Waiting and Waiting

UPDATED: 5 minutes later. So after checking over The Fletcher School's Web site and confirming with their admissions blog, I've learned that while decisions have been made, you have to wait to receive an email to tell you to check. That was not clear in their Facebook posting, but at least it has cleared things up a bit. But that also means that I have to twiddle my thumbs for a couple of days waiting for the email.

Last night I stayed in with the intention of just watching a movie and relaxing. Just before I was going to put a movie in around 10 pm I look over Facebook and saw that The Fletcher School at Tufts University had posted their decisions for Fall 2010. Instead of a letter or even failing that an email, we were being notified on the Facebook newsfeed. The notice also said that you could expect problems logging in because everyone who applied would probably be trying to find out at the same time.

I spent the next hour (Friday night) trying to log in, continually refreshing the page. It reminded me of a few years ago when I would try to buy concert or sports tickets via Ticketmaster, and having to continually hit refresh. The minute Red Sox tickets became available, you would have to reload the page 100 times in hopes of getting 1 game. Finally it became obvious that I wasn't going to get in, so I put in a movie and waited it out.

But at the end of the movie, around 1 am, I tried again to see if I was accepted or not. I was now able to get to the log in page, but a new problem developed. Now I had no idea what my user name or password were.  They weren't the same ones that I used for the application, nor were they related to my email address. I requested a new password, and though that arrived, the spot for user name was blank. I went to bed hungry to know what happened, but aware that there was nothing I could do.

I got up at the crack up dawn to check again, and still no luck signing in. The Fletcher School is one of the best in the country for International Relations, and it would be an honor to be accepted there. But I have to say, I'm pretty upset with the notification system. First of all, for a $70 application fee, an email at the very least would be appreciated, rather than by chance finding out through Facebook. Furthermore, if they want students to find out through their site, their server should be able to handle the load of the expected amount of students trying to find out if they got in. Of course everyone who applied will want to know as soon as possible, and posting it online and then saying you won't be able to see it is a tease.

I'm not sure what the next move is. Hopefully a letter will be sent to my parent's house in the U.S. But who knows how long that will take. In the meantime, I have tonight to look forward to. My friends will be arriving from Ecuador around 9:30 pm, though a day late, they will also gain a day on the trip. So it all works out in the end. By the time they get to my place it will probably already be 10:30 or later, and I'm sure they'll be exhausted. So maybe we'll just grab a bite to eat and call it a night. We have to make the most of the time together that we have because I'll be working the majority of their stay. But it will still be nice to have visitors for a while.