I’m sitting in packed lecture room listening to the professor talking about the Ancient Greeks and their views on economics when I decide to check the time. After all, I have a class on the other side of campus I need to get to at 5:00 pm. I shift some things around in my pocket and pull out my cellphone.
It’s 5:10 pm. The professor is still talking as if the world inside my mind isn’t about to shatter with the possibility that the class ends at 5:30 pm. Which means that I’ll be half an hour late to my next class. The class which coincidentally, is meeting for the first time, and the instructor will be handing out CCNs (Course Control Numbers, used by UCB students to enroll in classes) on a first come first serve basis.
Still a faint light at the end of the tunnel. Could be that this is some kind of freakish mistake. I turn to my friend and ask, “Does this class end at 5:30 pm?”
“Yup.”
So the end of the tunnel is actually on fire. Good times.
At this point, I’m trying to make sure my brain doesn’t go full-bore into the whole “behind enemy lines” mentality.
I tell myself that the class I need to go to lasts from 5:00 to 6:30pm. I’m still good. I can still make it on time and get my CCN. The other part of my brain has something much more different to say:
Are you stupid? This is the first class meeting. What exactly is he going to talk about for an hour and a half? More then likely he’s going to pass out the numbers and then have everyone leave early. This isn’t a serious class. We need to use a backup plan.
At this point, I realize that I didn’t set up a single back up plan because I had thought my schedule was rock solid. Furthermore, I had gotten on the reserved list to get into the class, so I thought I was safe.
We have no backup plan? THERE’S NO CHOPPER?! CHARLIE IS IN THE MOTHERF$$#%#^% TREES MAN!
It went downhill from there.
I get out of class, run over where my next class was supposed to meet, only to find everyone but one person gone. Turns out the instructor dismissed class early. Still a chance to go on the wait list though.
As I walk home by the pale orange light in the sky, my thoughts are frantically diagramming:
NEED (13 units)
CURRENT (12 units)
IF Drop Class (12 units)
THEN Get another Self-Paced Study Course. (Learn C?) (13 units)
OTHERWISE Get another DeCal (13-14 units)
BUT Get another Self-Paced Study Course and Fail Java? (12 units)
THEN Get another Decal (13-14 units)
OTHERWISE Error: Very Bad Situation. Do not contemplate.
BUT All DeCals full by time fail? (12 units)
THEN Error: Very Bad Situation. Do not contemplate.
OTHERWISE Contemplate Ritual Suicide
By the time I get home, my mind feels like its in a table vise. Didn’t even feel like eating though I hadn’t eaten in nearly eight hours or so. Went DeCal hunting. Found a DeCal that teaches UNIX. And the CCNs are posted. And the DeCal isn’t full. And I’m more interested in UNIX then the DeCal I had a reserved spot in.
Hallelujah.
Funny how things work out.
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