The Worst Post Ever. (Seriously, your eyes will bleed.)

Hello movers and shakers. This is probably going to be a short, horrible post because this is the week before midterms (which are on Monday and Tuesday of next week) and all of my professors seem to be in competition with each other to win the contest of  "Who can give the most work to Nicole?". Prepare for poorly written thoughts and descriptions about the week.

I suppose this post will mainly focus on my adventures to Harvard for the debate tournament I went to. I actually debated this past weekend instead of judging rounds, and it was interesting.

Last year, my first tournament was Harvard. So coming back to the college with a year of experience under my belt was quite comforting. But who am I kidding (it's a rhetorical question but the answer is "no one"), I was still quite scared of debating still. The awesome (sarcasm) thing about debate tournaments is that in your first round, you could hit one of the best teams in the nation if you're unlucky. So there's always this deep fear residing in the belly of my being whenever I'm about to learn whom I'll be debating against.

My partner this weekend was Alex, whom I've debated with before at Bates during our novice tournament. It was overall a fun experience, and I did pretty average. It doesn't really matter, because I enjoyed myself. Sammy, a recent Bates graduate who was on debate last year, hung out with us during the tournament, and that was nice. (Jesus CHRIST this post is boring, but I have no time to add humor or nuance, sorry). But I've definitely improved from last year, which is quite a nice thing to know. However, I  have no interest in speaking about my debate rounds. Rather, I would like to talk about the case American University ran against Taylor and Matt in quarter-finals. Are you ready for the motion AU ran as Gov? I cannot remember the exact case statement but it was pretty much:

"This house would disband/ban the sex offender registry".

Yep.

They wanted the public to stop knowing who in this world sexually assaulted, raped, molested etc. innocent human beings. Theie defense? That some sex offenders were just people who exposed themselves or urinated in public, and sex offenders shouldn't be punished for life by being on this list. Because it's unfair.

Taylor and Matt counter-cased (which is pretty much debate speak for: We don't want to argue the status quo because that's stupid, so we're going to create a mutually exclusive case that makes our idea better than yours).
The counter case was that small offenses like indecent exposure and public urination would not show up on the sex offender registry (because they would not be treated as crimes equal to rape etc) and that after 5 years, if they go through rehabilitation, the sex offenders can be taken of the list (unless they repeat the crime, in which they go back on).
AU's response?
"But that's not good enough. The repeat offenders should just be put away in jail forever." But wait, wasn't Gov just arguing that punishment for life was bad? Hmmm. Another one of their points was pretty much summed up in a POI ( which is a Point of Information: where the other team  (Opp in this case) asks the current person debating (A member of Gov- AU) something about what that current debater is saying) by Taylor as "So you think that people rape kids because they're bored?". There were a lot of both hilarious and down-right upsetting things said in the round, but I'm done describing the slaughtering that was quarter-finals.
Needless to say, Taylor and Matt won on a 5-0 decision.

Taylor and Matt made it to semi-final rounds but lost to a Yale team. Understand that this is a huge feat. Especially because Taylor and Matt are Sophomores. Usually debaters go through a "Sophomore Slump" and never break. Not Taylor and Matt. THEY RULE THIS CITY. Or whatever. They're doing quite well.

On Saturday, before we left for Bates, the debate team got Mexican food (again. We had it the night before at midnight in the middle of Harvard Square). Matt and I also got some Ben and Jerry's ice cream. It was glorious. My flavor choice? "Coffee buzz buzz buzz".

Then blah blah blah, homework, blah blah blah, Chinese tests, blah blah blah got a lot of assignments and essays. This is the week of A minuses. It's the worst. JUST GIVE ME AN A. Yes, I am complaining about A minuses. No, I have not changed at all.

Life is boring and jam-packed with work right now, but my light at the end of the tunnel is October Break. On my white board, I just have each day written down with a box next to it. And at the end of every day I get to check the box off to show that I AM GETTING CLOSER AND CLOSER TO FREEDOM.

Blaaaaaaaargh. I need to go get dinner. And  then do lots of work. Okay. Sorry for the worst post ever.

Your friend (or whatever, I don't want to impose labels on our relationship),

Nicole