Does anyone know if a confirmation from the registrar actually means that you got the name?

All the registrars I'm dealing with seem to be indicating that they are "processing" the requests, and what shows available and what is actually registered may not be the same.

Enom (who I love) has some janky queue that's broken, so I can't register with them, Dotster says "we'll take 24 to 48 hours to get back to you", GoDaddy is broken (and they have the WORST interface, constantly trying to sell me crap I don't want), so I'm with some off-brand registrar called "Instra Corporation"