License in hand, despite the FAA !!!

What an irritating day! Yesterday, I struggled mightily with the FAA's IACRA system to get an application for a Sport Pilot License entered. This systems is the most counter-intuitive, cryptic POS I've had to deal with since some of the DOS dinosaurs finally died. Screens change, you can't necessarily back up to fix an error, etc.
After I threw my hands up, Sherman rode shotgun on my wing over the phone last night at around midnight and we thought all was good.
This morning I'm about ten minutes from the airport when Jim Julius calls me and says there's no need to come in, there's a huge f____ with the FAA over the spelling of my name. I told him I was continuing in anyway and would work with him to fix it.
For background, my MOM spelled my name wrong on my birth certificate. She spelled in with a "Y", but taught me to spell it with an "IE". At age 15 (1965 for those playing along on the home game) she took me to get my Learner's Permit and Georgia has issued my Driver's Licenses since with an "IE". The Marines insisted that I spell it with a "Y" and "Y" is on my passport. Now, I'm the third of the name, the first two are with an "IE" or "Y" , but my grandfather's grave is JOHN so who knows. I'm one of the few people around that doesn't know how to spell his own damned name!
But it doesn't really matter, the social security number never changes.
And to my surprise, the spelling of the first name was not the problem! It was the lack of "III" on one form and the contraction of my middle name to an initial on another. Talk about a split personality! To the FAA that was three different people none of whom had satisfied all the requirements for Sport Pilot.
The FAA was the archetype that George Lucas based his "Empire" on. Totally unresponsive and all-powerful. Jim Julius had been trying to get an answer. Apparently the only way for the cabal in OK City to verify that I'm not really "Achmed Osama Poole" is to make an appointment to see an inspector at the secret FAA office in St. Pete (they took the sign down after 9/11) Of course the GPS will still take you there, but the suicide bombers will only blow up the 7-11 on the corner!
So now I'm totally steamed, neck-vein bulging, lock-wired to the "Kill" position as only a Marine Sergeant Major can get with faced with super-stupid. The fall-back position was for the Pilot Examiner to fix it, which everybody assured me would not happen. My overload warnings were shrieking in my head like a Three-mile Island coolant sensor!
Of course Dave Whitman, the Pilot Examiner and ex-Eastern pilot, comes in examine the issue and decides the student license can just be ignored, and the name on the written test report doesn't kill the program. All I had to do was make sure the suffix showed up on the new application. Odd that it was on the Student ticket and automatically filled in on the application! But we did as he asked and a miracle occurred! The application worked!
Now for the part I could study and prepare for! I was so out-of-tolerance that I considered cancelling the ride because as a pilot I was concerned that I was jazzed on adrenaline and other bodily "Kill" juice!. But I managed to regain composure and enter into the Oral portion. Dave made it easy, but there was a question I didn't know. Because I will never come close to taking off with a 1000 foot ceiling as VFR. The law says you can, but practically, the airports I operate out of are where people actually live and 1000-foot separation from urban areas is required. So It would mean flying my wings at cloud level. The other part of the law say I have be 500 feet below clouds. Simple math says 1500 or better to takeoff, but the arcana of CFR 14 is such that I guess somewhere out west you could do that.
Next we went flying, and there was considerable wind and turbulence on the way to the practice area. I'm doing my best to demonstrate to Dave "quiet hands" flying and we're being knocked thirty degrees on our ears and hitting thermals that drive you up 200 feet. But Dave recognized that I was working it. A couple of steep turns after clearing the area followed by full-flap stalls and a power-on stall went very well with me talking to Dave and explaining what I was doing.
Next according to Dave, I lost an engine. Right over the most perfect field I've ever seen! It was even plowed parallel to the wind!
I started yakking away at Dave while trimming for a good glide and circling "Perfect field". I explained all the stuff I'd do while I had speed and altitude. And when I got down to 1000 feet above that field I rolled out on a downwind, spotted my base turn, and was working final, when Dave said to go-around.
I think it tickled him when I called out "Positive Rate!" He made the motions and called "Gear up"! Standard big-plane stuff in a Light-Sport!
We wandered back to Sarasota with me working the radios as needed. We were once again chased down the glideslope by AirTran. And Dave did not appreciate the 30-second separation! But I had the taxiway and he had to wait me out!
So after shutdown, Dave told me I passed! Not a second before!

Now I'm officially one of the "wind people" a true steely-eyed, square-jawed Sky God of a man! Feels goooood!!!