[Chefelf]

For those who know me it is common knowledge that I hate leaving the house for any reason. My ideal day would consist of waking up, having some tea, checking my email, gaming, fiddling with my computer, lunch, doing some web-surfing, having some coffee, checking my snail mail, checking my email again, dinner, creating DVDs out of ReplayTV captures and/or old VHS tapes, checking email again, forum surfing, bed. Repeat.

Nowhere in my dream day does it state that I should leave the house. There is a good reason for this. Firstly it is a matter of preference. Secondly, it can be illustrated by recounting this morning when I, stupidly, decided to leave the house.

I left the house around 9:00AM. I had a doctor's appointment at 11:00AM so I figured today was a perfect opportunity to go down to 34th Street and renew my driver's license. Originally I was planning on doing the DMV second, but if I hit it first (and got lucky with the line) I would be able to go to the doctor and with a little luck be home before 12:30.

Since September 11th New York state has decided to make renewing your driver's license just as near impossible as it can. I am shocked that the streets of New York have more than five or six cars on them at any point given the level of advanced planning necessary to renew one's license.

However, I'm nobody's fool. I spent an entire month planning for this day and there was no way anything was to pop up to stop me. I did the research and I was going to dive into this head first, my eyes unwavering from the prize.

I'm not sure how it works in other countries for all my international readers, but in America, the DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) is probably the last place anyone in this country would want to be at any time. This comes well after funeral homes, torture chambers (although the DMV probably falls under this category) and chained to the bottom of a swimming pool.

The normal thing that happens at the DMV is that you go there with copies of everything you need and then find out there's just one more thing you're missing after they make you wait in line for two hours. Having fallen victim to this trap in the past, I was ready. I checked the New York DMV website and found the insane requirements for renewing an out of state license. If you want to revel in the absurdity you can read them here.

Basically, New York State assigns point values to different documents and somehow you have to reach a total number of points to be able to prove you are who you say you are. This meant that I had to bring the following:

• My old license.
• My last pay stub.
• My checking account statement.
• A utility bill with my name and address on it.
• My health insurance card.
• A copy of the MV-44 form from New York State, filled out.
• My birth certificate (which I had to have my parents send to me).
• My social security card (which I also had to have my parents send).
• Last year's W-2 form (sent to me by my cousin/accountant/Chefelf.com member, Jeff).

So, after some organizing, I got all of this information together and today was going to be the day I finally renewed my license. As you may have figured out, this didn't quite happen as planned otherwise I wouldn't be writing this. Would I?

When I approached the desk at the DMV, I gave the woman all of my information. She peered over the mountain of documents between me and her that proved that I existed as if they weren't there and asked me for my old license. I handed this to her. She looked at if for a few minutes and said. "Hmmm. There's no issue date on this license."

"Oh?"

"Under CDL issue date it's blank."

"I know," I replied. "That's because CDL licenses are for people who drive big rigs. I don't do much of that these days."

"But there's still no issue date."

"Well, I got it in 2000."

"Sorry, but we won't be able to give you a license until you can prove that you've had this license for at least 6 months."

"Of course. Just like it stated on your website. I must have gathered all of this documentation but missed that point."

"It's not on the website."

"Oh, I know. I was being sarcastic." I left a brief pause for laughs. None came from either of us. "So what do we, and by 'we' of course I mean 'me by myself' do about this now?"

"You need to get Rhode Island to send you a copy of your driving record so we can prove you have had this license for six months."

"And none of this other paperwork can help me out," I asked, gesturing to the pile of papers that stacked so high it was preventing me from leaping over the counter as was my first instinct.

"Nope. Sorry."

"Yes. I'll bet you are."

Dejected, I returned to the frosty December air. "Well," I thought. "At least I got an early start and I would be able to go the doctor and get home even earlier. Maybe the doctor would even be able to see me early and I could return home where the evils of the world could not get me."

So I took the subway uptown and arrived at my doctor's office a full hour early. When I went up to the reception window there was a woman who was furious with the secretary because apparently she made an appointment for today and the doctor who she made the appointment with was not in. After a few minutes of arguing she stormed away in a rage and I approached the desk.

"Heh, heh," I said to the receptionist. "Must suck to be that lady."

"Tell me about it!" The receptionist laughed. I laughed with her. We both laughed together. After about six or seven minutes of this we both got our composure and wiped the tears from our eyes as we enjoyed are shared bond of friendship.

"Anywho! My name's Nate and I have an appointment today. I'm a little early."

"Could you spell your name."

I spelled it.

"And your last name."

I spelled my last name.

"We have you down for an appointment tomorrow at 11:00PM."

"You do? Fantastic."

"Is that when you made the appointment."

"No, it was for today. I'll be at work tomorrow at 11:00AM."

"Oh. Well, I can offer you an appointment a month from now."

"Perfect. That will do nicely. That's precisely what I hoped to get out of this trip."

"No problem! Have a great day! I'm going to go back to talking with the other receptionist about my 'long' night on Saturday that caused me to sleep until 4:00PM on Sunday."

"Brilliant. You have fun with that!"

And then I left, back into the December air which felt even colder than it had before. On the positive side I was going to return home plenty early. On the negative side I had wasted almost two hours of my morning and journeyed half way across the island of Manhattan for nothing at all.

An unproductive trip like that would be likely to get most folks down, particularly because it was only the stupidity of others that had caused my morning to suck so bad. However, I wasn't about to be defeated. On my way home I stopped by the drug store right near my house and picked up a box of tissues knowing that we were almost out of tissues back at home.

I smiled to myself as I left the store. That had been my intention after all. I left the house this morning to run the simple errand of picking up some tissues. I had gotten the tissues and returned home with them. Mission accomplished.

I love it when a plan comes together.

[ion eon]

Hehehe...yah the DMV SUCKS. That was an entertaining little read it helped to pass the mindless droll of Comp Keyboarding...

[Chefelf]

Hey, on the plus side I just got the worst trojan virus my computer's ever had! I've been scanning, deleting and restarting for about three hours now! My computer's completely unusable!

Which is great because now I get to use my laptop to try to fix it. This will be great practice for my future as an IT professional!

I think I'm just going to go to bed now before anything else happens.

[Zatoichi]

Oooh if I ever find one of the bastards that write those up and sends them around, I'll kill them on the spot. Honestly, what is the point to being such an annoying menace to society. Unless you're making money, is it really that satisfying?

As for the license, I'm pretty sure the lady was full of shit and just felt like making other people's lives miserable. If you hadn't been driving for at least the last six months, then why would you need to renew your license? Maybe she just didn't feel like looking through all of that paperwork at the moment.

[Chyld]

We've got it relativly easy with driving licenses here in Blighty. You still need a huge pile of paperwork, plus a big ass form, but you post it instead. And... yeah.

[Jeff]

O boy...do you remember that time that I wanted to get one of my cars registered. The ticket that I got said estimated wait time......12 hours!!!

-Jeff

This post has been edited by Jeff: 05 December 2005 - 09:57 PM

[SimeSublime]

That's terrible. When I need to renew my license, they send out a letter with a bill at the bottom. I go to the post office, pay it there, and then go home. A new license then arrives in the mail in a couple of days. Why would you even need all that paperwork? I can't see any possible point for it.

[Zatoichi]

We call it a country run by a bunch of bueracrats who like to make things extra hard for all of the good citizens, when the bad ones just find new ways to get by laws and regulations. And when they get in trouble they just hire a good lawyer to get them out of their mess.

[WalkingCarpet]

You buy a new box of tissues, and then lose access to the internet.

Oh, sweet irony!

[Chefelf]

Well, I continue from my laptop. Currently formatting and reinstalling Windows. This was a NASTY virus. How embarrassing.

[SithAvenger]

Wow. Good I don't have to suffer through that because I live south of the U.S.A.

Anyways, what a great way to kill time Chef.

[Deepsycher]

I'd say the "Demoralisation of Motor Vehicles", a part of a scheme to cut pollution maybe?
Could this be a step forward to encourage people to drive unlicensed with a good side of generating revenue from fines.

I very rarely experience exploits, but normally I pull the drive out and search file by file on another computer that was not on at the time. The last exploits and trojans I found were through advertising scripts, until then I use a proxy server to progressively block known offender/advertising sites, not a problem since.

Curiously, what type of operating system do you use?

[Deepsycher]

Well, I did not realise the uncooperative responses to questions.
How worthwhile signing up.

Anyway must go, for now...

[Otal Nimrodi]

For your information, Deepsycher, this is a forum. It is not a chatroom. It is not IM. Your message will not be read immediately. If nobody happens to have read your message, because they're not logged on, or they don't care to read the topic at the moment, or for any other reason, they will not respond. It's as simple as that.

[Deepsycher]

This was for people signed on reading this post. I did not imply; it was chatroom, im, to be read for people offline and to expect messages to be read instantly. Just posted many and did not get a response, that is all.

Perhaps it is busy as for Christmas.