Most Likely Scenario

This past weekend, I visited a school in Colorado for an interview at a marketing program - along with two other applicants.  It started with a dinner Sunday night with two faculty members and one of the other applicants.  Then Monday, I had 30 - 60 minute sessions with faculty members (individually) and current grad students (in groups).  A grad student also took me out to dinner.  I felt that it went "fine" but not great - everyone was very friendly, but it seemed to me that I was having difficulty clicking with people, hitting my stride, whatever metaphor you want to use.  Also, even though the location is objectively awesome, I'm not sure I actually want to live there, especially as a relatively broke graduate student.  2-bedroom apartments close to campus are like $1500+.  I had to control the urge to laugh many times as we walked around the pedestrian mall area on Sunday evening and the professors kept pointing out things like the restaurant that has all-you-can-eat sushi one night a week for $29.99, the vast number of independent coffee shops, etc.  It was refreshing the next day when a different professor remarked that there are a lot of good restaurants in town because the residents are mostly rich and it's also a popular tourist town.  I was overall beset with this feeling of being in a place dominated by stuff white people like to a crazy degree, such as:

Organic food
Yoga
Snowboarding
Vegan/vegetarianism
Whole Foods and grocery co-ops
Dogs (oh god, their love of dogs)
Bicycles
Outdoor performance clothes

It's probably just as well that the program/location didn't feel like a terrific fit because they have already offered a position to one of the people I interviewed with but not me.

However, by Sunday night, this totally didn't matter to me because I got a phone call from my dad's nemesis school with the news that I am their top choice for their program!  This is the program that in my first foray into thinking about marketing PhDs, when I looked at the websites of all US-based programs, I liked the best.  And I definitely felt when I did my phone interview that I had a great interview and really was talking to like-minded people.  The prof told me that they were going to give me, in addition to the regular funding, an extra research stipend of $7500 to be used for attending conferences, paying participants, etc., which is awesome.  She then asked me what they could do to help me make a decision to come there.  I said that my only reservation about the program was that I feel a little intimidated by the winters in [this infamously cold and snowy place], so maybe if I visited the campus, I would be able to get over this psychological barrier.  I'm currently arranging to visit around April 1 (no foolin'), at their expense.

Coming back from my trip was an adventure.  The plane from Washington Dulles to home should have left at 6:29pm but did not actually leave until about 11:30pm.  It was annoying, but on the plus side: (1) I got to meet a lovely group of people who were all waiting for that same plane and (2) I had Obama-approved burger and fries from Five Guys for dinner.

But on the downside, I have gotten sick again.  I'm feeling a bit better today than yesterday, but still just totally worn out.  Robert and I went to see My Masters University's basketball team lose in the first round of the ACC tournament this afternoon, and I was exhausted by the time I got home.