Happy Australia Day and general update!

After so many reviews, I think its time for a slacker entry.
Man, it was hot today! Usually on Australia Day and Aus Day Eve, since its a public holiday I like to go party. But it was soooo freaking hot last night and today that I decided to stay home with the airconditioning and watch dvds.

Futurama was a great show full of geeky humour. It should never have been axed.

Alors! As to the project update, I am officially moving to the Anatomy Dept. to take up the PhD project investigating the mechanism of blindness in diabetes. I instructed Erica (project supervisor) of this development on Tuesday. She seemed really happy to have me on board - it was quite flattering. She then instructed me to go and officially enrol. I asked some of the students in Path how to do that, and they said something about a form I to hand in. As I was going to the Graduate office, I realised that I'd never received official confirmation from Student Admin that I'd finished my undergrad degrees so I headed off there to ask what was going on. They informed me that they'd never received paperwork from the Science (my leading faculty) as to my complete status. Indignant, I marched off to Sci to ask what was going on (I had had a similar battle with them in November when I was sent an email asking me to re-enrol as an undergrad).

As I came into the office, I explained to them why I was there and told them the problem and as they pulled up my records they said
"Did you complete Honours?"
"Yes"
"Oh, you need the guy who deals with the Honours students"
And so I had to wait while the *special* honours guy came along and did something with my records! After he tapped away at the board for a while, he told me I had to go to Arts to get them to clear my points.
"Err...Isn't Sci the leading faculty in this double degree?"
"Yes, but you need to get Arts to clear their component of your points"

So I trudged over to Arts to inform Arts of what Sci told me. They brought up my records and then said there appeared to be a complication and that they were going to print them out and count manually. I heard the ppl counting my results whispering to each other that, yes, I did have 600 undergrad points....but it seemed that I had only 182.5 Arts point which couldnt be possible. This went on for a bit as ppl came along and counted over and over...until a genius realised that 37.5 of my Arts had been linked into my Honours - which meant Sci had to be informed (as the Honours points were from a Sci project).

Thankfully, they decided that phoning Sci would be better than making me walk over again. This was completed and they printed out the clearance form which they faxed to Student Admin. Arts then instructed me to go back to Sci and tell them that they had fulfilled their part and if there was anything else to be done, they were responsible. I went over and said this, they said they were fine and S.A should post me paperwork in a few days(hah! lets see in a few days!)

I then headed over to the Grad. Centre and looked for the form. Seeing nothing there matching what I was told to submit, I asked at reception. They gave me a funny look and said
"You want to enrol for a PhD?" (really snotty-like)
"Yes"
"You needed to have submitted the form in October"
"I did submit a form back in October"
"When we receive your forms, we mail out the enrolment form" (hint hint - obviously you didn't submit the form)
(Getting kinda annoyed) "Look, I did submit the forms back in October"
"Then you should have the enrolment form"
"If the forms had been mailed to me, I would have the enrolment form. Obviously, something has gone wrong on this end"
"Are you sure you submitted the right forms?"
"Yes I'm sure!"
"You were supposed to submit *this* form to us and *this* form to the office where you're planning to do your PhD" (she holds it up for me)
"I downloaded those forms off your website, I submitted the first form to this office and I submitted the other to the Anatomy Office. I did that when I applied for the APA and MRS scholarships. Now, seeing as I've received mail from the scholarship office and I'm on the waiting list for them, I'd say that's pretty hard evidence that I submitted the forms"
"......................................... Can I see your student card?"
[I then the see the office person I've been dealing with walking around, talking to various ppl and looking at various computers before returning to the desk]
"Okay, I'm sorry about the misunderstanding. According to our records, you DID submit the form back in October, but we never received this second form Anatomy, so that's why you never received the enrolment form. You have to go back and get them to fill it in again. Or if you're lucky, they might still have the one from October"
"........................................" (I was pretty flabberghasted)

I was getting pretty pissed off by now but I managed to calm myself by the time I walked up the 7 flights of stairs to Anatomy (I needed the extra time). I got to the office of the lady who handles the submission forms...
"Thats what the Grad Office said? Sorry, what's your name again? I'll check your file"
"My name is **********, and I'll be working with Erica"
"Yes that's right" (She proceeds to look around her desk in various drawers before pulling out a stack of manila folders and explaining that these are the files for all the 2006 applicants, and starts rifling through them) "Oh, help!!!"
(I help her catch the folders)
"Lets see....oh my god...."
(I see that the original form is in my file)
"Oh my god!!!! I'm so sorry!!!!" (She continues apologising and upon finding that it has been signed by various Heads to clear my enrolment says she can't understand how she still has the form) "Gosh, I hope you didn't have a moment of too much panic"
(Seeing that she appears to be genuinely upset...) "Well, maybe just a little...I can submit that for you now so you won't have to walk to the Grad Office"
(Still flipping) "It needs to be signed bu one more person. I'll get that done for you personally and submit it tomorrow"

And that was my battle with Administration on Tuesday.