enthusiasm

This whole process of trying to get job offers is strange.
One of the positions doesn't exist, but they are opening up a position for me. The problem is that in order to do that they need to think there is a reasonable chance that I'll actually take the job if they offer it to me. In this case there is a reasonable chance to take the job, but I'm wondering how effectively I'm communicating that. When I am overworked it seems that this ability to judge this type of thing is seriously impaired. I think that my natural tendency is to be the nice guy and make all sorts of promises that I can't keep. So I go in the other direction and keep things very formal and brief. I feel like I'm involved with this elaborate poker game of bluffs and counterbluffs, which I'd like to break out of and just tell the truth. The problem with some types of truth is that they are complicated and can be seriously misunderstood if not fully understood.

Anyway, my advisor suggesting to me that this is an exciting offer and I should be "enthusiastic" is one of the hardest aspects of this whole process so far. I'm not much of a bargainer.

I was thinking about what it would be like if the process of getting married were like this... if the goal was to get two or three offers and then take a few months to consider them, weigh the pros and cons and then make a decision. Maybe all the applications would be due around April sometime and the responses would filter in by May/June...

I was going to say that I must clearly be out in left field, but thinking about it I wonder if right field isn't the better analogy... maybe missed the game due to bad traffic? uh.. anyone?