The Great Inspection Fiasco of 2017 (GIF17)

or that time Jesus facepalmed a lot

If you’d like to hear this delivered by an amateur narrator who also happens to be a Southerner well versed in animated storytelling, check out the audio version.

Introduction

An acquisition at the day job currently has me running in circles, and as you read this I’ll be on our last planned trip for the year—the annual beach trip with family on the Gulf Coast. So I’ve brushed up an old favorite for you.

This post showed up in my Facebook memories recently, and it still makes me laugh (although I wasn’t laughing when it happened). So naturally, I wanted to share it with you. It’s a story about my annual vehicle inspection, which was required in the state where I resided then. I hope my misfortunes will be your delight.

Baton Rouge, Louisiana | September 1, 2017 | 12:36 p.m.

I'd like to relate to you what shall henceforth be referred to as "The Great Inspection Fiasco of 2017" or "GIF17" for short. This is in no way comparable to cute little GIFs you find on the Interweb and send to your friends for a laugh, but I promise you will laugh at this unfortunate greatest waste of my time this year (and that's saying a lot considering the countless hours wasted in the black hole of social media).

On August 1, I flipped to the month view of my neat little planner where I had written "Durango inspection" in my list of tasks. I'm an organizational freak of nature, so this vehicle need was both expected and financially planned for (take THAT, younger self!). As much as I am a planner though, I am an even greater procrastinator, so sometime around August 20, I thought I should probably get my inspection sticker renewed this week.

That was about the same time we noticed the right headlight had gone out. Again.

I will not even tell you how much we had to pay for this tiny bulb just a few months ago when it went out because you would probably throw up in your mouth a little like I did, but let's just say it cost nearly as much as an annual vet visit for the family dog, which is its own special kind of purgatory.

So the hubs decided to beat the system and find a cheaper bulb on the Interweb (useful for more than just those cute GIFs and memes). And he did—MUCH cheaper! Two for a fraction of the cost of that first one, in fact. Amazon, no less! Click. Click. Click. Done! Ordered and on its way with plenty of time to replace the faulty one before the end of the month.

Except Hurricane Harvey happened.¹ I mean, I hate that jackhole storm for far more reasons than this, but Amazon relies on UPS, and UPS relies on planes, and many Amazon packages bound for south Louisiana have to first fly to Houston before they hop on over to Baton Rouge. On the expected delivery day, the Houston airport was about 10 feet underwater. I knew the email was coming, so it was no surprise to find it in my inbox on August 29:

“Delivery Delay: Your Amazon package is still on its way but will arrive later than expected.”

For 24 hours I received conflicting information—“package will be delivered today” vs. “delivery will be delayed”—as I watched my package traverse from Dallas to Kentucky to Lafayette, LA. If you have ever been nine months pregnant with your doctor telling you, “Oh those are just Braxton Hicks contractions—you haven't dilated at all," then you understand where I was at this point. Just get here already!

The package arrived on the evening of August 30, and I thought I was out of the woods. My fabulous husband changed the bulb the next morning before he left for work, and I was in the final dash. It was the last day of the month and the wait for the inspection would probably be long, but whatever. I was good to go, right?!

On my lunch break yesterday, I got in my SUV to head over to the inspection station. I started the ignition and DING! A warning message flashed on my instrument panel.

“Right rear turn signal is out”

<facepalm>

You gotta be <expletive> kidding me!²

After my initial reaction (which probably made Jesus do His own facepalm), I decided No problem. I got this. I'll just change the bulb myself. Get 'er done!

I watched a YouTube tutorial (more Interweb usefulness!) while waiting at stoplights all the way to the auto parts store. Feeling totally confident, I walked in and declared that I needed a bulb for a rear tail light. I gave the guy the year, make, and model of my vehicle then waited while he typed…then looked…then typed some more…then walked to the shelves…walked back…looked at the computer again…then said, “Hey, Steve, can you take a look at her vehicle? Because it doesn't return a part for a rear turn signal bulb.”

Of course it doesn’t.

Steve had me pull the vehicle around to the service bay where he and a service tech investigated. After they got the light plate off, the tech said, “Aw man--dis a L-E-D. Man, Dodge know dey wrong for dat. Dey got you good. You gon hafta replace da whole kit.”

More Jesus facepalms, I'm sure, as I drove back to work, resigned to just being in violation of the stupid inspection sticker law (by the way, whoever made that law/policy/whatever, I wish you the worst karma ever when getting every single inspection you ever have to get in your life again). Things only got worse as I looked up the cost of the kit on the Interweb. More mouth vomit.

I decided to wait for the hubs to review the item before ordering. I left work feeling like a failure, and it was only after dinner when he followed me home in his car that a great revelation was made.

The signal worked just fine.

<facepalm>

This morning (September 1, I remind you) I started my vehicle, only to have it tell me my light was out. I called her a dirty little liar and went to work, ready to get this deed done on my lunch break.

Lunch break rolled around, and I stopped by the nearest bank to get the required cash for the inspection. I exited the vehicle and walked to the ATM (because they don't love their customers enough to put one at the drive-through) only to discover:

“Unable to dispense cash at this time”

Say it with me—you had ONE job!

Thoroughly disgusted (more Jesus facepalms), I got back in my vehicle and had Waze route me to the next nearest ATM location. Got the cash and asked Waze to find inspection stations around me. Turns out Waze is a dirty little liar, too. It took 10 minutes in barely-moving traffic to get to said inspection station, where they do everything (say it with me) but (louder and with feeling) inspections.

So I decided to try this place a guy at work told me about. It was totally in the opposite direction, but at this point, I just needed this done.

I find the place, which is basically the equivalent of a snowball stand and a metal carport (except they aren't selling anything remotely yummy here), and there are 10 cars parked in line. At this point, what can I do??

Actual photo while waiting in line. Kinda ugly, right? Well, the whole experience was ugly!

So here I am, and as I finish typing the story of GIF17, I have finally reached the front of the line. An hour and 3 minutes later. Please join me in praying that the GIF17 ends right here as I've already wasted a quarter of a tank of gas running my AC for an hour.³

Epilogue

The inspector told me the front left turn signal was “acting a little funny” (as though it were a bad knee), but everything checked out. Thank God...because I might have been institutionalized if I had gotten the rejection stamp.

GIF17 has officially left the building, y'all.

Actual photo of me after passing inspection, which seemed a minor miracle worth documenting.

1. Hurricanes are no joke. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Harvey

2. It’s true. I love Jesus and I use curse words. It’s something I’ve been working on since middle school, but the struggle is real. At least I stopped getting wasted, fornicating, judging others (mostly), and having murderous thoughts about my ex-husband, right?

3. Yes, I know this is not good for Mother Earth, but remember last week when I talked about how hot it is in the South in September?