I CAN DRIVE!!!

Well, I can drive between 5am and 11pm in this state with a licensed driver aged 21 or older in the front seat….but still, I can drive.

Our DMV, as a tribute to inefficient bureaucracy, is only open on Thursdays…and I have heard rumors of Saturdays, but I have also heard that this applies only to road tests and then only depending on where you live. What it means in effect is that everyone in the entire county has to get their licenses, permits, road tests, photos, and what have you on that one day. I waited in line (with mom and Sophie who are my new role models) for THREE HOURS to take a test that took me about five minutes.

I only got one wrong, and it was something I don’t plan to use about what the penalty is for your first offense of underage drinking.

This is my tribute to:

• The lovely woman with the cornrows in front of us who turned sixty in January and has two daughters who don’t drive
• The woman who lived in New Jersey, where everything is more efficient, and needs glasses
• The woman who didn’t go with Geico because they wanted  to charge her something ridiculous for insurance
• The vet from NYC who has a second home in Oregon and a pickup truck
• The man who can make figure eights on half a basketball court on his motorcycle
• The other man with the mustache who can do the same thing only better
• The first man’s wife Megan, who was getting her motorcycle permit
• The girl whose birth certificate had her name misspelled
• The girl whose examiner gave her the test and then went to lunch before he graded it
• The woman who used to go to school in the DMV building…her classroom was underneath Joey’s.
• The two women who spent half an hour discussing the better neighborhoods of the Bronx and Queens
• Mike the DMV employee
• The person who called Mike on the phone and asked him whether the DMV did driving school (no ma’am we do not…you should look in your yellow pages….well ma’am you should look under D for driving school and i’m sure there will be some addresses….no i don’t have a yellow pages right here so i can’t look for you….yes…that is correct…yellow pages…i don’t know ma’am, you need to get out your yellow pages and look under D…yes, D for DRIVING school…yes, it’s alphabetical….yes….you’re welcome…)
• The two women who were being too nice to each other and kept making the other go first in the photo line, thereby holding the whole thing up
• And the man who didn’t complain about his photo, thereby speeding the whole process along.

They all congratulated me when I passed, and I felt like I should ask for their emails.

And my favorite quote….”If someone got a little stall with beer and pretzels, they could make a fortune!”