Wednesday, March 11, 2015

If this is Wednesday, it must be Nostrum

I'm looking at the weekend after the coming one (which I'll be working States both days) as my opportunity to port things over to Kindle. Continuing in my wallow in the past, here's the d.p., C through F. And yes, Hans Castorp is stolen from Magic Mountain, but isn't that better than stealing from, I don't know, 50 Shades of Grey?


Castorp, Hans


Hans Castorp, a German emigre, is a Hollywood wunderkind with a thick Teutonic accent and shoulder-length dirty blond hair. He is having difficulty casting his next picture.



Combat of Conquerors

Inevitably referred to as the COC, a tournament held at the end of each school year. An advisory board to the COC analyzes every tournament around the country by such criteria as the number of participants and the number of states from which these participants come, and jumbles it all together and comes up with the COC limbs: at certain points in a number of tournaments, perhaps at quaterfinals or semifinals, or at very big tournaments even at octofinals, COC limbs are granted. If you make it that far, you get a limb. If you get enough limbs to stand on—usually two but some years three and some years only one if you have a ghost limb or a wooden limb (don’t ask!) — then you are allowed to participate at the Combat of Conquerors.



Cratch, Bob

The secretary of the Quilty Prep forensics team. Bob Cratch is a perfect choice for the position: he is serious without being joyless, and he is capable of maintaining accurate records, which is more than can be said for many adult coaches. Even Bob Cratch’s appearance is serious but not joyless: tall and beefy with his blond hair in a Marine buzz cut, bright red flannel shirt over faded carpenter pants, giving off the sense of an apprentice lumberjack. This is his second year as secretary, and in that time he has never missed a registration deadline and never failed to obtain the maximum number of slots for his team.



Davidson, Disney


A vegan freshman at Northeastern Agricultural Institute, and former Nighten Day LDer.



Devans, Alida


At six feet tall, the most formidable coach on the circuit aside from Seth B. Obomash. Alida Devans, 53 years old, coaches speech at Brooklyn Behemoth. For Alida, it’s not about competition, it’s about winning. As it is hard to foster a mindless, prejudicial hatred unless you yourself are somehow tainted by the thing you hate, it behooves us to point out that Alida was raised a Catholic.



Diamond, Cartier


Nighten Day’s contribution to Dramatic Interp. A senior with shoulder-length blond hair, blazing violet eyes and a honey-soft feline voice. She usually dresses in black and is tall enough and pretty enough to be a model; Tarnish Jutmoll often gets the impression that she is only pretending to be a high school student to bring back notes from the field.



DiBella, Ellie


Once known as De Belle of Debate before she settled down with Trat Warner. A Nighten Day LDer, Ellie often  manages to break into elimination rounds. Both Ellie and Trat are seniors, and have already decided to seek early admission at the same college. No one doubts that they will be buried together about eighty years from now.



Dwindle, Chip


Representing Farnsworth Catholic’s LD contingent, Chip is his real—baptismal—name. Presumably there must be a St. Chip, therefore, celebrated somewhere in Catholic liturgy. Chip’s father, who often judges, is notorious for always dropping Jasmine Maru.



Farnsworth Catholic


From Manhattan, Farnsworthians always dress similarly in blazers and chinos, a recognizable uniform of exception in the otherwise uniform debate sea of inclusion of dark gray and blue suits. To a degree Farnsworthians are interchangeable cogs in their school’s attack on forensics, always running the same cases at blazing speed, leaving nothing behind but a whiff of incense and a hint of irony—they are Catholic to the core.



Coach: Haj L. Sworn



Debaters: Chip Dwindle



Fleece, Had


Six foot two with a linebacker’s solidly muscular build, he is golden and blond and chiseled thickly from the WASPiest of blood stocks. Had is neither conceited nor pompous about his debating success, any more than he is conceited or pompous about his classical good looks or his consistent high honor roll average or his perfect 1600 SATs achieved in his junior year. His lack of conceit and pomposity have made him the most popular boy in his Toulouse-Lautrec class, another fact about which he is neither conceited nor pompous.



Fudless, Gloria


Originally known as Gloria What, the word that would best describe her first appearance in Nostrum is undead. Her hair is dyed black, and she wears black eye makeup and black lipstick. But her voice is deep and rich. She appears—representing Bisonette Tech—at her first NDL in a short black skirt, black tights, a black shirt and a black jacket; you can take the girl out of the night, but you can’t take the night out of the girl.

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