[New York]: How to wake up a sourdough starter

Since last weekend, I've had a sourdough rye starter (organic rye flour, water) slumbering in the refrigerator. I wanted to wake make another loaf of bread today, but wasn't sure if it would come back to life after having been in the refrigerator. So just to be sure, when I took it out of the fridge to warm up overnight, I yelled at it: "WAKE UP!" and I shook the container vigorously. It must have heard me, because this morning it was warm and bubbly and I put it in my bread dough. Heh. I'm planning to take some down to Ma in North Carolina but am a little apprehensive about the airplane - dough starters can explode if you put them in too small a container, and it would be very hard to explain why foul smelling brown stuff had exploded with a very loud noise in my luggage. Especially since I'm already on the Transportation Security Administration watchlist (a story for another time).