Stalking People on Speechranks

I thought about writing a post on speechranks.com in general, but decided that I wanted to be more specific. In case you're not as speechranks-obsessed as I am, speechranks is that fantastic website where you can see how you and others are doing or have done in a given season at speech and debate tournaments. You can smugly count your green checkmarks or glare at your lack thereof. You can see how you or your speech ranks in your state and in the nation. For example, I was the 13th highest-ranked non-debater last year. Is that an really an official ranking, you say? No, but clearly it should be. However, perhaps the best part of speechranks is stalking other people. 

If you're half as competitive as I am, you probably use speechranks to see who's ahead of you. Sometimes it's fun to know that the guy who beat you in an event has won that event at every tournament that year, but that you came really close to breaking his streak. Or you can scope out who you're ahead of, and that never gets old. :evilgrin:  Then you watch as they jump ten places ahead of you after the next tournament... ahem. You may also use this fantasical website to see if you're friends qualified for Nationals and in what event(s). You could follow trends on speechranks to predict who will be in finals at NITOC and at what event. (For the record, seven of the people I thought would be in HI finals at NITOC were in HI finals at NITOC. But that wasn't too difficult to call.) Of course, you could also play "find the person with the most green checkmarks in one event." The most I've found is 11. Which is amazing.


But I haven't even got into the real stalking yet. Maybe you're just checking out results from some tournament when you see a name, random or otherwise (or you type a specific name in for bonus superstalker points), and you click on it. And you read stuff. Then you click on his debate partner. And you read more stuff. Then you click on her duo partner. And the list goes on and on and on until you hit a dead end. So you start all over.


No, speechranks was probably not supposed to be a form of Facebook without the friend requests and status updates and obnoxious poking. But homeschoolers have to make up for their lack of social lives somewhere.


You're homeschooled, and you're a speechranks stalker. For shame.

Little Siblings- Elena Trueba

(Elena is awesome and if you don't think so already, you will after reading this. And I officially need to meet Emma. Enjoy the newest guest post!)


…Not that we don't like older ones, too. (I just don't have any, so… I can't speak from experience!). But there is absolutely NOTHING like knowing that you have at least one completely devoted fan (and excellent critic) throughout the entire year of speech and debate. 

It starts in the summer. My little sister continually asks me about what I'm planning for speeches (admittedly, she's a little less interested in debate, but that certainly doesn't stop me from outlining cases for her, much to her chagrin). As soon as the pieces are ready to be seen, she's the first person I go to. We retreat to the garage, where she sits on a basketball she's named Fiona (you know what, don't even ask. Some things are just tradition), and she coaches and critiques everything I do. I'm convinced that my speeches always do better after Emma has had the chance to tear them apart.

Besides a fantastic coach, we also get quite the fan club in our little siblings. Emma will faithfully come watch my speeches during tournaments (although not my debates. Well, she comes… she just falls asleep. But hey, at least she's there.) She'll also bring an entire crowd of other little siblings with her. Which is absolutely wonderful, because really, what's more fun than entertaining little kids? 

I don't think we realize how much our little siblings love us. I mean, really, all that they put up with (at home and at tournaments!) is pretty incredible. Emma's always around at tournaments to hug me after an awesome round (or a terrible one), or to give me a reality check ("Elena. A sub-par extemp round is NOT the end of the world."), or to make me laugh after a stressful day of competition. Or just… whatever. (And, by the way, she's going to be my fantastically amazing duo partner next year. Be jealous.) 

You're homeschooled. Go hug your little siblings. :D

The Art of Flowing

I'm not very good at flowing. I have officially flowed a grand total of four rounds. Three of them were mine, by the way. Ok, I did sort of flow my first round, but I didn't count that one. I didn't have a flowpad yet, which made it hard. I had a composition book, but those have pretty small pages. I had to flow every speech on a different sheet of paper. As if that wasn't hard enough, I also had to do it in reasonably legible handwriting because my partner had injured his right hand and could't flow for himself and needed my notes. Which means I also had to "pre-flow" my speeches. It's not a very good system, but you know what? We won that round.

Even though the art of flowing somewhat baffles me, I've found that it does actually make TP, I mean, uh, Policy, easier to follow! Amazing! Who knew, right? And some of you guys who are not recent debate-converts such as myself are actually really good at it. That's why I call flowing an art. I'm talking two pens in each hand, flowing the current speaker on your left while your right hand flows your own responses and if I look on the ground, you may have slipped off your tournament shoes to write notes to your partner with a pen in your toes. Skills right there, people. Or maybe you just do it the normal way with one pen in one hand, but you remember to write down the sources and are therefore still better than me.

Or maybe you're awesome and flow with a pencil. I've seen it done before. I was kind of shocked, thinking, You can do that?? Yes, yes you can. But probably you can only do it in LD. I suspect you can do all kinds of crazy flowing tricks in LD, because you don't have a partner who will yell at you. When I'm in LD, I intend to invent an intense form of shorthand that only I can read. I'll flow every single word and I'll read the other debaters arguments precisely as he said them. I suspect this method may be faster, which means extra time to prep and/or doodle in the extra column I always leave on the side. (I haven't figured out the eight-columns-per-sheet thing yet and always have nine. But I like the extra space.) Or I may flow in morse code like .. / .-- .. -. / .- - / .-.. .. ..-. . That would be cool.

You're homeschooled, and you are an artist.

Shakespeare

Wherefore doth our affections lie? By my troth, with William Shakespeare, be thou assuredeth. Truly, coz, Shakespeare beith the greatesteth playwriteth evereth.

If you understood that, I commend you. Because that wasn't even real Shakespeare. It was just weird. :awkward cough: Anyway, Shakespeare. We like that guy. He's really good at writing duos and the occasional HI. But beyond just interps, lots of us SCHSADK's do real Shakespeare plays. (Note for the interpers: real plays last more than 10 minutes. Try to wrap your minds around that. But don't hurt yourselves.) And also we go to Shakespeare camps. And read the plays. And take classes about Shakespeare. It's just a homeschooler thing, I guess. And that's cool. I like that guy too.

As a whole, our favorite Shakespeare play is Much Ado About Nothing. I know this because a) it's my favorite and I write the blog. Suckers. b) I have seen it performed three times in the last two years as both a duo and some HIs, but I haven't even been around that long. I'm sure I missed some performances.

Hast thou noticed this fascination with the Bard? Doth thou also love Shakespeare?

You're homeschooled. You do. Eth.

Trying To Tell People That You Aren't A Champion Debater

You know how people who know nothing about the wild world of speech and debate really don't get interps? Well, they have the same problem with debate. I've tried explaining debate to people: "Well, there's this thing called the resolution that says 'Resolved' and then it like, states something that's resolved, only it's not really that resolved 'cause they still have to argue about it, 'they' being these two teams and one's affirmative and they're like 'w00t! Yea! The Resolution! We love that guy!' and then the Negative is like 'Dude, the Resolution sucks and here's why,' and then they argue about it and stuff."

Sometimes some of them come out with some kind of misleading misconception that resembles understanding following my oversimplified, run-on explanation, but most of them are just more confused. However, something that none of the people I talk to can seem to grasp is that I am not a champion debater. (They have not read my Confessions of a Non-Debater, apparently.) Just the other day, this guy who helps out at my youth group asked me how many debates I've won since the last time I saw him. "Umm... none." He enjoys telling people about all the trophies I win regularly from debate and how I win $50,000 or so on a weekly basis from debate (but with taxes and whatnot it comes down to about 7). I really don't know where he gets this stuff.

People just tend to assume that if you do speech, you do debate (because they're the same thing, right?) and since you're soo brave because you do debate, you must be really good at it. And then you have to explain that you didn't win your last tournament, or that you don't debate at all, and that's kinda awkward. By the way, if you're a non-debater who does impromptu, just explain that instead and they'll be way impressed.

Of course, some of you actually are champion debaters who do not understand the ways of us mere mortals. Pssshhh... whatever.

On second thought, I should just let my friends and acquaintances live on in their blissful ignorance and keep assuming I am a debate champion. Yes. Plus I have a ton of experience now anyway [/sarcasm] so I'm obviously well on my way to becoming a champion.

You are homeschooled. You are a champion.

Making Your Timer Laugh- Felicity Lorenz

(Fun fact: Though she may not know it, Felicity is the first CHSADK I met who was not in my club. Funner fact: She's really funny. Please give a big high-five to the author of our secondever Guest Post!)

This season, I did an OI from a children’s literature series, the Berenstain Bears. Since I had pretty much decided it wouldn’t break at all at any tournament, I set goals for myself that were unrelated to breaking. One of them was making all my timers laugh during the piece, since the series is geared for kids anyways. (Another reason is that kids have short attention spans. Having to sit through speeches for over an hour must be really boring and repetitive! I wanted those kids to be entertained, not bored stiff.) As I waited for the judges to be ready, standing there in front of the audience, I looked at my timer and prayed, “Lord, if no one enjoys this piece, at least let my timer like it and be entertained.”

If you have ever made your timer laugh (or even better, cry!), then I commend you. Those kids are tough cookies! They won’t laugh at just anything! I would have rounds, where all the adults were hollering up a storm, but my timer was not even amused. So, it is definitely no easy task. Yet, that’s the fun of it! You are presented with a challenge, and in order to meet it, you will need to step up your game, put your best foot forward, and really try. When I realized a timer wasn’t even chuckling, I worked especially hard to do my best. This improved my overall performance.

Sometimes, you’ll find that only your timer laughs. Yet, for the reasons stated above, that’s not entirely a bad thing. I would leave rounds thinking, “Sure, my judges were stone cold silent – but hey, my timer loved it, so I’m happy.” When I look back on this year, I feel this was one of my main accomplishments, and was more rewarding to me than any trophy.

You’re homeschooled, and you like it when your timers laugh.

“Their sides hurt, their face hurt, tears rolled down their cheeks!”

- My Berenstain Bears OI