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All things considered, I really don't know how I would be making it through this cycle without this little support group of ours.

I don't know if I can tolerate another week of waiting for Stanford.

Not that I know of, unless of course you have contacts in the process. I only knew my POI at the school I referenced wasn't on the committee because she told me. That being said, she's enough of a BFD to get whatever she wants, so she doesn't have to be, or so I've heard. Which makes me quite giddy she wants to deal, I mean, work, with me.

Hm. I like to think most LoRs are similar in the "John took my class. John received an A." unless something really stands out about you, like, "John created a formal theory solving world hunger." or something along those lines. In all reality, the prestige of your LoR writer is unlikely to be the deciding factor in whether or not you get into a program, unless, you somehow managed to get a LoR from Phil Converse or something (or the equivalent scholar in your respective sub-field.) If anything, it might have some subconscious influence on the committee. Further, it depends on if your POI is even on the committee/high enough in the department to say, "I want John. Make it happen." if they're not.

Allow me to follow up--for example, one of my POIs called me before I got admitted and we had a lovely conversation and she says, "Oh, well, we're both *Name of my Research Advisor* fans." So in that scenario, it's a good thing. That being said, he also has a reputation of being an ass who works with no one unless he considers them worth his time, so a rec from him says a lot. If you have a rec from someone they've worked with in the past who skimped on their part of the article, a rec from them won't go near as far.

Depends. Do they like your recommender?

I just sat down with my wall calendar and blacked out the days I'll be out of town. I'm spending more than 50% of the next 5 weeks away, and every weekend for the next 5 weekends. I'm glad I bought the nice luggage last year.

Classy.

I'm thinking I'll go with the nicer side of "smart casual". I'll walk down the hallway of my department and take a poll.

General Question- any thoughts on what to wear for admitted visits?

Yes, teensy town A to teensy town B. That being said, even flying from Houston doesn't make it much better. We're still emailing back and forth to see what can happen. If I fly out the next day, rather than having an overnight layover, I can get it down by about half the price but I'll be there two hours later...not that it makes that much difference. But we'll see what happens.

The flight from where I'm at to the school I'm looking at visiting on the dates we agreed upon is appx. $1500. And yes, it's all domestic.

I have officially been deemed too expensive for one of my visits. I declare this a success.

I just spent 20 considering which of the schools I've been admitted to would give me the best chance of winning their state Miss America pageant. Not that I've ever competed in a pageant, ever. But, you've gotta break the tie somehow, right?

I'll be flying from one university to another for one of my visits. I intend to visit every school which has offered me admission, as I would not have applied if I wasn't legitimately considering them as a possibility, and visiting campuses is one of the primary methods for me to make my final decision. As long as you do visit, it won't be an issue. I actually was on the phone with the DGS of school #2 on my visit and told them, "Well, I've been admitted to X, so I'll need to fly from there." Her response was, "Yes, I know. There should be another one of our admitted students on the same flight with you." Basically confirmed the rumor that EVERYONE talks.

Stanford sent an email with their visit dates on them, it starts the Monday after MPSA. (I guess just to be inconvenient as hell)

I feel that entirely. I've been putting off scheduling my personalized visits (why is almost EVERY visit the weekend of March 20th?) in case one of the schools I haven't yet heard from is having their visit on the date I'd pick to go...

The key concerns for me are safety, rent (preferably $500-700) and washer-dryer connections/included. I'm looking at starting at Vanderbilt in August. Any advice?

I have 17 lines of a paper left to write and zero motivation to do so. Why is no one here to distract me?!

Don't look suspicious. Be an international criminal in Boise.

My SO commissions as an Army officer in May, so we've been attempting to mastermind locations since before the cycle started. With his training dates, he won't officially know where he'll be long term until next spring--right now our options include him signing for more years to get his first station near me or us racking up significant frequent flyer miles.

Oof. That's nerve racking.

I did a little tinkering and managed to get it added to my regular American Airlines account. Hooray!

Ha, I think the look sad approach might be beneficial. The first leg of my flight is out of our tiny regional airport which only operates two airlines, one of which only does prop planes, so I'm not even entirely sure if they have the self serve kiosks! Thanks everyone!

Carrier pigeons! We had those at my school back in old army!