"Real ID" can eff off

So. My driver's license expires in February. I am thinking about this NOW, because of the "we want to be really, really sure you're not a terrorist, or if you are, that you're good at faking documents" act.

Yet another way of generating headaches for the law-abiding U.S. citizen, and something that people who aren't supposed to be here will probably have some way of circumventing.

What I need to renew my license is this:

1. The old license
2. My birth certificate (Which I will be picking up from my parents when I visit at Thanksgiving)
3. Proof of Social Security number
4. Documentation of where I live ("Such as a utility bill")
5. Proof of lawful entry/residency (the Hell? I was born here. Does this not apply to me? Please say that this does not apply to me. I have no way to prove my 'right' to be here, outside of my birth certificate, my tax returns, and my property tax bills)

#3 is going to be a problem. I cannot find my SS card. No, it's not a "I think an illegal alien has it" issue; it's a "It's buried deep in one of the approximately 1582 file folders I have stashed in my home office or it's in my safety deposit box and if it's not in my safety deposit box there is no way on God's green Earth I am digging through every-damn-one of those folders until I find it."

Has anyone got their card replaced? The government website makes it sound laughably easy - fill out a form and bring clear proof of who you are. But that makes me suspicious - it is probably laughably easy for some people, but if I walked in there I'd be willing to bet they'd give me the 3rd degree and then deny me.

I don't know whether to begin searching for the dang card and hope I find it, or to take my chances reapplying (I don't even KNOW where the nearest local SS office is.)

I might be able to track down that thing the government sends me every year that tells me how much money is purportedly in that (non-existent) "lockbox" for me. I wonder if that would count. Or if I could get a notarized statement from my HR department with the number on it and a verification that "Yes, this woman is who she claims to be."

I just feel like - I should NOT have to be doing this, not at this stage of the game. It especially irks me that I know there are going to be criminals - people flying under the radar - who will have faked documents or will pay off the right functionary and breeze right through, while I waste spend an entire Saturday afternoon searching for a 1.5" by 2.5" piece of cardstock with some blue ink on it because it's supposedly necessary for me to renew the license I've had for 20-some years.

Dammit.

(Oh, and incidentally? To actually get that list of stuff, know where I had to go? The Snopes site! I cannot easily find a .gov page that lists it! All the other links that come up are either government sites justifying how this is Necessary and Important and Really Not That Big A Hassle At All, or conspiracy-theorist sites that are saying, "This is the first step! Next step is that they ear-tag us all like cattle!"

But do you know how much it IRRITATES me that I have to go to an urban-legends site for IMPORTANT information that I NEED to have because of something the GOVERNMENT is changing?)

Oh - and they were reporting on it on the local news, but I missed that story because that was the VERY MOMENT my youth group co-leader called up to let me know that there's no one signed up to provide food for the kids for dinner tonight. Sigh. So I guess it's ricki-foots-the-bill-for-pizza again.