Swarmed

In the last few months a bunch of paperwork all hit me in the face at once. I needed to reapply for my passport, pay my taxes, find some insurance (which I'm still working on) apply for an absentee ballet and a few other sundry things. Now I've always known these things never go too smoothly. One charming incident involved getting a notice in the mail that the regulations for taxes had changed two weeks before the hand in deadline. Mind you I got the notice about a month after the deadline and it referred to tax law concerning home ownership and well. . . I don't. So yes, I expected a few bumps in the road.

The first one I hit was, more like a blip. A month after I turned in my application for an absentee ballet I was sent a notice saying I wouldn't be able to participate in the primaries, which. . . well ya, I applied a month after the primaries, they'd already been called. I looked at the paper went 'hu' and continued with my day. About a week ago I got the state of Maryland's fallow up which was to send me a letter written politely in both English and Spanish (in case I as a Japanese resident cant read English) politely informing that I was all registered to vote at the voting station on Good Hope road, about ten minutes to my parents house. I can imagine how my application for an absentee ballet may have been hard to recognize for what it was what with the huge black letters 'Application for absentee ballet' written across the top. But what I was a little interested to know is didn't the person sending the letter to me find something. . . a little off when they mailed it to my permanent address in JAPAN? I am now not quite sure how to communicate to them that what I want is an absentee ballet if sending them the correct application doesn't do the trick. Maybe I'm a little sensitized due to the week I spent hunting around to get just the right size of photo for the passport renewal considering they assured me on their web sight that any of the ones I could get hear in Japan were the wrong size and would result in a rejection of my application.

In an age where the inter net has made everything else wondrously easy, why is this so hard? If I can send a flower arrangement to my mom from hear why can I not VOTE considering they have spent so much of your hard earned money on assuring that right? The situation forcibly reminded me of that line from the declaration (since I've been on the subject) a complaint about a different George mind you.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

I feel swarmed. I feel a little bit harassed. And they might not be actively taking my food the prices of food are defiantly going up.