The Quizbowl Resource Center

The Stately Rhododendron

My old QB coach and MD alum Casey Reterer told me a story of once leaving THE JUDGE in a classroom overnight and coming back to discover that the university had called the bomb squad, which drilled a hole clean through it.

The Stately Rhododendron

Go for runs (or the gym) during the lunch break! There's a small park in Rosemont that's got a nice little path.

The Stately Rhododendron

Without a doubt, the single best way to get points in "Current Events" is to do some deep dives into political histories of most countries. This is something that Wikipedia can do yes, but you are going to have to ask yourself if that's the way you learn things. I am a partisan of working class stru...

The Stately Rhododendron

I'll also add that we have always provided lunch at every tournament we have hosted - even taco bars - so if you are going to complain about prizes please consider folks who provide lunch too - this is often a major cost that I rarely see when I travel to other tournaments. I can't speak for anybod...

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Wish I could have played the whole tournament, but was cutting down forsythia in Inwood.
Reel Knowledge was a lot of fun - much respect to the hosts - they kept it moving quite quickly for a side event.

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Can I suggest censoring the names of the location of this event? Just for extra security...

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Would anyone - Jews/gentiles alike - want to do havdallah Saturday night at HSNCT???

The Stately Rhododendron

I think the "play-along" aspect of Finals is something that a) is fun and participatory from afar and b) has been very hard to capture outside of a live setting. I'm talkin' bout when the whole audience is whispering to each other before, after, and during the buzzes. ("would you have gotten that???...

The Stately Rhododendron

physical activity such as push-ups, core exercises, and runs during lunch break will do you just fine.

The Stately Rhododendron

I signed up to moderate, is there some kind of confirmation that y'all got it?

User was reminded to create a signature in compliance with board rules

The Stately Rhododendron

One thing I might recommend is always trying to be what I'll call "intellectually curious." If you've got a few minutes, read some online articles on topics you don't know much about (or even just Wikipedia summaries). My analogy for this is the "doctor's office"--whenever I end up at a doctor's of...

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Where's the ethnography?

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The Dunkin Donuts Cambridge Open sponsored by Store 24 and presented by Feral Isaac

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I'm working in the White Mountains this summer, so I should be able to come down (perhaps with my better half as well

).

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Finally, justice.

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I do think that it overranks Isaac (sorry Isaac) for his NAQT ability, at the expense of players like Kenji and Caleb who are much stronger ACF players (remember, ACF is the dominant format, even if ICT is one of the two nationals). It does not overrank me, if anything it underranks me. I'm probabl...

The Stately Rhododendron

Kenji is really, really good, and probably the only active player who had my number at NAQT.

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Is this how Dees thinks quizbowl games end?

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In Satantango, Irimias is waiting, not Irimia.

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To get real, I think I have gotten much better at neg control, so perhaps I won't repeat some of my more bizarre statlines..

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How "difficulty" works in quizbowl is very different from how it is supposed to work. I think people think of difficulty like a pyramid - where as difficulty goes up, questions are gettable by less and less of those playing. How that works in practice is that the difficulty of questions is measured ...

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I think a Spring tournament that tries to have a more "NAQT" distro should be a regular part of the schedule (I'm thinking of that one that Will did a few years ago and FICHTE [but don't be like FICHTE]).

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vinteuil wrote:
Muriel Axon wrote:Paul Kirk-Davidoff is quite good, though it seems like his specialties are things like African and Middle Eastern film, which don't come up too often.
"Shockingly," Isaac is also excellent at many similar areas of film, as well as more generally.

Paul's better! Paul's very good.

The Stately Rhododendron

"Empirical econ"? Jacob, Das Kapital gets tossed up all the time!

The Stately Rhododendron

For the Physical Impossibility etc TU, halfway through it was clear it was what it was referring to, but I stayed away from buzzing because I wasn't sure if I remembered the name of the piece completely correctly and just got negged out of buzzing entirely. Maybe if there was a "description accepta...

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Everyone's hands are bloody - there's no corporation out there that won't have some tie to death, decay, etc. that's how accumulation works these days..

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Anonymous voices agree! with! Charlie!

!

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The beard thing is real, though. I'm not gonna go on and say trimming it is easy or whatever - it takes some practice and skill before you start to get what you want. But it makes your beard look much much better. I used to keep it long to get that "woodsy" look in the summers, but I've realized tha...

The Stately Rhododendron

Matt Weiner was right! The quizbowl leftist - Russia alliance is real!

The Stately Rhododendron

I was looking at qbwiki last night and came across the story of Nathan Freeburg.
High neg rate, MW thinks he's a "bad player," strange way of dressing, Ashkenazi, real knowledge, somewhat itinerant, tastemaker in alcoholic beverages
Are we long lost siblings?

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Thanks to electronic scoresheets regs is still in prelims at 430! Thanks technology!

- quizbowl's pre-eminent anti-revisionary luddite

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John, I really enjoyed this post. From the brief conversations we've had at various tournaments, I know this is something you have been thinking about for a while. Your points about the Religion/Myth line are well put, and very relevant. It's a shame that this thread seems to mostly be classic forum...

The Stately Rhododendron

Our target difficulty is similar to recent incarnations. We encourage teams to submit quality and adventurous questions: Chicago Open is the ground to ask about difficult and interesting topics, but it is not the place to fill your packets with 13-line tossups and/or insanely hard topics that punis...

The Stately Rhododendron

I didn't read the set and didn't play, so I'm coming at this from a position of ignorance (like usual). That being said, I think Ike's audio file was lovely. I haven't always enjoyed Ike's questions, or hard questions in general, but I think Ike explained his decisions in a beautiful way and I hope ...

The Stately Rhododendron

I think the Book of Isaiah TU could be better by switching the placement of some of the clues. The clues about Chapter 53 ("man of sorrows", "pierced for our transgression", etc.) may arguably be easier than the clues about Servant Songs and "spears into pruning hooks and their swords into plowshar...

The Stately Rhododendron

I'd personally prefer There Will Be Stock Clues over playing both Super ACRONYM and Tricon, for the following reasons: 1) It is decidedly a novelty event. Full-distribution trash tournaments happen every year, but I don't think there's been a food tournament before 2) It's tossups-only, so we shoul...

The Stately Rhododendron

Will, I think you messed up your search for citations somehow for Death Without Weeping . Scheper-Hughes is probably the second-most famous Medical Anthropologist out there behind Farmer and Death w/o Weeping is very important. When I looked it up on Google Scholar it had 3451! citations. But yeah, ...

The Stately Rhododendron

Great tournament! Loads of fun! Congrats to Maryland.

For Field Commander Kirk-Davidoff and the whole YSAC family, thank you! The Cracker Barrel is now closed.

The Stately Rhododendron

Had a cold, cold Greek beer with several Chicago and Yale people. Called "Alfa." David Allan Coe said Jack Daniels was "The only friend that's never done me wrong," but I'll throw Alfa in there too. Learned about Georgian food, too, an the philosophical origins of Swamp Thing, thanks to Chicago. Had...

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heterodyne wrote:yale student adopts rural patois as schtick, is Cool and Good, more at 11

My schlemihlhood is the only shtick known in my suburban patois.

The Stately Rhododendron

Your post was insufficiently cracker barrel-y. Weeeel, I've got a day to do you one. Had that chemically induced glee last night, made a sponge for some sourdough challah. King sleep had me in his court though, so I woke up beyond breakfast. Rush to the garden, boss man has me weeding all through l...

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Hang down your head Tom Dooley it is not time for this thread to die! Having "celebrated" and been "celebrated," hosting a Seder, a socialist meeting, eating my sauerkraut, life goes on. I have a "nosegay" in my shirt pocket right now and I'm smelling like success. Questions questions questions! I h...

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Whoever wrote the TU on the left hand did a great job.

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Y'all are talking about numbers and all that. Maybe around an "e-barrel 2.0" but around the cracker barrel the only number that matters is tha number of eyes and ears you have. I've got a hangering for qualitative reports and home fried wit, and my throat is parched!

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Played like mud in the prelims played like gold in the playoffs but it wasn't enough. Disappointment I tell Andrew Hart he's a man of many talents. He sez he's good at throwing things. That's a talent for sure. Michigan vs northwestern. Looks like a FUN final. Dan Puma sez I "Look like I'm following...

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First half was a little rough, I think. Could have done better, but I've learned not to focus on the could have. Went for a run in the scrubby bush around here. Went into a burned over field. Full focus. Back on it. Me and Rob had a talk. We're DSA comrades, don't take his attacks on my posing too s...

The Stately Rhododendron

But what's this? A premature banana! "Yeah, my banana timing is off," he admits.

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Bananas are intermediate sugars, sez Adam. Adam has 2 bananas, one for 930, one for 11, he says.

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