In which I am a moron

So it turns out that if you fail to pay your tuition on time, Euphemism College will drop you from all your classes.

I have no defense, I had just gotten fixated on this idea that I needed to drop by the college and pay in person with a check rather than do it over the internet and then just immediately pay off the credit card as I have done in the past. So yeah, the college is not near anything else I routinely go to, and last week Delia was sick, and then I got a cold, and then I was constantly tired, and kept forgetting...

So if you then go to pay your tuition and find you've been un-registered, you then must petition your instructors to register more than ten days after the start of the term. This means you get a petition form and write on it why it was that you failed to pay on time or whatever other reason you might have for registering late. I had to write five forms, for my five classes. This rather felt like standing at the board a la Bart Simpson: "I will not chew gum in class, I will not chew gum in class, I will not chew gum in class..."

You must then go to each instructor in turn and explain to them what happened, and they must not only sign your form but write a small statement regarding why it is exactly that you should be permitted to register so late. I have three instructors, so I had to tell each one of them that I, in effect, am a moron. Then they had to find some not-too-insulting way of saying that I should be allowed to continue despite my incredible ineptitude.

Perhaps this process is designed to be so humiliating and tedious that the student will never again be tempted to color outside the registration lines. I know it's certainly having that effect on me.