Win or lose, Sally Canfield expected to be in Italy right now.
''Every once in a while, I'll look up at the clock and think something like, 'Oh, it's 7:30 in Rome right now, I should be out on a balcony there with a glass of wine,' '' said Ms. Canfield, a domestic policy adviser to Gov. George W. Bush.
Instead, Ms. Canfield finds herself right back in her cubicle at Bush campaign headquarters, poring over law books and searching the Internet, quickly coming up to speed on arcane aspects of Florida election statutes.
Call it limbo. Or call it Groundhog Day, as some people here do, referring to the movie whose protagonist woke up to the same day over and over again. It's felt like Election Day for five days now, and it looks like it will for at least several more.
But here in Austin, the Texas capital that broke out into a premature laser-light and mariachi-music celebration early Wednesday when network television declared Mr. Bush to be the next president, the subsequent confusion over who really won has produced a particularly acute form of torture.
For one thing, Governor Bush is hardly the only ambitious Texas politician waiting to see if he will claim an official victory, or if a recount or legal challenge somehow hands the presidency to Al Gore.
The lieutenant governor's job is thought by many here to be the most powerful job in state government, though the governor's is of course officially more prestigious and its holder better known, and competition for it could become fierce. So many Republicans have expressed an interest that gleeful Democrats predict their colleagues in the majority will never be able to agree among themselves on a candidate, thus handing the Democrats a major say; some Democratic aspirants even dream of peeling off a Republican or two in a backroom deal and perhaps winning the job themselves.
That's all in private, of course. Officially, nobody is saying much of anything -- except perhaps to say that much as they love Governor Bush and would miss him terribly here in Austin, they certainly hope he becomes president.
And a spokeswoman for David Sibley, the Republican State Senator from Waco whom many handicappers describe as the out-of-the-gate leader for Mr. Perry's post -- if the candidates are ever let out of the gate, that is -- said Mr. Sibley was also unavailable for an interview.
Officially, Mr. Bush has put out the word that he is working with his transition team and considering appointments to a ''potential administration,'' as he put it Friday during a White House-style photo opportunity. But he also ducked a question from reporters Friday on whether his confidence about becoming president was so great that he was ready to resign as governor.
In Austin, some people here say they are intensely angry over the Gore camp's decision to fight. But others in this capital and university town, sometimes dubbed the ''People's Republic of Austin'' because it is thought of as much more liberal than the state as a whole, clearly hope the governor will wind up losing.
And there's humor too. ''Floridians ask your waitress for assistance,'' proclaims a sign outside El Arroyo Tex-Mex, an Austin hangout, a dig at the already infamous confusion over the ballot in Palm Beach County.
Meanwhile, for hundreds of workers in the Bush campaign, many of whom moved here and had planned to move out again right after the election (many to Washington, if their candidate won), the fallout from ''Indecision 2000,'' as some here are calling it, is excruciating.
''People just wish there'd be some clarity as to what direction they're supposed to be moving in,'' said Russell Schriefer, a member of the Bush advertising team, one of dozens of people who moved here for the campaign and are now wondering what to do with their apartment lease. ''You may or may not work in the White House. People would like to know.
For Ms. Canfield, who normally works on health-care policy, the forgone Italian vacation has its costs, and the primary one is not financial. She and her sister managed to cancel hotel and car-rental reservations without cost, and can re-use their airplane tickets at a later date for a small penalty fee.