Debating At Cambridge

It’s been a while since I last wrote something here. Whenever I tried in the past week, I kept realizing that what I wrote would be essentially the same each time – a frazzled lament at my rapidly approaching essay deadlines, reluctance to go to the Cambridge debating tournament this weekend, and generally bad time management, all of which reinforce each other to create a self-perpetuating cycle of self-aggrandizement.

Which, if committed to this electronic page day after day on end, would be rather boring after a while, as well as unrepresentative of what I actually do with my life. More importantly, it would mean that I’d be spending time whining instead of actually correcting the source of my problems.

But! Today I feel good. I do have to get a start on the two essays on criminal law that were due on Friday (ulp), as well as the one on European Community law that’s due this Thursday (zzz), but I’ve had 12 hours of sleep, some good coffee (Aroma, Tottenham Court Road), and right now, all that doesn’t seem too depressing. (Note to self: this will change, Michelle. You’ll read this and weep a few days from now…)

The predominant reason as to why I feel good is the Cambridge IV, which I got back from last night. We came in 15th out of 72 teams, which is pretty good considering it’s a high-quality tournament and we hadn’t prepared at all. I also came in 15th in the individual speakers rankings. I guess I’m just really glad things went right for us for once – a few weeks ago, at the College of Law IV we were languishing near the bottom of both team and speaker rankings, despite speaking no worse than we did at Cambridge. In fact, I think I spoke better there than at Cambridge, which really calls judging standards into question, given that judges at the College of Law seemed to hate my speeches and judges at Cambridge seemed to like them.

The social side of things was markedly better as well. Being good friends with a number of the Cambridge debaters organizing the tournament came in useful in various ways, and the fact that they were all a)nice and b)pretty damn competent added to it. Having not had a proper conversation with Aaron for far too long, it was nice to finally get the chance to spend some time with him. Side note: I must be one of the most comfortably accomodated crashers ever. I’ve never had to sleep on the floor at away tournaments, thanks to lovely people like Aaron (Oxford) and Vikram (Cambridge) who give up their beds. I wish I’d seen Dennis giving his “Most Camp Speech Ever” performance in the semi-finals, but his rendition of it later was amusement enough. I’m going to be thinking about that and laughing for weeks, which isn’t necessarily a good thing, considering that this laughter often comes while walking alone along the street, or during a tutorial.

So. I’m VERY glad I went to Cambridge. I’m not stressed about the undone work. Tonight, I’ll put on some Pavement (I’m in the mood for Terror Twilight), and get a start on everything.

I am a happy person.