Next time my dearest friend asks me to deliver something to a Feral office, I must remember to say no.
I had my state-issued annotated portrait in my pocket, and was resolved not to bother the Marshal at the gate this time with silly questions about the purpose, if any, of asking me to show it.
Halfway there I noticed a knife in my pocket, but no sweat; last time I went to the Federal Building in San Francisco, they simply put my knife aside and gave it back when I left.
But this was Oakland. “You have to leave that in your car.” “My car is twenty miles away!” “You can’t bring a knife onto Federal property.” . . .
I should explain that the Ronald V. Dellums Federal Building in Oakland consists of two towers with a semi-open rotunda between. My objective was in the south tower; the “security” gate is at the entrance to that tower from the rotunda.
Two men were loitering in the rotunda, apparently setting up some Halloween thing. I asked one, “Will you be here for a few minutes?” He consented to hold my knife; but that wasn’t good enough for the security-bot, because the helpful man was still standing on Federal property.
So I went home, mission abandoned.
I wonder why the badge-bot didn’t arrest me for my willful failure to comply. At least then I might have eventually encountered someone human enough to deliver the envelope for me.
Maybe I’d be more comfortable under a more openly corrupt state, where evasion is a way of life.
And now I think maybe it was the County courthouse, not the Feral building, that held my knife for me.