4 and 3 and 2 and 1 (What up?), and when I'm on the mic, the suckers run

First of all: The reports of its death have been greatly exaggerated.

Onto better things:

As of Tuesday afternoon, the axe which has hung dangerously above my head all summer was removed form it's position directly above the tender flesh of my neck, and replaced back above my head, falling at a slightly faster rate than before, but reduced in size by one quarter.

Confused (by my clever metaphor)?

So was I (but not by a metaphor) when I walked into my financial aid office with the Official Documents needed to finalize my OSAP application and got told that there was no way in hell that said documents would be processed in time for Friday. Friday the 29th. Friday the day I get kicked out of school if I don't get my finances arranged.

As I said. It was confusing. I had recieved an email the week before which explained that the Uni had picked up on my total lack of communication about just how I was going to fill their greedy outstretched hands this September. Of course this "lack of communication" was really a clever feint on my part (to make myself look like a disorganized fool) to draw attention away from the fact that my parents hadn;t done their taxes until the end of August, which had prevented me from finishing my OSAP application in any manner that could co-exist normally in a sectence which also included the word "timely".

In any case, the email also told me that if I was encountering delays with my financial aid, I should sort them out immediately. I did just that. I immediately sent an email reuesting the information I needed to finish my application. Surely with more than a week before my deadline, I would be able to get my application going enough that I could arrange my fees with Student Accounts. The next day I finished the application and submitted it. My first roadblock came at me then: the Official Documents I mentioned above needed to be printed off and submitted to my Financial Aid office as soon as possible. One was a form which stated that I have my permission to let the OSAP people collect my personal information and information from my tax returns. The second was the same, but for the rents.

Now, just digress with me for a moment: I am required to sign documents which allow OSAP to get all of my personal information and all of the information about my income for this year in order to allow my online application to proceed. Now, what did I put into my online application? All of my personal information and all of the information about my income for this year.

So why do they need my permission to go and get it themselves when I've already given it to them? Well, the obvious response is, "Because the government doesn't trust you not to lie cheat and steal every penny that you can from them". Which is fair. If I knew no one was going to check on it, I might just wiggle the numbers a bit in order to be sure I'd be maximizing my eligibility. But they are going to be checking. They're going to check every figure I've given them against the information being held in the CRA's chest of knowlege. So why make me waste my time filling in the bloody forms in the first place? Just go get it yourselves!

Anyway, I'm standing in the financial aid office replaying in my mind (for your benefit, not mine) the circumstances which got me there. I'm still at the part where I've only just recieved the PDF's of the important forms. My main problem is that the rents are in their town, and I'm in mine. It's not easy to get them to sign legal documents from that distance. So I had to email a copy of the PDF to my mother. No biggie. It seemed like a heftier challenge at the time.

Now I wait until Monday (This Monday, the day before this story is actually taking place, 3 days in the past at the time of this writing) For my faj to come into town and drop the form off at my house. Unfortunately, I was prevented from taking it to the Financial Aid office (or at least from waiting in line for 2 hours at the office) by the fact that 40% of my in-class week happens on Monday. The day grinds into gear with Exercise Physiology, works into Calculus, glides into Sport Psychology Tutorial (mandatory), which finishes at 2:30 giving me 2 hours to either study for my calculus totorial (which isn't really a tutorial, it's a mini-exam every week [most stressful 2 hours ever]) or wait in line at the Financial Aid office (allowing me to fail my calc tutorial). After calc I grab dinner and then shoot arows at things for a couple of hours before heading home to bed.

So I took the forms in on Tuesday after I finished class at 2:30. It didn't take 2 hours. It turned out that I'd missed the fact that there were 2 lines at the office door: One outrageously long one for people who (or whose parents) had had the foresight to apply for OSAP during the summer and who were picking it up now, and the other for general inquiries. I took the other. There were 5 people ahead of me. One of them was actually some clever bastard who jumped the big line and picked up his OSAP in about 1/10th of the time it would have normally taken him. I got to the front and handed over my forms. "oooh, a little late aren't we?" cackled the Financial Aid woman.

I took this in my stride. The Financial Aid ladies like all the students and genuinely want you to succeed at life (unlike the embittered she-devils in the Student Accounts office on the floor below). "Yeah, haha. I had a little trouble with my parents' tax information."

She takes the forms, begins stamping them, etc.

And that's where our story catches up the the beginning: "So, these are going to be processed in time for Friday, right?"

I'm casual, calm, just looking for reassurance. You see, I haven't quite been telling the story right. It's just a little more complicated (and be prepared to hear that over and over when dealing with the 3 seperate beaurocracies of OSAP, the Financial Aid office, and Student Accounts) than I said before.

We already know how the woman answers me, so let's skip to my explaination of how things are slightly more complex: Enter the Promissary Note. Some of you may emember my rambling about suckh a document from before, just in case you didn't care, here's a recap: A promissary note is a rather simple document which says "I can't pay you right now, but I'm good for $X from OSAP and as soon as that ship comes in, we'll be square". Or words to that effect. All that that note requires is a printout of my loan estimate from the OSAP website. Once I have that and I hand it in, the heat is off for as long as it takes for my loan to come through. To reference my metaphor, the Promissary Note makes the axe disappear completely, no matter how close it is to my neck.

So, obviously, I was aiming to have a PN signed by this Friday. There was but a single problem: OSAP wasn't going to show me an estimate of my loan until I'd handed in my Official Documents at the Financial Aid office. So when the woman told me that those documents wouldn't be processed for at least 2 weeks (1.5 weeks too late for my neck), I got... confused. A bit.

She sent me to talk to the fine ladies at Student Accounts. I encased my genitals in 6 inches of lead and a foot of reinforced concrete as a preemptive measure. It also made me look like I had a very large, if somewhat spherical, dick. However, the counter at the Financial Aid office was built for people over 7 feet tall to use comfortably, so nothing below my collarbone was visible to the employees on the other side.

I don't think that I need to get into the details of the opening rounds of our negotiations. I didn't have any cards, she had the card that says, "You Lose". I explained the entire situation and informed her that I really needed to stay in school. Now, when I tried a similar maneuver last winter, the ladies in Accounts nearly busted a gut laughing at me. That was when I told them that I had no way of paying them a sum which was less than 1/3 of the one I was telling them about now. But apparently the magnitude of the sum has an inverse relationship to the scorn of the Accounts lady. Eventually, the cynical, bitchy mask on her face fell off (and her face nearly cracked in half under the strain). I had passed a test: I had been deemed worthy to learn of a secret which no one tells you about until you are absolutely out of answers: I had to sign a contract.

I'm not getting kicked out of school. My OSAP application is processing away as we speak. I am under contractual agreement with the Uni to pay my outstanding sum by December, with a 5% "administration fee" for their trouble and an immediate payment of 1/4 of the balance owing. So, now I'm poorer than I was before. But I am still in school. Of course, this deal (and it says this right on the contract) is a one-time only thing, a get out of jail free card (It doesn't say that part). And I've already played it in the first term of my second year. Hopefully the next 3 go a little more smoothly.

In other news, I can currently only listen to DJ Shadow's Private Press, Kid Koala, and some of Calder's studd that I downloaded from MySpace. Please send me music. One or two songs at a time through email would be most beneficial.

I must leave you now. I've got a dryer full of clothes which need to be brought into my room, a set of pipes containing all the oxidane I'm going to need to clean myself, and some empty cupboards to fill.