twenty-four hours of impossible

so, here’s a few quick facts about life in texas right now…

1. vehicle expiration stuff is extended right now, including your driver’s license, tags, inspection, etc

2. drivers license offices ARE open, but because of the backlog and social distancing your appointment will be a few months from when you register

3. since CoVid numbers are still going up chances are this will get worse

here’s a fun personal fact – we close on the house re-fi tomorrow, so we can finally get some essential repairs done. because i held off till my credit score was pretty good, we cut our interest practically in half so while our payment seems to be about where it was previously, it now includes another $40K we pulled out in equity and will only take an extra five years to pay off.

not bad.

but the notary who oversees everything said my “invalid” license wouldn’t do. then he checked his facts and said it would, but i was nervous he might back-track again and i wanted to make sure my bases were covered, so friday i got a wild hair and decided to try what seemed impossible – securing a renewed texas drivers license in less than a twenty-four hour period.

NOTE – i am the originator of “muthaphukin charm”, so don’t try this at home

so first hurdle was my bank. first lockhart national bank closed it’s doors in march because of ‘rona. they have not reopened the lobby since. the lobby contains the vault which contains my safety deposit box. so i needed in, because that’s where my birth certificate was. i made some calls, got a vice president on the phone, and got them to let me in. i said that’s where it “was” because once i got in i discovered it WASN’T there. but the bank vp tipped me off that because of me being born in the great sovereign nation of texas i could get a replacement from the county clerk “for, like, thirty bucks”. so i left the bank and drove out to the caldwell county justice center, which sounds like where batman would work if he was a local.

twenty-three dollars and less than ten minutes later i had a crappy looking but totally official birth certificate.

then i went back to the courthouse (which is directly across the street from the bank i had been in moments before) and went to the driver’s license office where i was told that no appointments were available for a couple weeks, and she couldn’t just “squeeze me in” that day. but i laid on a bit o’ that em eff charm and next thing you know she handed me a sheet of paper after asking me my email address.

i had a 2:20 appointment the next day at the san marcos office.

i showed up a bit early, and they got me in and out quick, so i was in the car by 2:30pm. i had hung up with the notary the day before at 2:35pm. so twenty-three hours and fifty-five minutes after i set out on this ridiculous quest the goal was achieved.