Livin high and takin it easy

After many, many, many months, or perhaps years, I finally got myself a student driver permit! I have been asking Ryan for a long, long, long time to teach me how to drive, I think before I even got pregnant, but we just could not find the time for it.

I remember asking my own father to teach me how to drive using his car, but he said back then, “I am surely not teaching you how to drive WHILE you are pregnant!” This inability to drive has been such a hindrance to my activities when I am in Camarines Sur. My parents have a car that I keep wanting to drive when I want to get a quick CWC fix or a little trip to Naga City, but alas, I have no license. Or more like, alas, I do not know how to drive!

So Ryan started teaching me last year, after I had the baby and every time we had some free time. At first it was just up and down the street, and then a little bit around the village, then he let me drive the car for maybe twenty kilometers on our way to Bicol from Manila last Christmas break down Almeda Highway and let me drive again for maybe almost an hour on our way back to Manila. I must say driving down that nice deserted highway was fun, only if I did not hold on to the steering wheel too tightly that it made my fingers sore! Hahaha.

Our lessons stopped in the aftermath of the great Ondoy as we did not have a car for almost three months! But after we got it back, I drove a little bit every now and then, in little increments at a time, like from the house halfway to the village gate, then up to the village gate, then up to Ortigas Avenue and then the farthest so far within Metro Manila, from Red Ribbon in Libis all the way to U.P. Yup, I have been driving around a stick-shift car without a license. *straight face goes here*

Actually, about a month or so ago, I went to the Land Transportation Office satellite in SM Hypermarket Pasig and was told I am supposed to go to the office next to the Ynares Sports Arena. I made it there two weeks ago, with my daughter in tow, and was told that the person in charge of permits and licenses only go to work in the morning. I was like, WTF?

So anyway, today I finally made it to the LTO office in the morning!! In less than an hour and P318 poorer (plus P25 for the plastic case) later, I had my student driver permit in hand! In a month, I intend to have my non-professional driver’s license in my hand, gleaming and proud!

A portion of the student driver permit

This is the procedure for Student Driver Permit application as published on the LTO website:

1. Proceed to the Customer Service Counter to have your documents checked for completeness, and secure a Driver’s License Application Form. (This form is available for download here. You can accomplish this form prior to transacting your business at the LTO.) Get a queue number and wait for your number to be called.

2. When your number is called, proceed to the transaction counters to submit all required documents to the Evaluator.

3. Proceed to the Phototaking/Signature Area to have your picture and signature taken when your name is called.

4. Proceed to the Cashier when your name is called to pay the necessary fees and obtain an Official Receipt.

5. Proceed to the Releasing Counter, present the Official Receipt and claim the temporary student permit/license.

This is the procedure I went through:

1. Get an application form from the guy on the table outside and fill out. Attach photocopies of NSO-issued Birth Certificate and NSO-issued Marriage Certificate. Present all forms to guy on table outside, who looks at original copies of NSO, takes the photocopies and application form and staples them all together and stamps them with, I assume, something that says “Authenticity verified” or maybe just “Verified.” He does not give them back to me but instead hands it himself to person in glassed-in counter.

2. My name is called out on the loudspeakers telling me to go to “Photographer A”. I see a sign overhead that says “Photographer A and B” with an arrow, and so I walk over. Get my photo taken, wherein guy actually says “SMILE!” and thus the big smile on my permit, and walks over to (wow, so sosyal!) WACOM tablet to give them my signature. I then walk over to waiting area to wait for my name to be called.

3. Person on loudspeaker calls out a list of names, including mine, to go to Cashier: Window 7. I go over to Cashier and pay P318.00. I walk back to seats and wait for my name to be called.

4. A person calls out my name in Window 8, no loudspeaker this time. She gives me my printed out student driver permit, along with my receipt and asked me if I wanted to buy a plastic case for my paper permit for P25. An image of Lia crumpling my permit and/or munching it in her salivacious mouth flashed in my head and very quickly, I say yes.

That had me walking out of the gate into the hot street that is Shaw Boulevard in less than an hour. Wow, that was really quick! I loved it! If only all government office transactions were as quick as that.

Related links:
* LTO services
* Quick link to the LTO’s Requirements for License/Permits Applications

Some days are unproductive, not because you did not do anything but because all your efforts turned out to be in vain.

My daughter has been clinging to me like a jellyfish the past few days, ever since the day I came back from my three whole days of absence because I needed to work. In addition to that, she always wants to go out. I am happy to say that she is totally uninterested in television and seems to be more of an outdoorsy person but I’m not too happy about this always-wanting-to-go-out thing.

Separation anxiety

Today I decided I was gonna go out and take her with me. We went to the Land Transportation Office in Pasig, right by the Ynares Sports Arena at the Rizal Capitol. (You may also click here if you’re wondering how to get there.) I was supposed to get a student driver’s permit, only to get there and be told that the person in charge of permits only go to work in the mornings.

Since we were already out and Megamall was not too far out, I decided to go over to Columbia Photo and check on my Nikon D80, which I have brought to the shop for cleaning and check-up March 4th. They gave me my job order form with a number to call for follow-ups, a number which I have been trying to get through for the past weeks to no avail. I get there only to be told they did not have my camera, that it was still at the main office-service center and that it is waiting for a part that was as of that day unavailable. I was told to call after Holy Week to inquire if the part is already available. Nothing about when it’s going to be released back to me. I have not had a camera in more than a month. It stopped functioning properly February 17th, in that boat from Guijalo Port in Caramoan back to Sabang. I am hoping I would have it back in time for Lia’s birthday party eleven days from now or even for our trip to the island of Calaguas eighteen days from now.

I went home P282 poorer in fares with nothing to show for.

Today is my parents’ wedding anniversary. They were married in 1974 and now 36 years later, they have 4 kids and 3 grandkids to show for all those years. We had dinner at Gloria Maris in SMNorth, a mall I have not been to in more than three years.

Sky Garden SM North

While walking through the shops of the Sky Garden, we passed by Starbucks and I spotted my old boss sitting at a table. I have been trying to get in touch with this old boss for the past weeks too, because I needed to find out what he still needed from me for him to be able to sign my S/Y 2007-2008 clearance. I was told I needed to submit all the printouts of my reports and a documentation for even at least one activity I did in that whole year I worked for him. Yes I’m supposed to submit documentation for something I did two to three years ago; and this is expected of me despite the devastation the Typhoon Ondoy-brought flood wrought upon me. Great, just great. I have to do it nevertheless, if I want to get my hands on my last month’s salary. In my poverty-stricken existence, I can use some of that.

I guess this blog content doesn’t have anything to do with the title. I’ll retain that title nevertheless.