Wow. The last time I wrote something was last month. So sorry to my dear readers. To recap; August 1st-7th was my trip California, August 7th-9th I was at cheerleading camp, and August 12th-19th I was at debate camp. It was a pretty awesome month. Today I will type about debate camp. Everything else (California—with pictures!—and cheer camp) will be typed out at a later date. How is that for signposting?

So. Why did I go to debate camp?

Reason # 1: I wanted to. I know nothing about debate but yet, I want to join my debate team. So what, if I have to pay to learn? It was worth it.

Reason # 2: I chose to. It was either debate camp or summer chemistry classes. You choose. Since I'm taking Honors Chem this year anyway, I didn't want to do it over the summer.

Reason # 3: I had to. I signed a "contract" with my parents last year saying that I would join the debate team in my school for 10th grade. Here I am.

Regardless of the reasons why I attended debate camp, I felt that the week was worth it—even if I have next to no time to complete my summer reading. It began Sunday, August 12th, and I arrived late. It was about 2-ish hours away, there was traffic, and we got lost. Finally one of the directors called and was like, "where are you?" When I finally got there, I ate dinner late but I wasn't the last to arrive! That first night we had the first of over 20 lectures that we were going to receive. Then, we had the rest of the night to relax, get to know each other, and play games. I checkmated someone in chess and it was sooo cool. I had taken out all his pieces so it was just his king left on the board. Go me!

That night was also the night I was mauled by a ping pong table. It was actually kind of funny because the next morning the directors made an announcement about how no one was allowed to use the ping pong table anymore. Throughout the week, people said to me "you were the one who was injured? Omg!" Anyway, this is how it went down; two people were sitting on the ping pong table and I was standing next to it; my legs were touching the table. One person got off and then tried to get back on. The weight must have been too heavy for a table that normally supports plastic balls because one side of it collapsed. We put the table back up and then I noticed that it grazed my leg and I was bleeding. Now I've got an interesting-looking scar (two long slashes, side by side. Mederma, anyone?).

Debate camp was very tiring. When the dorm checks are at midnight, doesn't that tell you something? Our schedule went something like this:

Schedule from Monday to Wednesday:
Get up 6-7 AM – depending on whether you're an early bird or not.
Breakfast 7:30-8:30 AM – the breakfast food was awful.
8:45 AM – be in lecture room or else.
9-12 AM – lectures and lab meetings. Sit and take notes, basically.
12:30-1 PM – lunch. The food was hit, miss, or completely inedible.
1:30-5 PM – more lectures and lab meetings. Have your pen ready. I lost, like, two.
5-6 PM – dinner and some dessert, like cookies or odd cake slices.
6-9 PM – you guessed it. More lectures!
9-11 PM – free time/movies/games. Mostly chat with people or play manhunt.
12 PM – dorm checks. Be in your room, lights out by 12; so shower quickly.
Then you get up the next day and do it all over again. Sleep, much?

From Wednesday after dinner to Saturday morning it was mostly research, work, type, and freak out all day long with the odd lecture scattered throughout. We did watch two very fascinating debates between two nationally ranked faculty members... they're going to be seniors in high school this year and they are amazing. Basically it was work from 9 AM to 11 PM (library hours—computers!) with about 6 or 7 hours of sleep. We spent sooo much time sitting in front of a computer trying to write out cases. We were literally falling asleep during lectures. I was nodding off during one lecture in particular and had to shake my self awake.

We had only two days to research and write two cases, one Affirmative and one Negative. Mine ended up being 4 pages long each (though I didn't actually read all of it because some parts were cut out). It's easier said than done. I consider my self a good English student but writing those cases made me feel dumb. Where did all my skills go? Hmmm, probably blown out the window by the useless fan in my dorm room. More on that later. Anyhow, lack of sleep combined with stress, icky food, and the imminent debate rounds, totally fried my brain (and those of many others, no doubt). I had my big freak-out Friday night but managed to finish my cases mere seconds before we had to vacate the library. The faculty was right in saying that all students will manage to finish their cases. Thank goodness for that.

Saturday was the day we all dressed formally, in suits (dress shirt if you didn't have a suit) with nice shoes. My heels gave me blisters (I thought I had broken them in already!) so I changed into my other heels. After lunch we began debating. Each student had a total of five debate rounds at camp (three on Saturday and two on Sunday). We do LD debate (Lincoln-Douglas) and you are assigned either Affirmative or Negative (alternate between rounds). You argue against your opponent and you are given a certain amount of time to speak and cross-examine and the judge evaluates your performance. We didn't debate to win at camp, only to learn. Overall, I thought it went well and plus, we could always laugh about it later. That night we received our last lecture, entitled "Success 101," which gave us advice like always MATCH your clothing because it will distract a judge if you're wearing black shoes with a brown belt.

On Sunday, I wore a dress shirt and skirt with flip-flops... no more heels for the time being. After our two last rounds, it hit us that we were going away and that camp was over. It was quite a sad, emotional thing because I felt like we had really bonded in the 8 days that we were there. It was so final when we packed up... all the suitcases lining the hall... *tear tear* Any of you who are reading this, please keep in touch! Admittedly, I sometimes get too busy to write detailed emails and such but I'd like to think that I am a good person.  Anyway, at the closing ceremony, I was given the "Most Chipper" award because I always had a smile on my face even when I "had cases due the next day"... what can I say? I'm a smiley person!

Anyway, that (all the above) was the technical part of camp. Now for the crazy part; first and foremost, how that heck was I accepted? According to the directors, everyone who was selected to attend the program was smart. We all had to apply and write "excellent" essays. Apparently we were the best of the bunch and the biggest group they've accepted so far; in fact, they had to reject people who applied! Am I really that smart? What an ego boost! Yay! I'm not completely hopeless/stupid! I'd better stop before I go off on a tangent, but the point is, the people here were pretty bright. So why is it that we have no common sense? I'm sure we sound good on paper but honestly, so many deadpan jokes and comments went way over my head. It was pretty funny though and I had a terrific time.

You'd think that at this gathering of bright minds, we'd have better things to do than gossip; say for instance, discuss the SAT's at length in our spare time. While we did do that (I am SO freaked out by college now), we also whispered about the two students supposedly "kicked out," scandalous happenings in the dorm, and of course, myself. Apparently the whole camp was jumping to conclusions about a friend and me. This friend happens to be male. So, what are you thinking right now? Hmmm? Probably something along the lines of this; "omg, are they together?! In that way?" The answer is and always has been no. it seems that because we were great friends from the start of camp, everyone thought we were dating or something. Someone actually asked me "where's your other half? Something didn't happen, did it? Are you still okay with each other?" The whole situation was actually kind of funny, especially when certain persons were completely oblivious.

To clarify about the dorms; we stayed in a dormitory with three floors and a basement (there was a pool table and my finger was smashed by a pool ball. First the ping pong table and now this; debate camp is dangerous!). Common room and faculty dorms were on the first floor, boys on the second, and girls on the third. The first night, we were told that we could not go into rooms of the opposite sex but we were still allowed in the halls. Later that night they changed the rules and said we were not allowed on the floors of the opposite sex. Essentially that meant that the guys could not go above the second floor, but we still stayed in the stairwells so it didn't really make a difference. The girls each had a roommate (two people per dorm) but there were more guys so they had to sometimes be three per room. The dorms had no air conditioning (someone was probably like, "debate camp nerds. They don't need air conditioning") and the fan was kind of useless. The whole dormitory building was a men's dorm. It was awkward for us girls to be using a bathroom labeled "Men." Plus, the showers sucked. My hair suffered last week.

Overall, the campus was nice. Beautiful, in fact. We walked between the buildings to get places and spent time outside when the weather was nice. It would be cold in the morning, warmish before lunch, but hot in the afternoon. Food was really bad. Less than half was edible. Yay for occasional treats like birthday cake, popsicles, and ice cream. There are some crazy pictures of us eating ice cream bars out there.

Want to hear a funny story? I tripped over a rock (it was a big rock in the middle of the landing. Who put it there???) on my way to open the door of the main building (pictured above). One of the faculty asked me to do a reenactment and he got it on tape (he was carrying a video camera around because the camp is doing some sort of documentary so they could get more funding (it's a non-profit organization)).The incredibly sad part is that the clip of me tripping over a rock into the door will probably end up on the documentary with a voiceover that says something like "we even accept students who are exceptionally challenged here at this camp." Ah, good times.

We left on Sunday (yesterday). It was a sad thing. I will definitely miss the people I met there and all the smart-alecky comments about me being short (am I really that short?) and being both a cheerleader and debater (no joke, even a director said "that's an interesting combination"). However, there's a cheerleader on the faculty who cheers in college! Yay for practice. Anyhow, on the drive home, I fell asleep in the car and when we got back, I went to sleep on the sofa. My parents had to wake me up for dinner. I'm still tired, but I had fun. Now for my summer reading...  Please comment!

Wow. You have been busy. Well I guess that explains the debate camp thing, but how did the rounds go? Or do you not know yet? Anyway how do you find writing cases (I being interested as a fellow debater)? It really is ridiculous the stories I have heard from other debate camps. I am amused by your joke at the end. Very subtle. Anyway, hoping your day is smiley and you get on "America's Funniest Debate Videos" :P

GEEZ Angel! Your life is soooo exciting for you to be so young. And you stay PLENTY busy! I think I would have loved to go to debate camp when I was in highschool!

Jesus: The rounds were judged, but only for evaluation and critiques. At the end we were told how we did and how we could improve but there was no "winner" of the round(s). I think cases are hard to write, especially in two days. So, what stories have you heard from these other debate camps? And why are you calling yourself "Jesus"?

Kris: I try my best :) I don't think my life is that exciting but then again, who else trips over a rock and has it caught on tape? I hope I'm not too busy though, because then I wouldn't have the time to type about it!

Well, I guess it really is the "it doesn't matter if you win or lose, it's how you play the game" kind of instances.
*My response to that is, "if it doesn't matter, why do we keep score?"*
Anyway, case writing will get easier as you make more and different ways of fighting a resolution. Me I was terrible at writing cases, please do not ask Jay for the story of my first debate, just take my word for it. Anyway, I am still terrible, so bad example. Do you know about the "Happy Entropy Day" prank at one of the debates? Email me for details.

So I'm assuming that you did not meet with a certain stalker...too bad. I was hoping for something interesting to happen. Anyway, I had some interesting speech camp experiences at GMU - did I tell you I was going to go to camp there? Probably not since I didn't really decide until after school ended. Anyway, it was fun. So was India. And this has no relation to the post, so I'll email you. See ya!

Yea you pretty much covered everything (that was a LONG entry). it really was an amazing week, lots of good times in the little cube thing, just a few words to add...potato wedges and fizzy hair, oh and Jesus/Gandhi/Juliet II is a dangerous person.:)

Who is Jesus/Ghandi/Juliet II? One person? Many? Different aliases? Truly, I am intrigued.

Ghandi/Jesus/Juliet II is one amazing person. If you're readng this, I hope you feel special as you wander around waving your "jesus-light" glowstick.