August 28th, 2012.

Just admiring my bathroom.

I’ve now been at an MVA for about three hours. This is after having been at my first MVA for two hours only to be informed I need a copy of my father’s death certificate in order to complete my transaction. This wasn’t mentioned online in the instructions for what I was doing. This was not mentioned to my mother when SHE went to do this a month ago (rather, she was given another form that had to be notarized by someone in the PG County courts system). I called my mother who has informed me that a) she’s not giving ANOTHER copy of my father’s death certificate because b) they’ve got one on file… and I’m hoping this is true. There seems to be no way to find out in advance of waiting in line for another couple of hours, this time at the MVA my mother regularly uses in the theory that IF it’s actually “filed” some place, THIS is where it will be filed!

And so my number, C71, languishes somewhere in the future. C66 has just been called, but from previous experience even within a given alphabetical group they don’t call them in any particular order. They’ve just called K18. Isn’t that the Widowmaker or something?

Happy nine year anniversary at the Electric Maid! Rowan was in North Carolina for family stuff, but we had a guest Bruce on violin to help us celebrate 9 years since that fateful day… I was pretty nervous about the show initially, but we played to a packed house, standing room only in the back, great sound and great time. The recording is in danger of becoming a Live release!

I hate beaurocracy – so much that I don’t think I can even spell it correctly. I feel that red tape is mostly a way of dotting all your i’s and crossing all your t’s for the lowest common denominator of intelligence. I understand it as necessary – Hell, without it I’D screw things up too – but when it’s ineffective, at cross purposes and generally contrary I think there’s nothing else that angers me more.

Man – this is crazy. It’s Acacia Sears’ last Teavolve open mic… she’s turning it over to me for an undefined (possibly permanent) time because of pregnancy, broken wrist and general exhaustion. This was her last night at the reins and I tried to get a feel for what I was like to change and what I was like to leave the same…. first warning flag? I need another vocal mic!

Working for Fujitsu, our objective was the creation of paperless offices. It’s not an unrealistic goal – and beyond that it’s an ADMIRABLE goal making things much easier to search through, easier to track, faster to do ANYTHING with, easier to copy, transfer and backup.

And many of the things the government could view as a good cost-cutting measure – the computerization and cross-connecting (C67 – maybe they WILL be in order?!?!) of all of our databases would make a lot of Lives easier, decrease a lot of frustration, make a lot of things smoother. People drag their heels because a) it’d cost money, b) it’d mean CHANGE and c) let’s not even discuss privacy concerns caused by one hand knowing what the OTHER hand is doing!

In any case – I’m mostly ranting to pass the time. I don’t remember the last time I felt the mind-blinding SPIKE OF RAGE that occurred earlier this afternoon when, after waiting for hours, after having been told to go through the fucking line AGAIN because I’d filled out paper work according to the online instructions and not how they “do things here”, after being told I needed a piece of paper that my mother had expressly been told I WOULDN’T need – one that might be very, very difficult for me to get – after having wasted the entire trip up to that point (C68!) (sir, using the Emergency Broadcast System noise as your ringtone is DUMB) (boo – C63) – I almost flipped out. I ground my teeth – I checked myself and expressed that I was sorry that I’d raised my voice. Yeah, I don’t remember the last time I was that angry. 

I apologized for asking if she wanted to see a photograph of the damned corpse, because I believed I might have one on me.

Ahem. In any case – here I am again, growling at the process and knowing that this facility would have more workers, less-stressed employees, and shorter lines except that about 50% of the nation would view that as an expansion of government’s reach.

Wow. These seats are just about as uncomfortable as they come.

The mission began at 10.55am with me dropping Kristen off at HMT and continues with me sitting on my ass at 2.55pm… I think it’s funny how people dress up to come to the MVA. I guess those are the ones getting their pictures taken.

(still searching for K18….)

Sigh.

(C69 and C70 in close succession)

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