Barnabas Monkeypants

(Sorry for so long between posts. Life, as usual, has just been crazy.)

The city of Chicago has many problems, I can’t deny it. There is crime and corruption and deficits and it’s all going in the crapper.

But this is pretty common for most large cities, so I don’t really pay much mind to it. (Crapper be damned.)

Because, for the most part, the city’s a great place to live, with a ton of fun things to do. This is never more true when it comes to the Chicago Park District, which keeps the lakefront tidy (and free of the dreaded crimson tide) and all of the many parks full of activities. Henry is now of age (18 months) that we can start signing him up for park-related madness.

This sounds easier than it actually is.

The Chicago Park District has a website, and on said website is a listing of all the available programs. Every three months, there is a moment when you can sign your kid up for gymnastics or soccer or baseball. And when I say moment, I mean moment. Because when the registration opens up (and they have a second-by-second countdown) you have mere seconds… no, milliseconds to press “submit” before the class fills up.

There are horror stories where at 9:00:05, classes are closed or one kid may get the class but their sibling misses out.

Here’s the thing, though: because the park district realizes that not every family has a computer and not everyone is available at that exact moment on a Monday morning, only a percentage of available spots in any class are offered online. The rest you have to sign up in person. (For most classes, it’s less than 50% that are available online.)

So that’s where I was last Saturday morning, the day of in-person registration.

We had decided (because Henry loves to take baths) that a swimming class would be fun. A “Tiny Tots” class (for 18 to 36 month-old kids) was offered at a high school near us, so that’s what we honed in on.

Now registration opened at 9:00. Which meant that I was standing out in front of Admundson High School — in 27-degree weather, mind you — at 6:45 in the morning.

“You’re nuts,” you say. Well, yes I am. But here’s the really nutty thing: I WASN’T THE FIRST PERSON IN LINE! I was fourth! FOURTH!

So all us nutcases stood out there waiting, watching as various other parents joined us. We stood out there, mumbled nonsense to one another, and wished some kind soul would come up and deliver us  some hot chocolate. (None came.)

At 8:00, the doors opened, and we all filed inside (thankfully) and again waited in line.

From 8:00 on, dozens of parents rolled in and by 9:00, there were about 50 of us there. There were, at most, 25 spots available for 2 classes (a 10:00 and an 11:00 on Saturday mornings). And yet, these mothers and fathers went to the end of the line. Go home, people! No spots left!

Two friends of ours came later on, one around 8:30 and the other just before registration began. When I told them I had been there since the crack of dawn, they thought I was nuts. But here’s the thing: as the fifth person in line, we got the class we wanted. Our friends (and most of the people there) did not.

As crazy as this may sound, there are some programs (summer day-camp, in particular) at certain high-interest parks where people start lining up a 2:00 the prior afternoon and camp out overnight! I don’t think I could do that. I mean, I’m crazy, but I’m not that crazy.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 4th, 2010 at 9:42 pm and is filed under Barnabas. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.