Our governmental institutions, hard at work. (or, Why me?)

Living out of the country for the last several years, it has been fairly easy to ignore certain pains-in-my-ass that I should have dealt with a long time ago but haven’t.

1. I may or may not have a warrant for my arrest in California due to an unpaid traffic ticket. I don’t think they’ve issued a warrant, but they have threatened several times, according to my mother, who gets my mail for me. My problem, and the reason I haven’t dealt with it yet, is this: I only got my AR license switched to a CA license THREE DAYS before I left California for Ireland. In order to get my CA license, I was required to pay any outstanding fines at that time. So I paid all my parking tickets, etc, so I could get the CA license. I phoned California a while back and was informed the ticket was logged in September in Van Nuys. Problem number two: I’ve never been to Van Nuys. Obvious administrative error. Problem number three: They informed me I must appear in court in Van Nuys to clear it up. WTF?! I won’t be in Van Nuys anywhere in the foreseeable future. Thus the possibility of a warrant for my arrest.

2. Not too long after I moved to Morocco, Mom opened a letter addressed to me from the State of Arkansas telling me they had noticed my federal taxes for year 2002 were filed using an Arkansas address. I filed with an AR address because I was, at the time of filing, living in Ireland but wanted my refund sent to my mom’s house in Arkansas. Makes sense, right, that I don’t have said refund sent to some address in California where I don’t live any more? Well, Arkansas tax folks, in all their brilliance, decided that if I filed with an AR address, it must mean I was living and working in AR in 2002 and therefore owe AR taxes. My question is, when they looked at my federal tax return to see I’d used an AR address, could they not also have seen my employer was a California company? Dammit? The best part is I had JUST thrown out my copies of my 2002 tax returns when I moved from Dublin to Morocco. After cartin’ it all around Dublin for three years, the moment I throw it away is the moment I need it. And now they're threatening to “lien” on me. Get it? “Lien on?” Ha ha ha. Anyways, I gotta make long-distance-from-Morocco phone calls to sort that crap out.

The reason this stuff is now coming to be a big pain in my ass again (because I could easily continue living out of the country and ignoring it for yeeeeaaaarrrrrrs to come) is that I have to get a background check in order for Lahcen and me to get married. Which background check has to be sent to the American Embassy here, so they can issue some sort of “citizen in good standing” paper to the Moroccan authorities. I guess they don’t want Moroccans marrying criminals. That’s no fair, if you ask me. Criminals have feelings too!