dat_nerd

I don't know why everyone is making some big thing out of the word lonely. I think anyone who lives alone gets lonely. The thing is, there's some people who enjoy that loneliness. It doesn't matter how many friends or family members you have--if you live by yourself, you're going to have times when you get lonely. If you live with a significant other, they're ALWAYS gonna be around. Some people like always having their significant other around. Some people hate it. 

I took it as an adventure (I moved from NY to MO to OK). Just realize that Kansas is going to be a bit different than Cali, and be open to experience. I've fallen in love with the Mid/Southwest.

I packed up and moved clear across the country for my first grad school tango. I got a lovely 2 story loft apartment with a killer view and a gas fireplace for no apparent reason (it never got below 40). I paid more in rent than everyone else in my cohort.
 
Due to sheer willpower, I hosted a few dinner parties and game nights. In general, most people dont have the time for the typical college stuff at the grad level.
 
I hated the locals. I hated the location. I disliked going out into the town/city and dealing with the people. Driving anywhere was a nightmare. With time, the color of the flowers began to annoy me. This is how you know you've made a mistake in your choice of location and program. Flowers.
 
So my apartment was really my respite from everything I wanted nothing to do with. I had a blue microwave that played a song when it was done instead of beeping. I had an orange couch and a turquoise leather chaise lounge. I had a ridiculous dining table that seated 8 for no apparent reason that I'd randomly decorate as if I was Martha Stewart reincarnated. I had a drafting table I never used setup with impressive sketches and selected literature for if anyone did happen to come over. I had wall art - big gigantic wouldn't fit in my car and had to be strapped to the roof and driven home slowly wall art.
 
And there in my little womb I occasionally saw guests and plotted my revenge. My glorious glorious revenge on that awful state and it's awful people.. and their flowers. I sat on my bedroom balcony, peering out through the floor to ceiling window that was my rear apartment wall, and contemplated the many ways to exterminate those flowers.
 
Ah, those were the days.

Damn. As someone who's moving across the country alone next fall...I was really hoping to gain something from this thread. 

If it helps any, I'll answer your original question. I moved across the country four months ago. It takes over 5 hours to travel from "home" to my new home by plane. If I can't afford a nonstop flight, then it's about 8 hours. It did take some adjusting at first, but that's always to be expected. 
 
 
How do you make friends in a new place? The same way that you should in a familiar place -- by investing in relationships. In a healthy friendship, you selflessly support a person and they selflessly support you back. You build trust by being a good friend through the good and the bad times.
 
Your "best friend" certainly seems to trust you. Right now, she's probably scared and could use all the support she can get. What good is it to be a friend to someone if you're only a "fair weather friend"? If you want to know how to befriend someone in a strange new environment, practice by being a good friend now.

I think you're kind of stuck in the land of teenagers, where everything that happens to you is the absolute Worst and no one can Possibly Understand How You're Feeling. The rampant jealousy is part of that too. But guess what - you're going to have to learn to deal with it. You'll run into a lot of people that have what you want, and you need to be able to deal with it like a functional human being.
 
And Pinkster, one of the best adoptive parents I know was a single mother (who was, incidentally, a social worker). 
 
Going to graduate school to find a sense of purpose is not going to help. In fact, it will probably make it worse.

Cute.

First semester of the PhD is done, and grades are in the books.  When I got here, I was horrified of teaching, with imposter syndrome practically tattooed across my face.  I also came in without a master's degree, and as far as I can tell, in that context, I am in a cohort of one.     I TA'd three labs this semester, and feel like everything panned out much better than I hoped for to begin with.  I'm pretty sure I learned about 10 times as much as I did in undergrad just from TAing the introductory section.  Aaaaannnnnnddddd.... this is the first time I've managed a 4.0 for the semester in a few years.  I've been kinda checking the transcripts website a few times a day to make sure no one changed their mind.  Chipper human alert. 

Seriously?? Not. Cool.

Thank you!! I feel like I could join EHarmony after I figure out this grad school thing and meet someone. I mean I don't see why I couldn't meet someone to marry. I'm funny and smart and nice and cute and I would be a good wife and mother. I saw my therapist today and I realized that this needs to happen soonish because I can't imagine like dealing with people with issues like teen pregnancy I would be so jealous, or people in happy relationships but who have other issues like depression (I don't know how someone could be depressed and married... If I was married I would be the happiest person alive).

Have read the original post and responses pretty thoroughly (had insomnia last night). While I was suspicious that Pinkster12 was a troll, I'm pretty confident that's the case, given her most recent posts here.
 
They've taken ridiculous to a new level - - worried about the current online potential husband not having teeth, worried that she would be inappropriately jealous if faced with counseling a pregnant teen, worried she couldn't provide understanding or support to a married woman who might be depressed. We're being phished folks! As a matter of fact, her grammar and syntax changed in her last few posts from her previous style. I suspect there are two people playing us in this absurd thing, and they just ractcheted it up a notch.
 
 
 
 
       

Pinsker, if you were my friend or family member, I'd want to come right over there (wherever you are) and personally knock some sense into you. Two things.
 
First, you CANNOT force a relationship, no matter how much you want it. It's just not how things work. Vetting every person you meet once for whether you want to marry them and have their children is NOT going to get you into a relationship any sooner. It's going to scare anybody with half their wits about them the hell away. You're moving at an unreasonable pace even for people who are also looking for someone to settle down with relatively soon. You're not using the early stages of dating for the right things - just getting to know the other person and finding out if you're in principle compatible. Slow down, there's a lot to learn about another person who you are considering having a committed relationship with, and as someone who wants a traditional family and marriage, you want to make sure you get this right.
 
Second, and more importantly -- you are putting yourself in all kinds of danger by signaling so openly that you are so desperate. People WILL take advantage of that, and it will NOT work out well. You sound alarmingly trusting (parents can't be bad people, seriously??) and/or willing to take unreasonable risks for some imagined reward that is just NOT there in the way that you think it is. Snap out of it, things will happen when you least expect it, once you calm down and stop with this manhunt. Focus on just being with yourself and getting to know YOU and what you want in life, and I promise it'll lead to a better ability to be part of a couple down the line.

I think that finding a husband in Graduate School is a great goal! Totally doable for sure, and while that ticking biological clock sounds pretty intense to me as a laid back man, I think most everyone understands that many women start to feel it in their mid 20s. Just a part of how the universe works, right?
 
However, focusing on getting married might place too much pressure on everything. Think about it this way: Say you are on a first date with some oblivious guy who finally plucked up the courage to ask you out after some serious flirtation. If you are super goal-oriented, and constantly thinking about marriage, then you will probably be more stressed out about the future and what everything means. There will be a latent thread through all your interactions with him that say "You're nice and all, but where is this heading? Because my clock is ticking buddy..." If you are feeling this, he will probably pick up on it.
 
It sounds like you know some stuff that is great about yourself. Now you just need to go find someone who you actually think is great, not just someone who "fits the bill because somethings gotta give." There are as many ways to catch a man as there are cures for hiccups. If all else fails, just wear low cut tops... Now, I'm not saying you should act like someone you aren't, because for a marriage to work best, you should probably both understand eachother and like eachother's genuine selves. Also, despite a little intensity, you sounds heaps cool, so why mess with that too much, right?
 
I'm in my late 20s, not married, grain of salt, etc. Also, never ever ever let anyone treat you poorly because your are feeling desparate and out of options. You still are young, and even though your forcasting sounds legitimate(years needed for relationship, marriage, babies, etc), you have options.
 
Good luck and have fun!

Straight A's all around and an "A+" and "Best paper in the class" comment on a final paper feeling quite swell about that.

This application cycle, I requested a letter from a professor who, although he'd written me glowing letters of recommendation for internships in the past, often had difficulty doing so on time. I factored that in and asked him for a letter two months before the letter was due. I clearly stated, "I am hoping to have my applications done by [insert date]. Do you think you could have the letter finished by that time? If not, what would work for you?" If he needed more time, he could ask for it - but it gave him the opportunity to name the date, which gives me a date I can reasonably hold him accountable to. He chose it himself - the actual school's date didn't even have to be mentioned. I received the letter in plenty of time - and even had built in enough of a safety margin I was able to last-minute apply to other places.
 
Professors are doing us the favor by writing letters. Not the other way around. They don't owe you anything, especially with that attitude. It is your responsbility to do your research on deadlines far enough in advance to account for the fact they might have 20 other letters to write, a full class load, research to conduct, committees to sit on, families...I agree with the posters above. If I was a professor and found out a student was blatantly lying to me for this purpose, I would not only refuse to write a letter, I would share this information with my department. A student who has no qualms about doing this is going to have no qualms about manipulating data to meet a submission deadline for a conference.
 
Loric, you have over 400 posts in this community. If it really digusts you so much, no one is forcing you to hit that "post" button. You're welcome to depart for other forums that better appreciate your analysis of strangers.

I'm honestly perplexed by you Loric. I have not responded to you directly before but I feel I must express my confusion. You seem to be perfectly capable of giving honest, insightly and funny advice to a lot of people around here, and I think they do appreciate it. On the other hand, you're prone to personal attack and ad hominem too frequently to be a calm, reasonable person, and dare I say, intellectual. You respond vehemently and aggressively to everyone who disagrees with you and express contempt for them. Why? Simply because they disagree with you? Even if they're wrong (in some case they're not, in other cases it's a matter of opinions, and yet other cases who the hell really knows), that's no reason for you to find the person contemptible, only the idea (but then why would you reserve such strong emotion for an idea on the Internet?). Or because they are snide and snarky? Snide and snarkly alone do not deserve contempt, and furthermore you are snide and snarky. Sometimes it's funny; sometimes it's not; but being upset with another's attitude while displaying the same attitude is just childish.
 
Perhaps I've just never encountered a poster like you before. People are either hostile and angry or calm and reasonable on the Internet in my experiece, but I guess it was a false dichotomy and you just opened my eyes. I'm gonna venture a call this "bipolar poster syndrome" and leave it at that. It's the way you are, and while I disagree with quite a few of your opinions, I don't find you contemptible.
 
What I don't understand is you seem to be anti-academia (or whatever version of academia you have in mind, I'm not actually in that world yet and thus I don't know whether you or your opponents are correct) and have a lot of problems with a lot of people here, why are you hanging around? You've been helping a lot of people so I don't have a problem with that, but 2 things: first, you're applying just like the rest of us, and even a lot of admitted student said there are just too many variables in the process to be sure of anything, so I find it interesting that you are always absolutely sure of what you say. I think a lot of people have problem with this tone and attitude than just the content of your opinion. Second, since you're so sure of your opinions, you should be able to defend them without resorting to name calling. If you think you can't fairly defend them because people are picking on/bullying/persecuting you (which I don't think they are), simply stop coming here. Why give them your time of the day, especially for those for whom you have so much contempt?

Don't let Pinkster see this thread. 

I vote we ban Pinkster12. Or, since this is not a democracy, just throw some games where she gets eaten by lions to appease the plebs. 
 
Back on topic, Congrats Mr. Pootawn. My parents had me when they were both graduate students. To this day, despite the lack of sleep and being tight on money, they still refer to that time as the best time of their life.
 
ps. I'll chip in for the lions.

Haha who cares? Honestly who cares about OP and this ridiculous problem? How is this even a problem?? YOU SHOULD BE HAPPY not online freakingout seriously... If you don't like what I said too bad.

Loric and Pinkster are totally racing for the most down-votes.
 
 
The bets are open.

I attended a relatively unknown college for financial reasons. I know I would have had more research opportunities at a different school and would've been better prepared for applying to graduate schools.  On the other hand, I made my own opportunities while in undergrad, graduated first in my class, and have no student loan debt, so I don't regret my decision.

I can vouch for this. He's also providing a much needed guy perspective on the situation. 

oh god, this thread is such a GOLDMINE!
 
i really hope that Pinkster12 is real and not trollin' the board.. 

How many pages do you think this thread's gonna last? My money's on 17. 

Did not mean to offend. I am able to have children one day, as far as I know, but I would rather adopt. Orphaned children are not second class children or last resort choices, as far as I am concerned. There are so many deserving children in this world who are suffering because they lack the love and stability of a parent and a permanent home.
 
It does not matter to me whose womb the baby comes from. I can love a child even if it has different genes or even if I didn't witness the baby's birthday or wasn't the first one to hold it. But I realize I am a minority and many don't feel this way. Which is why I said I don't understand why the biological connection is so important for some people. I did not say people who think differently are wrong to think as they do or they shouldn't. I just said that I don't understand it.