The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

Yes, I really did pay money for this

I'm in the Ancestral Homeland on a my last-ditch effort to maintain American Airlines Platinum status for 2016. If that sounds bizarre and pointless to you, then you have some empathy for the UK Border Force agent who interviewed me for fifteen minutes this morning.

Usually my UK entry interviews are about ninety seconds. I'm here four times a year, I always go home, and...well, that's basically all they've ever been concerned about. Until today, for the 23 years I've been visiting the UK, I have never had any trouble entering the country.

Today, however, we went several rounds on the theme "wait, you paid money to come here for one day?" Yes. I really did. I needed 6,149 elite-qualifying miles to keep my status, and the round-trip from Chicago to London is 7,906. Plus, it's London, a city I love dearly and would live in if circumstances and HM Customs and Immigration allowed.

So, I'm in, and I have a new note in my Border Force dossier now that includes things like, I have £99 in my pocket, and no official reason to be in the UK other than tourism. This may have an impact on my Registered Traveler application, which may now be rejected. The Border Force website says tourism is a totally valid reason for Registered Traveler status; but the agent in booth 34 this morning disagrees.

It's sad, really, because so far for the last 25 years all I've ever done in the UK is spend money and return home a few days later. Of course, I'll still visit, but who likes being rejected?

Reading list

Stuff to read (or watch):

Back to the mines.

That's the ballgame

With Labour trailing behind both the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, the Prime Minister today committed what may be the worst gaffe by a politician in modern British history:

And then – the journey into the car – the microphone left on…

"You should never have put me with that woman, whose idea was that, it's just ridiculous ... she's just a bigoted woman."

When the broadcasters catch up with her Mrs Duffy takes a while to understand what happened, but when she does, the nation sees the shock on her face.

“I’m very upset. He's an educated person ... and I'm an ordinary woman just asking him just questions like anyone would ask him ... I want to know why, with those comments I said there, why I was called a bigot.”

The moral is, of course, don't get into the car with a Sky microphone still attached to your lapel. More from the Times blog.

Did I mention I'd vote Lib-Dem this time if I were a UK citizen?