A very taxing day

The mail landed on the hallway floor this morning with an innocent plop; a few late Christmas cards, a bill and an envelope from the car licensing people.  We opened the last mentioned and stared at the contents aghast "unlicensed vehicle....potential fine of £1,000".  What???  We are soooo law abiding, never would we have failed to pay the road tax on one of our cars or any other tax or default on any other legal or civc duty.  Never, ever.  But wait...when did we last tax it?  "Oh sh*t"  How did we forget?"  Well, when we bought the car we duly sent off the forms and the fee for a new registration document in our name.  That was over a year ago and, in fact, it never arrived.  We kind of knew this, but in the melee of ongoing life the knowledge slipped into the background.  Reminders for tax renewal and vehicle inspection arrived for our other car but never, we now realise, for this one.  Now the system also changed around that time, no longer do you have a tax disk on your windscreen that always acted as a visible reminder that renewal was drawing near.  And somewhere in the depths of the Swansea mega-computer something is amiss, why did we never receive the new registration document, why did we never receive the reminders and renewal notice for vehicle tax?  Wrong address coded into the database? Well they knew where to send the fine.  Ineptitude? Chance?  Whatever the reason, for the crime of forgetfulness (and yes, it is our responsibility to keep up with these things, we accept that), we end up paying the road tax (no problem with that), a fine, probably £80, the £25 cost of applying AGAIN for a registration document because the authorities incompetently failed to issue one previously and the not nice feeling that we have sinned against the state.  Still the lady in the Post Office who helped us get the forms sent off was very kind, but the fact that we got thoroughly drenched walking up to the Post Office to get the forms (and back again) and back up to have the forms sent away (and back again) did not do our mood much good.  The weather is too foul to get good outdoor pics, so this bird's eye view of some tulips will have to suffice for today.