However, none of the previous scrapes with TSA could have prepared me for last week in Alabama. Game over, heading home and not wanting to deal with the headache of bringing all of the equipment through security I decided to check both of my bags and head straight to the gate. I had already been sitting there playing on my phone for about half an hour when, out of the blue, two TSA agents walked up to me, tapped me on the shoulder and asked, “Is your name Rounsaville?”
“Yes. Well… it’s Brett. My last name is…uh, how can I help you…?”
“You work for The Go Game?”
“Yeeeessss…? Why? That depends. What should I say here?”
“Your bags set off an alarm when they were being x-rayed so we had to open them up. That’s some crazy stuff you’ve got in there.”
“Yeah. So…um, what’s going on?”
“We just want you to tell us about The Go Game.”
“What do you mean? Are the bags okay?
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. But we had to open them up and we went through your stuff and read the instructions for your game and it sounded like a blast! Tell us more about The Go Game.”
“Yeah. So…um, how did you know I’m me and why are you here at the gate?”
Long story short, these two agents were Behavioral Psychology experts for TSA and were so fascinated by the weird pile o’stuff in my bag that they went to my gate and applied all their massive expertise to look for the guy who matched the profile of a Go Gamer (…I think my bright orange converse gave me away). Then tried to convince me to run a teambuilding game for TSA agents. (Granted, they didn’t know who I should call or how I could make it happen.)
The most disappointing part of the entire interaction was when I offered to run as many games for free as they want as long as they leave me alone whenever I walk into an airport. They just laughed. I think they thought I was joking. Oh well.
The end.
Brett.
