Thursday, April 5, 2007

Sadie enters the Bureaucracy

Sadie's Social Security card arrived today, which means she'll probably start getting mail offering $5,000 lines of credit. And it means that in 2074, if there's any money left, she can start collecting some retirement benefits. Wow, I'll be 100 that year. Ali will only be 96, and I'll still be four years wiser than her. I'll have to remember to remind her of that. I'll probably be using the phrase "whipper-snapper" to refer to anyone under 75. I hope I'll take the advice of both my grandfathers and 1) start joining lots of clubs to make my obituary longer and 2) start buying only top-of-the-line products because at that age I won't want to waste my time fixing a dishwasher or clothes dryer. I hope by then they will have figured out how to make alarm clocks easy to set, come to a decision on either the left or the right side of cars for the gas cap and put videos back on MTV.

On a side note (I guess pretty much everything on this blog could be classified as a "sidenote", with nothing rising the "noteworthy" category), her card came with lots of instructions including "DO NOT LAMINATE THIS CARD". This flimsy paper card is supposed to last 60+ years? What would a little lamination hurt? If anyone can guess the reason behind this bit of bureaucracy, please enlighten me. The most bureaucratic theory wins a 60-year paid subscription to Tripdub.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I am going with ...

"Too many people laminated their card before signing it"

Anonymous said...

The lamination interferes with the double-super-secret government digital-nanotechnology interface that is laser etched into the corithinan capitals of the columns on either side of the card. Information about Sadie's pooping haibits, speech development, crawling speed, follicle growth, and vomit volume are surreptitiously uploaded to a VERY black government computer. This is all part of the black helicopter hovering, secret road sign messaging, New World order republic that will take over as soon as Elvis and Jim Morrison can agree on which Caribbean Island they want to set up as the Capitol of the world..........