According to the Constitution, neither chamber of Congress may adjourn for more than three days without permission of the other. Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, did not seek a resolution of adjournment this week, because he knew that the House would not go along, lest President Obama grab the opportunity for a recess appointment of any of the many nominees being blocked by Senate Republicans. (It is also likely that Mr. Reid felt no need to highlight his members’ desire to go home.)

“The use of pro forma sessions to block recess appointments is a very recent development,” said Katherine Scott, an assistant historian for the United States Senate Historical Office. “Republicans threatened it with President Clinton in the 1990s, but didn’t use it. Senator Reid was the first to declare, in 2007, that the Senate would hold pro forma sessions to block recess appointments.”

During the pro forma sessions, which generally last from several seconds to a few minutes, no legislation can be transacted without unanimous consent of the kind that Mr. Reid worked out to break the impasse over the F.A.A. The job of handling the gavel generally goes to a member who lives in a nearby state, often someone of low seniority.

On Friday, the gavel was in the hands of Senator Benjamin L. Cardin, Democrat of Maryland, while Senator Jim Webb, Democrat of Virginia, held the floor. Mr. Webb brought up the aviation bill, H.R. 2553, and asked for passage. Mr. Cardin, acting as president pro tempore, asked if anyone objected. (Insert sound of crickets here.) Seconds later, Mr. Cardin swung his tiny gavel and closed up shop.

Things were barely more complex over at the House, which conducted roughly eight minutes of business on Friday. There was the Pledge of Allegiance to be said — largely by a gaggle of pages and a smattering of tourists in the gallery — the reading of a resignation letter from David Wu, the Oregon Democrat who left the House last week in a sex scandal, and a message from Mr. Obama concerning the signing of the debt ceiling bill. Then, Representative Andy Harris, a Maryland Republican in his first term, banged the gavel and called it a day.