What a neat thread and it is great to be together on a message board again after all these years.
After my older son completed and outgrew our much beloved curriculum that we had used for 6 years, I was at a loss. Your Betty/Olive comparison has really helped me to make sense as to why some of my other friends who experienced a similar change seemed to transition so much easier than I did. I am a card carrying Betty with a strong organizational bent and an acceptance of my own limitations. 
In the last few years, we have tried numerous other unit study approaches with limited success. They all seemed to require way too much of me even with my strong desire to see them through. My organizational bent seemed to prevent me from being able to shut my brain down from all the planning that was required and my acceptance of limitations always seemed to get in the way of being able to pull off the sea of projects that were required of me on a daily basis.
I have always leaned toward the CM approach but the awesome choice of books to read left me constantly questioning the current readaloud... maybe I should have picked this other book instead.
That relational Betty in me has always leaned toward a cozy "let's all be together and learn" approach to schooling and I am thankful to have found HOD. It seems to pull everything together in one place and add in projects and hands on things that make sense. I love it that DITHOR allows for that creative part of me that likes to do some of the organizing myself. I have never looked at a curriculum with a daily schedule that has actually made me think "this can definitely work for us" before HOD. I feel like after all these years of struggling to find something that fits, that I am finally home again.
Thanks Mary for giving something fun to think about today. Kimber