Beware Licensed Blind Drivers!
Yesterday’s adventure at the Easthampton Registry of Motor Vehicles consisted of two hours’ sitting on a wooden bench specifically designed to damage lumbar vertebrae, not to mention how unmentionably uncomfortable my scleral lens is. Oh, and I’d be remiss in not mentioning that the saline inside the lens clouds up after two hours. But there were people there from Springfield with smiles on their faces because as bad as the Easthampton Registry is, it ain’t nothin’ compared to the hellhole that is the Springfield Registry.
Uncomfortable enough, but I also felt like I was participating in a mass psychology experiment with their new deli-style take-a-number and wait-to-be-called system. There were six different categories of numbers, A thru F, and the LED board that displayed the next to be served had everyone staring in the same direction at the same time like baby birds watching mommy for lunch cues. It’s been ten years since I was last in a registry and the depths to which the service has fallen had me thinking I was in an Orwell book.
I wound up passing the eye test, mostly because that has been dumbed-down too and now consists only of reading a single line of letters (which was still pretty hard for me) and distinguishing 4 colored numbers from different-colored backgrounds (which was wicked easy). But $50 for all that!?!
I’m just glad it’s over and I get to retain my license. The current policy is that you can renew online every other period, so I don’t have to do this again until I’m 50. I can’t wait to see how inhumane and Eastern Bloc the process is going to be in 2020.
And I’ll be eligible for dreaded jury duty again this coming October…
Why the hell have I been so neurotic and long-winded about this license renewal? Maybe my subconscious is telling me that I need to start writing again.
Man Recombining
Uncomfortable enough, but I also felt like I was participating in a mass psychology experiment with their new deli-style take-a-number and wait-to-be-called system. There were six different categories of numbers, A thru F, and the LED board that displayed the next to be served had everyone staring in the same direction at the same time like baby birds watching mommy for lunch cues. It’s been ten years since I was last in a registry and the depths to which the service has fallen had me thinking I was in an Orwell book.
I wound up passing the eye test, mostly because that has been dumbed-down too and now consists only of reading a single line of letters (which was still pretty hard for me) and distinguishing 4 colored numbers from different-colored backgrounds (which was wicked easy). But $50 for all that!?!
I’m just glad it’s over and I get to retain my license. The current policy is that you can renew online every other period, so I don’t have to do this again until I’m 50. I can’t wait to see how inhumane and Eastern Bloc the process is going to be in 2020.
And I’ll be eligible for dreaded jury duty again this coming October…
Why the hell have I been so neurotic and long-winded about this license renewal? Maybe my subconscious is telling me that I need to start writing again.
Man Recombining