Civil liberty / I can't see to pay a fee

I wandered quite happily around the Intrepid Air Museum, killing an hour or two and indulging my closet fixation for old military aircraft. It was, as it always has been, quite a buzz to be surrounded by these design wonders, especially when the folks who pick the aircraft clearly seem to go for the quirky and unusual over the obvious.

I even managed to smile and mentally cast aside the three older Texan women who were saying to each other, quite loudly, that this would all come to an end soon, as Obama was gonna shut'em down and pal around with terrorists or words of that ilk.

But I wondered why the funny looks, from more than a few, especially those guys with the be-badged veterans hats that you alway see at these sorts of establishments. The guys who put USMC (Ret) on their title and keep on saluting each other, rather sadly, for decades after they were honourably discharged.

Then I went into the washroom and saw my hat in the mirror. Communist Chinese headwear, complete with a big embroidered red star, is probably fairly rare in an American cold war and military museum.

Still, I finally made it into a Concorde