No, Plant fans, it’s not what you think – we are saying happy birthday to the zeppelin aircraft – you know, the blimp.

And the reason is, it carried the first paying passengers in the air back in 1909 so it officially gets credit for being the first air travel conveyance – plus, because it is now 2009, that means all this happened 100 years ago which is a nice, round anniversary-type number – so you, dear readers, get a post out of it.

By the way, this was not cheap travel: a jaunt from Duesseldorf to Lucerne set one back about $1,860 in today’s dollars, but that wouldn’t have been a problem for that lady who’s sure all that glitters is gold.

Goodness gracious, weren’t we just talking about the Snoopster and his penchant for airport hijinks?

Well, it’s happened again – at Beirut International. Seems, rapper Snoop Dogg was there, heading out after a concert in Lebanon, when he was stopped by security.

Mr. Dogg was wearing a necklace of old bullet casings – no, no, it’s not what you think – this is the latest thing from a company called Bullets 4 Peace, which sells artistic ammo pieces (like the one at left – price: $275). Some of the money is said to go to charity but I don’t know how much or to what charities (though the site does feature a logo for one of Madonna’s pet causes).

Anyway, hard to believe, but bullets are still no laughing matter in Lebanon, so there was a bit of an “issue” and the Doggalator’s necklace was confiscated.

Wonder why a guy with his airport history doesn’t just break down and get a private plane?

You probably heard about this: Scott Weiland of the reconstituted Stone Temple Pilots was flying from LA to Miami last week (no private jet – it was an American Airlines flight) when, he had a seizure.

His folks have tried to downplay it, but it was serious enough for American to make an unscheduled stop in Dallas and have the frontman taken to a hospital.

But he proved his resilience – yet again – when he was back performing 24 hours later.

All the reports noted that Weiland has “a history of seizures”. Ah.

Nice story on the Beatles in the Los Angeles Times today – which reminds us that they began touring America 45 years ago.

Tempus fugit.

One of the things I liked best about the piece is the photo – there are the boys in front of an old Pan Am plane (a Pan Am Boeing 707-321 to be precise). Notice John clutching his little Pan Am bag – the sort of thing airlines used to give away as part of their, ahem, customer service.

Well, Pan Am as an entity lasted a little longer than the Fab Four did – it wouldn’t collapse until 1991. But the airline lives on, in movies like the early James Bond films, “2001″, “Scarface” and “Catch Me If You Can”.

Oh, and don’t worry about the boys – I understand their music is still doing pretty well.

Asher Roth may love college, but he also loves playing superhero – or so it would seem. In January, he participated in detaining a man who made a bomb threat on Roth’s plane.

Then there was Coolio, he of the Grammy award-winning “Gangsta’s Paradise” – according to TMZ, the singer was busted last week at LAX for allegedly having crack cocaine on his person.

Roth was on Delta, Coolio on Southwest.

I’m sure it doesn’t matter — heck, with all the cheap airfare sales going on now, I imagine they both got a fine deal.

Actually, it was 50-years ago yesterday since the plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, 22, the Big Bopper, 28, and Richie Valens, 17 (plus the poor pilot who nobody remembers – for the record, he was 21 year old Roger Peterson).

All of which was memorialized by Don McLean in “American Pie”.

Which reminds me: Blender magazine has a list of the 10 worst rock & roll plane crashes – see it here.

Such a waste – or, as Blender put it: “What is it about famous musicians that makes them believe it’d be a swell idea to charter a small, unreliable aircraft through inclement weather?“

I dunno, but we still miss you, Buddy. All you guys.

This is depressing.

Ever since Travis Barker and DJ AM were injured in that horrific plane crash that killed 4 of their associates, internetistas have been putting together THE LIST.

That would be the list of other music types who died in aviation accidents.

You know — Richie Valens, Buddy Holly, Jim Croce, Otis Redding…we’ve been down this road before.

But, doesn’t make it any less sad…

Not many know this, but some airports have “theme songs”. Los Angeles International Airport, for example, has the cleverly named, “LA International Airport”, a country hit back in 1971 (hum along with me: “LA International Airport, where the big jet engines roar…”)

Ooh, the goose-bumps! Anyway, this was the subject of a snappy article in USA Today. And it got me to thinking…

Help me out here, people. Let’s find airport homes for The Who’s “Won’t Get Fooled Again”, Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb”, Tom Petty’s “Free Fallin’”, and the Rolling Stones’ “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction”, “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” and “Paint it Black”.

Clearly, Jagger & Co. have spent some time in airports.