Illinois Open at U of I, 11.9.02

Results: In Rod We Trust (Northwestern A)
(Colby Burnett, Robert Flaxman, Mike Henninger, Andrew Reinbold)

    I'm not sure what exactly is supposed to distinguish mACF from ACF, but all I know is I barely do better in the former.  In one ACF tournament, I went for a scant 11.92 ppg.  Combined with 17.5 at last year's Elvis and now this one, in which I was lucky to hit 20, it's pretty obvious that hardcore academia is not my forte.  At least the team did pretty well, finishing 4-4 for what I believe was fifth out of nine teams, i.e. the exact middle of the pack.  Might've been better - could've been worse.  I'll take that, particularly considering we didn't have Jan who's really our one good ACF player (sometimes).
    Favorite Tossup: That would probably have to be David Puddy.   I didn't get it as quick as our B team, but then again I'm not as immersed in Seinfeld as Andy, who got it.  On the academic side, I'll go with Enemy of the People (because I had it quite early considering).
    Favorite Bonus: The one about Muslim advances into Europe is the only one I wrote down.  We actually only 20d it because I couldn't for the life of me remember Roncevalles, but Tours was simple and then I pulled Rahman (the leader of the Muslim forces) out of nowhere - i.e. out of the "Famous Battles" Childcraft book I read as a kid.  Nothing cracks me up more than being able to draw knowledge out of things I haven't read in ten years.
    Worst Neg: Amazingly enough, there weren't any.   No negs to speak of.  It's the first time (at least since I began tracking) that I actually went without.  Closest previous were one at 2002 NAQT Sectionals and at last year's Illinois Novice.   Of course, having no negs means I was sitting on stuff constantly.  Which reminds me.
    Holy Fucking Shit: In Rounds One, Two, and Eight, I managed to go without points, which should tell you how close to ACF this "m"ACF was.  After all, the only other tournament at which I'd ever gone without in more than one round (again, at least since I began tracking) was 2001 ACF Fall.  I also had a 0 and a one-buzz -5 at Elvis.
    Rally Monkey: Down 85-20 going into the ninth tossup in our match against Iowa State B and not playing all that well, we ended up hitting tossups 11 (Mike - PCR), 12 (me - Barr bodies), 14 (Colby - Hanuman), 15 (Colby - Job), 16 (Drew - The Rite of Spring), 17 (Colby - La Primavera), 18 (me - David Puddy), and 20 (me - Snake River) to end up winning 205-90 - in other words, we outscored them 185-5 over the last twelve tossups.  In fact, they negged on the eighth tossup, so we really outscored them 185-0 over the last thirteen tossups.
    I Remembered One Thing from AP Biology: One of the tossups that started our big rally against ISU B, as you see above, was Barr bodies.   After the ISU guy negged with just "extra X chromosome," we all kind of sat there until I was like "Hmm... this could be it" and just went in.  Money.
    So, I'm a Vulture: I interrupted on catcher in Round Eight even though Subash had already negged early with punter.  Sue me.  1) There was absolutely no way I was wrong.  2) The question was just droning on by that point.  3) I had been sucking it recently and needed a tossup to get back into rhythm.  Plus I wanted to beat Drew to it.
    Calls It: This actually happened a few times over the weekend, but none quite as weirdly as this: Drew apparently is reading Elizabeth Bishop poems for a class.  Before one round - I think Round Five - he asked me, "Are you ready for the Elizabeth Bishop question?"  The first bonus - which of course we did not get - was on Elizabeth Bishop.  Freaky.
    Non-Packet Mangling: You want to talk amazing, how about this.  In 20 tossups, 19 of the answers were ours and only three had been significantly edited.  Of the 17 bonuses that were read in our room, all were ours and only two had been edited - and then the only changes were making Colby's African leaders bonus three parts by throwing Kenyatta on the end and removing the "Britney Spears" part of Mike's semiconductor bonus (don't ask).  Also, of the 17 bonuses read, fully seven were mine, and something like five of the first six.  They yanked my PTI tossup, which was annoying, but then again I guess it was kind of easy.

Round Results

Round One: Indiana 355, Northwestern A 105
Round Two: Kentucky 525, Northwestern A 80
Round Three: Northwestern A 220, Loyola 20
Round Four: Northwestern A 280, Northwestern B 110
Round Five: Northwestern A 160, Grinnell 35
Round Six: BYE
Round Seven: Iowa State A 170, Northwestern A 105
Round Eight: Chicago 395, Northwestern A 175
Round Nine: Northwestern A 205, Iowa State B 90

Overall: 4-4; 5th place (out of nine)

Personal Stats: Questions Answered

   No one's asking you to care about it.  Powers would be in bold if they were used; neg-5s would be in italics with the real answer following, except I didn't have any.  Anything in plain text was just ten.

Round One
Nothing.  Sat on several things, though.

Round Two
Ditto.

Round Three
Ostrogoths
Arctic Ocean
Paris
Thomas Mallory
Jason Isringhausen
Kidney

Round Four
Portrait of a Lady

Round Five
Tagus River
Charles Gounod
An Enemy of the People

Round Seven
This round was just rough.

Round Eight
Catcher
Anaconda

Round Nine
Sula
Barr bodies
David Puddy
Snake River

PPG: 20.0