I spent most of Sunday browsing Nip's available courses for the coming semester, even though the semester wasn't going to start for another eight days. After talking a little bit to Brandon and Carrie, and finding all the possible courses which would not have me stuck on a waiting list, I had narrowed down my options to five possible courses which interested me. I would have had a wider array of choices, but as I was taking these courses by choice, I preferred courses which had only lectures, and no labs or extra tutorials.
On Monday morning, my father, having been hugely impressed and pleased with my idea of taking courses to pass the time, suggested I take the van up to the university and register, if possible. I had no problem with it and, after dropping him off at work and Sid at Byerlin, headed up to the university. I had an idea of where to go, having been invited up there during my high school days for a few academic events, and walked into the administration office. "Hi, can I help you?" smiled the receptionist.
"Yes, please," I replied. "I'm a student enrolled in a university out of town, and I was wondering if it would be possible for me to enroll here for a semester."
"Are you enrolled in your current university for this academic year?" she asked. I shook my head. "Well, in that case, it shouldn't be a problem! Do you know which courses you would like to take?"
"I've narrowed down my list to a few courses," I said, and quickly reeled off the names of the courses I had picked. "I don't remember the course codes, unfortunately," I finished apologetically.
"That's no problem," she said, looking impressed at the fact that I already knew which courses I wanted to take. "So what you'll need to do is check whether these courses are acceptable by your university, so that you can transfer the credits for these courses there when you're finished the winter semester here. I assume that's what you were planning on doing?"
I assented. "Yes, I figured taking courses here which may be considered acceptable electives at my university would lighten my workload when I go back to Toronto in September. I'll call them and get back to you as soon as I can."
"Thank you! Hope you'll be with us here next week when school starts up again!" the receptionist smiled and waved to me as I left the office to head back to the parking lot where my van was.
As soon as I had reached my house again, I called up my university in Toronto. I recognized the voice of the woman who answered and proposed my suggestion to her. After a few minutes of her asking someone else about my idea and whether it was doable, she said it was and asked me to email her the course names, codes and descriptions as written on Nip's website where I had found the courses. I did so while staying on the line; after another few minutes where all I heard from the other side was her clicking the mouse and typing something on her keyboard, she told me that two of the courses in my list weren't acceptable because they didn't have an equivalent course at my university. However, I could still take the remaining three and have the credits transferred at the end of the semester. She finished by telling me that they would send a Letter of Permission to me, both online and in hard copy, as soon as possible, because without that I wouldn't be able to enroll. Satisfied, I thanked her and hung up. My mom had already left for work by the time I had reached home from Nip, so the two birds and I were the only ones in the house. I played with them for a little while, when Brandon called my phone.
"What's up, asshole?" I said with a grin. "Back in the country after your vacation?"
"I got back last night, but I fell asleep right away," he chuckled. "Want to play some FIFA?"
"Sure, you got your Xbox Live account all set up? It wasn't set up before you left."
"Oh shit," he muttered. "Lemme see if I have any leftover subscriptions." I heard him rummaging around for a while before he spoke again. "Can't find one. What if I came over to your place? I can bring my controller."
