Flashback-
About three weeks ago, I volunteered to do chair massage at the CCSN Technology Fair. Got a t-shirt for my troubles. I was hoping to earn some tips, really, but all I got was one dollar. For busting my ass for four hours. Oh, well, it was an opportunity to hone my chair technique.
About a week and a half ago, I called the Massage Specialist Program Director. See, all of my instructors had contacted me with my grades (cool bunch, they actually called the students when they had them figured up so we didn’t have to sweat if there was a class we were worried about). I figured, since we had gotten our grades early, maybe they would have been turned in early. I’m out of work and dead broke right now, and I was hoping that I could pick up my certificate and get the ball rolling on taking my national exam and the whole licensing rigamarole so I could maybe get out working a few weeks sooner. So, I left him a voice mail message “Hi, Bruce, I don’t know it the grades would be in the computer this early yet, but I was wondering if they were and when I could pick up my certificate.”
I got a return message on my machine, in Bruce’s very best snotty high-school rich girl voice “If you had been paying attention in class, you would know that the grades aren’t due to be turned in until the twenty-fifth, and it will take me two and a half to three weeks to procees them.”
Huh?
OK, first of all, yes I did know that the grades weren’t due to be turned in until the twenty-fifth, hence the “I don’t know it they would be in this early” comment. Also, he never said anything about taking three freaking weeks to process the grades. There’s no reason for that, really. The massage program was small- fewer than thirty students total at graduation (we started with sixty, but there was a high drop-out/flunk out rate), so there aren’t that many grades to process. Plus, we’re being excluded from commencement, (the President of the college was kind enough to send fresh fruit, Krisy Kremes and Starbucks Coffee on the last day of class so we could have a little mini-party). But, anyhoo, it’s not like we’re waiting to put on mortarboards and be handed pretty diplomas with ribbons tied 'round them, so we don’t have that to look forward to while we wait. No, we have to pick up our certificates, then, those of us who opted to pay the extra tuition and do the extra work of taking English Composition 101 so we could get a Certificate of Achievement instead of just a Certificate of Completion have to pay for the freakin’ upgrade. Hey, we earned those, we paid for the classes, we did the work, it’s in the freaking computer, it should be automatic. And we sure the hell shouldn’t have to pay extra for the certificates that we freaking woked to earn.
So, yesterday, I got a manila envelope in the mail, just about the right size to hold…
“Woohoo”, thinks me. “Bruce decided to get off his ass and get our grades processed so we could get our certificates.” Excited, I opened the envelope. Breathless, I removed the pretty, suitable for framing Certificate…
Of Participation in the Freaking Technology Fair.
It’s been a long time since I’ve been that disappointed.