On Thursday, 18 February, 2021 22:37, "Warren Kumari" <warren@kumari.net> said:
4: Not too long after I started doing networking (and for the same small ISP in Yonkers), I'm flying off to install a new customer. I (of course) think that I'm hot stuff because I'm going to do the install, configure the router, whee, look at me! Anyway, I don't want to check a bag, and so I stuff the Cisco 2501 in a carryon bag, along with tools, etc (this was all pre-9/11!). I'm going through security and the TSA[0] person opens my bag and pulls the router out. "What's this?!" he asks. I politely tell him that it's a router. He says it's not. I'm still thinking that I'm the new hotness, and so I tell him in a somewhat condescending way that it is, and I know what I'm talking about. He tells me that it's not a router, and is starting to get annoyed. I explain using my "talking to a 5 year old" voice that it most certainly is a router. He tells me that lying to airport security is a federal offense, and starts looming at me. I adjust my attitude and start explaining that it's like a computer and makes the Internet work. He gruffly hands me back the router, I put it in my bag and scurry away. As I do so, I hear him telling his colleague that it wasn't a router, and that he certainly knows what a router is, because he does woodwork...
Here in the UK we avoid that issue by pronouncing the packet-shifter as "rooter", and only the wood-working tool as "rowter" :) Of course, it raises a different set of problems when talking to the Australians... Cheers, Tim.