I had an odd experience at LAX this week.

I cleared security and went up onto the concourse with about 45 mins to kill before boarding. I was talking on my cell when I heard my name being paged: "UA is paging Mr. TakeMeToEZE -- please report to Gate XX immediately."

Thinking this really odd as I had already been upgraded and had no business with the GAs I went up to the podium to find a TSA guy and couple of police officers with a dog that wanted to speak with me. He told me that my bag had tested positive for explosive residue and therefore they had searched it. He said that while it wasn't uncommon to find some explosive residue as it apparently is found in cosmetics, my bag was "covered in it." He said the residue was coming from an Entertainment book I had in there. (?!) He asked me who gave me the Entertainment book, where it came from, etc.

He was an officious fellow but nonetheless very polite, no complaints. He did, however, say that he needed to take down all my information. He copied down my name, address, phone numbers, drivers license number, etc. because he said that "policy requires we make a report and keep your information on file."

So, is this normal? I'm not an anti-TSA guy. I've never really had a problem with the screeners and usually sympathize with them even though I sometimes agree with several posters here who have had some pretty bad incidents occur out of the ordinary. But did TSA really need to take down all my info and "keep my information on file"?

Thanks for the info.