If this is Wednesday, it must be Nostrum, plus some math

The guys have just come out with Episode 2, over at Nostrum Nation. You’ll recall that in Ep 1 we met Dearth Hannah, the tournament director of the COC, and we went back to that glorious day in the middle of the Manhattan Lodestone (a magnet school) Vaganza (all other vaganzas are extra) Tournament when H. E. Horus-Pecan presented his idea for an event for the best of the best to Dan Ryan and Mr. Lo Pat over a bottle of Old Gomorrah. Unless, of course, you’ve been dipping into the Old Gomorrah yourself, in which you’ll be lucky if you can remember your name, rank and serial number.

I went this morning for a pneumonia vaccine. The nurse told me that one of the side effects is that I might become irritable. As if.

There’s 107 entries in VLD at Bigle X. There’s 251 rounds of judging signed up, whatever the hell that means. The way I interpret it, doing a little quick math, is that 107 entries divided by 2 flights divided by 2 teams = 53.5 flights / 2 = 26.75 needed 6 times = 160.5 rounds required, and while the majority of folks are booked for 6 rounds (plus elims) and only a handful of spalpeens are only in for the minimal 2, we should be fine. If the spalpeens are poorly preffed, even more fine. The experimental side of me is eager to play around with this. The practical side of me strongly believes that a high school tournament judging commitment is for the entire tournament, at least all the prelims, and why are you preferring sitting on an uncomfy chair in the judges’ lounge surrounded by the smell of burnt coffee and stale bagels and hummus from the local Piggly Wiggly when you could be actually doing something forensical? What do I know? I used to like judging—I thought it was fun—although I didn’t mind the odd round off now and then to recharge the batteries. Nowadays getting people to judge is like pulling teeth. Most coaches, even the good ones, don’t really want to do it, unless they’re under the drinking age (the normal point at which none of them are ever heard from again). Tells you something about the event, doesn’t it?

C’est la vie.

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