Frakkin' Bureaucracy

I am so angry, I haven't known what to do with myself. I really don't like paperwork. And every year, despite my best intentions I wait until April 14th to file our taxes. (There's no excuse really. In the grand scheme of things, our taxes are relatively uncomplicated, we usually receive a refund...)

This year, I thought I'll be on top of this. E-file your taxes! Less paper! Get your refund in 8-14 days! Who can argue with that? The taxes were bounced. Immediately. The reason? My birthday on the form didn't match what the Social Security office had on file for me.

Excuse me?

Come to find out, during the stretch of time that I got married and had to change my name on every piece of identification I owned, somebody down at Social Security made a boo-boo and entered my wrong date of birth. Never mind that I've been working and paying taxes since I was sixteen, including for five years with the new name before stepping away from the paid workforce to raise my son. And their mistake comes back to bite me hard now?

They freely admit it is their mistake. They can actually look in their records and say that up until 2001 they had it correct. Well for cripes sakes, change it back!

No. Instead I have to drive a 40 mile round trip, take a number and wait an interminable amount of time in an office to present my birth certificate and prove who I am. I tried to do so this morning while the little man was in preschool, so I could at least spare him the aggravation. I had to leave, as I ran out of time to wait. This means I get to do this tomorrow with Daniel. This also means that the Social Security Administration's error will cost me 80 miles on my car, gas money, an unknown number of hours and a mountain of aggravation for me and my kid.

Frakkin' bureaucracy.