(no subject)

My passport may be delayed. This is because the Passports Office didn't like the properly sighted and authenticated photocopy of my birth certificate. They want me to get an entirely new birth certificate and they waited until the day before a five day weekend to let the post office person know this fact. The absolute earliest I can get a new birth certificate is Thursday next week, and that's assuming everything goes perfectly.

I was perfectly willing to hand over my original birth ceritficate so that the passports Office didn't have to read a photocopy, but apparently original documents aren't in order for this kind of thing. This is a pity, it would have saved me significant amounts of money and about 2 hours of time on a busy day. I now need to get police certification of a whole *bunch* of documents in order to get that birth certificate. Firstly, though, I have to copy them and, naturally the scanner is down because a friend was upgrading some computer bits for me and I said blithely "I don't need my scanner for a few days".

So, instead of work, right now I am trying to sort my scanner, then find a police station (there's one about a half mile from here, I think, so that's not impossible, but it does mean a nice walk in the rain), then I must post everything to Victoria. I'm going to have to scan all sorts of extra documents, I think, just in case the Victorian office of Births, Deaths and Marriages doesn't like my birth certificate either. For yes, it appears that the prime document one needs to obtain a birth certificate is a birth certificate (or a passport). Thank goodness (unlike the passport people) they accept some fairly accessible other combinations. I'll send them about six different selections.

(no subject)

Things worked a lot better than they might have, although it's still another few weeks before I catch sight of a passport. My scanner behaved and my nearly-out-of-ink printer produced pale but legible copies. The sun shone (the rainclouds started returning while I was on my way home) and the nice policewoman joked with me as she signed everything. I had a bit of a wait at various stages, but I took work with me in case, and so I really have only wasted a bit over an hour and a bit under $30. We'll see if that's the magic cure when I get a new birth certificate and take it in for verifying.

On my way home, I wondered why I felt a bit tired. No coffee today. No water today. Nothing to drink at all today, because whenever I went to get something, I had to deal with another issue. Also, I have weather change aches (in case anyone in Canberra is thinking of hanging out washing). I shall put on a big pot of coffee. I shall have a big glass of water. I shall work merrily for two hours, then decant some chicken soup into my freezer (I did the beef stock before the post office phoned and my day got rearranged) and make something entirely evil for some friends I am seeing on Sunday (not cake, if either of you are reading this - something savoury and really, really bad for you - goes well with matzah or sour dough bread and with pickles and meat), then work a bit more.

And (this is to the universe) I would be very happy if you made the rest of the day more straightforward.