No Ordinary Evil

I went to the DMV today. I got my learner's permit. Again. Yeah. Three years of driving practice isn't quite enough for this depth-perception deprived girlie. A fourth round seems called for. I'm not sure I'll ever be comfortable with driving, but crying every time I arrive at a destination seems impractical. Gotta get that under control.

Mum and I got there at about 8:30 am. We left at 11:30. THREE HOURS. What kind of absurdity is this? Three hours?? There's something fishy going on here.

First, the system is incredibly slow. The people there seem to be working at half speed. They seem to wander around in between helping customers for no apparent reason.

Second, given the population of the surrounding area and the small number of things that have to be done in an actual DMV office (as opposed to the internet or over the phone), there should not be that many people in there. They're open 40 hours a week and there are always 100 people in there. How is this possible? We probably go to the DMV once every year and that's only because us kids are all permit/license age. Before that, we never went to the DMV. Maybe every five years. So how is there always a line that's hours and hours long? ALWAYS. They must hire people to just clog up the lines.

As I sat there, waiting for my number to get called, I had a thought. I leaned over and whispered in my Italian Mama's ear, "This must be what Hell is like." She stifled a laugh. It's true and she knows it. An inefficient system, zombie-like people who don't relate to the customers as human beings, lots of paperwork... time stretches like... salt-water taffy, for lack of a better metaphor.

By the time I actually took the test (2 hours after we got there), which only took me about 5 minutes to complete, people were leaving for lunch. So the same person was setting up tests and correcting them. There were 30 tests in the basket and no one correcting them. It took an hour for someone to look at my test and give me my fourth permit. Ridiculous. Dumb. Inane. What is the world coming to?

So now, all I have to do is learn how to drive. Ha! Or move to Europe where they have an excellent public transportation system. At this point, that seems like a more realistic course of action.