Moo hoo, ha ha

Thursday (and the day before, and several of the days before that) were practice tests. I was being cute about revealing the scores on those, because not only were those scores... not bad, but not awesome, but moreover there was a chance that the actual, real GRE test scores would be similar, or worse. So I didn't want to be blabbing about my 540 on the math part and my 650 on the verbal part, because wow would I look like a dork if the scores I'd actually be using turned out lower.

I did the real test yesterday, on Friday. Not to worry. It turned out very well. Thank you to all who helped, supported, or just wished me well and put up with my weird schedule and lack of availability.

You know, now that I am apparently a high achiever, I'll need to re-think my jaded, hipster disregard for people who succeed at stuff. Actually, all I need to do is refine it a little: here's what I've actually been talking about all this time, when I say snotty things about "straight A students" or "those damn pre-meds."

What I hate is an obvious sense of entitlement. When people crow about their awesome GPAs and their stellar experiences and how their dad the cardiothoracic surgeon set them up with a great guy who happens to be the 3rd most blah blah blah. They make us workin'-class kids think we are in danger of being shut out, because we had to work full-time and pay our own way, and that may have eclipsed some of what might make us amazing applicants in our own right. How could an admissions committee possibly know that a 3.3 for us might be more difficult, and more meaningful?

So if my own crowing becomes annoying, please call me on it. And also, please know that I mean it in the spirit of enthusiastic and grateful good-wishes to everyone who helped me get this far. I can't believe my good fortune, and yes I suppose I do feel like I earned it, but it's still a gift. I don't mean to be obnoxious to anyone, except maybe those dillweeds I mentioned earlier. As rare as they are, and seriously I have met very few, they're toxic. People who behave as though it's the most normal thing in the world to be fortunate, and anything less is a character flaw, are a danger to fortune and to character. And I hope to never be one of those people. I know you'll help me make sure of that.

So, are you ready, then? Here goes: I got--

Awwwww; a day later, and now I'm shy about it. I've re-edited this post. Let's just say I got a math score that's much higher than I had expected, based on the practice tests. In Verbal, meanwhile, I figured I'd do well, but I did well enough that I blew away a little goal I'd set for myself, which had seemed possible but not likely.

The combined score is high; the mean of the two scores is high; the difference between the two is actually not horrible. Based on some Web searching, I'm in great shape. That's the thing.