Turkey, Tiggers and tournaments in general

I’ll probably go offline for a few days, since there’s not much going on forensical over the coming weekend, whereas there’s plenty of real life things to attend to. I trust that you will do likewise. Go cook a turkey or something.

I’ve been adding judges to the hires pool as the Tiggers have signed them up. We’re almost where I would like to be, but not quite. Ratings/striking will take place starting on Sunday, so they have a few more days to get their ducks in a row. The only real problem with late additions is that they’re automatically Cs, even if they’re the cat’s pajamas. Oh, well. Other than that, the tournament is big again like last year, and should be fun for everyone. There’s a real attraction to the Tigger campus. It just feels like college, if you know what I mean, unlike some schools that are in the middle of somewhere else. Like NYU, for instance, which is in the middle of NYC. NYC overpowers the NYUness, whereas Princeton is Princeton, and while they might actually be the pickle packing capital of the world or somesuch, around the university everything is university, period. And what I think people go to the tournament for is the debating per se, since the bid is finals, and therefore pretty elusive given a field of 160. I like that so many people attend. As Soddy once said, he did not run his tournament (Big Bronx) as an entrance event to some other tournament, and that is the way all tournaments should be perceived, as ends in themselves. (I think Kant also wrote about this, but in his case it was sour grapes, because every year he debated he always dropped in the bid rounds.) You go to a tournament for the sake of that tournament. A lot of tournaments have definite personalities, and you want to be a part of the tournaments you like because of those personalities. Presumably some tournaments get TOC bids because the nature of the tournament personality and the people it attracts warrant those bids. As the VCA knows, I value a lot of things about forensics, and among the least of these is the whole $ircuit business. Trust me on this: if you debate now to learn things and enjoy yourself and make friends and do as well as you can, you will value the experience for life. If you debate now to get to TOC at any price and miss out on all the non-competitive aspects of the activity, debate will just be a blur in your past, another checkbox on your list of things that got you into college. Good luck with that one.

And so, it’s off to the holiday. Some early Christmas shopping tomorrow, breaking out the new Wii Resort game with the family, arguing about the Disney trip. (Disney trip? you ask. Yeah, Disney trip. Details to come. I promise you, the VCA is going to enjoy this one. Seriously.) Maybe take in a movie. Clean up this and that. Pack away the rest of the Bump crapola for the year. Play some poker Saturday night. Five whole days off. Ah, blessed peace!

And blessed peace to you, too.