As I get set for my first ever job interview in a foreign country (the concept is at once thrilling and alarming), I made use of my relative proximity to a regional office of the US State Department to renew my expired passport.
It was a pretty nondescript old marble building in government gray, but convenient, as these things go, and the Passport office itself was a fairly well-organized shop.
You still do the usual take-a-number drill like at the DMV,
but by the time I ran down the hall to the washroom, anticipating a long wait... my number was called. Wow. Efficiency in government? Amazing what an international airline reservation and $135 buys you. Zip, zip. In & out.
Afterwards, I had enough time on the meter to grab an oatmeal and a coffee at a Caribou a couple blocks away. This location had a "haiku board" hawking Caribou products in verse, so... hey, game on!
tea fusion latte'
blending of two essences
ancient yet modern
By their reactions, I apparently made the barristas' day. :)
On my way back to the car, I walked by a bit of downtown sculpture.
This was appealing on several levels. You may guess which. ;)
The only downer in this process was comparing my passport pictures from today to those of 12 years ago when I first got one. Yikes!
Back then I actually looked like a security risk. Now I just look harmless. Old, and harmless. :)
Ha - little do they know how much trouble lives in this innocuous-looking package. As they say, beauty may be skin-deep, but trouble goes all the way to the bone. Canadians have no idea what's heading their way...
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