Cute poll ... I'd like to say #1 - that I'm a free spirited woman and rule my own life. Well, technically I do rule my own life. So I guess it's me that's giving school/GRE prep. priority. I'd be bummed if I quit a good job (that I didn't like) to work part-time while going back to school only to find I didn't work hard enough to get into the program I want. Choices!
I almost clicked on the Gov't. because here in British Columbia the Gov't. does rule our lives. Between Govt. cutbacks and being taxed to death, we are treated like 'slaves' here. Thanks to Gov't. cutbacks my job is even effected. I am in the "working poor" category. It's a drag.
Government--definitely, definitely government.
God's rule enforcement is more subtle.
When you're retired and trying to get your meds paid for, more time is spent trying to read incomprehensible documents, filling out forms designed to keep the number of people who qualify for a given benefit low, etc. Plus the lines I have been standing in at the Connecticut Dept. of Motor Vehicles is totally crazed.
For those who haven't hit this joy yet: 9/11 means that no one is all that lax about id. If you need to establish ID to get your driver's license and never had a passport, trying to reestablish that you exist is a nightmare.
The DMV requires 2 forms of ID. Credit cards, with picture or not, Veteran's administration ID cards with picture, and many many others are arbitrarily not acceptable. An expired drivers license with picture ID is not acceptable. An interim drivers license from another state, while you wait for them to mail you your new picture ID is not acceptable. (I finally succeeded in getting my license after NY mailed my new picture ID. But if I had no passport, I would still be SOL.)
Acceptable: Social Security Card. Don't ask me. I could print one of these on My computer, let alone a counterfeiter. However, when you lost yours years ago, and try to get one at the Social Security office they say, "Give me 2 forms of ID".
Acceptable: Birth certificate: Go to Town Hall. "Give me 2 forms of ID"
Acceptable: Baptismal certificate: Go to Church. With luck, and if you never moved away from home (or are moving back) , they know who you are. However, if you live elsewhere, who knows what the response will be? There are lots of different churches with different policies.
In short, please take my advice. While you still have 2 acceptable forms of ID, make an effort to collect all the other acceptable forms of ID you can. And then store the backups in a safe deposit box.
Then we had to transfer all the registrations for 2 cars, a boat trailer and a box trailer. You can't do it at Norwich, the lines at DMV started at 4 or 5 in the morning with people with lawn chairs.
Yes Lawn chairs. If you go to Saybrook, they can't do VIN number verifications, go elsewhere. Danbury can do VIN verifications, but you have 2 cars, you drove in with only one.
Schedule a second 1 and 1/2 hour ride to Danbury. VIN verifications cannot be done on trailers in Danbury. The only site in the state that can do VIN verification is Wethersfield. Where's Wethersfield, the new resident asks. It doesn't end.
My job rules my life. Everything I do revolves around the job -- being a teacher means I can't just decide to take some holidays and go on a trip, calling in sick means making sure there's a complete set of sub plans in place (it's easier to go to work and be sick than to do up sub plans).
My kids used to rule my life, but one's in university and the other's in Grade 12 -- I've done about all I can do with their social/moral/physical development. It's now up to them to determine how they will use that -- as mom works fulltime to pay for their education (see #1).
My SO has an impact on my life, but I've grown enough in the past 20 years to finally be able to make decisions based on what's best for me, not what will upset his applecart the least.
Life is too short to live it for other people -- I choose to teach, so I put up with the restrictions I have because of that (although I reserve the right to whine from time to time!). I choose to support my kids through their post-secondary education because that's an investment in their futures -- and they will NOT be living with me when they're 40!!!! I choose to skate because that's an investment in me -- physically and mentally.
Being an honest person, I find I am the only one to fess up that the medicos now rule my life. Even when I ignore the diet and forget the exercise, the little medico voices in my head tell me to climb back on the diet and exercise wagon.
I voted for dentist. My dentist was the only person who could make me give up my beloved pipe. By telling me, "I wish I could clean your lungs as easily as I can clean your teeth."