Robin and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

And I thought 5 rejections in 5 days was bad.

Try 4 in one day, including my top 2. I was grading papers at Starbucks when I got the news. But I managed to hold it together. Perhaps I was in shock.

Then I returned home to grab lunch before some afternoon meetings. I walked into the apartment to find the scattered remains of five boxes of crackers, 2 platters of cookies, and 1/2 a slab of butterscotch fudge - all spread across the kitchen and living room floors. And there was the culprit, thumping her tail against the floor, as though praying I wouldn't notice her handiwork. I must admit I was a bit blinded by rage. All I could think of was the entire weekend I had spent baking Christmas cookies for neighbors and preparing for an engagement party we threw for our friends. But before I could enact on any discipline, I knew I had to take Mia outside to use the bathroom. Because history has taught us that Mia's feelings get hurt very easily - even something as simple as raising my voice and shaking my finger at her will maker her pee submissively. So now we let her empty her bladder first.

On my way out to the yard, I accidentally tripped on the sprinkler and ripped off part of my shoe. Still, I managed to hold it together. I brought Mia back in, rubbed her nose in the cookie crumbs while telling her "NO. Bad dog!" through clenched teeth, and put her in time out for 30 minutes (I locked her in her kennel and made it face the wall).

Then, I collapsed onto the couch and burst into tears.

Oh, the symbolism. Hard work, thoughtfulness, and anticipation - all for nothing. RIP baked goods for my neighbors:
Luckily, these survived:
My first attempt at Chismukkah baking. Because I thought it would be more thoughtful to give my Jewish supervisor some Hanukkah cookies rather than Christmas cookies. To keep you all abreast, then, I have a total of 1 interview. Which means I was rejected 14 times. 13.5 if you count the "maybe" I got from the Oklahoma City VA. 14.5 times if you count the second email I received from Virginia. This leaves me with a few options still: 1) Match at the consortium in Columbia, MO (given that I like them and they like me at the interview next month - a very big hoop to jump through), 2) match at OKC (which seems like a long shot right now), 3) attempt clearinghouse, 4) sit out a year and reapply next year when I'll be more competitive. All in all, not exactly the options I was hoping to be considering right now. But. It is what it is.

My future will unfold in the next two months. Stay tuned. Until then, here is my open letter to APPIC:

Dear Hell on Earth:
This is a broken process that enjoys putting applicants through torture. A few suggestions I have to improve the system:
1) Advise sites to NOT make applicants read an ambiguous email with attachments and then spend anxious seconds downloading and opening said attachments only to be rejected.
2) Advise sites to NOT reject applicants twice. One email is adequate. I promise we aren't still holding out hope after the first blow to the ego.
3) Advise sites to either invite an applicant for an interview or not. None of this in between, "you are still a person of interest" purgatory, please.
Sincerely,
Your Pawn