Thursday, August 10, 2006

Warning! Rant in Session




Can you say Pissed Off? I can. I had to renew my driver’s license, which I could have done by mail or internet. However, I also have to change my address and that can’t be done online or via mail apparently. So, this morning I went to the DMV. Or I tried.

Knowing that there is always a line out the door at the DMV for its 8:00 O’clock opening, I got up at 7:00 this morning and was there by 7:30. Only to find a sign in the window that they had moved to a new location. Sigh.

It took me forty minutes to find the new location, which turned out to be just half a mile from my apartment. By that time there was a...line out the door. I waited. I waited some more. I finally got to the receptionist who gave me a number and put me in the “Express” line. Yeah!

But wait. I was #032 and I sat while they called 028, 029, 030, 031, in short order. Then stillness set in. They called a bunch of other numbers for other, non-express lines, but no 032. I waited almost 30 minutes, at which point a man hollers for our attention and announces that the DMV’s computers are shut down across the entire state. There’s no sense in waiting but we can come back another day. Over two and a half hours down the drain and I’ll just have to do it again tomorrow. Yes, I’m not a happy camper.

2 comments:

Eric Paul said...

You experienced what I call getting "caught in the wheel". This form of absurdity is rampant now in the Crescent Critter, which is why I sometimes hate to leave the house for fear of winding up on the treadmill of the excrement of the bovine. To put it another way, I hate having someone or some institution suck away my time with their ineptitude. Whew!

cs harris said...

I love the DMV. When I moved here from Australia, they wouldn't give me a license based on my old Aussie license because I'd previously had a license in the States. Seems that situation requires either the old state's license, or if that is no longer available, a letter from the police of that state testifying to the fact that one is a good driver. Unfortunately, I'd been out of the country for twenty years, and all states purge their records after ten years ( I found this out after calling Texas, Colorado, and Idaho and hanging on hold for untold hours).

I ended up spending the better part of three days at the DMV, and after all kinds of arguments and cajolery, being told I could get a license if I took an actual DRIVING test. When my number was finally called, there came a clap of thunder and it started pouring. Of course, the DMV doesn't give driving tests in the rain...