We’ve arrived in the new year with a vengeance. I’ve got a
bunch of tournaments in a row, and been attending to all of them. Except one.
The one is Bigle X. This is one of the events where other
people do all the work and all I do is tabulate. To suggest that Kaz knows what
she is doing running a tournament is to suggest that the sun rises in the east.
Of course, at Bigle she is responsible for everything, and everything is a lot
of stuff, so Vaughan and Bro John and I do the tabbing for the LD divisions and she keeps her hands
off the equipment. I know that a lot of tabbers who run tournaments find
themselves sucked into tabbing, but I’ve always maintained that he who tabs his
own tournament has an idiot for a tabber. There’s too many other things that
might come up. If nothing else, a tournament director needs to be making sure
that the rounds are happening, that runners are checking that all is well and
whatnot. Until we have universal understanding that the start button in
tabroom.com means that you have started the round, and that pressing it
indicates this to the tab room, we will need human intervention. Not to mention
that a TD needs to make sure there’s coffee in the judges' lounge, ziti in the
cafeteria and no floods in the rest rooms. Among other things. If someone
collapses in a heap suffering from dengue fever, the TD must address it. If
there are procedural challenges, hello TD. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
Meanwhile V and BJ and I are sitting on our duffs studying the tropical fish in
the tab room (although we’ve been promised comfier chairs albeit less wildlife
this year). I’d rather tab than direct any day. No question about it.
Then there’s the two colleges. The Gem of Harlem is in two
weeks, for pete’s sake, and we still don’t have room confirmations. Try
managing a waitlist with no idea how much space you have. Penn is in the same
situation, but at least they’re not for another month. I’ve shut down TBAs for
both this week, and will be playing the game of numbers for a while as we await
confirmation. As I’ve pointed out many times, nothing engenders emails asking
if coaches will be getting slots than an announcement on my part that I don’t
know if coaches will be getting slots. In any case, I’m muddling through with
these. If you really want to know what’s going on, follow me here. Anything
else is just rumor.
And finally there’s Baby Bump. Registration was going slow
for this, so I figured I needed to take steps. I sent out a message to local people
whose tournaments I run pretty much telling them to kiss Menick goodbye if they
didn’t register by Friday. Needless to say, they began registering, and things
there are looking fine. I’ve pretty much promised that next year we’ll go back
to two days. They’ll be ready for it.
Oh yeah. The distraction. I’ve really become enamored of my
PS4. I finished Uncharted 4, and started on a Lego game. Apples and potato
chips, as they don’t say. I liked U4 a lot and bought the 1-3 set to play at a
future date. The thing is, if you buy a new game, it’s maybe $60, and if you
buy last year’s game, it’s maybe $20. If you’re wondering what I’m doing when I’m
not pairing rounds, I’m probably playing last year’s game.
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