Purled

I love that someone began this thread. I am absolutely getting a dog once my coursework is complete. Prior to that, I have long-term custody of the dog my partner and I have been raising together for the past year (before I had to move away to grad school) - both he and I worried about my separation anxiety, both from him and our dogs (we have two, the oldest is staying with him), and I do tend to hunker down and socially isolate myself while in school. I absolutely add my voice to the chorus of commentators advocating shelter dogs! They are a wonderful grab bag of physical and personality traits, and as worthy of love as any purebred. If you can't hold out until post-coursework, cats are awesome, too, and wholly respectful of your academic priorities. Or, mostly respectful. Usually.

I'm curious about this, as well. I keep toying with the idea of emailing my likely adviser, but don't want to annoy/pester unnecessarily.

Thanks to all the posters who helpfully described Ithaca's neighborhoods and transportation situations. A few pages back, a poster asked for names of reliable rental agencies or online resources (other than Craigslist, Zillow, and Trulia) and I haven't been able to find a response. If you could recommend who to go to to find apartments, that would be wonderful. Thanks!

This is excellent, thank you, and possibly see you this weekend.

Excellent, this is going on my resource list; thank you!

Just want to say that this is really helpful, and thanks for the insight. I'll certainly have additional questions after recruitment weekend.

SBM is definitely making the move. As is Brown, I promise.

For example, Butler and Brown are off to Columbia; Buck-Morss is leaving Cornell. The latter is certainly mucking up the works a bit for me. What other large changes are happening?

You cannot go wrong with a good bottle of wine, unless the recipient is an alcoholic or teetotaler. I've given wine to several past professors for letters of recommendation for grants and fellowships. I usually get them something from a vineyard near my hometown in California, to personalize it a bit, but no one does not appreciate wine.

Withdrawing from UWashington (theory), making room for those waitlisted.

I hadn't really seriously considered sending gifts until I saw this thread. I am definitely going to do something, probably crafty - I like the idea of the handmade cards. I'm more of a knitter, myself, but in a pinch I can decoupage. My LOR writers really did a fantastic job, not just with their letters (which I obviously didn't see, but they were mentioned by adcom members), but with their follow-up, as well. My application schools contacted a couple of my LORs for additional information, and they were happy to act as boosters for me. My appreciation increased tenfold after reading the letter-writing-related posts on Political Science Job Rumors (http://www.poliscijobrumors.com/topic.php?id=38427).

Interesting...I'm curious, and I realize that not everyone is comfortable sharing this info, but where else are you in/where else did you apply/what's your area of interest? Also, incredibly happy about this particular tough decision.

Cornell's made decisions; strange timing - they must have pulled up my file or something, after I contacted them. Umm, I'm in at Cornell - just received an email!!

Could someone give me a general idea of what's considered reasonable rent? I'm looking at studios, one-bedrooms, and shared housing situations. Is there a resource other than Clist for finding housing? Also, how's the fresh produce? Thanks!

Consensus seems to be that they aren't yet done with admits, given the large number of acceptances they issue each year: http://government.ge....edu/57323.html Remaining funding, however, is unclear. ------------ I emailed JHU last week to confirm my rejection/waitlist status, just to pull off the band-aid already, and still haven't heard back. Cold indeed, Ms. Hall, cold indeed. Edit: Just contacted Cornell, out of curiosity. There were glitches in the grad school's application system; applications didn't reach the Govt dept until recently (far more recently than that last email would have us believe); adcom is meeting this week; decisions begin next week.