I'm legal.
Not that I was too worried about getting pulled over. I've been riding the scooter to and from work for about 10 weeks, and haven't been stopped or barely looked at. I guess you could say that I'm on the happy side of racial profiling. White guy, short hair, wearing a helmet...I don't fit the profile.
I've been called a "chameleon" before.
Still, I wanted to be legal. I didn't want to be like the (unofficial) 50% of motorcycle/scooter riders that do not have a valid motorcycle (Class M in Texas) driver license. In my personal experience, I'd say the number that are legal is closer to 10%. Texas does not make it easy to get licensed. Not because the tests are hard. Because they make it hard to take the test. I'm not surprised that the numbers are so low.
Compared to the Road Test, taking the Written Test was easy and quick. Quick being a relative term in the world of the Department of Public Safety (or Motor Vehicles, etc) of course. Upon arriving (only on weekdays, please, as the offices are closed on weekends, which can be a hardship right there), you will have the obligatory 30-minute minimum wait in the information line snaking back and forth five or times before you even get to ask someone a question.
"You need what? Fill out this form and go to Line 13."
Line 13 has only about 10 people in it! Oh boy!
Unfortunately, each of those 10 people take about five to ten minutes apiece up there, trying to communicate with the DPS Nazi lady. On TV, the DPS workers, like all Customer Service personnel, look like this...
....but in reality, they look more like this....
So I finally get up to the front of the line, give "her" my paperwork, "she" fiddles with the computer, has to walk back behind those closed doors over there, to, no doubt, relax for a minute, have a smoke, and laugh at everyone in line with co-workers, comes back, fiddles with the computer some more, and finally looks at me.
"Go to computer number seven, baby, and take the test. When you finish, come back up here and I will mark your score."
Over to Computer 7. There are about 25 total computers set up for testing. Seems like a smart idea. Most are empty. Only a couple of others are taking a test. Where'd everybody else in line go? Probably were in the wrong line....
The written portion (computer portion) of the Motorcycle License test is a breeze, but it's a good thing I read through the Motorcycle Manual offered online by the DPS. I might have missed a couple of more questions if I hadn't read it. But I still probably would have passed. There were only 15 questions, and I got 14 right for a 93 score. It's so easy, I have to wonder if everyone has to take the same test, regardless.
Surely, they wouldn't have a separate test for Whitey, would they?
So now that I've passed the test and I'm flush with victory, do I get to walk right back to the head of the line so "she" can mark my score, or do I, oh, really? No? I have to go to the back of the line again and wait again?
Uh huh.
There are another 10 people in line now. So...after another 45 minutes, I finally get back to the desk again and she clicks one thing in the computer and says, "You're done." Just like that. Something that took that short a time, and they make you wait in the long line again. That's just bein' a nazi. These people have the power and they know it. And they use it. After all, if you argue, there are many people around (on their side) that are carrying guns. So, no one argues. We're all a bunch of meek sheep, subject to the abusive whims of the DPS workforce.
Then again, knowing "how people are," if they let you come right back up, some people would probably ask a hundred more questions and slow up everything. And if the clerk were in the middle of "helping" someone else and they let you interrupt, that would be rude...Or something.
Still, making you wait and wait again for a quickie, it's just bein' a nazi. When I did finally get back there, I grilled her with questions. I asked how long I had before I had to take the road test? You get 90 days from the date you passed the written test to take the road test, or else you'll have to take the written test again. AND, you have to come back to the same DPS office for the Road Test. Can't go to any other DPS office in this area (and there are about seven other offices), I guess because they never figured out how to electronically send any information from one office to any other).
All in all, the experience of taking the written test wasn't that bad. I'd walked into the office around 9am and left by noon. Lightning fast, compared to some.
The clerk also told me that, when I show up for the Road Test, to arrive beFORE 7am to get an appointment time for the Road Test that day. The office doesn't open its doors to the public until 8am, but we had to be there beFORE 7am, in line.
On the way out, I noticed the long line of cars snaking around the building, with their drivers sitting in them, many car doors open, legs hanging out, or the drivers were sitting off to the side, under some shade trees.
As I had parked my car close to where this line was, I zeroed in on one of the drivers that looked "safe." Hey, take no chances. If there had been a babe in one of those cars, I would have gone towards her, but...I asked a guy that looked to be about my age what they were waiting for, and he says, "Take the Road Test. I had a 9am appointment time, and look where I am!"
Indeed, it was now 12 noon, and he was at least 15 cars back from the head of the line, which I could not even see, because the line wrapped around behind the DPS building.
Uh oh.
So I have 90 days to take that Road Test, eh? It might take that long to get to the front of that freakin' line.
I'd learned, in my studies of the laws leading up to the written test, that when you take the Road Test for a Motorcycle License, you have to bring a car and a second person with you, and that person will drive that car (which better pass an inspection) and will carry the tester in it as a passenger, and they will follow you on your Road Test, grading you from the car.
So, TWO people get to be horribly inconvenienced. Not just the applicant. Nice.
There is a way around having to take the Road Test, according to the DPS. If you take one of the approved Motorcycle Safety Courses, you may get a waiver from having to take the actual Road Test at the DPS office. May. May not?
Several cycle shops around Houston offer a course. But, shit, this one charges $295, and it's a course taken over FOUR DAYS?! WTF? For 24 hours total?! And that other shop charges $195 for a two-day, 16-hour course?
Scanning the internets and blogs, most everyone I found seemed to be in agreement that taking a Safety Course was a really good thing. Even experienced riders claimed that they learned a lot, and liked the course. And all of them said they'd gotten waivers. (How much of this was propaganda planted by cycle shop personnel, I will never know, he thought, cynically).
So, my choice was to spend upwards of $300 to take a course or go back to the DPS and take the Road Test. Ultimately, I think I will take one of those courses, as soon as I win the Lottery. No, really, I'll take one, after saving a few bucks for it.
But, wanting more immediate and allegedly free gratification, I asked the wife to be inconvenienced and go with me to blow an entire day at the DPS. Fortunately, she was willing to be inconvenienced.
Since we don't have a trailor or another way to haul the scooter over to the DPS site, I would have to ride it over. This DPS office is about 12 miles away from home, and so we left the house at 6am, thinking that should be plenty of time. No highway speeds, of course, just regular surface streets. And we caught every red light there was, AND a train.
And we rolled into the parking lot at about 6:58am to see a line of about 100 people at the DPS door.
Very soon, at 7am (how punctual these people are! ha!), a non-uniformed guy comes out and splits us into two lines: those taking a Road Test and those doing something else. Why anyone else would show up at 7am and wait for an hour till the doors open at 8am to conduct normal business is escaping me.
Lots of foreigners in this group. Lots of languages.
As we move up in line, I can hear the guy giving appointment times to us Road Test wannabe takers. Everyone of them that I hear is, "9am." Sure enough, when I get to him, he tells me, "Come back at 9am," and gives me a piece of paper.
So, practically everyone, if not absolutely everyone, is told to "come back" at 9am. We split, leaving the scooter in the parking lot, in search of some breakfast and coffee, and returned to the DPS office by about 8:15am, and there were already about 25 cars ahead of us. In two lines. So about 50 cars ahead of us.
This is probably what we looked like to the DPS nazi's.We didn't move at all until shortly after 9am. It was almost like the first Road Tests were going to be administered at 9am, so y'all come back at 9!
And it starts getting hot. Get in the car. Run the engine for some A/C. Move up one car length. Stop and wait. Really wasteful.
By the time we had turned the corner around the building and could see the destination in sight, we were still about 10 car-lengths away, and the DPS nazi's started telling everyone to turn off their car engines and sit inside the car, with the windows down if we want. And you can't leave your car to stand in the shade!
"Everyone INside your cars! Turn OFF your engines!"
And it's about 90 degress already. It's like an oven inside the car. If we'd had small children with us, we might have been brought up on charges of cruelty to small children. But these people get away with anything. They're a lot like George W. Bush.
Every one of the DPS nazi's, of which there were four or five (so why didn't the line move faster?!) had to point out loudly the piece of plywood on the wall over there.
"See that? That's where a driver drove their car into the wall! That's why you have to turn off your car! Because you'll drive into the wall and you'll sue us!"
One of the uniformed male nazi's told me that many of the people taking the Road Test had never even SEEN a car before. Which is an odd thing to say, and a strange thing to allow. The state of Texas is going to let people who have never even seen a car before take a Road Test? That doesn't sound very safe to me.
As luck would have it, by the time we were only a couple of cars away from the front (and it was now around 12 noon, so we went much faster than the poor suckers in line the day I took my Written Test), it was beginning to cloud up a bit.
On the good side, it cooled off a little, and a little breeze started to blow. On the bad side, I could hear thunder in the distance, and it began to look like it was going to rain. Just when I needed to take my Road Test.
Like I said earlier, I have had this scooter for about 10 weeks now, and I've ridden it back and forth to work almost every day during that time. Although we had gotten some rain off and on over that time, I have been lucky enough to not get rained on ONE single time. Yet.
I was ready though. I'd found a "rain suit" especially designed for people riding motorcycles. Awesome. Only, I'd left it at home.
Not rained on once. Until today.
Sure enough, when I was only one car away, the skies opened up. Since we were no longer under the canopy, the bike got soaked while we sat, helpless, in the car. Sweating.
The rain slacked up, the sun came out and the humidity shot up. I dried off the handlebars and mirrors, only to have it start raining again. And quit. And I'd dry it off again.
Finally, "my" Tester arrived and the rain had subsided. I thought I might just get lucky, except that roads tend to be their slickest moments after the first rain.
She explained the rules. We were not going to parellel park, as all those poor foreigners were having to do in their cars. (Easily half of them could not parellel park properly. Wow.)
We were going to take a series of right turns and left turns. They would honk the car horn once for right, and twice for left. I could also look in my mirrors to see which blinker they were using.
She would be watching me for lane position, for control of the vehicle, and how well I obeyed the signs. And, oh yeah, if I took off too fast and allowed another car to come between me and the Tester, the Test was immediately over, I would fail, we would return to the office, and I would have to come back another day for another Road Test.
Amazingly, the rain had stopped completely. So, as we left the DPS office for the Road Test, before I entered the street, I waited. And waited for the cars to pass. And waited. Lots of traffic. Wait, wait. I looked back and my wife was asleep at the wheel.
Finally, I turned into the street. I heard one honk, turned on my right blinker and turned right at the next street. And then, the sky opened up with a blinding downpour. I could barely hear the honking of the horn over the roar of the rain on my helmet. Forget the rearview mirrors; they looked like they were underwater.
Honk honk. Go left. Honk. Right. It's rather hard to see. Is this a hurricane? Damn, here comes a guy in a boat. Does he have the right-of-way?
It was raining so hard I just began to laugh. It was an odd reaction, but I found the situation hilarious. I really didn't care if I passed or not. I didn't care how wet I got. The rain felt really good. I could take the test again. I could do the safety course. I just couldn't stop laughing.Suddenly, I thought about sliding off the bike, hitting my head and drowning in the torrent. I quit laughing.
Finally, we arrived at the end of the test back at the DPS office. I'd passed! Unless every speck of human tenderness had been ground out of my tester from dealing with the unwashed public all these years, she had to feel a little sorry for me. Even through the confusion of a gullywasher, I'd make all the right turns and maintained control. Of the bike.
I'm legal.
Now, if we could just get Bush and the Congress to obey the law.
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