as you do

anyone who complains about waiting at the DMV for an hour should attempt getting an irish license. that poor soul will quickly discover that in order to see the whole thing through, he will have to take up some kind of spiritually centering practice, and quit his job to have the time to deal with the 184 forms required. and that soul must be irish, because for any other foreign national, the verdict is out-and-out beezer. perhaps because they now can, the irish now do consider anything non-irish pure rubbish, especially a California driver's license.

it is equivalent to provisional, which means that the alien driver must be accompanied by "qualified" (irish) driver at all times. but even though it is provisional, it isn't--one must still apply for such a license before being allowed to even sit behind the wheel. but in order to even be permitted to apply, the poor soul has to take a "theory test," an eye exam, and must pledge their first million Euro to the galway city council to be put towards installing stop lights in the middle of roundabouts. but. the theory test is given by a roving, mobile unit. and the poor soul must wait until the unit is in his neck of the bog. which could take weeks given the sticky relationship between peat and rubber tires. and. in order to even sign up for the theory test, the poor soul must give a PPS number, roughly equivalent to our social security number. which means the poor soul, once again, must be irish. or have proof of address. and if the poor soul is not irish, he must find the kind person who owns a hotel down the street wiling to provide such proof. so, if the non-irish poor soul wishes to get a license, he can indeed succeed. but it will take place well after his stay in ireland ends.

but the process of learning that my goal is impossible was quite invigorating. it involved all the key players one can imagine in a small irish town. the owner of the garage, the proprietor of a pub, the manager of a hotel, secret winks, drinking jokes, drop-ins, closed doors, and ungodly amounts of slang, most of which were just different ways of saying "sorry honey, you're screwed. have a drink."

and so i did. as you do.