Gobble Gobble Gawk
Happy Thanksgiving boys and girls and welcome to my vlog!
Just kidding. This holiday break I didn't really do a lot of things. I mean, I guess I did, but it's nothing extremely significant. In the beginning of break, I went to the Fall Debate tournament at Arroyo High School. On Friday, I judged for the novice division. It was heart-wrenchingly boring and I felt for the first time burdened by the fates of these young students. It went alright, though. On Saturday, I was able to actually compete, and even though we never lost a single actual round (except for the one we conceded to let our teammate also get a leg to state), we came in with a close clutch of second.
The state tournament is considered a lay tournament, which means that people talk slowly so that community judges can understand. At a circuit level, which is where I regularly compete, we talk pretty fast. The style of debate we do, Policy Debate, also consumes a lot of our time. Take this round for example:
You can kind of tell that it's quite a task!
Now, what's a leg, you might ask? There are two ways to qualify for the state competition. The first way is to directly qualify through the State Qualifier tournament. This route is extraordinarily difficult (even though we somehow managed to finesse it), because it is at this tournament where the really really good schools in our region compete. By really good, I mean scary good. However, an alternative way to qualify for the state championship is to get two "legs" at the Fall and Spring local varsity tournaments. To get a leg, you must place either first or second, and to qualify, you need to be the top two at both tournaments. It's not difficult at all; I think it's the judging pool that makes it so incredibly difficult.
Just kidding. This holiday break I didn't really do a lot of things. I mean, I guess I did, but it's nothing extremely significant. In the beginning of break, I went to the Fall Debate tournament at Arroyo High School. On Friday, I judged for the novice division. It was heart-wrenchingly boring and I felt for the first time burdened by the fates of these young students. It went alright, though. On Saturday, I was able to actually compete, and even though we never lost a single actual round (except for the one we conceded to let our teammate also get a leg to state), we came in with a close clutch of second.
The state tournament is considered a lay tournament, which means that people talk slowly so that community judges can understand. At a circuit level, which is where I regularly compete, we talk pretty fast. The style of debate we do, Policy Debate, also consumes a lot of our time. Take this round for example:
Now, what's a leg, you might ask? There are two ways to qualify for the state competition. The first way is to directly qualify through the State Qualifier tournament. This route is extraordinarily difficult (even though we somehow managed to finesse it), because it is at this tournament where the really really good schools in our region compete. By really good, I mean scary good. However, an alternative way to qualify for the state championship is to get two "legs" at the Fall and Spring local varsity tournaments. To get a leg, you must place either first or second, and to qualify, you need to be the top two at both tournaments. It's not difficult at all; I think it's the judging pool that makes it so incredibly difficult.
As you can see from above, my debate partner Edmond and I had to also take some trophies on behalf of some of our teammates who left early. We accidentally dropped one of them (well, more like it broke, but the devil is not in the details come this time around). I posted this picture to Reddit so that I could reap some virtual points. Yay, debate!
Besides the tournament, my week was mostly spent lazing around at home and "working" on some assignments. I revived my old passion for this game called Roblox and I (ironically) played with some of my old friends. Now, I can't say that I definitely was completely obsessed with the game, maybe in like 2013, but I think that this ancient YouTube account from 2013 speaks volumes:
God, this is really embarassing.
Another good portion of my break was spent on YouTube. I watched some pretty funny content creators on there, so I'll just share one of his videos:
Now that's pretty funny.
I think the peak of my break came around Wednesday. I actually lost nearly 6 lbs during the first half of break, but with the hotpot Thanksgiving celebration my family had and the litany of family dinners/meals in the succeeding days, I can say for sure that I gained that weight back. It's definitely a reason for me to be sad because I think I celebrated my weight loss by...eating. I think I need to exercise a little more self-control in that department, hahahahahhahaa.
I wish this week lasted longer. I need another week to just recover from Thanksgiving.
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