The pirates of pen spinning (you'll get it eventually)

As you know, most of the time at tournaments I’m in the tab room. There are a couple of reasons for this. I can tab pretty well, for one thing, having done it the odd million times or so, and it also keeps me from causing too much damage in the judge pool. I think it’s true that to be a good judge you’ve got to do it pretty regularly. If for nothing else, you lose your ability to flow speed if you don’t do it all the time. And, of course, it helps you keep up on the latest arguments. I don’t wish this to be construed as a belief that all judges should be able to flow speed or know all the latest arguments—a good debater has to be able to adapt—but, let’s face it, if you want to have any serious cred as a judge you’ve got to be able to do it at the level of the highly regarded adjudicators. It’s one thing to bring an old-fashioned love of resolutional arguing to a round, and another thing altogether to miss everything that was said because, even at slow speed, you couldn’t follow it.

Anyhow, there may be a perception that tabbing is somehow less work than judging. I would say that, rather, it’s different. First of all, we usually start way before a tournament begins, often by writing up the tournament for tabroom.com and advising the tournament director on this and that. Plus, the events need to be monitored throughout registration, checking judges and waitlists and hires and whatnot. Sometimes this is rather onerous, although usually it’s just keeping an eye on things. Then there’s getting the data into TRPC (an ever-changing adventure) and running through it all and making sure everything is in working order. Often the starting friction at tournaments is because people haven’t pre-tweaked TRPC. In my case, it’s usually because the data in tabroom.com, transferred to TRPC, is not quite the same as the reality. It is unfortunate that about 25% of all teams registering are incapable of reporting changes from the registration sheet that they are asked to check at the table. They tell you people are there who aren’t, and vice versa. Judges are unavailable for round one with no warning. At ALJ, one team that will remain nameless changed its judges both days (after rounds started), in addition to its endless string of competitor changes. These sort of things have an impact that resonates throughout a tournament. A judge is on the schematic because we think the judge is there because no one has told us otherwise. Ditto the competitors. We casually refer to round one at many tournaments at taking attendance. I wonder if it’s too much to ask if people actually look at their registrations and inform us of changes at the table.

Then again, there are those schools who, to avoid fines, don’t report changes. There are chaperones who didn’t take attendance on their bus in the first place (very responsible on their part) but allowed some kid to say that everyone was there, but that kid is the policy captain and doesn’t know the LDers from a hole in the ground. There are coaches who don’t realize that the list they typed up themselves a week ago is not the list we have, because we’re going by what they entered into tabroom, which may not be identical to their original list, but they’re too dumb to check. There are coaches who can’t spell the names of their kids or their judges; I love when judges keep respelling their names on the ballots. I want to write back, don’t tell me, tell the person who’s paying you. There are judges who didn’t know the round was starting: what did they think we were doing here, playing pinochle? It’s a debate tournament. Rounds follow one another like elephants on parade. You should know that by now.

There are myriad other issues to be addressed as rounds come and go. There is the simple entry of data that can take forever at big tournaments, which is why we try to get ballots in after flights. There’s a lot of pressure to get the data entry right, for obvious reasons, so there’s a high level of concentration and tempers tend to flare. If we’re trying to figure out if it’s a 6 or an 8 and why it’s not marked as a low point win, or how can we get this judge out of that room into this other flight in the down-one bracket, we’re probably not interested in answering any of the following questions:
“When is the next round coming out?”
"Do you know where the men's room is?"
“Can I use your printer?”
“When can I pick up my ballots and go home?”

Of course, while we’re working furiously, you’re probably eating debate ziti. Then it switches off, and you’re judging and debating, and for an hour or so we get to eat the debate ziti (or, if it’s me and O’C or JV, we get to wander off for Starbucks or something). So we look unbusy when you’re at your busiest, and vice versa. Then again, we got there earlier in the morning than you, and stay later in the evenings.

In other words, a tabber’s lot is not a happy one. But then again…

When debaters aren’t engaged in their employment (their employment)
Of maturing their felonious counterplans (counterplans)
Their capacity for eating debate ziti (debate ziti)
Is just as great as any honest man's (honest man’s)

A judge can be a poor young newbie’s mother (newbie’s mother)
Or a hot shot college kid who thinks he’s Kant (thinks he’s Kant)
Ah, take one consideration with another (with another)
A filled-up flow pad’s all the kiddies want (kiddies want)

Ahhh
When adjudication duty's to be done, to be done,
A judge’s lot is not a happy one (happy one).

When the enterprising theorist’s out a’theorying (out a’theorying)
When the harms disad is turned at ev’ry link (ev’ry link)
Kids love to hear the A-ranked judge a’flowing (judge a’flowing)
And listen to the merry timer clink (timer clink)

When the kritik runner’s finished spreading Zisek (spreading Zisek)
He loves to read “On Liberty” by Mill (-y by Mill)
Ah, take one consideration with another (with another)
A T shell is an argument from hell (-ment from hell).

Ahhh
When adjudication duty's to be done, to be done,
A judge’s lot is not a happy one (happy one).

Thank you, Gilbert. You too, Sullivan.