whoa... we're wireless at Gig Harbor

6:27 p.m.
Gig Harbor has wireless, so this is a semi-liveblog of their speech and debate tournament. It's early Friday night, the time when the grease of pizza and the caffeine of soda have joined together in perfect harmony in your small intestine, and you have a nagging itch to argue over trivia. Example. In the middle of downtime, two CHS debaters are arguing whether XP or Vista is the superior Microsoft OS. A bit like asking which Titanic bathroom is the cleanest.

6:53
"You get better food for judging. No, let me rephrase that. You get free food for judging."

7:15
Another round needs to start, and soon. Nerd-gaggles slowly creeping back into the cafeteria. The rustle of pantsuits and cheap silk ties.

8:47
I watched my first round of the evening, after spending most of my time coaching from the sidelines. It is so hard to avoid making faces when people make putrescent arguments. So hard.

8:54
Has any debate tournament in the history of debate tournaments ever begun and ended on time? Methinks we'd have to travel back in history to at least the Middle Ages, when the Oxford Aquinians faced the Locke Posse, the former forfeiting due to perceived bias when the adjudicator declared himself a "tabula rasa" judge.

It is nearly 9:00 Debate Standard Time, which is long past midnight elsewhere.

9:14
This concrete block disguised as a bench has won the battle with my lack of sufficient padding. Thanks, genes + diet. (Exercise is not in that equation, remarkably.) I'll sign off because--hope against hope--we'll be leaving soon. And to think: I'll be back here at 7:30 tomorrow. Maybe even blogging.