The Boy on Top
Well you'll be back home soon. Back to good old Blighty 
With all the time delays you'd have probably been quicker on the train!
Next time I'll know better. TB
An immigration official in Dallas, Texas, made me cry once. I used to love air travel. Now I avoid it whenever possible.
Hey! We'll be in Boston on Saturday. I wonder if we'll pass by each other, and not even know it?
Probably not I'm afraid, as I'll be safe and sound at home by then! TB
"I won't ever complain about Heathrow again." Which goes to show, I guess, that no matter how bad you think you have it, someone else has it worse.
And is this a good or a bad thing?
(And what is the origin of the term "Blighty" for England?)
I think that officially classifies as a "thing". Neither good nor bad, it just is. However, it is not an infinite connection. Somewhere there is a poor sod to whom no one else has it worse. He's the one to really pity...
"Blighty" actually goes back to the British Raj. It is a Hindustani word (for "Foreigner", and the Brits, on taking over India, adopted it for their own when all the locals called then "Bilati". TB
OTT on security -- or the facade of the security at least.
Facade is the word. Is x-raying my shoes REALLY going to stop a determined bomber? There are better less instrusive ways of detecting posion, like a cute little well trained dog... TB
Laura.
I believe it was used a lot by soliders in WW1, but I may have to go check on Wiki...
A bit earlier than that, blame the Indians... 
TB
I did look it up and come back to say that it started in the Raj but The Boy beat me too it.
Please tell me you had to look that up and didn't know it off the top of your head.....
Uhmm, I went and checked the Hindi transliteration, but I have one of those minds filled with useless background info. Can't remember where I learned this, but when I first moved to the UK I always annoyed people asking about the background of words I hadn't heard before. TB
I'd heard it before, but had no idea of the etymology. My grandfather served in the RAF and would occasionally use the term, always while puffing at an imaginary walrus moustache and putting on a gouty-old-colonel kind of accent. Which amused we (Canadian) grandchildren no end, though we had NO idea what he was on about.
You used the term, I had a flashback to my childhood, and saw an opportunity to get to the bottom of it. And you came through in spades!
Grandad also served on "the Northwest Frontier" before WWII, as it happens.
Commenting by HaloScan
