If something is unpleasant, it’s human nature to just avoid it at all costs.

That’s easy enough when the unpleasantness is something relatively simple, mundane and of no harm if simply ignored.

But when that unpleasant something is a near necessity of life, well, that’s when practicing grin-and-bear-it techniques come in handy.

One of the unpleasant tasks of life that many motorists must endure is the periodic renewal of a driver’s license.

The people who work for the Mississippi Department of Public Safety don’t purposely want us to hate having to visit them, but to them we are, by the nature of their business, just a number, a face and a criminal background check.

It’s not personal; it’s just the way it is.

The MDPS, however, has heard the collective, loathing groans of Mississippians from Tupelo to Biloxi and from Meridian to Natchez and have answered it with two new options.

Twenty-nine new kiosks stationed around the state will offer more rapid service for driver’s license renewals. In addition, the state will start offering driver’s licenses good for twice as long as the current ones. If you choose — and are willing to pay slightly more money — you can make those painful trips only come around as often as every other Olympic games instead of the current period of every four years.

While it’s not pain-free, it’s just about as close as it gets in government interaction — and we’ll take what we can get.