Plus other stuff, I am sure.
Went to get my ID today, but it turns out you need ID to get your ID these days.
The problem is that, in addition to losing my last photo ID card, and apparently having lost yet another CareCard (???). I also lost the pocket birth certificate that I have carried around forever for just this sort of identification.
So I had no way of proving I was the guy who deserved to get a BCID with my name on it. For all they knew, I was a criminal intent on identity theft.
That’s totally a thing these days.
So I am going to have to get another copy of my PEI birth certificate, and who knows how big a hassle that will be. I haven’t given up on my original yet… I have a bad feeling that I put it “somewhere safe” at some point and then promptly forgot about the entire thing, and I have a few places to search.
But I might well have to go to all the trouble of phoning home to Prince Edward Island and convincing them to send me a copy of the proof that I was born.
Funny how the province of British Columbia believes in my identity enough to send me $950 a month plus spend further thousands on my medical expenses, but that’s not enough to convince ICBC to give my a piece of paper with my picture on it.
Oh well. At least today I am not blogging via my tablet. My clue finally showed up and I figured out that I could just use the shared computer in the living room, with its nice comfy full sized keyboard. to blog. Duh!
So no foreshortened entry today. We are back to the full thousand.
No progress on the computer front, natch. It will take me asking one of my more technical acquaintances to come over and play computer doctor before my beloved PC is up and running again.
I really miss playing Hearthstone. Everything else, I can handle via other means, but you can’t play Hearthstone on an Android device (yet!) and I don’t think this shared computer has the hard drive space or the CPU muscle for it.
Oh well, there are worse tragedies. I am hoping that replacing my computer’s power supply will do the trick. The worst case scenario would be that when the power supply blew, it took a bunch of other stuff out with it, and that I basically have not so much a computer as a brick now.
That would suck. I would have to just plain reclaim this shared computer as my own personal computer and leave my friends to fend for themselves. Both computers are mine, so I am well within my rights to do so.
But I would really, really prefer it didn’t come to that. I would feel guilty about it, and would rather just have my current main PC go back to normal instead.
Did the therapist thing today. My therapist was a tad nonplussed to have been called as a character reference yesterday.
Actually, there is a story about that.
See, yesterday, I had a phone appointment with Daniel from VFS, who is some sort of head of education something or other there. He just wanted to talk to me about what special needs I might have as a person with depression, and I honestly couldn’t think of anything at the time. I don’t need a handler or assistant or anything like that, as far as I know.
And we have yet to figure out how to build emotional prosthetics (seriously, Windows dictionary? You have prosthetic but not prosthetics?) unless you count drugs, so it’s not like I need the place to be depression-accessible somehow.
I don’t even know what that would mean, anyhow. Subdued lighting?
So my conversation with Daniel was brief. But during it, he mentioned that usually, they want people’s two references to contain only one friend, and I had put two.
At first I thought “But I don’t know anyone else!”, but then, after I got off the phone with Daniel, it occurred to me that there was one person who knew me besides my three friends, and that was my therapist.
But it was too late, right? My application had already been submitted, references included, so what could I do?
Fast forward to around 4 o’clock, and I get another phone call from VFS. It’s Sheena and she is calling my references. She dialed our number by mistake, having copied the wrong number down, and had meant to get Felicity.
There was my opportunity! I told her to call my therapist instead, and gave her his name (which she got wrong) and number.
To be honest, I didn’t really think about his end of things. But it turns out he had never been used as a reference before and had no idea what to say, given patient confidentiality and all.
So during therapy today, we filled out a page of questions she had faxed him, and faxed it back to her. Usual job interview type stuff, like how well I work with others (depends on if they are idiots or not) and what my work ethic is like (I work like hell until it’s done).
Weird questions for one’s therapist, but I have been outside the world of employment for like 20 years, so it’s not like I have former employers or co-workers they could consult.
Anyhow, so all my preparations for VFS are complete except for the freaking ID thing. Maybe I should go back to the ICBC place and throw myself on the mercy of the court. Tell them I can’t get into school without it. Beg them to make an exception for me. Look really sad and pathetic.
Nah. At least, not until all other avenues have been exhausted.
After all, I have my pride.
Talk to you again tomorrow, all you wonderful beautiful fabulous kind people!