Monday, December 1, 2008

The worst thing about turning 30 so far...

is going to the DMV to renew your license!

I used some vacation time this afternoon to go renew my license, heeding the warning in the paper that, in simple terms, if I let it expire I'd regret it. Not sure what the consequences would be, but I didn't want to find out.

As I left my house, I was already in a bad mood after flashing back to last Friday - a day that was perfect to complete this task - when I turned the corner and was amazed at how empty the parking lot was, until the guy in the car in front of me informed me that they were closed until Monday. Of course they were.

When I turned the corner, I saw that the main and overflow parking lots were both full, and people were waiting idly for a parking space to open up. This was going to be fun. I finally found a space, and walked in to find about 5 of the ~100 chairs unoccupied, but for one reason or another, none of those 5 appealed to me, so I got my number (another annoyance) and sat in the back, leaning on a counter.

My number was A007, and as I scanned the 9 (out of 20) open windows, I noticed that they were only on A090, not to mention the B's, C's, D's, E's, and F's that were in front of me. They called a couple of A's but then nothing. 30 minutes later, still no progress for the A's. Other letters were progressing nicely.

So, you're thinking "Didn't you take anything with you to occupy your time and keep you sane?" Well, yes I did. I brought New Moon with me, but didn't feel like reading, because I didn't want to miss my chance for people-watching. In hindsight, good decision.

The 5 open seats must have been just as unappealing to the people behind me, as they remained open while I was standing there. However, as people were called to their windows, their seats were almost instantly taken by someone else. One time, a guy got up and immediately turned around (not sure why he got up, maybe he thought he heard his number) to find his seat taken. He was not happy about it! He said nothing to the man who took his seat, just stood over him for a few seconds, looking at him like your dad looks at you when you've disappointed him - you know the one! There may have been a hand gesture but no words. Eventually he just walked away and leaned up against the wall - he also found that better than those 5 empty seats.

I spent most of the 84 minutes of waiting observing the family next to me. The mom had 2 daughters with her - Madison and Brooke (I know the names from her scolding the older one because she had to pee and there were too many people there for her to go by herself and the name written on the sippy cup of the younger one, who repeatedly dropped mom's keys on the ground to get a laugh out of her older sister) - and her other 2 children, Elizabeth and Ethan, were with her in spirit. Elizabeth was at home working on a maze project that mom thought wasn't due until March, but apparently it's due soon because mom wasn't happy that the wood in the garage wasn't good enough, and that she wanted new wood. Not sure what Ethan's deal was. I'm not a stalker, this is just what I gathered from my perch.

Once my number was finally called, I was out of there within minutes. Then I went to Target to get some stocking stuffers for Dave, and came home to watch "John Adams." Awesome if you have 7+ hours of free time and like semi-accurate historical drama.

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