Back in town
Jun. 14th, 2004 08:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yendiI'm back from another pair of tourneys at UTC.
Saturday was the summer academic tournament (using the high school NAQT final questions, which, alas, including too much math solving for anyone's taste). I haven't done a true academic competition in over ten years, and it showed. I didn't finish dead last in scoring, but I was in the lower middle of the pack. If my speed was off, I was at least able to help on bonuses, and with Gerry and Steve both kicking ass (they finished eighth and fourth in individual scoring, respectively), we made it to the semis. Alas, the same one-man-gang team (Seth from Kentucky, for anyone else on the circuit) who had beaten us by five points the first time did so again, so we dropped to the consolation match, where we promptly managed to beat the other team that had beaten us before. Alas, we were playing with advantage rules, which meant that as the lower seed we had to win a shootout (twenty toss-ups, no bonuses), and although we had a lead going into question 19, two quick power buzzes on their part led to a win. We got the fourth place boobie prizes (calculators), and at least the satisfaction of doing well.
Saturday night (we didn't get out until after 9) was a late dinner at Acropolis (yum!), followed by playing Trivial Pursuit Pop Culture Edition (Steve and I each won a game)
Sunday was the real reason I went -- the trash tourney. Whatever rust I had in academic wasn't there for trash. I finished fifth in scoring, my best showing ever. I nailed all three comic toss-ups that came my way (Flash, Crisis on Infinite Earths, and Plastic Man, the latter two being fast enough to earn recognition at the awards), as well as a few geek questions (there were toss-ups on both "blogs" and "Livejournal"), and the usual mix of movie and other stuff. The most depressing part, though, was successfully getting a question about Al Goldstein (before either "Midnight Blue" or "Screw" had been mentioned), and having everyone on both teams just give me a blank look. Damn, I feel old.
I wasn't the only one doing well. Steve finished fourth in scoring, and Mike was in at a tie for #7. In a double round-robin tourney, we ended up 6-2, with both losses to the same Indiana team. That Indiana team lost twice to a UTC team that we ended up beating solidly twice. Which meant that at the end, there were three teams with 6-2 records. So we had to resolve a three-way circle-of-death. They brought out a a shoot-out round, and all three teams competed together (the Indiana team, having scored the fewest points, was forced to share buzzers). Alas, UTC pulled ahead early, and we had to settle for second.
Prize-wize, I got a nice piece of crappy casino software for my individual efforts, and we all got a copy of One Shining Moment: Sports Heroes For a Day for our team accomplishments (trash tourneys are not meant to be serious).
Overall, a damned fun weekend, even if I got back late (after 9 last night), and was exhausted. Definitely worth it, and I didn't even mention the lunch at Lupi's (best calzones ever), or the music mini-tournament (for which I somehow qualified, and managed to finish dead last in).
Now, I'll be offline for the morning, because the folks from WeFuckPigsInsteadOfHelpingYou.com (also known as Bellsouth) are supposed to get my DSL working (ten to one they flip when they see a Mac and try to blame the OS). I'll get back to dealing with email and everything after lunch, I hope.
Saturday was the summer academic tournament (using the high school NAQT final questions, which, alas, including too much math solving for anyone's taste). I haven't done a true academic competition in over ten years, and it showed. I didn't finish dead last in scoring, but I was in the lower middle of the pack. If my speed was off, I was at least able to help on bonuses, and with Gerry and Steve both kicking ass (they finished eighth and fourth in individual scoring, respectively), we made it to the semis. Alas, the same one-man-gang team (Seth from Kentucky, for anyone else on the circuit) who had beaten us by five points the first time did so again, so we dropped to the consolation match, where we promptly managed to beat the other team that had beaten us before. Alas, we were playing with advantage rules, which meant that as the lower seed we had to win a shootout (twenty toss-ups, no bonuses), and although we had a lead going into question 19, two quick power buzzes on their part led to a win. We got the fourth place boobie prizes (calculators), and at least the satisfaction of doing well.
Saturday night (we didn't get out until after 9) was a late dinner at Acropolis (yum!), followed by playing Trivial Pursuit Pop Culture Edition (Steve and I each won a game)
Sunday was the real reason I went -- the trash tourney. Whatever rust I had in academic wasn't there for trash. I finished fifth in scoring, my best showing ever. I nailed all three comic toss-ups that came my way (Flash, Crisis on Infinite Earths, and Plastic Man, the latter two being fast enough to earn recognition at the awards), as well as a few geek questions (there were toss-ups on both "blogs" and "Livejournal"), and the usual mix of movie and other stuff. The most depressing part, though, was successfully getting a question about Al Goldstein (before either "Midnight Blue" or "Screw" had been mentioned), and having everyone on both teams just give me a blank look. Damn, I feel old.
I wasn't the only one doing well. Steve finished fourth in scoring, and Mike was in at a tie for #7. In a double round-robin tourney, we ended up 6-2, with both losses to the same Indiana team. That Indiana team lost twice to a UTC team that we ended up beating solidly twice. Which meant that at the end, there were three teams with 6-2 records. So we had to resolve a three-way circle-of-death. They brought out a a shoot-out round, and all three teams competed together (the Indiana team, having scored the fewest points, was forced to share buzzers). Alas, UTC pulled ahead early, and we had to settle for second.
Prize-wize, I got a nice piece of crappy casino software for my individual efforts, and we all got a copy of One Shining Moment: Sports Heroes For a Day for our team accomplishments (trash tourneys are not meant to be serious).
Overall, a damned fun weekend, even if I got back late (after 9 last night), and was exhausted. Definitely worth it, and I didn't even mention the lunch at Lupi's (best calzones ever), or the music mini-tournament (for which I somehow qualified, and managed to finish dead last in).
Now, I'll be offline for the morning, because the folks from WeFuckPigsInsteadOfHelpingYou.com (also known as Bellsouth) are supposed to get my DSL working (ten to one they flip when they see a Mac and try to blame the OS). I'll get back to dealing with email and everything after lunch, I hope.
