BadgerBadgerBadger

I admittedly stole this link from Bob Mould's blog, but if you counted the number of things I had stolen from Bob Mould you would have, well, you would have this link and the lyrics to Hoover Dam. I mean, I guess I haven't really stolen the lyrics to Hoover Dam, but I do like the lyrics to Hoover Dam, if that counts for anything. Those lyrics aren't really from his blog either, they were around before I think the whole concept of the blog was even around. Maybe not.

Regardless, the link in question is, not surprisingly, www.badgerbadgerbadger.com. Check it out, its fucking awesome. Watch it as long as you can humanly stand it. After about 5 minutes or so it will simply get funnier and funnier. Seriously, its like this joke I know, which I would just type out but I think there are some key details which don't really transfer to the electronic medium. Chure. I really like these types of websites, like the punk rock kittens at rathergood.com or the banana donkey, which no longer appears to exist, which makes me quite sad. If there are others that I should be aware of let me know. There is also the Britney naked cat-a-phone, but since Katie doesn't really like it I will speak of it no more.

So, this weekend Katie and I are flying to Chicago. I am not entirely sure why we are doing so, but we aren't paying for it so whatev. Katie's Aunt and Uncle live there so we are heading into town to watch their kids for the weekend while they take of for Vegas. They wanted us to drive, originally, and that was straight out of the question. I would have thought that they would offer to fly Katie in, but I am not sure why they bought me a plane ticket too. Katie told me that she needs another person in order to watch all three of the little folks. I admittedly am not entirely wild about watching children for the weekend, even though I know that these are nice little kids. I have never been in a situation where I was among the primary caregivers for someone else for any extended period of time and to be honest am scared that it will really suck. If I can still watch some TV and get some work done and not be ridiculously uncomfortable like all of the time then that is a plus.

This is why having a cute little pug dog would rock. I mean, sure, sometimes they require some work or are inconvenient, but you can leave them at home during the day, you never have to worry about the TV you are watching, so on and so on. Anyway, so I will be in the Windy City. Katie's fam lives near Wrigley Field, so while its a pretty nice area I am not sure where is the best place to go to get a solid hot dog. If worse comes to worst I am pretty sure there are some joints I can get one with everything in the airport, but I would rather have something more authentic. We might also get to meet up with Katie's friend Erica, who I am pretty sure neither of us has seen in like 2 full years. I never knew her ridiculously well, but that would be a nice use of a weekend away.

So this is not related in any way shape or form, but I was thinking about a combination of debate things and an idea Joan was discussing in class. So the debate related part of the issue involves Louisville, a University whose debate team is apparently quite good. I haven't seen them, but they were in some big debates and right on the border of getting a first round. I am not a big wig enough in the community to know if there is any underground resentment towards their not receiving one, but still. Anyway, apparently these Louisville teams all make arguments which primarily concern the relation of race to the activity of collegiate debate. I won't speak too much to what they say because I haven't seen them, but I think generally their argument could be safely defined as not traditional debate, I would even go further and call it an experimental form of debate argumentation. It should also be mentioned that I believe both of the students in question are African American women.

For the purpose of this discussion lets imagine that debate arguments could be subversive and that what you say in the context of supporting the university structure could matter in any way besides who wins a debate round. I don't think this argument is subversive. Lets make this comparison. There is a guy who debates for NYU who exhibits many of the qualities that would be stereotypically associated with an urban black male. I won't testify to what this dude always argues, he may make race based arguments on occassion, I am not sure. Regardless, at least in the debates where I have seen him, he was just running threat construction and security arguments. He and his partner were pretty good, but the thing that struck me was the complete lack of individuals like him in the activity. Don't get me wrong, I was aware before this that there are almost no non-white people in debate and even fewer African Americans, since debate's ridiculous class preferences make it far more likely that Asian-Americans and those whose ancestry is of the Indian Subcontinent will be participating. Even then there is a drastic underrepresentation. Regardless, the thing that struck me specifically was that the non-white individuals in the game almost never have these "urban" characteristics. Excuse me, by the way, if this term is not an acceptable one, I am not sure if there is a different term.

Fuck, I actually have shit I need to do right now. I will return to this argument later, it has some further development anyway. Gotta change the laundry.

Peace,

MB-K