excess baggage

Noun

excess baggage (uncountable)

1. (literally) Luggage which exceeds the allowable size or weight (as for an airline flight or train trip), and for which an extra fee must therefore be paid.
   • Watch your weight: Excess baggage is damaging to the wallet. Airlines charge typically from $20 to $30 a kilogram.2003 August 29, Roger Collis, “Frequent Traveler: Send blues packing”, in New York Times, retrieved 20 Jun 2013
2. (idiomatic) Something or someone not needed or not wanted; something or someone of little use or importance; something or someone considered burdensome.
   • Come on, you dog-gone, bullnecked, beetlebrowed, hogjowled, peanutbrained, weaseleyed four flushers, false alarms and excess baggage!1922 February 2, James Joyce, “[Episode 14]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company […], →OCLC
   • Exiles and refugees . . . are likely to find the old ways and old language excess baggage, especially if their adopted homeland is the U.S., where the race is to the swift and the adaptable.1976 Dec. 6, Paul Gray, "Books: Book of Changes" (review of The Woman Warrior by Maxine Hong Kingston), Time
3. (idiomatic) A dubious or unhelpful mental outlook, emotional disposition, or personal history.
   • A chin-whiskered man in Walla-Walla, carrying a line of hope as excess baggage, had grubstaked us.c. 1905, O. Henry, The Handbook of Hymen
   • The Pirates entered the season lugging no one's expectations as excess baggage.1996 April 8, Murray Chass, “On Baseball: An Early Lesson on Expectation vs. Reality”, in New York Times, retrieved 20 Jun 2013