No liquids! No presents! Babies in the X-ray machine! The airport security follies don’t appear to be ending anytime soon. According to this week’s “On the Road” column in the New York Times, snow globes, long a favorite of tacky souvenir purveyors and collectors the world over, are now contraband at the airport due to restrictions on liquids and gels in carry-ons. And no, the TSA isn’t joking: “Snow globes, regardless of size of amount of liquid inside, even with documentation, are prohibited in your carry-on.” Bruce Schneier, a security expert quoted in the piece, says that the agency’s focus on minutia like this just causes a lot of unnecessary hassle, and doesn’t actually make us any “safer” (no, really?!)

“The notion that we can stop the bad guys by focusing on tactics [is] moronic. I pick a defense, you see my defense, and then you, the bad guy, decide what to do. That’s a game we can’t win. Screeners are so busy looking for liquids that they’ve missed decoy bombs in tests. We’ve defined success so weirdly. When T.S.A. takes away some frozen tomato sauce from grandmom because it might become a liquid, they think of it as a success. But that’s a failure. It’s a false alarm.”

Oh, and they also have special rules concerning monkeys (scroll down).

Previously:
– Airport Security
– Souvenirs

(Image via Vaguely Artistic’s photostream)