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Me too. And people always ask! I try to ward it off by telling them I applied to nine, but usually I have to go through the whole list. I feel like I'm invoking the spirits of bad juju or that saying the list aloud is some incantation wrought by the evil wizard of applications.

There's an action figure of Pope Innocent III?!?! NO WAY, how did I not know about this?! That's it, I'm totallly getting that for myself if I get in someplace. That and a hockey jersey from my favorite team (you know, because I'll have to move away from the town where they play ans so I'll have to find a new way to show my pride and everything).

I went with a handwritten thank-you card and handmade baked goods.

Oh my goodness. This is terrifying. That would definitely be more tragic than just simply getting rejected.

Genius! Mad props to Allport!

Hall and Oates- You Make My Dreams ("what I got, you want, it might be hard to handle") That's also my major pump up song (walking to exams snapping my fingers like I'm a member of the Sharks/Jets on my way to a dance fight). I second Abba- Take A Chance on Me!

No worries! (which reminds me of that song "Don't Worry, Be Happy" Doooo dododo dee doodly doo ah deedly dooo)

The beginning of that sounded suspiciously negative. Don't make us bring out the flails! This is a happy land of no self-doubt; haha there are more than enough threads for agonizing over shortcomings- I would know, I'm a high-frquency poster in them As for the person-above-you game, I went with the creepy creeper strategy of searching.

Depends on your programs. Best way to check is by going over the the results page and searching your programs. Admittedly, I have spent countless hours doing this for my programs and can tell you about the ones I've looked up/obsessed over: For the programs that do interviews: Duke and UMich have typically invited people for their open house/interview weekend in the last week of January/first week of February. Columbia's invite for the open house went out on Feb. 11th last year. NB: there's always a person who posts an acceptance who didn't get invited to the interview/open house, so don't worry! For PhD programs (the MA decisions seem to all go out in March, but then again, I could have overlooked something): Duke= 1st week of March UMich= late Feb-mid March (rejects went out first, acceptances and waitlists came out later, in March) Columbia= 1st week of March Brown= end of February UVA= late Feb- March Yale= accept mid-Feb, reject mid-March Harvard= mid-March Clearly applying to grad school isn't helping my obsessive-compulsive tendencies AT ALL. I apologize to all the people who are much calmer than I am (and who are now thinking, "Hey, will you get your OCD stress/neuroticism off my BB!" These are all just culled from the results page, but if you want me to look up your program, I totallly will. If you've heard anything to the contrary, let me know!

I was hoping this thread would appear, and was tempted to start it myself! I'm also PADI certified. Haven't gone diving in a while since my last dive was at Alki (Washington) during a December blizzard (wasn't the best choice of times). My younger sibling was getting certified and I was his buddy. There's a lot of stuff floating around in the Puget Sound, and I'm convinced cold water creatures are creepier. My dad is also a divemaster/instructor and has done a bunch of really cool wreck dives. I'm dying to try a warm water dive! They have some really amazing cave dives in Mexico where you enter through a sinkhole, go diving through the completely dark cave, and exit through another sinkhole.

Can we also add why we think the person above us is awesome? Ego boosting is more fun when we can do it for others, too As in, I think I'd be a really interesting candidate for studying material culture because I have an interdisciplinary background (history and archaeology). Also, I think I would have a great time at UVA because I visited there and absolutely loved my conversation with the grad students- I waanted them all to be my friends on the spot. Also, perrykm2 would be a great candidate because from her comments, it always seems like she has nice, positive things to say. She would brighten any department smart enough to pick her!

I have zero claim to greater knowledge or insight, but in my opinion, it seems like a fairly good call. I think it shows you know what you're getting into and that you've given the whole situation a lot of forethought. Haha, I would't have thought to add the addendum (because I'm not as good at thinking ahead?), so I think maybe it shows that you've got a good head on your shoulders. Again though, that's just my opinion as a fellow applicant!

I apologize for degrading your BB holdon; I didn't post my stats because I'm applying for Art History programs, not History. I keep up with the history boards because I did my undergrad in history and work part-time in a history department. I also post on the lit boards, because they have really fun and lively conversations there.

Congrats! I haven't found out...anything. Except that they haven't met yet to look at application at the school I work at (but am not applying to).

Also a diver! In fact, I had a dream the other day where the admissions committee brought be in and said that if I wanted to get admitted, I would have to do a nighttime search-and-rescue dive in order to save the local hockey team, whose plane crashed. I was really upset and told them that I couldn't do it because I wasn't certified for that. Then a really scary adcom guy said in a scary voice: "Are you going to let that be the reason we reject you??" with a raised eyebrow. Terrifying. I don't knwo where this stuff comes from.

The whole applications process sort of makes you commit wholeheartedly to ONE THING (not a bad thing, I mean, I'm definitely in love with my super-specific field). Not to suggest you'd cheat on your field or anything, but if you weren't doing what you are doing, what would you all being doing. I love me some Medieval monastic architecture (what I'm applying for), but If that topic suddenly disappeared off the face of the planet and I had to pick something else, it would be Bronze Age Aegean archeaology (Mycenaeans! Woohoo!). Anybody else? I'm always curious about what people's other interests are. You know, since we're sort of defining our lives by our major interests now.

Sorry, I'll pull myself together. The hysteria, it just sort of seeps out sometimes. My bad y'all.

Haha well now I have that general feeling of sneaking unease. "They could be looking at my app RIGHT NOW" You know, that ominous sensation of coming doom. No? Just me?

OMG- I saw that on the results page. I agree- good on UVA. But also OH MY HEAVENS- ITS STARTED! Agh. That means they must be looking at applications. AGH.

A thought (that came shortly after last night's grad school nightmare): this thread covers people's varying thought on posting acceptances, but does anyone plan on posting about rejections? Maybe only me, since I'm convinced at the moment that I'm only going to get those? Maybe I'm weak, but misery loves company. Also, it saves me having to say it out loud and in person, which I imagine is going to be extreely painful, since I told everyone who would listen about applying. So, I figure, just post my sadness, bam get it out of the way, then when something more amusing comes along in several hours, post a new, more cheerful status. Cathartic possibly? Alternately, my roommate and I (we're both applying to the same schools, but for different programs), made an agreement that we'll just knock on each other's doors when we find out and have a good cry together.

I have a smartphone, so I pretty much am okay waiting around not checking my email, but I'm becoming obsessive about checking the boards. Thinking: "Anyone from any of my schools hear back yet? Of course not! I won't hear for at least a month... Anyone in my field hear back yet (at any school)? Argh. Still of course not. Wait! That's the name of one of the schools I applied to! Oh wait... that's for chemistry. Which isn't art history."

Same here. I figure they're trying to desensitize me to their emails.

I have a Nook color (the tablet one) and adore it for reading pdfs (and romance novels). My roommate has a regular Kindle and uses it to do all her class readings, but I think she has bionic eyes or something, because the font is extremely small.

Got an email from "Yale Admissions" today and my heart definitely stopped there for a bit. Scrolled down to see what they were up to (after regaining my self-control), only to find out they were just telling me that general admissions had passed along applications to specific departments for review. Don't tell me that Yale! I don't need that kind of stress!

I'm really warming to this idea. We round them up, then find a nice tower in middling stages of ruination and lock them in it, and proceed to convince them that they are doing some kind of reenactment. Mary Bruce imprisoned in Roxburgh? Any number of folks in the Tower of London? We'll even give them period clothes! Woolen hose should keep them happy until all the deadlines are over and we let them go free.