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[jactrades]

So, thistlerose tagged me for this meme thing-y.

SIX NAMES YOU GO BY:

1. Jac
2. Jaclyn
3. JC
4. Jactrades
5. Jac-Attack
6. Kaki (father’s younger brother’s wife in Bengali)

THREE THINGS YOU ARE WEARING RIGHT NOW:

1. My $8 nearly-dead off-brand black sneakers from Payless Shoes
2. Tunic-length grey sweater coat
3. Medical ID bracelet-cuff-thing

THREE THINGS YOU WANT VERY BADLY AT THE MOMENT

1. One of the Ghirardelli squares from the Holiday Chocolate Assortment that finally came out – Eggnog, Peppermint Bark, and Pumpkin Spice Caramel.
2. To be done packing.
3. To have time to start writing my space_wrapped fic, instead of just day-dreaming about how much fun it’s going to be to write it.

THREE PEOPLE WHOM YOU HOPE WILL DO THE MEME

1. erynwen
2. creek_chub
3. tresa_cho

THREE THINGS YOU DID LAST NIGHT

1. Finished up a ficlet for maypirate and started brainstorming one for igrockspock. Because, yes, I overthink everything I’m going to write.
2. Read _samalander’s Kirk/McCoy STBB fic, which was fantastically h/c, but also way more than just that.
3. Packed four boxes of kitchen stuff and linens.

THREE PEOPLE YOU LAST TALKED TO ON THE PHONE:

1. My friend Rosh on Skype about life and why boys are stupid and propositional logic and the original definition of the word “decimation”.
2. My husband Abhi on my cell about dinner plans.
3. My coworker Srirama in DC on my office line about why we hate our jobs and oh, yeah, here’s the specs for that run we need to get done yesterday.

THREE THINGS YOU ARE GOING TO DO TOMORROW:

1. Go to the Bacon Bacon Truck with my SF coworkers for a delicious lunch of bacon (and other things).
2. Clean up (part of) the disaster that is currently our frontend database.
3. Science pub crawl in the Mission with a college friend visiting from Germany – there’s a series of lectures about things like earthquake prediction, the science of orgasms, and the future robot-dominated world, plus, you know, beer.

FOUR OF YOUR FAVOURITE DRINKS:

1. Tea – anything from herbal “tea” to single-estate Darjeeling black, it’s all fantastic.
2. Coffee – black, strong, and not the office swill (we get beans from Starbucks)
3. Long Island Iced Teas - *wince* a dangerous favorite
4. The Fall – it’s a seasonal mixed drink from a lounge in Brooklyn, and tastes exactly like you’d expect autumn to taste, if you could drink it. Hard apple cider & hot toddy’s got nothing on this thing.

THREE THINGS THAT MADE YOU SMILE TODAY:

1. maypirate’s keyboard smash.
2. My dog’s ridiculous snores as he sprawled out on the floor while I was getting ready for work.
3. My college debate teammate reminding me of this insane MP3 on my facebook wall. I was close to tears during lunch from holding in the laughter.

Comments

[maypirate.livejournal.com]

Go to the Bacon Bacon Truck with my SF coworkers for a delicious lunch of bacon (and other things).

I WANT THIS TRUCK. BRING THIS TRUCK TO ME.

[jactrades]

Perhaps I can kidnap it and drive it across the country on a bacon adventure.

I almost wrote that we could make bacon cheeseburgers when I arrived, but then I remembered that all the good cheese would be back in California.

[ageofalejandro.livejournal.com]

Another debate nerd? AWESOME. What events?

[jactrades]

Ah, and here's where my shortcut betrays me.

I didn't actually do debate, but instead a similar form of formal argumentation: Ethics Bowl. It's similar to set-topic arguments in parliamentary debate, except that a) it's all applied ethics problems and b) the exact proposition isn't known - you get a set of cases a few months in advance that describe various scenarios but no exact question regarding what moral conflict in the case they're going to ask you to debate on the day of competition. Cases are on everything from from nurses from developing countries leaving for higher wages in developed countries to a Deaf lesbian couple deliberately trying to conceive a deaf child to the County of Sacramento allowing developers to create housing in areas where levee failure is probable in the event of a 100-year flood - i.e. places you can't get flood insurance to all forms of copied text/work that may or may not be considered plagiarism.

We used to prep for about 20 hours a week after we got the cases - one set for regionals, one set for nationals if you go on. Good times - put a bunch of loud philosophy students with OPINIONS in a room together for that many hours along with a few professors who have just as many opinions and a lot of interesting ideas get thrown around. I honestly thought about joining the debate team - we were pretty competitive at the Div III level, but our Ethics Bowl team did better, nationally, and I thought the set-up emphasized more in-depth thought and careful consideration, at least for the subjects I was interested in.

I take it you do debate, though? What events? Any particular debates or opponents that will live fondly in your memories?

[ageofalejandro.livejournal.com]

I wish we'd've had that. I woulda done that in a heart beat, because it sounds pretty awesome. :D

I *used* to. I did it for eight years and the high school and college level, and that was enough for me lol. I competed in LD, parli-LD, parli, public forum/ted turner/controversy/whatever you knew it as, plus impromtu and another event I can't remember the name of.

The best round I ever had was one on whether terrorists should be treated as regular criminals or not, which was about two years ago now. I had written a research essay on the very subject a year before and had all of it - bibliography and all - on my laptop. We ended up on the same side I had written it for, too, which was the best thing EVER. I distinctly remember seeing my opponents' faces start sinking out of the corner of my eye when I rattled off a dozen supreme court cases in our favor and mentioned I had about ten pages of evidence if they wanted to see it. We owned the shit out of them, obvs. :D

[jactrades]

Oh, the pwning memories are always the best. :D We had a few like that, typically when we'd guessed the question perfectly and the person whose case it was had a seven minute opening spiel for that question that hit everything that was pertinent in the case.

Finals at nationals my junior year was like that - I had an argument perfectly prepared for the question they asked - except that'd we'd been knocked out in the round before. :-( But at least the whole team had had a chance to hit the hotel bar before the final round, so it was easier to laugh as both sides floundered on the case.

(The semi-finals case we got knocked out on was on an eminent domain issue, and one of the very liberal competition judges didn't like me quoting a Scalia dissenting opinion on the matter - despite the fact that Scalia was actually trying to protect individuals within a poorer community from some really nasty corporate shenanigans in his arguments. But Scalia is a conservative, and thus apparently can never be right, even when he totally is. Not that I'm bitter or anything.)

[ageofalejandro.livejournal.com]

Very nice!

I know that feeling, too. Same tournament, we got knocked out in quarters, and the semis were another terrorism topic. I was irritated as hell, because that's really interesting stuff.

What the shit! That's that dumbest RFD I think I've ever seen, and I have seen some doozies. And I'd be bitter, too!