Rolling Circles

"Why don't you take a year off?"

You're probably better off with the fellowship. Also you should take note of how long the fellowship lasts. Say it is 4 years and you take 5 to complete the degree. I admittedly know next to nothing about philosophy, but a fellowship is nice if you want to avoid undergrads.

Not in particular. Basically what I got was "the closer you get to campus, the more undergraduates you will find". I believe many of the graduate students live across the river in Lafayette. I just Google mapped apartments and went through them all.

You can withdraw your application, but it is unlikely that you will get any deposit you put down on it back. The graduate students I talked to when I visited said it was a generally safe area to live in.

I have my PI's for rotations pretty much decided, and I will more likely than not end up working in host-pathogen interactions in one form or another. I liked the area. I recieved an email saying that I was accepted, so I attended the recruitment day to meet other recruits and potential PI's. I'm actually pretty excited to move out there.

I will be attending in the Fall in the PULSe program.

Applying for an apartment as soon as possible is always preferable as it will guarantee you a place to live come August. If you wait, complexes will fill up and have no rooms available to you. This will severely limit your options of living. You can apply for any size apartment you want. Some places (typically places catering to the undergraduate community) around colleges do roommate matching. It is basically like living in a dorm.

I will be living at River Walk apartments come the Fall. On your list, I looked at Blackbird Farms and Franklin park as options. I wanted to go with Blackbird Farms but it is kind of expensive. The Armory in Lafayette looks nice as well. I also looked at Crestview North as a possibility.