Our story so far

For all practical purposes the debate season is now in full swing, so let's see where we are.

We've migrated many of the meetings to the chez, and I'm starting to push for more meetings at other chezes. It's a lot easier, as I've been saying, to talk among a handful of people than the entire 13th tribe of Israel, and more gets accomplished. On the down side, half the team (the rawer recruits) haven't figured things like, if they sign up for a meeting they should look on the signup sheet to find out when the meeting is, or that since all of the team business is conducted through emails, that it might be a good idea for them to read their emails once in a while. I still sense that brain-fog attrition is not yet concluded for this season, and that we still stand to lose one or two more. Considering that there is a tournament virtually every week, and no one seems to know this other than me, we're not in the greatest of shapes. Where are the hungry people? Well, I oversimplify, because there is at least one hungry novice (she knows who she is), and maybe more. On the plus side, I'm seeing more JV hunger. Not that I'm all that in favor of hunger per se, but total lack of same sort of baffles me. Back in the day, there was so much hunger it used to scare the pants off me. What I'd like to see is balanced hunger.

Bump is filling up frighteningly fast. At least other teams are hungry! I've sold out all my hired judging, and filled up most of the policy slots two weeks before the deadline. I do hope that we really DO get more rooms in the future. Although I like to blame everything on my hardware engineers (because I like the looks on their faces when I do), it's not their fault we don't have a basement. Maybe next year. Bump assignments will be made at next week's tutti meeting, when all the forensic fruttis are tossed in together. I have a feeling a lot of people won't be happy, but I can't just give jobs to people because they used to be a part of the team...

Judging all weekend at NFA was rather enjoyable, as it turns out. I'd forgotten that I like judging, although I do also like sleeping and eating, neither of which comes easily at Newburgh. Still, it's fun to get into the trenches for a while and see who's who and what's what, and it's also illuminating to hear a topic argued, especially early in its life. I think I did get some good stuff to pass along to people, although no one bothered to comment one way or the other when I did. Come to think of it, maybe they didn't give a raccoon's patella. You know, I didn't have to be there, you ungrateful louts! I could have been golfing! (Except for the snow and ice.)