This is the start of my shoe drop blog

Banned

Yesterday, just minutes before the final boarding call for flight 1186 to Johannesburg, I was banned from boarding the plane. It turns out that the 3 blank pages in the back of your passport are not to be used for stamps or visas. Therefore, once you reach these final pages, your passport is actually full, and useless when trying to leave the country.

Everyone else had already boarded, except Kate Schelter and myself, so with great regret I sent Kate on to the plane with the unfortunate news and I stormed off to the ticket counter livid with this grave inconvenience.

To add salt to my wound, I was met with sarcasm and little apathy as the woman behind the ticket counter explained I would not be able to leave for 2 more days and that I would have to pay $600 to get more pages added to my passport, which in her opinion was too frayed and worn out to be worthy of a proper government document_

I explained that I accidentally went swimming off the coast of Belize while fighting a tarpon on a 9 weight fly rod, and that the salt water did this damage to the holy government document she held in contempt, but my story neither amused or interested her.

She simply gave me some super glue and suggested I improve its condition before she sent it and my $600 off to the Washington DC passport office.

Without a cell phone, laptop, or any special messenger pigeons on hand, I decided to keep my plight to myself, letting my friends and family believe I was safely aboard the flight to South Africa with the rest of the group. I would spend the next two days in Atlanta, off the grid, existing without an identity, but with a purpose. I would write, read, and rest as I prepared my mind and body for the journey that lie ahead.

As I write this journal entry which will later be faxed to my assistant Jake to be posted on my blog, I discover a great truth I will leave you with: "Being banned from a flight die to a full passport should be celebrated, not seen as an inconvenience."