but they were not screened in order. The 10/8 post is below a 10/7 post. Whatever . . .

different mods working different schedules looking at randomly assigned posts. that's why posts take widely varying amount of time to pass. did you really think that ter was organized enough to tell us that "your posts will be approved in the order in which they are received?

Is the likely reason.
When posts are moved, they go on the top, and the time stamp doesn't matter.
Here's a hint: Did you ever see DavePHX reply on this board?

Take a look at the S&P board. There's a thread from August above a whole bunch of newer threads, because it just got moved there