I don't think you're a nut, just too ready to buy into a nice-sounding, well-packaged presentation. Don't feel badly, I bought into it, too, for many years. I grew up reading Hal Lindsay's "Late, Great Planet Earth" and thought it a compelling argument, at the time, but couldn't really piece it together from scripture, nor had I the time to do so. Having in recent years endeavored more diligently to build that edifice from it's foundations, I find I cannot, for the foundations do not exist. I am quite convinced that scripture makes enough prerequisites that bind our "gathering together" with Christ to "the Day of the LORD" that a pre-tribulation rapture scenario is quite out of the question.
Obviously, I do not have the space, here -- lest I be rude, which I shall eschew -- to construct a comprehensive argument, but just the scriptural references I have provided, below, are a sufficient beginning for any committed Truth-seeker.
Ref. 2 Thessalonians
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20thess%202;&version=49; Ref. 1 Thessalonians 4
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Thess%204;&version=49;
The phrase "our gathering together to Him" from 2 Thessalonians 2:1, is bounded by some prerequisites further elaborated upon in 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17.
1. The LORD Himself will descend from Heaven with a shout...
2. The dead in Christ will rise first
After these prerequisites, "then, we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds".
Note that "we who are alive" CANNOT refer only to Christians saved during the Tribulation; ones 'left behind' by an earlier occurring 'rapture'. Why? Because the writer of 1 Thessalonians 4, uses the pronoun "we", by which he means he, himself and all of his contemporary hearers, none of whom had been 'left behind', nor were they going to be. In fact, since the write states thus in 1 Thessalonians 4:15, "we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord", how can we then contend that there are some of "we who are alive" who will, by some means (i.e. 'rapture') NOT "remain until the coming of the Lord"? There's only ONE other group of people described: "the dead in Christ".
So, by the testimony of the Thessalonian epistles, a Christian (for that is the audience to whom these letters are addressed) must EITHER be "dead in Christ" OR be "alive and remain until the coming of the Lord".
It's actually pretty plain, when all of the dispensationalist bookstore hype gets laid aside. But, don't take it from me, go read the scripture, again, for yourself. Hash through it between you and the LORD in prayer with JUST HIS WORD between you. Let HIM confirm what He has said. Let God's WORD be true and every man a liar.