And the prize for the biggest...

I just noticed on Amazon that you can buy a Justin Bieber karaoke album. I presume that this means you get a Justin Bieber album without Justin Bieber singing on it. How can this not be a good thing?

Someone responded to my post about hanging around for the whole tournament with the suggestion that there should be more sweepstakes awards. These are not my cup of tea. For the most part, sweepstakes are contests among the big schools with mega entries, vying for the bragging rights of being the biggest school with the mega-est entries. These awards bounce around between the same few schools again and again, and while I’m sure they’re all as happy as clamlarks about them, they’re pretty unengaging to the hoi and the polloi from all the other schools. O’C has tried to counter this with sweeps for big and for small schools, but that really doesn’t solve the problem. Wherever you set the distinction for size, it stands to reason that whoever has the most entries has an edge, and why should there be a reward for having a lot of entries? My understanding is that sweeps are very popular with Speecho-Americans and their breeders, or at the very least traditional amongst them. If you like that sort of thing, fine, but given that most of the early sneak-outs are not from the big programs, and most of the people in the running for these are big programs, even if I was in favor, it wouldn’t solve the problem.

I should point out that some tournaments do not traffic in award ceremonies, and I have nothing against that. These tournaments tend to want to run toward efficiency and minimal pomp(osity), and if that is what they want to do, it is their tournament and I’m happy to go with the flow. But if a tournament builds in awards as a part of the event, so be it. And I remain unconvinced by the idea that people have a long way to travel, hence they want to leave early, because I have yet to see anyone who has a long way to travel leave early when they’re still in the tournament. (Well, aside from my daughter, that is, who used to say enough is enough and, in or out, she would lead the charge to the nearest restaurant and to hell with the tournament. She hasn’t changed much since then.)

Of course, my thoughts on people who leave early is merely opinion and open to disagreement. My thoughts on people who blow off their judging obligation is something else altogether. These people are the scum of the debate earth. As I run more and more tournaments I begin to know more and more of them by first name. It isn’t many, but it’s enough, and it’s always the same ones. I haven’t forgotten a scurrying judge yet. That will be the sign that I’m getting Old-Timer’s Disease, when I forget that you left me hanging without a judge. But of course, scurrying judges don’t read this blog. Then again, as I start excluding them from tournaments, they will start having the time to do so. Maybe they’ll put two and two together. But I doubt it.