Registration Day

Today, registration for fall term opened up for me. I think I derive an unhealthy level of pleasure from pre-registration, waiting for my registration appointment, and finally registering. It’s like some kind of weird buildup of fierce, passionate academic excitement. For a fall term, it’s even better because the wait is longer until you get to fulfill your dreams of taking those wonderful courses, and the philosophy department offers better courses in the fall anyway.

I am kind of a registration addict. Without it I don’t feel like I would enjoy the end of the semester nearly as much. It’s like an adrenalin shot right before things get bad. I think it’s helpful that my registration happens exceedingly early for an undergraduate, since I technically only need one more credit to graduate (oh rapture of raptures, I may register the first day for winter 2009!), so I get into the fabulous courses I really want to take.

This fall it’s looking like Frege, Russell and Wittgenstein with Ian Proops, Problems of Space and Time with Lawrence Sklar, and Technology and the Humanities with Thylias Moss. There isn’t any reason not to be excited: all of these topics fascinate me in so many ways; and the faculty teaching them, I’m told, are all spectacular. The thing of it is, these courses are still work. And hard work, I’m sure, but work that won’t be wasted, or unpleasant. Nevertheless, the reality of actually taking a course is pretty great and everything, but registering for it is a singular thrill, unmarred by any requirements for completing the course. Is this weird?