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Yours portly has been flying more frequently, which is out of character for me.  My older brother lives in Indianapolis, and I’ve flown up there twice this year so far for various events (and will do so a third time this summer).

Between the two trips, I’ve somehow set off TSA’s full body scanner three times.  No, dear reader, yours portly is not some kind of chaos agent attempting to smuggle more than three ounces of shampoo into the airport.  For some reason, my manly area is setting off the scanner.

At first I thought it was the pants I was wearing.  I wear these Member’s Mark mason pants (just $15 a pair at Sam’s Club!) and they have a brass (or some similar metal) button above the zipper.  I figured those were setting off the scanner.

So on the way home from Indy, I wore a pair of shorts with a plastic button.  Surely, I thought, I’d be immune from setting off the scanner, but I set it off nonetheless.

Is it the zipper?  We’ve all heard of microplastics; are there micrometals?  Is my personal area full of tiny particles of metal?

Regardless of why I keep setting off these scanners, let me explain to you, dear reader, what it is like to be fondled by Uncle Sam.

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