Day: September 24, 2004

A sign in a Bank Lobby reads:

“Please note that this Bank is installing new Drive-through teller machines enabling customers to withdraw cash without leaving their vehicles. Customers using this new facility are requested to use the procedures outlined below when accessing their accounts.”

*After months of careful research, MALE & FEMALE procedures have been developed. Please follow the appropriate steps for your gender.

MALE PROCEDURE

1. Drive up to the cash machine.
2. Put down your car window.
3. Insert card into machine and enter PIN.
4. Enter amount of cash required and withdraw.
5. Retrieve card, cash and receipt.
6. Put window up.
7. Drive off.

FEMALE PROCEDURE

1. Drive up to cash machine.
2. Reverse and back up the required amount to align car window with the machine.
3. Set parking brake, put the window down.
4. Find handbag, remove all contents on to passenger seat to locate card.
5. Tell person on cell phone you will call them back and hang up.
6. Attempt to insert card into machine.
7. Open car door to allow easier access to machine due to its excessive distance from the car.
8. Insert card.
9. Re-insert card the right way.
10. Dig through handbag to find diary with your PIN written on the inside back page.
11. Enter PIN.
12. Press cancel and re-enter correct PIN.
13. Enter amount of cash required.
14. Retrieve cash and receipt.
15. Empty handbag again to locate wallet and place cash inside.
16. Write deposit amount in check register and place receipt in back of checkbook.
17. Drive forward 2 feet.
18. Reverse back to cash machine.
19. Retrieve card.
20. Redial person on cell phone.
21. Drive for 2 to 3 miles.
22. Release Parking Brake.

A quick glance at the wall clock reminds me that I’m running late again. I start to accelerate the pace of my morning routine. I’m Just about ready to leave, and then prompts the question: cereal or no cereal ? I chose cereal. I shovel the entire helping in about 5-6 spoons. After, I slide my feet into my slippers say a barely audible and rushed ‘bye’ to my Grandma and start to head to my Taurus. A bunch of white envelops protruding out of my mailbox side-tracks me for a second. Mail already? A cursory shuffling reveals there are no letters for me, save one, stamped with a cornflower blue URI boilerplate. I put the rest of the letters back in the box (someone will eventually get them) and take the URI letter with me into the car. On a more thorough analysis, it seems the letter is from the Office of the Dean, so I tear it open. I am expecting confirmation of my December Graduation from the Dean. Instead, I find a highlighted reminder that I am still missing two courses in order to satisfy my Gen-Ed requirements.

I would later find out that the College of Engineering and the College of Arts and Sciences (the college I had to transfer into for my Major change–computer engineering to computer science) have slightly different Gen-Ed requirements, a big enough difference to postpone my graduation another semester. Wow.. first the fly, now this. It is certainly not my week.

QOD : Paranoid schizophrenics outnumber their enemies at least two to one.