Badness goes postal...

Hubs and I realized the other day that we'd been a bit lax, and hadn't set up an RESP for Bad yet. ANd then we realized that we couldn't, because we hadn't applied for his SIN. So today I dropped the Princess off at school, rooted around in our files for Bad's passport and headed down to our friendly government offices.

"Hi, I just need to apply for a SIN for my son."

"Was he born in Canada?"

"Yes."

"Do you have his birth certificate?"

"No...I brought his passport."

"I'm sorry, we need his birth certificate."

"But...do you know how much I had to pay for his passport? How much trouble I went through to procure it? This is the HOLY GRAIL of personal identification!!! It's much better than a birth certificate....I'm an artist, and trust me - I could forge a Canadian birth certificate with one hand tied behind my back....but I couldn't forge this! Couldn't you make an exception?"

"I'm sorry, but if he was born in Canada we need his birth certificate. That's the primary documentation."

"I'M sorry...did you say IF HE WAS BORN IN CANADA? Do you mean that if he was born somewhere else you'd accept a passport as ID?

"Well....yes."

(insert outraged speechless sputtering here)

I heard the friendly government employee apologizing feebly for their asinine policy as I turned around and stomped out, unable to trust myself to speak. Luckily I live halfway between two government 'Community Service Centres' (their name, NOT mine) and so tomorrow, to save myself the agony of facing the same government employee twice, I will be off to the second one, proper primary documentation in hand. Gah.