[Anyone else feeling negative?]

For a few weeks I berated myself for not having applied to any safety schools, but my measured conclusion is this: i applied to only the places I desperately wanted to go to. The enormity of a five-year PhD course is too significant to make any compromises on. I absolutely completely and utterly want to do this PhD but if this doesnt work out, life will lead me down another course, which is also not a compromise (just a different solution).

Exactly. I've only applied to four programs, all in the top 5. A lot of people are surprised to hear that I don't have a safety, and for a while I was deciding whether or not I needed one. I don't. Like you said, a PhD is too much of a sacrifice and commitment to do it someplace where your research won't be completely supported or the faculty in your area aren't top-notch, etc. And all that work just to enter a shitty job market, even from a top program? No, if I'm really going for a PhD, it's got to count.

Though I wish I had your optimism regarding the compromise vs. different solution thing.

[take a gamble: predict your own outcome!]

My wife and I quote The Office all the time. That's one of our favorite lines.

Ah! I knew I got that from somewhere! I watch so much TV these days it's hard to keep track. I like that line especially because it's a clever example of what's called a back-formation in linguistics, like the way the noun "teen" came from "thirteen, fourteen," etc.

[take a gamble: predict your own outcome!]

No way am I doing this. Of course I've done it in my head multiple times, but I'm not putting it in writing.

I'm not superstitious, just a little stitious.

[The waiting is the hardest part]

I'm prepared for a rejection or two, but I pray that an acceptance comes first. I don't know how I'd handle a rejection without knowing that I at least got in somewhere.