EricaMarie

http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/7488523 It's about five minutes of amusement. Serious amusement.

public speaking

I, like other who read signatures, am aware that tickle has gotten into a masters program. While I may not have been clear about it, my comment was more in hopes that she gets into a Ph.D. program. I was unclear, which I'll apologize for. Not everyone appreciates the use of foul language. I use it like a sailor because, hey, that's how I grew up. However, I know that some people do not appreciate it. However if you'd prefer that I say that tickle was being a solid bitch in another thread about this, then fine. I'll say that. She was being a bitch about it. And if you really want to play this game, go fuck yourself. Better? And where are those people going to go when they get rejected? Here, for a little bit of sympathy. I've seen that so far. I've also seen that this is where people go to hang out to help forget about the waiting. And honestly? If they're here, it's less time they spend refreshing their emails. I also highly doubt that those of us applying this cycle are assuming that, just because we don't get a rejection email within a few days of one email, doesn't mean we won't be rejected. We're not stupid. We simply have hope. I never said it wasn't worth taking. Honestly, I was all for taking your original advice of logging off. I never said it was bad advice. I said tickle was being a bitch about giving that advice. Which, in turn, makes us less likely to listen to her. Because she's being snarky, which isn't helping. And the people who have lived this experience do have a lot of good advice, but they aren't me, are they? They have no idea what my life is like, so they shouldn't judge me for being here as often as I am. It's one thing to say "hey, relax, you'll get the emails when you get them. if you hang out here for three months, you'll be unproductive." That's giving us a reason to log off--find something more productive to do to forget about the waiting, and we can't control when or if we get stuff. It's quite another to say "Nobody listened when I said to relax...Nobody listens to me at all and I'm a third time applicant." Bitch bitch bitch, whine whine whine. "Oh nobody listens to me!!" pout pout pout. Seriously? It makes her sound like a whineass. No wonder nobody listens to her. I'm not saying she's not intelligent, and I'm not saying that she doesn't have solid points. But she has a really shitty way of getting those points across. Like I said, I never said she was stupid. Nor did I tell anyone not to listen to her. All I said was that her advice comes across as snarky, and doesn't help anybody, least of all herself if she wants to be heard. You're damn right I call her a bitch for saying "I told you so." Nobody likes a know-it-all, and most people really despise people who say "I told you so." We don't need to be told "I told you so." Like I said, it doesn't help anybody, and it makes her come across as a know-it-all, pompous, self-righteous bitch. Like I said originally, your advice was good. It came off as hard, but kind. You didn't come across as a dick trying to make the rest of us feel like shit for wanting a place to talk. You didn't say "well nobody listens to me, so I told you so." I'm not advocating a lack of advice. I'm advocating advice that isn't snarky or bitchy in tone. You wanna help us? Then help us. Tell us it's a good idea to get off the computer and go outside. Tell us it'd be better for our mental health if we block this website, because otherwise we're all going to become neurotic (although if we all did that, there'd be no point to some of the subforums here). Tell us to go read a book for fun, or walk the dog (if we have one, as I do). Tell us that, at this point, there is nothing we can do but wait, and obsessing about it won't make decisions get to us any faster. Tell us that, if we must be here, avoid the threads that force us to compare ourselves so that we feel inadequate. But if you want to help? Don't tell us "I told you so."

Unfortunately, you said it in a snarky tone of voice. StrangeLight didn't. It's all well and good that you're a third time applicant--really, I hope you get in somewhere--but for those of us who haven't done this before, it's kind of second nature to worry. It just is. And you telling us "i told you so" just kind of makes you come off as a b**ch. Just saying. On a similar point, some of us don't have people in our lives that we can talk to about our neuroses, so we come here instead. This is where I can say I go to let off some steam and find others who understand exactly what I'm going through. Telling us "newbies" to just log off is to not take into account the possibility that we need to be here, if for no other reason than solidarity. Thank you old timers for your advice, but telling us "I told you so" isn't helping.

space out

Yes. Yes, they are.

Never assume, my dear. I applied to work with McConville. He didn't tell me he could only take one funded student though. He said "due to the current financial climate, we can only fund a limited number of entering graduate students, and usually only one person entering to study early American history is granted funding." That didn't read as "can only take one funded student," so I don't know if we applied to work with the same professor, but it doesn't sound like it. I hate feeling like I'm in competition with you though, nat. I feel like we've become friends (sort of) through this forum, and I don't like competing against my friends. :-(

Well that's irritating. I was warned about the funding issue by the professor I'd want to work with there. However, I wasn't aware that they took that long to decide on funding for students or not. As I will not be able to attend BU without funding myself, this is slightly off-putting. Damnit.

http://www.bu.edu/history/appstat.html

So to the other historians who have applied to Boston University's Ph.D. program, are you as irritated as I am that their application status website keeps saying "the status of applications will be posted later in January"? How much farther into January are they going to get before posting?!?!?!?! Arg!! ....I hate waiting....

I'm refusing to look at last year's results page to figure out when I'll know something. I am an individual that obsesses and worries a lot over a lot of stuff. I'd much rather NOT do that with this. If it's meant to be, I'll get in.

Quite. I can only hope it's good news. My mantra has been "just one acceptance with funding." I applied to 8 schools--that's not asking too much, is it?

I have this exact same problem. I'd love to apply for jobs, as I've been unemployed since July (purposefully--I needed to finish my thesis, and my job wasn't giving me the time I needed to start it, much less finish it). However, now that the hard part is done, I'm spending more and more time at home, bored out of my mind. I want to apply for jobs, but since there's the possibility that I won't be here in 6 months, I don't want to put my heart into searching for one. Tough gig. Rock--meet hard place.

As I applied to Yale's Ph.D. program, I'm entirely uncertain as to how I feel about this....

This. I'd email the person again, explain what's going on. If you don't ask, the answer's always no. On a separate, albeit related, note, I thought most Ph.D. programs allow you in straight from undergrad if you're good enough. I'm in history, though, so I could be wrong.

I, thankfully, do not show up on the interwebs. I google'd myself, and pipl'ed myself and google image'd myself---I do not exist on the interwebs really, and the two social networking sites I'm on, nobody can view without being my friend. Thank God for privacy settings. I don't have a lot of risque or taboo behavior on my myspace or facebook anyway (especially because my MOM is on my facebook), but it's still good to know that I won't really be embarrassed.

Manipulation Station

I, too, have a January 15th deadline--two of them, actually. But from what I've seen, that's par for the course for my program. Even so, I'd really prefer to know earlier than "late February-early March" because this waiting game is KILLING ME!!! :wacko:

Hi, my name is EricaMarie, and I'm a GradCafe addict. I check the results page numerous times a day, and have to force myself not to check the school websites for information. So far, doing pretty good....except with GradCafe.

Crap, I'll be drunk well before beer o'clock at this rate!

I think we're all using the Grad Cafe as a support group for precisely this reason. I'm pretty sure we're all anxious and freaking out. Although I will say that sometimes I think this forum only makes it worse, cause it forces us to confront others who may have better statistics than us (at least to our anxiety-ridden minds). I also refuse to go into "The Positives Thread," as it makes me even more insecure than I already am.

Almost nothing. That IS admirable....a bit crazy, but admirable.

Mine is really simple. It's my name. My avatar is Stitch banging his head against a wall, because that's what I've been doing since mid-November.

How much did it cost me, personally? About $20 in sending writing samples and such priority mail. How much did it cost my father? A pretty f'ing penny, let me tell you. I'm lucky my dad was willing to pay the application fees (which total somewhere around $800) and GRE score reports (approximately $200), not to mention the $400 it cost him to get UConn to release my transcripts because of a hold on my account. In terms of paying for transcripts, none of the schools I went to require me to pay for them, thankfully enough.

Revolutionary and early republican America, with a focus on the socio-political and socio-economic reasons for both the American Revolution itself (which is what I'm working on now for my thesis) and the Constitution itself. I have some theories about the Constitution that I'd like to flesh out in a dissertation.