All of my worrying about flying with equipment and getting searched, seized and confined was unwarranted. Customs was uneventful minus the part where they gathered around the monitor and snickered at the gnome zipping through the X-ray machine in the front pocket of my camera bag. [He likes to travel first class, what can I say?]
For a split second I was sure they were going to take him away from me and claim him as a lethal weapon. Then he would spend the rest of his splendid life in Cancun- lucky bastard- and leave me alone in Dallas with his knife-yielding twin brother Gnome. O the agony that those seconds of snickering held.
I wonder what “look at that crazy girl with a Gnome in her backpack” is in Spanish. Note to self: listen for the words “gnomo” and “loca”.