Take last Friday night. It was close to 11 pm and I had just gotten off a flight back to NY from Los Angeles

On the flight home, I had to change planes in Chicago. Not surprisingly (since it's winter) there was a mix of snow and rain in Chicago, so our plane got delayed. Of course, the airline didn't delay the plane before we got on it and they closed the doors. They waited until the plane (every seat and every fraction of an inch of overhead space) was fully loaded and everyone and clasped their seatbelts closed . After about 10 minutes, the pilot got on the speaker and apologized, saying they had just finished loading the last of the baggage, and it would be just a little bit longer because they had to de-ice the plain. He added that there was a strong tailwind so he expected we'd still get to NY on time.

They de-iced the plane and another 15 minutes or so went by, and we were still on the ground. The pilot came back on the loudspeaker and told us we still only be about 10 minutes late because of the tailwinds. Now, that might have been true if we took off then, but we didn't. When we finally took off, it was an hour after the scheduled take-off time. Whatever tailwinds had been there before must have tailed it out of the area, too, since we arrived in Islip an hour late. (Surprise, surprise.) Which put us at the airport at about 11 PM.

To make matters worses, two other flights came in about the same time. I don't know if those were scheduled to arrive then, or had also been delayed, but three flights landing close together at 11 PM in Islip seemed to be a problem. We waited for close to 45 exasperating minutes for them to get the baggage off our flight and to the baggage claim area. (Islip is a small airport.They only have 4 luggage carousels in the entire airport, so I was begining to wonder if they were hand-carrying the bags from plane to baggage area instead of loading them on trucks.)

But finally they announced that our flight's luggage would be coming through on Carousel 4. Eveyrone rushed over to that carousel, crowding around so they could see what was coming, grab their luggage fast and get home to get some sleep. The carousel started up with the usual clunk and the track started moving. Heads leaned over the moving track, peering at the black flaps at the the beginning of the carousel hoping their luggage would be the first to push through and start its way around the carousel.

That's about when you could hear people nearest the baggage entry point start to snicker. Yes, suitcases were coming through. But the very first item on the baggage carousel was a single tube of toothpaste. As it got near the first turn the carousel makes, one man pretended he was reaching for it, and very loudly said, "Great. That's what I was waiting for. Let's go."

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