off-the-charts nervous

Thanks for the warm welcome, Lucia! So now I am faced with a ticking time bomb of grad school decisions and the pressure to be funny enough to justify my guest appearance here. I am off-the-charts nervous, but I just imagined you naked, and it helped a little bit.

My program isn't like your program. Here are some key features:

• 25 programs across the country, each of which takes between 4 and 6 students each year
• approximately five Y chromosomes in the entire profession
• we're not going to be MDs or PhDs (this is a sore spot) but we'll have to work as hard as them for the next two years, starting with the interview process
• no clear hierarchy among the programs; applicants are encouraged to find "the best fit" for them during the interviews. I preferred to create my hierarchy based on the strength of the MD and PhD programs.

Interviews took me to six schools, nicknamed as follows:

1. "Your welcome"-- perfectly good program. Current students were nice and helpful. Wonderful, supportive director. However, the director tragically responded to my post-interview Thank You email with a two word reply: "Your welcome." Now, I imagine that certain readers may already have noted several grammatical errors in this post. But this director lady misspelled 50% of her correspondence! That is how I will make myself feel better if Your Welcome says No, Thanks to my application.
2. "Smart, Sexy, P, P!"-- smart, sexy, and all about public policy. Or... OK, this is why I don't blog. Because this story should not be told to an audience of unknown size and composition. So here goes. This school wooed its applicants, made us feel elite, wined and dined us (black bean fajitas) the night before the interview. And I was off-the-charts nervous then too (and didn't meet the interviewer who I wanted to imagine naked until late afternoon). 10 minutes before my first interview of the day, I think maybe I should make a quick run to the ladies'. And... I clog the toilet. Holy crap where is the plunger. Must be in the closet that is, thank god, within the bathroom. Closet door is locked. Holy crap 8 minutes until my first interview at my dream school and I have clogged the only toilet on this entire floor. Quick review of my options: a) walk away and pretend I didn't do it and pray no one is waiting outside, b) tell the administrative assistant what happened and hope she isn't tight with the interviewers, c) try to simulate plunger action without a plunger. Option C was ruled out first, but not as quickly as you might hope, because I was wearing a suit and needed to be presentable in about 6 minutes. Mildly disturbing that these were the only 2 reasons that led me to rule it out at the time. I went with Option B, and I think it was the right choice. The admin asst was perfectly discreet and I arrived on time, smelling like roses, for my first interview. So that's "Smart, Sexy, and Plunger, Please!"
3. "Putter-together": Perfectly OK program; probably the closest thing to a safety school that I have. The director spent the first 2 minutes of the interview showering me with praise such as "you're a great application-putter-together." I kind of tuned out the rest.
4. "Graduate housing in Manhattan for $600 a month"-- I guess there might be some classes or something involved too. My third choice.
5. "KO"-- Knockout. Amazing. Smart, sexy, young, promising. These adjectives describe the program, its director, and my ideal man. But this is a man that wouldn't pay for me, whereas #2 would. So KO is my second choice.
6. "OC"- Perfectly ok program, fabulous directors, too close to home. 

The acceptance process is kind of like for MDs, but better. Starting Friday morning (eek- today!) schools start calling everyone on their acceptance list and wait list. Lucky to be on the West Coast... if all goes well, I'll be getting at least one wake-up call at 5 or 6am from the East Coast. Applicants have to make their decisions by next Wednesday. So the next 5 days will be chaos in my little world as applicants turn down offers from places like #3 in favor of sexier options and directors continue to call as wait lists change. 

Will blog as real-time as an overbearing boss permits.