Long Version/Short Version

Short story or long story? Which one? I'll give you the long first... It's more fun to write.

I'm a felon.

The state of Indiana said so, and as we all know, the state is never wrong. (Ha!) Okay, so the state is wrong a lot. In one of their errors they suspended my license for driving without insurance. I know! It would be a horrible, terrible, almost unpardonable offense- if it were true. My dear father has made sure that I'm very well insured for quite a while. So, the state messed up.

Thursday morning, before class, Alex and I headed to Indy to correct this problem. (Thanks for driving this reprobate, Bax!) We arrived at the BMV (which, by the way, is in  a totally jank part of town.). I would like to know what on earth the state is doing will all those reinstatement fees that it's collecting from innocent drivers. I can tell you what they're not doing. They're most definitely not fumigating their deteriorating BMVs. They're also not fixing the sidewalks outside of said establishments. I stood in a puddle, in a line, with my dear brother, outside the BMV waiting for it to open. As the line lengthened behind me, the grizzled man in front of me turned around,

"Watch'er doin' here?" he queried.

"Oh, just waiting for them to open." says I. (Like it isn't obvious, and like I'm going to tell him my real reason...)

"Ain't we *%^& all?" (he had a great vocabulary which I only feel comfortable depicting in symbols.) They !@**# messed up my license and took it away." Sympathy flooded my face.

"Ahh. Wow. That's rough."

"Yah! I mean, come on! I was arrested, but it wasn't that big a deal. Just me @#$% second offense. @#$%* D.W.I!" Anything resembling sympathy vanished from my face. A DWI?!?! TWO DWIs?!? Are you kidding me? In Europe they take away your license after one offense. Due to this, the Europeans have developed two different tactics to handle this problem- the English just take "cabbies" everywhere. The Germans learned to stomach their liquor better- through careful training, the German builds up an immunity to alcohol. A German has to drink a LOT of beer to be drunk.

I have no sympathy for people who endanger others with their driving. (I listened to this guy talk to a BMV lady, he's got a pretty rough road ahead of him. That's going to be a hard road to remediate. I hope he does...)

Anyways... after a lot of hassle, the BMV lady, looking over the insurance paperwork asked,

"Honey, which one of these cars is yours?" (She was black, and had the greatest dialect EVER.)

"The Nissan Versa."

She throws her head back, pushes her chair away, and raising her hands in surprise says,

"Shoot, Giiiirrrrl! You drivin' a 2007? And you's in college?"

The other ladies around her turn (the other customers were left unattended for the remainder of this conversation...).

"Yeah," I admit, "I'm the oldest, and--"

"Awww! Ladies! She a daddy's-girl!" (They all make clucking sounds of understanding) "That do it every time! You sho' got him!"

"Yah, giiirrrl!"

"Lucky, shuga!"

"I wish my daddy does that!"

After they all finished chiming in, I shrugged,  embarrassed, "Yeah, he kind of spoils me..."

"I should say he do! Well, there you go, honey. You all done. You legal!"

So, the short story? I went to the BMV and I'm a legal driver.

Woot.