My, how time flies.

I knew it had been far too long since I'd updated my adoring public on my uber-exciting life, but the fact that it's been a month is news even to me. My apologies to all, and especially to Ruth, who apparently has lost some of her will to live since she hasn't heard all the interesting bits of my life lately. Never mind that she was there for most of them.

Anyway! I'm sure there is someone out there who is dying to hear all the details about my acceptance to the University of Texas... oh, you haven't heard? You are reading the uncharted rantings of an almost-university student at this very moment.

So, I applied in December, had all my paperwork in (including the transcript from my reluctant previous college) by January, and then had a couple of months of sitting around being anxious before the application deadline on March 31st. And then the anxiety level kicked up several notches, since the UT website promised that "outstanding" applicants would be notified early on, and the general public could expect to hear back by mid-May. Since I was with me all through high school, and I graduated from a community college, I didn't expect to be in the "outstanding" category.

In the meantime, I got a courtesy email from the financial aid office at UT letting me know that they had received all my paperwork and would begin processing my application once I was accepted. Good to know, thanks.

I checked the website about six times a day the first weekend in April, then decided that was a bit over the top, so restricted myself to checking every Friday, which I did the following week, followed by a little anxiety-relieving dance around my living room when I saw that I was still being reviewed.

On the following Tuesday, I innocently checked my email in the morning & found a message from the financial office that they were about to begin processing my file. The speed at which I put two & two together will probably stand for the rest of my life as the fastest time I ever managed to do maths. I'm not exaggerating when I say that my entire body went numb and I sat there for a minute starting at my screen after I closed the email.

Then I decided that I couldn't wait until the evening to find out-- I had to know then. So, I raced to the back of the office (this was still all unknown to most of my coworkers) to check my status. And it was probably the longest three minutes of my life while I located my login credentials, navigated away from the page by mistake, located my credentials again, and then finally found my status check page, where I saw the magical words: "Congratulations! You have been accepted into your first-choice major..."

And that's all I saw, because that's when I began shrieking, jumping up & down, and hugging everyone within reach. And smiling so hugely my face almost cracked.

It was Friday before I got my letter in the mail, and finally got to take the picture I'd been planning since last summer:

So, we're moving to Austin. Wish me luck!