In which we demonstrate unspeakable skill at Photoshop

Catholic Charlie thinks that my guide to tabroom is about as user-friendly as the IRS tax code. Philistine! There’s no accounting for taste. And he’ll live to regret his flip attitude when all his rooms come crumbling down around him.

Meanwhile, I’m trying to figure out why I’d ever buy another piece of music if Spotify is just going to give it to me for free. I mean, I seem to want to listen to “Happy” every five minutes, so I thought, what the hey, I’d listen to the album and maybe buy it. But if I can listen to it on demand, why exactly would I be buying it? Unless I want to put it on my home system, in which case I would get the disk, but I’ll admit that my disk buying is minimal these days, in that I can always just put the mp3s on a disk and play that on my stereo if I really want it in the living room. Anyhow, shouldn’t Williams get something from me for my accessing his intellectual property? Presumably he is getting something from Spotify in a basic radio-ASCAP/BMI kind of arrangement, and he’s probably not starving on the street or anything, but creators need recompense for their creations. Some things I might want to give away (like Nostrum), but others, not so much. Members of the VCA might recall how years ago I fought the fight against illegal downloads. That fight doesn’t even matter anymore. My, how the world has changed. Are those kids I see out there on my lawn?????

And in honor of the 154th day until DisAd14, here’s a photo I worked on for weeks days hours about 3 minutes to satisfy O’C’s craving for a photo of all of us in front of Cinderella’s Castle.

In which we show why we haven't been here for a little while

Well, I haven’t been posting, but it’s not as if I’ve been doing absolutely nothing:

http://www.debatecoaches.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/tabroom_guide.pdf

I’ve figured out how to upload files to the NDCA website, and as I’ve said, I think the best thing to do with this and all my other how-to tournament material is to put it in one accessible place for the duration, and NDCA seems like the right place. And specifically with the vade mecum, I’ve also tucked it into the help on tabroom.com, for anyone who wanders over to that previously unpopulated area. (And according to the rule, use it once, use it twice, use it three times and it’s yours, I’ve now used “vade mecum” in 3 recent postings, and it is therefore now officially a part of my vocabulary.) It will be nice to have a document for people when they get lost (or in advance of their getting lost), but I’ll probably also keep an online version going at jimmenick.com, for those who want to browse it more by topic than to dive in to the whole shooting match.

This coming weekend is the NYCFL Grands qualifier for CatNats. Kaz, JV and I do this one mostly by hand, with the computer to back us up, primarily by pointing out whether the judges we’ve put in can actually judge those rounds, the hardest thing to keep straight when you’re working with cards. When I was helping out some folks in Virginia last weekend, they had trouble printing the exact cards we’re going to want to print this weekend, and CP fixed that, so we’re all set, meaning that it is a good thing to help others because you might end up even helping yourself. For us the good news is that we’re under 20 in both the LD and PF fields, which means only 2 judges. Having to use 3 judges is a real bear, but doing 2 is just maybe a little cub.

Last weekend a bunch of the DisAd14 group got together in NYC to celebrate the gorgeous weather and, for most of us, a weekend off. I’ve already spent some time working on the plan for MK day on touringplans.com, the Unofficial Guide website. Because we don’t have fastpasses yet, the times were a little off, and we did encounter a 10,000 hour wait for the Jungle Cruise, but I have assured everyone that the line for that attraction is seldom that long at the time of year we’re going.

Tales of Great Golf/Debate Adventure

Even as the day dawned, most of the northeast was already at a fever pitch. It was the day of the ErsatzDeAd, the epic contest that would mark the one year countdown to DisAd14, while also acting as a sop in lieu of the much missed DisAd13. How could such a day be celebrated? What could conceivably bear the weight of all that history and expectation and the unspoken longings of an entire generation plus a couple of other generations, with people coming from far and wide except for the ones who didn’t come or really only had to roll out of bed to get there?

Miniature golf, of course.

It was beautiful weather Saturday. The golf course is right next to Stuyvesant, and I walked down from GCT, savoring it all. Of course, the next time I walk the High Line I’m bringing a whip: even strolling I can’t move as slowly as some of these people. And as much as I like the idea of the HL, it is becoming such a tourist attraction that it’s almost better to avoid it. After getting off and doing the remaining distance on the walk by the Hudson, I was much happier.

Kaz was already there when I arrived, and JV was there a minute later, as was Kate. The daughter and I were the only ones appropriately attired in Disney regalia. What is wrong with these people? And let’s face it, who doesn’t want to see JV in a Mickey ears hat? Whatever. As time passed, soon a text arrived from O’C saying that he was running a little late. Shockingly enough, when this was announced to the crowd, none of us were surprised. O’C running a little late? And he practically lives on the fourteenth hole? C’est la vie.

He arrived eventually. I must say, he at least got into the spirit of the thing, with his tam o’shanter and plus fours. I think arriving in Liberace’s limousine was a bit much, and no one else needed a caddy, but, well, style is as style does, and one just goes with the flow.

The course was pretty decent. Not a lot of windmills or dancing hippos or other elaborate obstacles, but there were holes you had to get the ball into, and that was good enough. We began with a reorientation session, trying to explain to O’C how to hold the club so that he had at least a marginal chance of looking like he knew what he was doing. This turned out to be a game of diminishing returns. He would do what you told him to do, sort of, and then his concentration would drift off… He doesn’t have the cold, steely determination of a professional golfer, in other words. The fact that he spent the entire game on his iPhone texting, tweeting, snapchatting, vining, instagramming, emailing, checking in and buffing his toenails, I would offer that he is unlikely to evidence any steely determination, period, except where it comes to social networking (and keeping his nails buffed). The fact that while we were playing miniature golf, freebooters might be descending on Japonica to oust him from the mayoralty must have also played heavily on his mind.

The game itself was the paradigm of excitement. I got off to a slow start myself, still in the midst of my golf sabbatical as I am, and after nine holes, JV and Kate were tied for first, with me two strokes back, and Kaz a couple of strokes back from that. O’C’s score by this time was mostly asterisks, and it went down from there. On the back nine, while the two leaders fought it out, I made my move, as the sports journalists like to say, with two holes-in-one, but the water hole stole my thunder, and in the end, I managed only a second place finish. JV was the big winner, by one stroke. At this point he announced that he had done his best not to be too competitive, although his going off and doing a two-hour victory dance sort of undermined his alleged complacency. As for me, I shrugged off my defeat, knowing that I am now 1 and 2 in two outings, and that a rematch in Orlando at the DisAd14 will be my chance to set things aright.

After the excitement died down, we went off into the city to celebrate, or drown our sorrows, depending on who you were and how you did. There were occasional discussions of items forensical, but not so’s you’d notice. In a nutshell, a splendid time was had by all. Things bode well for DisAd14!

Not quite leaving on a jet plane yet

Zeroing in on the DisAd14. I’ve tinkered a bit with the countdown, so it now points to 11:00 a.m. of the arrival date. Just about exactly a year from now. As I write this, there’s 366 plus days: just around the corner, in other words. I’ve gotten a couple of attendees on the official app that controls your dining and FP+ reservations and whatnot. I’ll put off packing for a little while, though.

RJT sent over the raw Kaiser invite, and I Academy-ized it and set it up on tabroom.com. Registration will open on 8/28. I’ll be sending out notices then to all and sundry to sign up for this sucker. You want a tournament for your younger kids where they’ll have a chance and they’ll learn something, this is it.

I may or may not run the new software for some of it. I’ve set it up for it, but a lot depends on how polished it is by then, and more to the point, how well I know it if I have to do goofy stuff that’s a little off the books (deep bracket breaking, for instance, in small fields). At smaller tournaments, goofy stuff is rife. Big tournaments pair pretty easily because there’s enough data to go around, so something like Pups or Jake is time consuming because there’s a lot of ballots to enter, but other than that, there’s not much to go haywire, especially nowadays when I’ve gotten quite a few MJP tournaments under my belt. Granted that TRPC doesn’t find a judge for everyone (the flighting throws it off), but it’s pretty close, and my system for doing the rest is fast and efficient. And if there’s enough judges to sink a battleship, like at Jake, you don’t really want for 1-1s, and maybe a couple of 2-2s between the offlanders in the later rounds.

And, of course, there’s the issue of connectivity. Tabroom.com needs an internet connection on the backend, and works at its best when there’s internet for everyone. That’s been one of my worries since day one, that internet access isn’t as global as we would like it to be, even in tab rooms. This is a problem that will eventually be solved by the world in general, but until that point…

Anyhow, I continue to test away. They’ve made some changes today, and when I get a chance tonight I’ll dive back in and do some more pairings and hacking around. The only way you learn new software is to use it until you don’t have to think about it anymore. I don’t have to think about TRPC anymore, which is why I don’t mind using it, but it has an awful lot of limitations. Something with a lot of unlimitations would be really nice to replace it.

Glimmers of the new season

I’ve spent a lot of time lately beating up the new tabroom software. A lot of it is just learning where the pulleys and levers are located, other parts are finding things I wish worked some other way. The software is still WIP, so some things don’t work as they should, but it’s getting there. I’ve been sending a stream of emails to CP in the process, but now he’s off to Ireland and its various neighbors, first to tab and then to vacate, so there will be a hiatus on the testing for a while. Too bad, because it’s kept me busy as we wait on the brink for the season to kick in. Resolutions are released Thursday. It’s about time.

We’re going to open the MHL/NYSCDA/NYCUDL (Everybody Wants to Get Into the Act) Workshop this week, also on Thursday. Of course, nobody really knows who’s coming or going at this early point, but it does get people into the groove of thinking about it. Plus it will allow me to send an update message on the MHL in general, and the various openings for hosting and the like. January is sooooo weird this coming season, with Newark on what I guess you can call the Christmas Vacation penumbral weekend, and everything going kind of weird from there. The problem is, as I think I mentioned, the Superduper Bowl, which is at the Meadowlands this year, those swamps just over in Jersey a little down from Manhattan. That’s probably going to be one cold football game, it being February and all. Oh, well. I’ll watch it from the comfort of home, as I always do. And I’ll curse the NFL (the football one) for coopting one of our weekends. Then again, we’ll probably throw an MHL into there just this once, so there is some silver lining this particular black cloud.

Not much else going on in the debate world, just a lot of pacing the floor. O’C claims that he’s ordered his Notorious B.I.G. Bronx trophies; I thought O’C was living with the trophy guy, so I was sort of surprised that this was a special occasion. Seeing this reminded me that I’ll shortly have to do likewise for Bump. I usually do it around Labor Day or maybe the week before. Gets it out of the way. And as you can see according to the countdown, we’re at the point where, if all had gone according to plan, we’d be doing DisAd13. Oh, well. I’m already meditating over DisAd14. It’s never too early.

It's heating up. Sigh.

Good grief: Countdown to Doom!

On the other hand, nothing is ever wasted. Look over at the right-hand column, second item down. It would seem as if there is a widget for everything, and I, for one, am not above stooping to borrow it.

The Twitterverse is beginning to pop now, with all sorts of people announcing how they're about to swoop down on poor, innocent Kentucky. Then the TOC is offering advice like, get some sleep when you're here (presumably not during rounds, unless you're judging).

I have more to say about TOC, but I've got a comment from Ryan that I'll respond to first tonight, as it's probably much more interesting (at least to me and Ryan).

How does your brain leak, then?

I’m hoping to TVFT tonight. I’m rather curious to hear about TOC. O’C said in a comment that it was an improvement in many ways, and that is good to hear, I guess. At the same time, I wonder how many people who broke in LD at TOC in 2002 would have been able to adjudicate the rounds among people who broke in 2012. Oh, well. The $ircuit is the $ircuit, and either you play the game or you don’t. I’ve discussed this ad nauseum.

The Sailor Speecho-Americans, I’m happy to say, acquitted themselves well at the NYSFL championships. Panivore Junior came in 3rd in his DI division, and one of our sophomores managed to break as well in Oy. (Actually, I think they call it OI, but Oy sounds so much better. “Did you break?” “Oy!”) That’s half the contingent that we sent, so proportionately, who else broke 50%? They’ll spend the rest of the year working toward pieces for next year. Except for next week, when they play Bean Trivia. Best (worst?) crappy first prize ever! But I don’t want to give it away here. I don’t want to frighten anyone away.

I’m working on editing a complex book at the DJ, and after an hour or so of bearing down, my brains start to leak, so I look for ways to take short breaks. Yesterday I was pricing hotels at WDW, doing a little early comparison shopping for the DisAd. The problem is, you can pay way over twice as much for a hotel as we did in the DiDeAd, but you probably won’t get more than twice as much out of it. Let’s face it; most WDW time is not spent in the room, or even in the hotel, for that matter. And if you want to take advantage of something at another hotel, it’s no big deal to truck over there and do so. (There’s a lot of trucking at WDW. Like the doo dah man… Speaking of which, or not, I finally found out why Jimi Hendrix speaks that line about never hearing surf music again, but I won’t explain it here. That’s what Grinwout’s is for.) I can’t believe I’m thinking about this more than a year early, but as I say, complex work requires short breaks for leaky brains. This is how my brain leaks. Could be worse, I guess.

Happy End of the Universe!

It was a peaceful, quiet holiday, vis-à-vis forensics. Vis-à-vis everything else, for that matter. That’s not a bad thing, once in a while.

We did try to get a TVFT going, but we are becoming progressively more incapable of turning up at the same time as the eons progress. We’re going to try to get back to the Wednesday routine, and I think we’ll put something out even if it’s just me and O’C making Disneyland plans. Of course, we have more important stuff to talk about, to wit, the Jan-Feb resolution. Plenty of people have been talking about this elsewhere, but I have not been one of them. In a way, with such a limited commitment to LD at this point, I feel a little less than involved in the situation. But I have my opinions, and I would like to exercise them a bit with others. CP is strongly planted agin’ it, and I think Bietz was likewise. I want that conversation.

In the world of upcoming, this week is Byram Hills. It’s small and local, so should be simple enough. Then there’s Bigle X, which is always fun, although this time I’m only staying for the main event: no RR for me this year. They’ll have to provide their own beans for the trivia event (if any). On the other hand, it’ll be the first time in decades I’ve had that Sunday and Monday to myself. That will be a treat.

And then there’s the Gem of Harlem. The real problem there has been securing rooms. Without rooms you can’t accept entries, and there’s a lot of people hanging on, waiting to hear. I cleared off all the far-aways who needed plane tix, and have started on the locals mostly by when they entered. I should have a better idea of rooms by the end of this week. Then we can get serious, and even, just maybe, create a schedule.

Then again, this being the year the Mayans are proven right, we could go off into oblivion at any moment. I probably shouldn’t plan too far ahead. Aside from the Disneyland trip, that is. Me and O’C, together again. Set your Twitter feed on stun.

I wonder if Jar Jar is in the latest version of It's a Small World...

We were going to TVFT last Wednesday, but O’C had other fish to fry at Japonica or something, so we didn’t. It seems that just as we get a thought going, it goes. I really do want to talk more about bracketing. We’re going to try again this week, but the coachean breath is not being held.

Not much else going on debatewise, at least for me. I’m not CatNatting, although the Panivore’s brother is doing his Speecho-American thing. I wouldn’t mind going down to Washington for a weekend, even with a tournament happening around it, but this year it was not to be. There will be ample ops in the future, I’m sure. I’ll be using the time to get my golf game up to crappy from its present position at appalling, but it won’t be easy. The weather this spring has not been conducive to such activities. It’s hard to play golf in a snowsuit during a monsoon. Jeesh.

So I’ve been pursuing other pastimes. I’ve begun the Lego Harry Potter, for instance, which is so up my alley skill-set wise. It’s not terribly hard, it’s pretty funny, and when you play it you make real progress. I loved the Star Wars Lego game too, for the same reasons. I don’t have the patience for learning to press A and Z while standing on my head with my thumb up the cat’s nose while whistling “Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor on the Bedpost Overnight?” I’m a plain, simple kind of gamer. The relatively button-free Wii is right up my alley.

I’ve also been catching up on the movies I haven’t seen over the last year. Social Network and The King’s Speech were very enjoyable. Tron: Legacy was totally incomprehensible, but I sort of liked it anyhow, except for the Jeff Bridges scary Polar Express face. Spooky. Humans don’t look like that.

Our DiDeAd/DisAd listserver has been filling up with moaning and groaning from O’C who wants to ride Star Tours 74 times. No appreciation of antici

pation. All these kids want nowadays is instant gratification. Bah! Of course, not only will there be a new Star Tours the next time, but also a new Tiki Room: they’ve booted the “new management.” Strike a blow for the traditionalists.

"Hmmm... yousa point is well seen." Or, hence the meh.

[The "lost" episode from when blogger went down.]

Blogging becomes less debate relevant starting at this time of year. There isn’t a tournament every week, so the gossip is light, and there’s not much to say about the remaining finals (which, I know, allows you to breathe a sigh of relief, because the last thing the VCA wants is another multiple-part rant like the one about TOC). I only track the debate camps from afar, since I don’t participate in any of them. I won’t be personally concerned about much of anything debatish until the Sept-Oct topic is released in mid-August, at which point whatever Sailors are left standing will pop over to the chez for a hour or so of gossip followed by five minutes of topic analysis. Such is the Way of the Sailor.

But the lack of active debate to write about doesn’t deter me all that much. There’s a big world out there. During the summer I do things I don’t do during the winter. I go to the movies, for instance. I roam Manhattan. I plan DiDeAds. I have plenty to keep me busy.

Speaking of the DiDeAd, the next trip is the DisAd 13. O’C keeps finding himself losing his concentration, drifting off into reveries of why he should go to WDW now! This very instant! He misses it and he wants to experience it again.

I maintain that that is wrong thinking, unless you live next door to the joint and have an annual pass. The wise traveler does not go to the same place every year, no matter how much the same place is liked. There are other places out there, and the wise traveler would like them too. I consider this the travel dilemma, the choice between the known and safe and the unknown and risky. I mean, if you’ve been somewhere and loved it and want to go back, you’ll probably love it again and, as a result, safely invest your travel dollars. Going somewhere new risks those travel dollars. But nevertheless it opens the opportunity to find a new place to love. Let’s face it. Unless you start considering travel to Abbottabad or somewhere else with less than state-of-the-art EconoLodges, you’ll probably have a good time. Never been to Paris? London? Barcelona? Santa Fe? Oslo? Well, none of these is exactly a risky bet. Expand the old horizons, I say. Try something new. The old will always be there.

I think this is especially true of WDW. I love Disney and have written about my experience of the parks going back to when Disneyland opened. But I love not going too, because I love thinking about it and keeping up with the fan blogs and podcasts and whatnot, and then planning it when the time comes. As it is, a three-year gap for me is practically moving down to live permanently in Orlando. O’C wants desperately to see the new Star Tours, but it will still be there for the DisAd. Savoring the anticipation can be quite enjoyable. Every time you think about it, it’s great. It’s like knowing the Star Wars prequels were coming before The Phantom Menace actually opened. The Phantom Menace, anticipatory, was ecstasy. The Phantom Menace, reality, was…meh. The anticipatory ecstasy lasted for months. The reality lasted a couple of hours, followed by the enduring meh in its wake. Not that I think Star Tours will be a bust. But it’s so great in the imagination that I’m fine not threatening that imaginary version until I’m ready for the whole WDW experience.

Of course, meanwhile, I’ve got no vacation plans yet, having put aside our European trip to settle the Aged P. Once that settlement is really settled, then we’ll start thinking about it.

And see. I told you I could write about something other than debate.

Well aren't we the busy one?

First of all, not doing speech, while not as much fun as doing it, is a lot less hard on the calendar. Not having the weekly meeting and the daily angst is nice. On the other hand, I went home to an empty house last night while Liz was off taking some classes, meaning, first, I was an hour later than usual due to some hoo-ha at the dj, followed by a greeting from one elderly diabetic cat who will bite your arm off if you don’t feed him immediately and prodigiously but not too fast because he’ll throw up, and then you have to give him his insulin, plus there’s the lunatic in the cage in the other room who is way too energetic for all of this and wants to jump on everything the minute his collar is off (and no, I’m not going to make that joke), and I’m back and forth between them, opening and closing doors and cat food cans and wine bottles and microwaving soup and a whole lot of shakin’ goin’ on for very little reward. I did, on the positive side, advance a few levels of Angry Birds while waiting for Tik (pronounced teek) to use his box. I was very happy eventually to settle down and watch a DVD on Imagineering after all of this that I had picked up during the DiDeAd. Did you ever notice, Disney fans, how much more the audioanimatronic Jack Sparrow looks like Jack Sparrow than the audioanimatronic Barack Obama looks like Barack Obama? The president obviously needs more eye makeup.

Speaking of Jack Sparrow, did I hear correctly that Disney is not going to hire Keith Richards to reprise his role in the next film installment because of revelations in his new autobiography? I mean, this is Keith Richards. What didn’t Disney know, and when didn’t they know it?

And through all of this, Jules and the Nostrumite are bugging me about the next episode. Like I’ve got time for all of this?

Jeesh.

DiDeAd conclusion

The last day of the trip was at Epcot. We slept in this morning, agreeing to commence our adventure at 11:00 at the bus stop. It was nice to arise in a leisurely fashion for once, and to enjoy a leisurely Mickey breakfast waffle (although my recommendation for Mickey-shaped food is the ice cream sandwich from the loose vendors in the park, which are everywhere, or the tripe-on-a-bun treats, which are nowhere).

Day two of Epcot began with Spaceship Earth, which we all agreed was not its finest hour. They’ve dumbed down the narration, and eliminated the great ending. It’s not terrible, just not as good as it was. Where is Walter Cronkite when you need him? On the other hand, although we had seen Soarin’ yesterday, we popped on it again today, which made up for our reaction to Spaceship. On the last trip, the smell-o-vision seemed to be on full blast. Maybe they had cleaned out the blasters overnight or something. Whatever the reason, it was the best flight of all. Most of the day, though, was on World Showcase. A slow but excellent Japanese lunch, the various countries (despite O’C’s pooh-poohing of Norway), dropping in on shows and whatnot, shopping, movies (yes, Canada is great, and all the people who are any good in the USA are, in fact, born in Canada—we get the point, you damned furriners!), etc. I was amazed when I looked back and saw that among our travels we managed not to see the China movie, one of my favorites. It’s as it was with the other parks. We never felt rushed, never waited around much, enjoyed everything we saw, but didn’t see everything. I consider this a good thing. WDW is not a scavenger hunt where all the pieces have to be collected to win. It’s a great place to be and see and have fun, and that’s what we did.

It all culminated in Illuminations, the extravaganza over the lagoon, and it was a great way to end the trip, although to be honest, Fantasmic or Wishes would also have been great ways to end the trip. Go out with a bang, in other words. And that’s exactly what we did.

The next day we returned home. The immediate family hit Downtown Disney for a last bout of shopping (the final pins, the odd shirt), then off on the bus to the airport. And so we bade a fond farewell…

Overall take on it? It was a nutty thing to suggest in the first place, but I’m damned glad I did. It was fun, and we all enjoyed it, and mixing and matching friends and family was fine. There may be no other place on the planet where you can do this and have it work. It was fun to tweet the whole thing back, mostly to the Bronx team which hangs on O’C’s every utterance, although eventually my fingers got tired of reporting how much he was screaming in terror on Dumbo or whatever (or maybe it was vice versa) so he won the battle for the twittering hearts and minds. It did require a bit of planning and the help of a good travel agent, but it was not onerous for a WDW veteran commando, armed with experience and Unofficial Guide, to make it work. We had a good balance of parks and relaxation, big and small meals, and run to the next attraction vs amble for a while and meet up somewhere eventually. Having relatively empty parks and decent weather didn’t hurt either. In other words, you shoulda been there too. Really. You would have loved it.

DiDeDd Part 5

There are those who consider Animal Kingdom a half-day park. In our early planning, I had to convince O’C that he should even go at all. I realize that Disney likes to say that it is not a zoo, but realistically, AK is almost exactly a zoo that’s been disneyfied. This turns out to be a good thing.

There are attractions at the park, and one kicks off the day with Dinosaur (the same ride system as Disneyland’s Indiana Jones attraction), a silly little wild-mouse coaster, and the great Expedition Everest. By this time our little adventurers were ready for any roller coaster we threw at them, and we told them Everest was the best themed of all, and it didn’t go upside down, and it was very smooth and they’d love it. We did neglect to mention that it runs out of track and starts careering backwards, but one hates to give away too many spoilers… This coaster is the most narrative of the bunch, unquestionably, as one is progressively more menaced by the Yeti during the trip. It’s one more pinnacle of Imagineering if you ask me.

After that, it is indeed animals. There’s walk-throughs and ride-throughs and sit-throughs, birds and bats and mammals and reptiles, pachyderms and ungulates, lions and tigers, hidden Mickeys (although, after some discussion, we agreed that the naughty bits on the bat were indeed not a hidden M). This was why I brought along my long lens for the SLR, and I did get a few good pictures. They’ve designed the place so that you can really get up close without bothering the animals. It’s a remarkable accomplishment.

There’s also entertainments, live-action versions of Lion King and Nemo and a 3-D Bug's Life movie. One did sneak in an extra trip or two to Everest in there along the way (gotta love them Fastpasses). That evening there were extra hours, but we were done about park closing, and we headed over to the Animal Kingdom Resort for dinner, for the African buffet at Boma, which was quite the crowd pleaser. Of course, we started with these wonderfully sweet cocktails in the lounge first, so they could have fed us sawdust and gotten away with it, but the food is quite good and unusual. And because it was Liz’s and my anniversary, which I had made known all those months ago when I made the reservation, they gave us a special desert from the other restaurant in the hotel, the fancier one across the way. Keep that in mind. If you have a celebration of some sort, let them know. It will pay off.

And then, back to our hotel, via Downtown Disney, which meant we took a nice little boat ride back. Very nice. This was the day Kaz had gone back home, but she got a good dose of AK first, so she didn’t miss anything except the drinks. Then again, she probably got polluted on the plane (provided she had a credit card), so she was covered. And I’m sure she was glad to get off of her sore feet. She was a great trooper through it all, even though her pedal extremities were not cooperating.

At the end, O'C made the pronouncement about AK that he gave it the O'C Seal of Approval, rescinding his original demurral that the park wasn't up to snuff. Absolutely. It is totally up to and, perhaps, even above snuff. Those who skip it miss out on a lot of snuff.

Not the DiDeAd, for which the VCA breathes a sigh of relief

The discussion of case disclosure is not completely ended by any means, but I think that it has been dealt with fairly definitively for the time being, if you take the last TVFT into consideration. Much of the discussion has been an education process, at least for me. I absolutely began with an idea that case disclosure was X, and it turns out that case disclosure is actually Y. The reasons for my misconceptions don’t matter, because it seems other people have/had other misconceptions. While the idea is not set in stone at this point, and it is unclear where it will be or how it will affect the activity five years hence, we can make some general statements now. First, it is not onerous. I grabbed some instructions from Bill Batterman that I put into the Feed, if you need them. Provided that you have wireless at the venue, you’re fine. Second, it is not working as a wedge for big schools to trump little schools, but by the same token, it is not working as a shield for little schools against the prodigious abilities of big schools. It just changes things a little. Why? Because: three, it is disclosure of what you’ve done, not what you’re necessarily going to do. It captures for the record the case that is in the so-called public domain after you’ve run it. Which means that, four, it is really more a collection of strategically useful data than a tool of tactical useful data. In the real world, it is not turning debaters into the puppets of their aggressive assistant coaches, making them little preset response machines to preset cases. And to protect ourselves and our students from what we might call the misappropriation or at best the misunderstanding of this data, five, we will in the future lock it down from the outside world. The best thing we can do now is watch the experiment as it continues at Big Jake. It is another potential change in an activity that is constantly changing, another piece of the dialectic. Where it will go, no one knows. It might improve things, it might not, it might not even be much of an issue as time passes. As Jedi Master Bietz advises, one must wait and see.

Of course, over the last few days I’ve been debriefing the VCA on the DiDeAd more than addressing any debate issues, but then again, there haven’t been that many debate issues. Or in my case these days, speech and debate issues, until we get a new speech coach in. As is my wont, I’ve written up some elementary how-to material for my Speecho-Americans that I’m still polishing, but I would like to see them up the ante a bit on their choice of material. Also I’d like to see a little less death and destruction. What a gloomy bunch! Anyhow, I had hoped for inauguration of all of this year’s Plebes last night, but it turned out it was Open House at the Naval Academy, so tonight is the night. Which is not a bad thing actually, because it gives the Sailors another day to recruit after last week’s one-day-in two-days-out shortie. I love inauguration night. Sometimes we get newbies that we reckon by the dozens and sometimes we get two poor schlubs with dazed expressions that are never heard from again. Only time will tell.

Things will heat up next week for the Pups, none of whom read this blog, which means that only CP will be annoyed when I once again whine about their not entering judge names yet. The rest of you don’t have to read that previous sentence, but I guess it’s too late for that now. More importantly to all and sundry is the issue of judge rank assignments at the Pups in the world of MJP. If you haven’t done so already, read the take from Greenhill on the TVFT blog to see what they said they were going to do (which I presume they did). There’s lots of issues there, and we’ll be discussing it next week on the podcast. I think JV, who will be tabbing with me there as usual, will be joining us in the discussion. Needless to say, he brings a great numbers mind to the whole proceedings; he does teach physics after all.

So, wish us luck tonight at the inaugural. I wish you luck with your inaugurals too. May we all have more novices than we know what to do with!

And in a minute, a new DiDeAd posting. You didn’t think you’d get out of it that easily, did you?

DiDeAd Part 4

I find it remarkable that even though we spent full days in MK and DHS, we didn’t do everything. Nor did we mosey and just absorb things. Not that we were total commando—we stopped and smelled plenty of roses, and given the small crowds we didn’t spend much time in any lines—but there’s just so much to do that you can’t do it all in one day and still have any fun doing it. Before we left there had been much discussion about which might be one- and which two-day parks. I insisted the Epcot was the latter, and got everyone’s agreement after the fact. Epcot absolutely requires moseying if you really wish to enjoy the countries. You’ve got to stop and watch whatever entertainments come your way. You’ve got to enjoy the food. (You’ve got to search for hidden Mickeys.)
Our first Epcot day was the third day of the trip.

To a degree, the two-day plan is mostly Future World on day one and countries on day two (or vice versa in Kaz’s case, seeing that she had already done our day two as her day one). So you ramble into the park at the usual half hour in advance (although this time O’C wandered off big time: putting together a round robin the day you get back from vacation sort of does require a little phone time; even I’ll admit that) and head for the big E tickets on the near side of the park. (For that matter, the World Showcase doesn’t even open until 11:00.) That means Test Track, Mission Space, Soarin’ (via Fastpass), etc. Mission Space, of course, is the attraction where, last time, O’C’s brain got loose in his skull and he ended up in the Disney World infirmary with Doctor Mickey trying to intubate him. As the VCA knows, his brain never did settle back correctly, which explains a lot of things, so he skipped the opportunity to shake it even more loose this time around. Of course, what he was really polishing himself up for was Captain EO. Or, maybe better, Captain Oy. Oy. Why does the man so like this? I guess it must be the Lucas connection, but there’s also a soupcon of Michael Jackson fandom as well. I can’t say I ever cared much about MJ one way or another; he was after my time, so to speak, although I do like the way he imitates Bob Fosse. Then again, I was getting pretty tired of Honey I Shrunk the Audience (and don’t ask about Journey into the Imagination, which seems to get worse every time I see it). Anyhow, our attendance at Captain EO was marked by many strange squawks and squeals that I can neither comprehend nor imitate. I’m surprised they didn’t throw us out. The worst thing was, the squawks and squeals were contagious, and kindred spirits in the audience started squawking and squealing along with him. That was one weird half hour marked, of course, by the purchase of a U-Haul of Captain EO merchandise. I have to admit, I bought a hat, more because I like the hat than I liked Captain EO. I’ll wear it to tournaments whenever O’C needs cheering up. I just ask the VCA to remember that’s why I’m doing it. Please. I’ve got a sick friend.

This was the day we headed off to Fantasia Gardens for miniature golf, the video of which I’ve posted here. The video is self-explanatory. I have to admit I was struck dumb by O’C’s display of athletic prowess. I mean, it’s not like I expected the secret PGA pro to emerge or anything, but all those years of watching Howard the Duck over and over again have wreaked their havoc. See for yourself.

We capped that night off with a visit to the Biergarten, with those enormous steins of beer. Then we went back to the motel early, all except Kaz who stayed for Illuminations, seeing that she’d be leaving the next day.

The trip remained solidly enjoyable. Let me tell you, it was hot out there playing miniature golf. I’d do it again in a minute. Let me know if there’s a mini course near your tournament, and I’ll be there with the proverbial bells on.

DiDeAd Part 3

Disney Hollywood Studios kicks things up a notch in terms of thrill rides, compared to MK. And it’s a more focused experience than MK, concentrating as it does on movies and entertainment. It was originally built to trump Universal Studios down the road. I am personally not one to knock Universal; after all, much of it was built by Disney alums. But it does lack the underlying Disney Disneyness, whatever that is. It’s ineffable, but it’s there. Frankly, I think there used to be a little more of it in the olden days. Maybe new management will bring some of that back.

Be that as it may, again our day started at 8:00 am, heading for the bus to the park. Liz and I started with breakfast, as did Denise. Old people eat breakfast: it gives them strength to get those kids off their lawns later in the day. By now I’d sort of gotten into the swing of dealing with the meal plan that was added to the trip, Disney’s come-on to the park during the off-season. (And it was the off-season; we never waited much for anything.) The plan is a combination of sit-down meals, counter service and snacks. The people working in the restaurants seem to spend half their working day explaining it to everyone. Wise Disney Dining management requires that, when you spend your credits, you get the most for them. Management of free Disney Dining means that, well, it’s free anyhow, so you don’t get your knickers into too much of a twist over it. A Dole Whip is a snack. So is a bottle of water. So is an apple or a cup of coffee. Choose accordingly.

I found it remarkable that we all actually did meet up each morning at 8:00. I chide O’C for moseying, but this is unfair. Every day he was a minute earlier, until one day he was a minute earlier than me. I should have photographed that.

Again, I won’t catalog everything we did in the park. Toy Story Mania was down, but everything else was up and running. We kicked off with Rock ‘n Roller Coaster, which is a really fun, smooth ride, and we got almost everyone in it, although do I recall correctly that O’C passed on this one? My cousin passed on Twilight Zone, as she finds the idea of falling down an elevator shaft about as entertaining as jumping off a cliff, which it closely resembles. We managed to find this out-of-the-way coffee shop for cappuccino and these wonderful carrot cake cookies as our morning break. And we followed the Guide again, as I say, never waiting for much of anything.

Of course, Star Tours, closing a couple of weeks after our trip, was high on O’C’s list. He rode it a few times, and Kate and I joined him for a couple of those. He bought himself an engraved medal honoring his 40th ride. He tried to get Disney management to schedule an award ceremony for it, but they were not interested. In the shop attached to the ride (and please note, there’s a shop attached to virtually every ride) he discovered some goodies previous unknown to him, and he started piling on packages like Dagwood Bumstead accompanying Blondie for their Christmas shopping. An eagle-eyed clerk recognized a sucker fan in the mix and pounced, and the next thing you knew, O’C and the clerk were comparing notes, trying to figure which one was the biggest Lucas fanboy. O’C ultimately claimed victory by naming the key grip on the Willow set, at which point the clerk committed ritual suicide with one of those plastic light sabers. It was not a pretty sight: that plastic hurts. On the other hand, he had now collected the equivalent of a year’s salary in commissions from O’C’s purchases (mostly of action characters of people who work in the shop attached to the ride—the cashier, the custodian, the clerk he had been talking to—twenty sets of these, if I remember correctly).

Our lunch was at the Sci-Fi diner, and I have to admit, anyone who challenges O’C’s knowledge of obscure or bad movies in the genre is bound to go down in flames. It’s not so much that O’C knows all this stuff, but that when we see a clip from an Ed Wood film, O’C has not only seen the film, he’s seen it twenty times, he owns it, and he threatens to make me watch it in a tabroom eventually. No doubt he also owns the action figures. I find the thought frightening. I kept my head down for the most part, eating my lunch (the Oreo shake was a marvel, the ribs were okay but it was so dark—the restaurant is themed like a drive-in movie, and you eat in convertibles while you watch coming attractions of B movies—that I couldn’t tell the bones from the meat from the napkin except for the damage any given bite caused my bicuspids).

There are a lot of shows at DHS, stunt shows like Indian Jones and a motor show (that’s not episode 5, btw, Indian Jones and the Motor Show, that’s two separate shows), and most importantly, Fantasia, the extravaganza that closes the place for the night. This is a great show. At Disneyland they work it into the middle of the park, which is pretty amazing, while at DHS they have a special amphitheater built for it. There’s lots of storm and fury and sound and light and effects and fireworks and Disney characters battling it out for the soul of Mickey Mouse (really). It’s a great way to end the day, but you have to get there way earlier than I had planned. We got SRO, which was okay because there’s an area where everyone sat until the show started, then it didn’t matter that we were on our feet.

As I mentioned before, I do miss the underlying Disneyness a bit. It used to be there were shops that sold items that were unique to that shop, which meant that in the Studios, you could find niftly little Hollywood thingies. Not so true anymore. Now it’s just the same merchandise pretty much in all the shops, and for that matter the same merchandise in the shops across all the parks. Occasionally there’s a ride-specific tee shirt, but that’s about it, aside from Star Wars merchandise. Years ago I bought a wonderful Bates Motel ashtray. That’s the sort of thing I miss, and that sort of thing was everywhere. Not that I don’t like Disney shirts and stuff, but the serendipity has been minimized. They’re missing a bet, if you ask me, but at least they’ve incorporated some retro stuff into the mix, which is a step in the right direction.

So, another great day was in the can.

DiDeAd Part 2.5

Due to unpopular demand, from Kate's pictures, first we show the entire group at the Biergarten in Germany. Considering that there are minors in the audience, that is actually faux beer. Tastes like chicken.







And this is the full golf group. Liz sat this one out.










Yes, Kaz really did ride the carrousel.














And here's Cruz buying souvenirs (about which more in the next post).

DiDeAd Part 2

After all the discussion of which order to attack the parks, O’C’s original opinion that MK is the place to go first proved out. While I reserve the idea that, with kids, it might be best to work up to it, to avoid the perception that the other parks somehow don’t match up, there is no question that, as adults, we all arrived full of anticipation and energy, more than capable of attacking the MK in one physically grueling day. The hours of the park were from 9:00 am to 10:00 pm. We were at the bus stop at the hotel at 8:00 am exactly. (O’C was almost there at 8:00 am exactly, which is close enough, for him.) We traveled as a group to gates of the Magic Kingdom.

Once upon a time, opening the park meant slowly leading the assembled multitudes in through a series of steps leading to multiple rope drops in the directions of the various E-ticket attractions, in aid of minimizing the inevitable stampede. Now they have a little opening show up at the train station, and the early risers get to watch some Disney dancers sing and high-step to some gleefully peppy music, and then the Mayor of Main Street comes out and welcomes us. I understand that when hizzoner is unavailable, it will be the Vice Mayor of Main Street, or the Speaker of the House of Main Street, etc., doing the honors. Then the train comes steaming into the station and various Disney characters and a family chosen at random for their gleeful peppy appearance all wave at us and they shoot off the metaphoric starter’s pistol and we all go storming into the park for our promised magical day.

Right off the bat, cast members were waving people away from Space Mountain, which wasn’t running at the opening, or, for that matter, distributing fast passes. We took this in our stride and went on to #2 on the Unofficial Guide touring plan, which is Buzz Lightyear, where you shoot at aliens and rack up a very impressive score that makes the rest of your group look like inept invalids. Oh, wait. It was only me who racked up a very impressive score. A word to the wise: study the literature before your trip to learn how to improve your score, and you too can lord it over your friends and relatives for the rest of the vacation, or at least for the two minutes subsequent to the ride, after which you mosey on to the next attraction.

I won’t list them all, but, for the most part, we did them all. “it’s a small world” was under rehab, which was probably a good thing, because it is the attraction that has sent the most guests into rehab, babbling the music while drooling into their pillows, lying on their hospital beds in their straightjackets. Space Mountain came back up fairly early and we grabbed fast passes; one benefit of O’C’s iPhone was access to information on wait times and the like. For many of the group, SM was something of a maiden event, their first SM or, in some cases, first roller coaster ever, or first roller coaster since seventh grade. Everyone survived admirably, although I have to admit, when you look at the official photos they take on the rides, in virtually all of them Katie and I look as if we’re enjoying ourselves and the rest of the DiDeAd look as if they rather be in rehab wearing straightjackets drooling onto their pillows. These are the only pictures from the trip where O’C isn’t on his iPhone. After SM, we did the other coasters in turn over the vacation. Everyone loved Thunder Mountain, which is something of the anti-SM, being out in the light and all, although in the evening Kate and I rode it again, going for the dark of night approach, and it was great fun then too, and quite different. Speaking of night, we also waited until dark for the Jungle Cruise, and I have to admit, this made a big, positive difference. I’ll never ride it during the day again.

There were many high points of the day. We discovered Dole Whips, for one thing, which are only available at two venues on property, and are not to be missed. I ran into Lou Mongello, a podcaster I’ve followed for years via whom we found our travel agent. We took a midday break to strut with the swells over at the Polynesian resort, which was much classier (and more expensive) than our hotel, but it is nice to get away to recharge for an hour or so. And don’t forget, when it first arrived, the monorail at Disneyland was an E-ticket. Since for our trip to the Polynesian we got on the wrong one first, for us it was sort of an F-ticket, but you can’t win them all. Despite some drizzle that started at night, the Mainstreet Electrical Parade and the Wishes fireworks both went off to the great satisfaction of all and sundry. I was especially awed by the fireworks, which are incredibly choreographed to the accompanying music to the point that it’s almost unbelievable. During the day at some point O’C and Kaz got to ride the Carrousel, which is admittedly an old classic but it was a bit much watching them push little kids aside to get to the best horses. Thank God they also didn’t want to do Dumbo, or were at least too ashamed to admit it. This is the first time we’ve seen the Haunted Mansion since it’s last refurb, and it is spectacular. It was always top five, but now it’s even more top five. (We spent a lot of time discussing top fives and top tens, both extant and extinct.) Kaz felt that the Hall of the Presidents made a good lesson plan, while Kate felt that it made a good nap. I’ve never gotten past the absolute surrealism of the proceedings, all these robot chief executives nodding and scratching and whatnot. O’C even got his updated Cinderella autograph, although admittedly, since he was the only adult on the line (alone at the time since the rest of us were doing something else), park security was keeping a close eye on him from that point on. By the way, character actors at Disney must keep their hands visible at all times when encountering guests. Cinderella, interviewed after her meeting with O'C, claimed she did not find this to be a problem in his case.

All if all, a swell time was had, and it was a great start to the proceedings. One park down, three to go.

DiDeAd Part 1.5

Here's my pictures. I'll put up some of the other folks soon.

http://picasaweb.google.com/117432765512228834328/DiDeAd#

DiDeAd Part 1

We arrived on Friday at various times, except for Kaz whose various Friday arrival time was Wednesday. She spent Thursday at Universal, very much enjoying TWWOHP, et alia, and Friday at Epcot, doing what we would do on our last day after she had left. Our meeting place was on Prairie Dog City Paradise City Pleasure Island.

Orlando’s airport is pretty big, thanks to WDW’s development of the area. The WDW site was originally chosen because it was on a main highway, with the assumption being that there would be a lot of automobile traffic with East Coast folk all driving in. Nowdays that’s probably still true, but the number one accent one hears is unquestionably British, and there’s no question that people are flying in from all over creation. A monorail takes you from the gate to the main terminal, which is a nice albeit accidental theme park touch: you get your first ride before you even leave the airport. We availed ourselves of what they call Disney’s Magical Express. You would probably call it glorified bus service, but it is pretty nifty. When you check in your bags at your home airport, that’s the last you see of them until they turn up in your room a couple of hours after you check in. WDW picks ‘em up and delivers ‘em, and you don’t have to think about it. Just make sure you have the bear [sic] necessities of life with you in your carry-on, and you’re in like Flynn.

The bus area at the airport was virtually empty aside from the three of us (my cousin traveled down on our flight) and about eight thousand WDW employees wishing there were more than just the three of us. This leads, of course, to pretty quick service, and we were on a bus and on our way, as they say, momentarily. (Am I the only person in the world who mourns the loss of the correct meaning of that word?) It’s about a half hour ride to the Disney property, and they play an orientation video to fill up the time. (I was thinking that maybe I’d try an orientation video for Bump this year, that people could watch on the bus as they drive in…) When they run out of information they screen an old Donald Duck cartoon. The Disneyfication has begun. Resistance is futile.

We stayed at the French Quarter at Riverside, one of their so-called moderate hotels. A few amenities, perfectly nice rooms, a Mardi Gras theme. One treat unique to Riverside is a boat to Downtown Disney, which we caught after we got freshened up. You pass things like the famous Mickey-shaped golf sand trap as you toodle along, and I noticed that the captain of our vessel did a lot of tooting along to boot, and I can just imagine getting up on the tee box and beginning my backstroke on the fourteenth hole and just as I’m about to punch it out 300 yards straight down the middle there’s this blast of TTTTOOOOOOOOTTTTT and I’m dribbling off 3 yards in reverse. There are pluses and minuses to ubiquitous theming.

Pleasure Island, which is in the middle of the Downtown Disney shopping area, was once a themed destination of its own, with a comedy club and the amazing Adventurers’ Club and various music venues. You paid one price to get in, then you roamed around with a drink in your hand until midnight, when, every day, they celebrated New Year’s Eve with a fireworks display for those guests who were still sober enough to be able to see anything that far up in the air. Now it’s in the process of re-grooving, probably for not much of anything other than more restaurants. Anyhow, we met up at the Paradiso 37 (or maybe it was 57—whatever), which is sort of Caribbean themed (because there’s 37 or 57 Caribbean islands?). The fancy drinks began with a nice passion fruit caipirinha. We were all there except for O’C, who had preemptively wandered off. In fact, he had been visiting Soddie that day before joining us, young Skywalker touching base with Obi-Wan or however you want to look at it. He kept us informed of his progress, as is his wont: O’C is nothing if not wedded to his iPhone (which, of course, is what the Scalias of life are most afraid of with things like Prop 8, but that’s another story entirely). It started raining, and by the time he showed up at our table, he was slightly drenched. But we were all met! The festivities began with a nice dinner, especially the cheesy corn thingies. After which, Kt and O’C and I went to the shop to buy the mandatory new cap while the others drifted back to the rooms (which, as it turned out, were contiguous, a nice touch from our travel agent).

If you don’t believe that the starting gun had been fired, and the games begun, consider this. At some point on his journey from Soddie to DiDeAd, as O’C texted us his every move, I received the following text from him, quoted in its entirety: “I am turning the corner.”

I’ve been waiting for him to turn the corner for years now.