A rejection letter two-fer!

My hide is leathery and battle-scarred. I have been through the academic hiring gauntlet and back again. I have taken their best shots and their, at best, half-assed ones, but I'm still standing. Underemployed, but standing. Based on the countless dozens of rejection letters I have posted here over the last two hiring cycles, I am convinced that there is only one person who writes the rejection letters for all English Departments, and he or she has a very limited repertoire.

Dear Mr. Jihad,

Thank you for contacting The Iron Curtain University regarding the tenure-track position in the English Department. We appreciate you taking the time to submit your application file.

A large number of excellent applications were received for this position with very strong backgrounds, and our decision is not an easy one. We have narrowed our search to a small group of candidates whose background appears to best match our current needs. We regret to inform you that you are not in this final group.

Your interest in Iron Curtain University is greatly appreciated. Please accept our best wishes for your continued career success.

Axl Thrustpuffin
Chair, Search Committee

Ooooh!!!!! It was a hard decision!!! I hope everybody got through it ok. Do you need a moist towlette? "Continued career success?" Did I miss "initial success" somewhere? Or are words' meanings things you let other people worry about?

Dear Professor Jihad:

The Search Committee wishes to thank you for applying for our position in Modern and Contemporary American Literature at the University of Historiann. We very much appreciate your having let us consider your application and recognize the effort and time that went into preparing it. We regret to inform you that another candidate has been offered and has accepted the position. You have our best wishes for success in your search for an academic post.

Sincerely,

Ulirike Philpotts
Chair, Search Commitee

As I look at these two letters, I find an interesting grammatical connundrum. Behold: 1) "We appreciate you taking the time to submit your application file," and 2) "We very much appreciate your having let us consider your application and recognize the effort and time that went into preparing it." Having spoken the both of them out loud, I am going to say that #1 is more elegant, though they are both thanking me for something they really shouldn't. I mean, "appreciate your having let us consider," is a Frankenstein's monster of verbal awkwardness.

HJ