a couple of weeks ago, i sent my passport away for new pages. i'd never done that before, but i had to do it now. there weren't many blank ones left.1
it took a little longer than i expected. i sent my passport away with the application, but i guess i didn't notice that adding pages takes "about 6 weeks" unless you request expedited service. as i waited over the past month and a-half several things came up that will, at some point, require me to use my passport: there's my ongoing tourist visa to iran project, there's that ticket to mexico, and, of course, there's this. i really did need my passport back soon. i kept wondering what the hell was taking them so long.
my passport arrived in the mail today, with all these glorious extra blank pages. i assumed that when they added extra pages they knitted them into the passport somehow. you know, for security to make sure that anyone can't just slap their own pages in. at least i expected them to use some kind of special glue. but no, it looks like they just stuck them in there with packing tape. they really should just save us the trouble and sell do-it-yourself kits.
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1-tangential gripe: why do border control people stamp right in the middle of the page? there's room for four stamps per page, with neat little dividing lines to boot. and yet, no matter what country it is, the agents just love to stamp in the middle of the page, thus ruining all four spots. if border agents were just a little more anal, i wouldn't have to ask for more pages.
