"I thought you said vision test. Let me take it again."
Today I had an epic adventure trying to get my Minnesota drivers license finally – a building source of stress over the last 6 months.
The Wisconsin ID I had since 2001, was set to expire on my birthday next week. Granted, I have known about this for years, but I only started looking into it a month ago – at which point I discovered I would need to take a written test since I am getting a MN ID for the first time. Two weeks ago I started looking to see if there were practice tests. The state didn’t seem to offer anything.. including a general list of laws. I did however find this site, which had a few freebie tests. In the mean time, my friend told me of the horrors he experienced trying to get his MN ID and offered up a couple examples of the harder questions. This got me really nervous since the free practice tests contained really obvious questions. As such, I bit the bullet and bought the 100 question test for $15 via that site. I took it a handful of times until I aced it. However, the questions from my friend still scared me since they were not covered in the practice tests.
Anywho, I decided that today after work I would hit the DMV and take the test. Before lunch, I was browsing the DMV site and discovered that I would need my birth certificate in addition to either my old ID or my social security card. For some reason, I thought I only needed my old ID and my SS card. So, I called my mom to see if she had it and ended up leaving a message. Yarg! So, I knew that I was born in St. Paul (store below) so I looked up how to get my Ramsey County birth certificate. As it turned out I could walk in and “take care of it”.
So I attempted to do all this on my lunch break. I zipped over to downtown St. Paul with Arika to the office I need to get my cert. Arika ran off to get some change for the meter. In the mean time, I filled out the fairly simple form and waited for my number to be called. In the mean time, my mom called back and said she had my original certificate. Based on the form, I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to walk out of there with the certificate or if they were going to mail it to me. This made me worried since I wanted to take care of my ID this week at least. So I told my mom, I might be driving there and back to pick it up depending on what the skinny was. Luckily, I got up to the counter and I was able to get my certificate… but not before running across the street to get cash since they only accepted checks and cash… I called my mom back and told her the news. I think she was sad that I wouldn’t be coming home. I guess that means I should try to get home soon…
Then it was off to the Midtown Market DMV (voted best DMV in the Twin Cities). After I picked a number, Arika and I anxiously waited in the lobby area listening to numbers being called off. I watched people in the testing area staring at the touch screen tests in utter frustration. I even saw a couple people telling answers to eachother…. nice… glad these people will be on the road eventualy… legally or not. I gawked at the colorful mix of people all bonded together in the utter frustrating of the entity that is the DMV. After catching a couple peculiar whiffs in the air and started getting overwhelmed by screaming unattended children, the DMV song from Primus popped into my head and wouldn’t stop. Haha.
My number was finally picked, and the guy at the counter took my old ID and my birth certificate and gave me another number “46″ without much explanation and said “good luck”. I assumed that meant I had to go find the corresponding computer and take my test. I found computer 46 sandwiched between two other people who seemed like they had been sitting there for a while. I nervously stared at my screen touching it in random spots in hopes it would initiate the test. After a minute or so, the screen read “Welcome Blaine Garrett” … and it was on.
Long story short, I zipped through the test and got 2 wrong out of 34 – a passing score. Going into the test, I had no idea how long it would be so when the end came, I was a bit surprised. I guess I figured it would be longer since the two people sitting on either side of me were still taking it when I finished and continued to do so for at least another 15 minutes. Eeek. In the end, the test wasn’t very hard and I only tripped up on a few akwardly worded questions. I am really glad I studied however if for no other reason that it was a time saver.
So after a bit of paperwork and waiting around some more, a guy I could barely understand issued me my temporary papers, charged my credit card, and then half unexpectedly blinded me with a bright light (I guess he said photo – not eye test…). Arika and I grabed some celebratory Mexican mush piles at a stand in the Market and went home. In 3-6 weeks I will have my new ID and will officially be a MN resident! I guess in the end that wasn’t as much of a pain in the butt as it could have been, but I suuuure got really anxious about it over these last few busy months. I’m just glad it is over. A special thanks to Arika who has been my moral support through this and all the other stupid crap I get needlessly anxious about.
Some Primus for you. My day was sorta like this, but with less Bass.
Now, I figured I would mention why I have a Ramsey County birth certificate since this story came up the other day while camping with my brothers. 27 years ago next Wednesday, my mom had 6 weeks left of the pregnency left. However, I was getting tired of waiting around to be born and had shit to take care of. My mom went to the local hospital and they figured I was going to come out 6 weeks early. The airlifted her to the children’s hospital in St. Paul because they were worried I would be too premature and there would be complications. Once she was there, with little struggle, I popped out health as a baby born on schedule. I’d like to say I was born with a paint brush in my hand, but really it was probably just a glob of slime. However, I did want to hurry up and get out so I could get going on stuff – perhaps more characteristic of me than my creative side. So either way, that is why I was born in St. Paul. Luckily, so too, because since I only discovered today that I needed it, I only had to drive 20 minutes to get my birth certificate rather than 2 hours!
This story came up over the weekend, becuse my mom told it to my sister in-law who has 6 weeks left of her pregnacy with her first child. Needless to say that caused her some worry. My mom seems to be good at telling temporally akward stories.
