Just be sure you take what you'll need out of your Jacket and put it in your shirt pocket before you leave the house!

I've got two "Dumb Shidt" stories for you, hope you can learn from my mistakes!

DS story 1: I'm flying MD-11 F/O, it's my first trip in March (1998ish) and I've got my jacket on, forgot to leave it at home, but when I get to the lounge the other guys say, "Hey, it's March! We don't need to wear our jackets." so I leve mine in the commuter room and we head off to Narita.

Well we didn't need pasports to get into Narita in those days, so I was not even aware that I didn't have mine, until we came home and I'm filling out my customs form as we taxi into ATL...and then the light in my head comes on...NO PASSPORT!! It's in my JACKET!

Well, as luck would have it, we parked at E5, right above the pilot lounge back door to the ramp. As soon as the jetway is hooked up, I look around for customs guys, seeing none, I hot foot it down the stairs and started banging on the door, until someone opened it, then ran in and got my passport, ran back up the stairs to the jet and proceded as normal. None the worse for it, but a close call!

OK, I'll never do that again: Which leads to DS story #2:

LAST WEEK...It was early March, and I said, "Oh thank God I don't need the Jacket!" so off I go for my commute flight up to ATL and as I'm nearing MCO (after driving 90 minutes) I realize...my ID IS ON MY JACKET!! DAMIT!!!

No time to go back home and get it, (3 hours round trip) so I call the CPSC, tell them about it, they sent a message to the gate of my commuter flight to ATL and I was able to get on the jumpseat without it...but the Security Clown at the Employee Parking wouldn't let me into the lot! Rat Bastard! I had to go to the Blue lot and pay $30 to park!!

I got past the MCO TSA with my driver's license and when I got to ATL they already had my new ID waiting for me. The old one was going to expire soon so they already had a new one made up.

So...if you are going to ditch your jacket, be sure you take your passport out of the breast pocket and unclip your ID from the lapel!

Sucks getting old...the first thing to go is your memory and the second thing is....

Oh, and for you whipper snappers out there laughing at the old farts, remember, nobody's getting any younger, so here's the 3 rules for when you get older, as told to me by an Old Fart back when I was a Baby Pilot:

1. Never trust a Fart
2. Never walk by a bathroom
3. Never waste a hard-on, even if you're alone

Words to live by.