"have you been to the motor vehicle bureau lately?: it's a leper colony down there"

This mildly obscure Seinfeld quote describes my afternoon. On Saturday I made the unpleasant discovery that my license had expired two weeks ago without me noticing. Not a peep from Queensland Transport...even though I had changed my address with them not so long ago. Aren't you supposed to get a letter or something. And, then I discovered that once it's expired you can't renew on line. So, not wanting me to be booked for unlicensed driving my friend Anne offered to take me down there after work. (even though I had been blithely driving all round town...as a potential criminal). Just in case they asked me, how I got there we went in her car. I needn't have worried. The line was out the door and the staff were tearing their hair out. There was a friendly yellow note stuck to each window advising that a new computer system had been installed and could cause some delays. And everywhere you turned there were gawky boys in their school uniforms, accompanied by their hassled mothers trying for learner's permits (the boys, not the mothers). To this add in various other people of differing degrees of scariness.

Let me just say, that it wasn't very user friendly. First my slightly snarky service person sent me away to fill in the form. And then, I had to endure the cranky looks of the never-ending queue as I jumped back in (as she had told me too). It sort of surprised the guy who was already at the window, but I just threw my hands in the hair and said "She told me to come back and stand here!". And we had a little laugh about that.

And then the obligatory awful photo moment. And I paid for five years so I don't have go back again any time soon.

So while not quite the leper colony that Jerry describes to Elaine in convincing her that the bulk of the population is undateable, it certainly is an interesting place to while away 45 minutes.