Chaos at College!

Yesterday was my second attempt to enrol and pay for the Art Foundation course. The first was on June 9th, when I handed in the completed form and my documentary evidence for the concessionary rate, but was told I couldn't pay until the Course Manager had contacted me.
I spent the summer waiting. In fact I was so concerned that I phoned the Art Department on several occasions to ask if the course was still running and whether I had a place on it, but no tutors were ever available to ask. Finally, last week, I had the long-awaited phone call - the Course Manager is also my Line Manager for the life model work, so after the shock of discovering that the attendance days had changed (see last post) we started to book me up for modelling. He still seemed a bit unsure about numbers and enrolment so said he'd phone me back on Monday to confirm.
I waited in all day, twiddling thumbs and unable to get down to most of the other things on my To Do list because they depended on knowing about the course... finally at 5.00pm, when I'd given up, he phoned and things began to move.
I said I'd come in and pay the next day.
Arriving at Reception it soon became apparent that the Right hand was in total ignorance of the Left hand's movements. The Receptionist was trying to field enrolments between her Receiving work and was quite obviously stressed. She found my paperwork - but I still couldn't enrol. I needed the Course Manager's signature on a seperate form to say he'd explained everything to me. She phoned through. He came over from the Art Department. Again. It was his third trip that day to sign papers. He thought he'd signed up to teach Art. He hadn't even wanted to be Course Manager in the first place - it was a 'poisoned chalice'. I commiserated. He signed. I waited my turn for the harassed Receptionist's attention again, and finally managed to pay.
Then, having driven all that way, I thought I'd use the college gym to save myself the session fee at my local one - I'm trying to get back into shape after a rather lazy year. At the Fitness Centre there were people waiting for the Receptionist...
I went to get changed. There was still no sign of him. Finally I recognised him taking a large group of new students on a tour round the facilities. When he got back to his post I asked for a locker key so I could use the gym. He looked flustered and decided to deal with the next person in the queue instead. I continued to wait patiently. It's a bad habit of mine.
'Locker key?' he said eventually. 'Follow me.'
We went to the gym, where he hunted on a high windowsill at the end, past the weight training area, and came back with a bunch of keys. The first he tried opened a locker full of someone's equipment. The next one was empty. 'Ah,' I said, 'so I come and see you when I want to get my stuff back...'
The gym was full of young men showing off, graced by the occasional short visit of sporty young women. The music was loud. Some of the cardio-vascular machines weren't working. The Receptionist noticed me struggling with a rower and came to apologise. 'We're getting it serviced next week,' he explained, 'and we're getting some new machines in too. It's hard getting things past the budget.'
I left through a lobby crammed with new students milling around in a state of confusion and high expectations. It's going to be interesting, being both a new but mature student, and a (decidedly mature) life model.