11:00AM – I look in my backpack to check that the Project Proposal that is due at my PHYS 192 class at 11:30 is still in there

11:01AM – I realize it isn’t there, I left it at home

11:02AM – I decide to just reprint it on campus, and relax

11:05AM – I fire up Word and open up the Print Dialog

11:06AM – I discover that the campus print server isn’t in my printers list

11:08AM – I locate the campus printing instructions and start setting up the printer

11:10AM – I discover that the printer driver I need isn’t included in Windows

11:12AM – I locate the printer driver online and start downloading it

11:15AM – Printer driver installed, I configure the campus printer

11:17AM – Still reasonably calm, I fire up Word again and send my document to the print queue.

11:20AM – After packing up my machine, I walk over to the printing station in the Laptop Lab

11:21AM – I discover a “Out of Order – Sorry for the inconvenience” sign :(

11:25AM – I walk to the other side of the building to another lab and put my printer card in the reader

11:26AM – Spending the last $0.11 on my card, I print my document

11:27AM – Calmly, I grab the printed document and see the following text:

Error: PCL Protocol Error

11:28AM – Scramble to a PC in the computer lab and log in to the machine

11:30AM – Machine finally logs in, and I fire up Internet Explorer, navigating to my Live Mesh Desktop

11:31AM – Open up the document from Live Mesh and print it

11:33AM – Go back to the printer station, and discover that my printer card is empty!

11:34AM – Walk to the nearby printer card top-up machine and see: “Out of Order – Sorry for the inconvenience”

11:35AM – After discovering I had no cash, walk to the nearby ATM and withdraw some

11:37AM – Head to the nearest cafeteria and buy a bottle of water, getting a twoonie ($2 coin, for my non-Canadian readers) in change :)

11:37AM – Head off to the library on the other side of campus (where the only other printer card top-up machine is… AFAIK)

11:40AM – Reach the library and stick my card in the machine, pop my twoonie in the slot and top-up my card

11:41AM – Go over to the library printer and release the printer job

11:42AM – Pick up the paper and dash over to the lecture hall with my printed proposal in hand

11:45AM – Arrive, late, and take the only remaining seat… at the front of the class, right next to the pile of proposals from the other students

11:46AM – Drop my proposal on the pile and sigh in relief

Seriously… need a way better campus printing system.  Only two top-up machines on campus?  Why can’t I just add funds to my student account online and submit PDFs and DOCs to be printed if I don’t want the hassle of configuring the print server?

Arg…