I am flying out to Seattle for a week of training and internal meetings.  Here are some things that I have run into during the trip so far (and I am typing this at 38,000 feet not having even got to Seattle yet):

• Air travel is extremely safe.  The danger that was caused by my 3.4 oz toothpaste has caught by the TSA screener and the offending item was disposed of.  Question for Colgate: how come your travel size toothpaste does not meet the TSA rules?  I will say that despite my frustration with the process, I was very courteous to the TSA people.  They have a very important job and they don't get paid enough to listen to me complain about an extra .4 oz of toothpaste.
• There is no good airport food.  Enough said.
• Huge book stores at the airport are a great idea.  The guy that opened the used book store at Milwaukee's General Mitchell Airport is a genius.  I spent the 1/2 hour delay just combing through the stacks and picked up a copy of the book "Illusions" by Richard Bach (A great book that I first read 25 years ago).  There had to have been 10,000 books available in the store.  Contrast that to the typical airport newsstand that carries about 100 titles, and half of those are written by Grisham, Clancy or Crichton. 
• Late Connections.  How come when I am on the plane waiting for take off it seems like we are always waiting for a couple of passengers that have a "late connection".  The one time that I have the late connection they say "we are not holding the plane for you", take a later flight.  I did make it to the plane, but I had to run across 3 concourses and literally had to scream at the gate agent as she was about to close the boarding door.
• Harry Potter is bigger than the iPod.  Just based on my observations and not a statistical sampling I see 4 times as many people carrying the latest book around than listening to iPods.  The teenage girl sitting next to me is over 1/2 way through the book.