I willed myself to be more cheerful this week. Seriously, I told myself I would look at everything with rose colored glasses. God tested me. I will spare you the details but I had a major hell come to Jesus with my babysitter. Additionally, both of my kids got strep throat which entailed a three hour wait at the urgent care clinic with a wild eighteen month old. Why do we keep espousing the belief that boys are harder as toddlers? Anyway, I just kept chanting, thank God it is only strep, thank God we have health insurance. It became this crazy exercise for me. FYI, I missed another two days of work this week. I''m really batting a thousand lately at work.

DH is home tonight before he flies out for another four days. We are on better footing now that we have returned to our more rational states. This interview process has been one heck of a ride. Not only have I been single mom par excellence, I have to cope with a different set of possible outcomes every day. In the beginning, he went to a program in the South which he LOVED but was never on my radar. I did some research about COL, schools, distance from home, housing, etc. and wrapped my brain around this particular location. Several interviews later, he decided that he loved a program in a non-descript bland midwestern city. Again, I did my research to get to where I was "o.k." with this option only to be told a week later that he loves a program on the East Coast. Although I''m fairly against the East Coast because of finances, this program rocks academically and is set up to be super family friendly. I couldn''t believe the call schedule. On the other hand, one of the programs near our home town brutalizes its fellows and appears to suck the life out of its fellows. Story of my life.

I guess this falls under the Mick Jagger category: "You can''t always get what you want. But if you try sometimes, You get what you need."

I''m to the point where I almost don''t want to talk about it until he is entirely done interviewing. Of course, I could never institute this amount of self-restraint and I continue to call him the moment I know that the interview is complete.

My incessant complaining has obscured the fact that I''m really proud of him. He has worked his hiney off to get where he is at. Programs are courting him hard core. This is an exciting time for him professionally.

It is hard to be enthusiastic with him when I''m half-crazed trying to keep our lives running back home and we''re blowing $7 to 8,000 on this little adventure. (Because we have that kind of money

But I''m trying.

The last interview date is April 10. I can honestly say that in almost 6 years of residency I have never played the countdown game before. I am now. I want this over and done with now. There is this illusion of control, like we have the power to influence the match. We have had a match not go our way before, so I''m trying not to get worked up about any particular outcome. Things always work out the way that they are supposed to, right?