Is it just me?

Had a letter this morning from social services. Explaining, I use the term loosely, that they had rejected our application form and returned it to us due to us 'having handed it in at the end of the course'.

They enclosed a blank application form for us to complete and return to them.

Let's leave aside for one moment the minor technicality that we didn't receive back our rejected application form and have been under the mistaken impression that they were doing something about our application, albeit somewhat slowly.

Let's also leave aside the fact that we first completed an application form in November 2007.

Apparently our error was that we were not supposed to give them the application form at the end of the course. We were supposed to take it home, think about it, decide if we wanted to proceed and then return it in the post along with our course evaluation form.

Instead, we gave them the form immediately after the course, thinking (yes, I know it was foolish - can't think what came over us) that it might be helpful to them to know we wished to proceed, and then filled in and sent the evaluation form.

Needless to say the application form we received today is now in the post.

And another month ticks by. Another month for us and another month for some children in care.

There have been a number of points in this process, when contending with social services bureaucracy has been really painful. This morning was one of those times.