Getting the car back to the United States from Canada

a.k.a., realizing that no one importing/exporting cars from the U.S. to Canada and v/v knows what the hell they are doing.

You may have remembered me writing some helpful posts about bringing my car to Canada and what documents that entails, and also finishing off the whole long process.  I paid my overpriced insurance and my overpriced registration, but that was ok, and I just dealt with it.

And then it was time to bring the car back to the United States.  And literally, the guards at the border in Detroit thought I stole my own car because I was an American citizen moving back to the United States, and I had Ontario plates.

Jean-Luc, you're so applicable.

Really.  I got hit with "failure to import a vehicle," after I showed them my title, which is still Pennsylvania-based (remember how they stamped "REGISTERED IN ONTARIO" to my title and then gave it back to me because I was only taking it temporarily to Canada?).  They did not like that at all, even after I explained the situation.  Sir, I have a Ph.D.  Sir, this car is 12 years old.  Sir, my family and I have owned this car since it was first driven off the lot in 1999.

"Well where is it originally from?"

"Georgia."

Oh my goodness, it's like people don't understand that some people have moved states at least once in their lifetime.

After demanding to see the title, the registration, my passport, and my Pennsylvania plate (which was on the moving truck and not with me), they asked how much cash I was carrying on me and directed me to go inside their little hut.  I wasn't allowed to take anything.  I was to leave my keys on the dashboard and take only my wallet inside.  Windows were to be completely rolled down.  As I went inside, I saw 2 guards converging on my car.  I thought that was it.  I was going to come back to all my stuff stolen.

Inside the importation office, I explained the situation to the guard who eventually laughed it off, told me I had done nothing wrong, but to get a Michigan title, plates, and insurance, which I was of course going to do anyway, as that's what you do when you move states.  I got out of there really fast before they changed their minds.  

The thing is, I still don't even know what it was the border guy wanted me to do, especially since I had a bunch of wordly goods with me in the car and was obviously moving.  How can you have a license plate already for the country in which you're not yet a resident?

Fast forward to the Michigan Secretary of State office, where you get everything changed over.  This place is... an interesting place to people-watch.

I brought everything.  Michigan no-fault insurance.  My passport.  Both work visas.  My lease.  2 bills. My title.  My registration.  Everything was ok, until she looked at that problematic title.

"You need an import form for this car."

Even though it was never exported from the United States?  "Yes.  It's registered in Ontario."

But it's titled in Pennsylvania.  You're telling me I have to drive to Detroit, hop the border, then hop the border BACK again, pick up the import form, and pay $10 in bridge fees?  "Well.... we MIGHT be able to look at your border crossing record.  Take a number."

The lady who helped me next blinked not a single eye at the Ontario registration, but ran through the transfer of license, registration, title and plates efficiently with no questions.  So now I'm 100% Michigan, and the only remnants I have of Ontario are the plates, which are now hanging up on my wall along with the GA and PA ones.

A common thing I've done every time I've had to do something with international nonsense and the car: If they give you what you want, get out of there before they realize they've messed up, if they have.  Just goes to show you how little faith I have in people who do vehicle imports/exports between the U.S. and Canada.

Academics and starting a family later, if at all

I was a graduate student for 5+ years.  Most of my friends are graduate students and have been for at least 3+ years.  Also, almost all of my good friends who are also currently graduate students are male.  And today, because of this, I came to an amazing revelation:

In one week, I will be going to my first baby shower.  In two and a half weeks, I will turn 29.  I made it to almost 29 without attending a single baby shower.

I may be highly educated, but I have almost NO idea what to do here. (picture from babygearworld.com)

We can back up and analyze this six ways from Sunday.  A large part of it is that I just do not have that many close friends who have had children.  And a large part of THAT is because my close friends are eternally in school and not financially ready for kids.  And going deeper into the rabbit-hole, a large part of THAT is that my friends are largely male.  Venn diagram, anyone?  Let's be safe and assume U.S. friends only.

Pardonnez pour le Open Office illustration.

My female friends are not less-educated.  I just have less of them (and that's what I'm trying to illustrate).  I would say that by and large, people who are graduate-level educated make up the majority of my friend base.  Because I am in a STEM field, and so are many of my friends, the population of males is just going to be larger.

There have been many, many science bloggers that have exhaustively discussed the prevalence of children in Ph.D.-parent relationships, the average age of Ph.D.-parents at first child, the dearth of women in tenure-track professor jobs because of the difficulties (or not?) of balancing work/life, or because of the general environment, etc.  The general trends are what you would expect: those with more education wait to have children and typically have fewer children than those who are less-educated.

But hold on.  Then there is something else.  The average age for EVERYONE (highly educated or not) having children is increasing.  So perhaps I, at almost 29, and my friends, who are typically younger than I am, just haven't hit the baby boom yet, and those blue circles will increase in size as time goes on.

And here I sit making graphs and analyzing instead of thinking of how to prepare/shop for a baby gift.  In light of the above graphs, it's not too surprising, eh?