Naming part 3

[eirias]

So it looks like knell's suggestion was the right one....

Graham goes today to the SSA to make another attempt at the name change. He starts to explain the situation and pull out the screwed-up drivers license, and he's preparing for a fight, and then the woman there...

...says it's not necessary.

She takes his paperwork (including, I note, the exact same components as previously) and enters in his new name pronto. He described this experience as "quite pleasant and quick."

WTF?

Perhaps the two people we talked to on Thursday weren't actually distinct people after all. Maybe there was just one bitchy woman there who was responsible for all of that aggro. Or maybe after two unpleasant confrontations in one morning, they actually decided to look up the law...

I mean, not that this is the only reason or anything, but dear God I hope I never end up on disability. Having to deal with this office on a regular basis would be like being imprisoned in a funhouse.

Now he just has to figure out what the heck to do about the inaccurate driver's license. Probably yet again, the answer will be "go back and hope for someone with a few more clue points."

Comments

[exilejedi.livejournal.com]

It sounds like you're ready for a crack at Bureaucracy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bureaucracy_(computer_game)) to blow off some steam. ;-)

[leora.livejournal.com]

Reminds me of my experience trying to get my handicap placard. Went in the first time, and was told I needed an in-state doctor to sign; I only had an out-of-state doctor. So, I waited a couple years until I could afford an in-state doctor. But ended up getting in a couple years later with an out-of-state doctor's signature. :/ Cost me a fortune in energy and some amount of money as well.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

Wow, yes, that sounds very like this experience, except with more negative consequences.

(Then again, within a couple years it could be that the requirements legitimately changed. But still, how frustrating.)

[leora.livejournal.com]

I don't think so. And my lothario had a similar DMV experience with a shorter timespan. We went in with everything we thought we'd need from the website, and they wouldn't give him an ID because he didn't have his birth certificate. So, calls made all around, to his mother, to Germany, etc. Birth certificate obtained. Went back in, never needed the birth certificate.

What you need and how hard it is to do often depends on who you talk to and what exactly you say. Such as if you ask, do you need FOO, then you are more likely to need FOO.

I find it a lot like being ID'd for alcohol. Pre-cane, I was usually ID'd. My lothario was almost never ID'd. If I wanted to not be ID'd, I'd order iced tea and he'd order a beer. Later in the meal, I'd order something alcoholic - no IDing, since they couldn't easily ID me when they didn't ID him.

If I wanted him to be ID'd, then he'd order... no ID request, I'd order during the same round of ordering, at the end they'd ask for both of our IDs.

This happened a fair bit of the time, enough for me to think the implications are true. And really quite similar to what your husband ran into, except the particular prejudice is different.

[knell.livejournal.com]

Hey, glad to hear that my powers of prediction still work.

[harleybitch.livejournal.com]

I am glad it got fixed. Everytime I am forced to do paperwork (ie. name change, or anything at the university since it all involves LOTS of paperwork) I remember the Asterix and Obelix 'the place that makes you go mad'. They walk into a pyramid with a simple task-- to get one thing (cant even remember what they went to get). They end up running from floor to floor turning in one form to get another form and on and on until they finally go crazy.

[drspiff.livejournal.com]

Klingon bastards! I would have taken the first person's name down and wrote a letter to their supervisor. There isn't room in an government founded on equal rights for a bureaucrat with a personal puritanical agenda.

[vja2.livejournal.com]

Aaah, that must be commandment 11 she was defending: "thou shalt not take thy wife's name, for I am the lord. And, a chauvinist."