Originally Posted by
sellener
Did I violate my initial taxi clearance by exiting taxiway to runup area?...
No.
..Did my intial taxi clearance allow me to cross back over to movement area?...
Yes.
...Is this ATC and pilots being lazy?...
You are referring to which item?
...Am I ill-informed :0)...
You are expected to know how far you are cleared to taxi when you receive a clearance, so yes if you want to be fussy about it I would say you are a little rusty on taxi procedures, but at least you had the good sense to ask ATC what to do. AOPA has free computer-based modules on its website, we all need a review every now and then.
AOPA Interactive Courses
...When I finally got short of 28L and wanted to wait two minutes after the RJ, does ATC expect me to tell them[?]...
No. They know you get two minutes, it's their job to know. However if they fail to do it for some reason (brain lapse) then you should demand the time. It's your right.
...I just figured I'd wait and call ready when I was ready? No traffic in line behind me...
One thing I do is use the airplane itself as a huge flag telling tower what I want to do. That gives them two signs rather than one. So I will wait until the last few seconds before I am ready to take off to move the airplane to the hold short line at the runway, for example. This way they see my airplane and they hear my call at the same time and put two and two together- this airplane goes with this radio call.
...I can imagine if I called "xxx holding short 28L" and then they said cleared for takeoff, and I came back with "im going to wait two minutes" they would be annoyed. Or perhaps they were expecting me to say "xxx holding short 28L" and they would tell me to wait two minutes.
You do not need to ask for the time delay. You can avoid the whole issue by waiting a little while to get to the hold short as stated above. Or you can just ask for the time if they forgot for some reason.