown at all since 9-11 and had heard all sorts of horror stories associated with TSA especially the hassle that they might give a kilt wearer. Everyone was told to take off their shoes, loose outer clothing, empty all their pockets, take off their belt, remove their hats (I kept my bonnet on since it was my kippah!) and place their belongings in trays provided. Opting out of the main scanner and just the metal detector I set it off with my kilt buckles and was asked if I wanted to be examined in the open area or a private area. I said that the public area was okay and then was searched in and around my body and kilt by hand and with a metal detector. No hands were up the kilt and they were very professional about explaining ahead of time how they would pat me down being careful of any medical or painful areas. Although the whole procedure took a little more time than I wanted to spend, overall it was worth being able to wear a kilt and feel safe about the whole matter.

Special note: the TSA apparently also do some sort of chemical detection and I was kind of worried about that since I had recently attended the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Tippecanoe and I was wondering if there might be some gun powder residue on my kilt and outfit. All I had done was just airing out my kilt outside on a clothesline to get rid of all the smoke smell (which it did).

Happy kilting!