Long time. My bad. I’ve been eating turkey almost literally for two solid weeks. It was a great weekend that has been followed by a rampage of work leading up to the end of the semester. I am attempting to get a couple things done before I leave here for the holidays and head back to Minneapolis and while I’m not 100% confident that all of them will get concluded in time, at least the pressing has invigorated me around the mid-point of the year.
Collegiate debate is done for 2005, after this weekend’s John Carroll Tournament in Cleveland. For the most part I love this tournament, for a lot of reasons that are not at all intrinsic to the tournament itself (it is in Cleveland, only three hours away, and the opposite direction of every other tournament we attend) and a number of others that are (good debates, technical proficiency, nice hotels, more sleep etc.). Both times I have attended this tournament we have been hit on Friday by a hella snowstorm. Two years ago it wasn’t that significant, just slowed down the last half hour or so. This year we got nailed pretty much the moment we left the New York thruway, and were destroyed pretty steadily into the parking lot at JCU. It took us almost 5 hours in total to get from our apartment to the school, compare that to the less than three hour trip we made on our return voyage.
Once we got into town I was very pleased that the snow was falling. I love the climate of a snowy day, the lax regulations on driving, and especially making fun of idiots who think its cold or can’t drive in the snow. There’s just something about the feel of a serious blizzard, the cleanness of it all. Also, we had a debater from Texas who had never seen one before, so that was an interesting situation.
My absolute favorite thing about the John Carroll tournament, beyond everything else, is the judges’ lounge. A lot of things about the judges’ lounge are pretty normal, cheetos, chips, candy, blah blah. They have donuts, not just bagels with vegan cream cheese, like a couple of tournaments in this state, in the morning and specifically they have some really excellent glazed cherry cake donuts, a personal fave of mine. But far more importantly than those tasty-m-cakes, was the greatest thing at any debate tournament ever. A FOUNTAIN SODA MACHINE.
Yep, there is a fountain soda machine which enables me to have free unlimited Diet Pepsi over the whole course of the tournament. Since I am a freaking genius who was aware of the existence of said Diet Pepsi miracle, I brought a 20oz bottle and refilled it once, maybe twice, maybe three times a debate. It is the best thing in the history of debate tournaments, end of story.
I am going to cut this post short, cuz the poor little Hippo had to take a bath tonight and now wants to sit on my computer to warm up.
Peace,
MB-K
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