Late in the first week of November, the teachers of New Jersey hold an annual convention in Atlantic City. In the early years of my children's' education, they were in private school so these were not days off. But for the past three years they have been. I discovered that a nearby community college offers youth programs that coincide with these school holidays, so last November I signed up Kenny and Tim. They liked it very much even though it was advertised as Lego robotics and the robotics piece was very clearly absent.

This year, Kenny moves into the twelve-year-old bracket and there's an aviation program. They'll take the class to a nearby airport. This year Chris will join Tim in the Lego robotics class.

The community college's website said the center where in-person registration usually occurs was under construction until last Friday. I could have gone last week to register them, but I wanted to wait until the construction was completed. I went over there yesterday and entered the center. It was nice and clean and newly renovated but completely vacant of staff. So I left, looked at the campus map I'd snipped from the college's booklet of classes and walked to the administration building on the far side of the campus. Why registration doesn't routinely occur in the administration building anyway, I don't know. I would have parked in a lot closer to that building if I had known.

I found the room in the administration building and the staff in there said they were just getting ready to return to the center. I said I'd thought they were be back there already. I'm sure they thought so too. I asked whether I should come back next week and they said no, that they could accommodate me. I already had the three registration forms completed and three separate checks written out. That's actually easier on me because then I never see a "grand total!" Although I can work out a "ballpark" figure easy enough in my head.

The staffer wanted to verify my form but she couldn't find her copy of the course catalogue. Along with the campus map, I had snipped out the course descriptions so I handed that to her. She verified the information on the form, made sure the class had available seats, stapled the checks to the registration form, stamped the forms "received" and said, "OK." I wish she had actually registered them. I think that, if she could check the class for availability, she could have registered them. But I asked whether I'd receive a registration confirmation in a couple of week and she said yes. So, we'll see. My hope is that the aviation class doesn't get cancelled due to low enrollment. Kenny really wants to do it and I don't want all three of my boys in the same class.

They updated their website yesterday to reflect that construction is not yet completed. I wish they'd done it before I went over there.