I am an unusually non-violent person. I tend to let spiders out of doors and open windows for flies. But today I could have killed an entire government department, or at least given someone a rather large smack in the face.
As I can’t attribute the blame to any particular person, an imaginary knuckle sandwich will be applied to the entire DSA, or as you may more likely know it, the people who organise your driving licence.
With Friday being my driving test, I have made sure that I’ve taken plenty of lessons and gotten to know the test area over the past few weeks – Lower Gornal. In fact, I’ve spent a few hundred pounds doing so.
So you might imagine my delight when I peeled open an envelope this morning to find that the nice people at the DSA, with two days to spare, have ‘cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances’ and rebooked me in for 16th April.
Their wisdom prevails three-fold. Firstly, the new date is over a month away. Hurrah for thinking when I got on the beginning of the waiting list after Christmas that I might have to only wait 6 weeks for a slot, but alas I now discover once you get to your point in the queue, they don’t mind sending you to the back.
Their second masterful stroke was reorganising it for slap-bang in the middle of my India trip. Now, I’m usually optimistic, but getting back from Kathmandu to complete a driving test on a Monday morning is pushing at the realms what is physically possibility in my opinion.
Finally, I was angling that I might have is the ability to take up someone else’s cancellation. After checking all the available times, I found that there are no available time slots before I go travelling, and the test centre aren’t in the habit of letting you know when one becomes available. Therefore I am overwhelmingly pleased to announce that I can’t even get a test at the original test centre, and now to make sure I have a stab before I go, I will be doing my run in Kidderminster. A few hundred more pounds to get to know a new area and will everything will eventually be sorted.
I vented some of my frustration today by cutting down a 40ft tree in the garden. If you work at the DSA, I suggest you stay at arms length from me for the next two weeks until I have had enough time to calm down properly.