In which we spend a weekend in the country

Sheryl was down for the weekend, and this and that were done by one and all. Friday we went into the city to, first, see the Moholy-Nagy exhibit at the Gug, then to have dinner with a handful of the DisAds, including JV. For a while, before the civilians showed up, we discussed debate business. JV is going to try to herd local folks into some novice scrimmages after school. With the demise of the MHL, which was for all practical purposes created to provide novice rounds, those rounds are sadly lacking in the region. The odd thing is, the MHL’s demise was all its own; there was no outside catalyst. People just stopped coming, even though the same number of people needed the same number of rounds. Go figure. Anyhow, there needs to be something for the young forensicians. You don’t get good by lying fallow. Experience is required. As a general rule, the average 4th year debater can beat almost any younger debater drawing on experience alone. This is not a guarantee, but it’s hardly counterintuitive. If you want to get good at something, practice. And if you want your novice year to go by with you doing nothing but growing moss, don’t practice. But the rounds have to be there in the first place before you can go to them. Some local scrimmages could go a long way to replacing the MHL.

Kaz and I additionally provided some input to the Rather Large Bronx folks about registration. Getting people through efficiently is always a problem anywhere there’s a lot of people, and RLB is one of the worse. Needless to say, my Toolkit addresses this. If nothing else, I’m pretty efficient and have plenty of tips to make others efficient. Whether RLB takes our suggestions remain to be seen; I’m sure they’ll take some of them. No registration process is so perfect (and no tournament is so perfect, for that matter) that it cannot be improved. I’ll share more on this as it comes to pass.

We also soaked up some other culture, like the three-woman version of the Scottish play at Boscobel and a tour of the Gothic Revival mansion at Lyndhurst and a screening of North by Northwest to educate the Hitchcock-deprived Lexington coach. Very satisfying weekend overall. And there's only a couple more before the games begin in earnest.

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