"smoke free" torture travel... for 1500$ a ticket!

going through "security" in the monroe airport, some weasel faced, reba mcintire looking, TSA cow took my zippo lighter [which i could carry on before!] - which was the beginning of my travel rage, before i ever set foot on the plane! travel into and out of america has become so paranoid and ridiculous; nowhere else in the world do people have to go through all the crap that they have to to enter/leave there. i expect everyone will have to be strip/cavity searched, or fly nude, in the near future.

mercifully, i had 2 seats to myself, got a seatbelt extension so i could strecth out, and slept all the way from atlanta until about an hour and 1/2 from zurich. i woke and had some of what passed for breakfast.
arriving in zurich... the 1st thing i saw when i got off the plane [before having to walk 1000 miles or go through customs and baggage claim- as we have to do in the USA] was a nice clean smoking lounge [unlike the nasty one they keep hidden in the bowels of the atlanta airport]. i thought to myself, "how civilized" -but then i always think that whenever i arrive in Switzerland. all the people inside were talking about how ridiculous the over all non-smoking and security scenario was/is in america. here, you de-plane, go through passport control, show your passport, get your luggage, and go out... with NO crapola. again... "how civilized" ...

after smoking, i went through passport control, got my luggage and went [as i always do] to this little cafe [above] for immediate good coffee. another smoking booth is to the right... it used to all be totally open- but ever since america started the non-smoking bullshit, europe has followed suit. whatever america does, the rest of the world eventually does... unfortunately.

[above: jackie and i in the smoking booth- shot by an anonymous smoker]

jacqueline met me and we loaded my luggage into the Jaguar and drove to Zug, where i had my 1st gig. the shot below is outside from the city


driving back we got stuck in a huge traffic jam close to the gotthard tunnel... traffic was backed up for miles. everyone is on holiday here and many were headed south or to italy. mercifully the Jag has a/c. we went through solothurn [below] - unfortunately there was a bridge hiding most of the shot... so i cropped it.


i brought my small digital camera with me this trip, after finding out it can use either 110 or 220 electricity. so, this makes the whole foto- blog thing much easier. there again, i also brought 3 plastic 35mm cameras, my old 210 polaroid, and had several russian and german cameras here. i also bought several more at the 'brockenstube'/brocante saturday: yet another agfa 120 film camera, and a polaorid for 5 chf [maybe 3$]= cool.

[c] 2007 doug duffey