Then Dark Mindless Void…

Today largely writes itself. I got to spend an hour or so in the Department of Motor Vehicles licencing (DMV) office in Everett. It was time to renew my driving license, and for a number of reasons I had to do it in person this time.

For my non-American friends a Washington State drivers licence expires every five years. At that time I have to go in person, take an eye test and have a new photo taken. This compares to my British drivers license that expires in 2039, it was issued in 1987 and does not expire until I’m 70. It did make life very interesting when I once tried to cash travellers checks with it many years ago and the guy looked for the expiration date on my license.

I think it’s one of those things we all dread, but is a necessary evil that has to be taken care of every five years. I can think of other things the initials DMV can stand for, Dark Mindless Void comes immediately to mind, it’s a government office and typically not some where one typically goes for fun.

Before heading over I checked the queue times on the web, it said 8 minutes. It will come as no surprise that when I got there 15 minutes later I was number 37 in the queue. They were serving number 9 in the renewal line…

It’s a busy place, there were a lot of people in there, and being Everett there was some great people watching.

I did not have a book so pulled out my phone and started playing Angry Birds to pass the time (Number 10…). I’ve yet to find anything that passes time like Angry Birds, it’s scary how many times I say “Just one more then I’ll roll over and go to sleep.”

There was a low hum of activity and background noise in the room when suddenly there is a kid screaming, with the dial turned up to 11. There is a rather unhappy looking mother trying to get the kid to quieten down, The screamer (Kid-1) turns to his little bother and wallops him (as an older brother I understand this). Now Kid-2 is adding to the noise.

Mum momentarily forgets where she is and yells “Stop it now or I will hit you!”.

For a moment the entire room is silent (Number 11…”), then mum suddenly understands where she is, and that there are 100 people staring at her. She goes bright red, and starts staring at the floor.

There are moments when I love living here, Everett has all sorts. To end my story, I got what I needed, it took a lot longer than 8 minutes and I look like a total knuckle dragger in my new photo.