Tournament

Whooee. That was exhausting. I only got third place, though. The sad thing was that only 13 people showed up, although 15 were pre-registered and 2 people showed up without pre-registering. Without fifteen people, the tournament was E1, meaning you could get an E if you were first place, although most people were already D's and E's. Imagine signing up online and not showing up. Lame. Oh yeah, and my body cord spontaneously combusted. It was ripped to pieces. It was so unfortunate. It is probably irreparable. I have no idea how to break it to Mom since this is the first tournament it was used in. (My last body cord was ruptured at the last tournament. These things are so short-lived.)

Homeschool Convention

This morning I was up at 6:00. Mom had signed up to help set up the Annual Used Book Sale of All Homeschoolerness. (Disclaimer: Not actual name) It seems that whenever something homeschooly needs to be organized, Mom is there. And usually there are two or three strong young sons of hers that were somehow roped into helping too. David and I went to help this morning. It wasn't too hard. All we did was tape of some aisles and set up tables. It was kind of like setting up for fencing except exponentially larger. Speaking of fencers, we saw at least five fencing families there. I guess we were filling in as the makeshift security. In addition, we saw Heather's old car that has the bumper sticker "This car is protected by a woman with a sword" still on it. I hope that family bumps into the Colemans' table where Joseph was advertising our fencing group. More members!

Music Camp

Our kids are attending another church's VBS this week. We've all been doing it for years. Every year Covenant Pres puts on a bible musical and the McPhersons join for the ride (despite obvious lack of musical abilities.) I think this year is the story of Gideon, but don't quote me on that. I'm going to find out at the end of the week when I go cheer them on in their little performance. You see? Shakespeare camp isn't the only camp insane enough to put on a play with only one week of practice!

Coincidence: Music Camp was where I first met Josh Grace, when he played Shadrach and I played Abednego. I saw him just last night at fencing. I was going to ask whether his sisters were going to be in it, but didn't find a chance.

Bimodals

There are very few things that I remember from classes I've taken. One of them is the Bimodal, which I learned about in Statistics. We were learning about different types of curves and situations in which you would see them. The bimodal is the curve that defines the grade distribution in classrooms. What happens is that there are two normal curves right next to each other, one centered over D's and one centered over B's. Dr. Edwards said this is because there are two types of people: Those who try and those who don't. If everyone tried there would be a normal curve, but since there are two types of people there are two normal curves overlapping each other.

Anyway, I have seen two bimodal curves in fencing. First, the percentage of matches that the fencer wins and second the number of matches that the fencer has fought.

The first one starts out as a very drastic bimodal. Everyone either wins their first one or loses their first one. Everyone is either 100% or 0%. Obviously since for every winner there is a loser, there would be a bimodal. Interestingly, the curve become more and more normal as time progresses as people with good first days start having bad days and people with bad first days start having good days.

The second one starts out normal. Everyone fences pretty much the same number the first day. Everyone fights about 1-4 matches. However as time passes it becomes clear the people who fight four the first day will fight four for the rest of the season and people who fight one will only fight one a day for the rest of the season. Therefore in a matter of weeks there is a huge discrepancy in the number of matches and we have our bimodal: People who fence a lot and people who fence a little.

Programming Error

Alright, most people who read this won't understand how this works, but I'll try my best to explain it. This all began last week when Jared asked me to fence him without it going on to the record. I realized that the reason for this was that he thought that last semester he wasn't promoted because his battles against Green knights hurt his score. To remedy this, I modified it so that matches against knights of two more or less than you wouldn't contribute to your scores. It changed from

If Wcolor > LColor then increase Winner's wins against lowers
If Wcolor < LColor then increase Winner's wins against highers

to

If Wcolo = LColor+1 then increase Winner's wins against lowers
If Wcolor = LColor-1 then increase Winner's wins against highers

All of a sudden there were some random matches that weren't recorded. I was stunned. What could be happening? When I went back to look at the code, I saw it instantly. If you didn't see it, you can look at it above. The variable "Wcolo" does not exist. Therefore if the winner's color was higher than the loser's color, the match wasn't recorded. I went ahead and put them in by hand since they were all recorded in the "Today's Matches" section. And of course I fixed the error.

Electric Foil

I don't understand the appeal of electric foil. It costs too much and breaks too quickly. That would probably be my fault, but speaking logically, shouldn't swords be constructed to hit people? Sheesh. I was alerted to an electric tournament on Saturday so I took out my neglected, but still pristine electric foil from its ancient sheath of pipe. (cue the Lord of the Rings choir. Laaaaaaaa! OK. Cut the Lord of the Rings choir.) Since I have no idea whether it still works, I gave it to Joseph so he could test it when the Chattanooga Fencing Club. (I use the future tense, but technically at this time it's in the past. Wow!) I still haven't heard back about the condition of my sword. Anyways, if it is working, I fully intend to go whoop Baylor. Oh yeah!

Bested

Well, this might come as a surprise to some of you, but my ranking system is better than Fiore Dei Liberi's. Ho ho! Well, I guess I've proved how completely awesome I am in a poll that was only taken by five people, one of whom was myself and the other four were friends of mine. It looks like I am totally terrific. I think I should think up more polls like this, just to boost the ole ego some. (Not that it really needs it, though.)

Flos Duellatorum

Just for fun, I've been doing research on the crest-a-ma-bob that Heather brought into fencing yesterday. In case you didn't hear or weren't there, Heather dug up an ancient crest (turns out to be from the third oldest martial arts manuscript surviving) and showed it to us. There was a guy divided into seven sections, representing the seven guard positions, and in four sections there were animals: The lynx at the head, the tiger at the sword arm, the lion at the left arm, and the elephant at the feet. As Heather described it, the elephant was strength, the tiger was attack, the lion was defense, and the lynx was cleverness. Before you go any farther, I'll just say which people associated with which animals to give you a general idea of who associated with which characteristic:

Lynxes: Duncan, David, Matthew, Dylan, Kathryn, Grace, and Annie.
Elephants: Luke, Elliot, Aaron, Jacob, Michael
Tigers: Joseph, Connor, Oscar
Lions: Alex, William, Jared, Chris, Andrew V., Phillip

Just as an aside, the Lynxes won the huge battle. He he. Superior planning has always overcome superior force. (Yeah, I thought the Elephants were going to whoop up on everyone too, especially when they made an alliance with the Tigers.)

Oh yeah, now it is time to define what they really mean. I've read up on it and they are most literally fortitude, celerity, audacity, and prudence. Yeah, the lynx is "prudence." Sounds pretty lame right. Since it was translated from latin, I just counted it as a poor translation and changed it to "wisdom" or "intelligence." Oh yeah, as it turns out each animal has a motto that allows you to see exactly what sentiment they are representing:

Lynx: No other creature is able to see so clearly as me, the lynx, and by this I always reckon by compass and by measure
Tiger: I am the tiger. I am very quick to turn and run, that the arrow in the sky can never approach me.
Lion: None bears a more ardent heart than me, and I challenge anyone to battle.
Elephant: I am the Elephant and I have a castle for a burden. Never do I kneel down or lose my true place.

Just saying, the tiger has the wimpiest motto of all time. "I am very quick to turn and run"? Good luck selling that one to a fencer with an ounce of guts. The Lynx also doesn't seem incredibly manly to me. I suppose that's why our team was full of girls.

By the way, a long time ago I wrote a system of organizing fencers that is frightening similar to this and I've tried to apply the animals. Last summer David and I had a long talk about it and here's pretty much how it works: There are four types of fencers, Cunning, Aggressive, Defensive, and Direct. A cunning fencer is creative and uses disengages to defeat his opponent. He's like a baseball pitcher who uses nothing but breaking balls. An aggressive fencer attacks first and attacks repeatedly. A defensive fencer waits for his opponent's attack, parries, and then takes his attack. A direct fencer waits for an opening, and then attacks. I'd say if I apply the animals, Lynx would be cunning, Tiger would be aggressive, Lion would be defensive, and Elephant would be Direct.

Anyways, here's a summary:
Fiore Dei Liberi:
Lynx - A fencer with prudence, characterized by good point control and distance measurement
Tiger - A fencer with speed, characterized by keeping his distance and then moving in and out quickly after his attack
Lion - A fencer with courage, characterized by moving forward and relying on his bladework to defeat his opponent
Elephant - A fencer with endurance, characterized by good footwork and not wasting his energy

Heather:
Lynx - A fencer with intelligence, characterized by using disengages to defeat his opponent
Tiger - A fencer with ferocity, characterized by fast bladework
Lion - A fencer with skill, characterized by moving forward and relying on his bladework to defeat his opponent
Elephant - A fencer with strength, who attacks and doesn't need to fear his line of attack being broken. (As one author described using a pistol grip, he uses a hammer to do the work of a screwdriver.)

Duncan:
Lynx - A fencer with cunning, characterized by using disengages to defeat his opponent
Tiger - A fencer with ferocity, characterized by moving forward and attacking his opponent quickly and repeatedly
Lion - A fencer with patience, characterized by using a parry to open up a spot for attack
Elephant - A fencer with balance, characterized by using point control and footwork to exploit openings.

By the way, I'll put up a poll, just to see which one everyone likes best. If you stopped reading by the third paragraph because it was too much analysis, you don't need to vote.

Oh no! How can I continue to live!?

Tragedy has struck! The fencing tournament I was going to on Saturday was... cancelled! AGH! I can't believe it! I've been looking forward to it since last semester! I am broken-hearted! I am crestfallen! This is the worst news I've received since I found that all my Monday classes were cancelled for snow! Now how am I supposed to turn in my "Interview!?" Gaaah! The only comfort now is the tournament on Wednesday. If that gets cancelled, I'll be really upset.

Fencing Rules

For the tournament next week I'm planning to compile some standards to go by for right of way and stuff like that. That way if conflicts arise, we'll settle them quickly. Unfortunately, standards just tend to make people feel bitter after they finish their match and find in such and such a rulebook section 5 that such and such does not establish right of way after all. I mean, after you've lost, you've lost. What good is it to find out whether you should have won!? Blagh.

Anyway, between that and trying to find 15 sources for my paper due next week (current # of sources: 0), I'm so bushed. It is exhausting.

Groundhog Day

I actually have so many commitments on Feb 2. that I have e-mailed all of them to myself. I have the Banner test, Fencing, Lacrosse (I wanted to swing by and see what was up and since they sent out a UTC memo pleading for members, I figured it was now or never.), and a possible Pro-life club meeting (It looks like it will fall through, but I decided to remind myself anyway.) Also, Groundhog Day could be the day of my first test if my Physics Teacher decides to move the test back because of the snow day at the beginning of the year. Sigh. Looks like it is going to be a long winter.

Scottish Tournament

Yay! Tournament on Wednesday! Starts at 2:00 instead of 3:00! Just in case any of you were about to show up an hour late to our tournament! Hooray! I don't know why, but Heather is calling it the Scottish Tournament. I mean, if she doesn't want to get teased mercilessly about her new hubby, why suddenly transform into a Scottish stereotype? She lives and breathes Scotland now! And she's still in America! Aagh! Anyway, show up to the tournament. It is one hour earlier than usual so don't show up on time because if you do, you will be late.

The Excel spreadsheet I created for the purpose of digitally recording and calculating scores does not look in the slightest bit Scotland-y. It is all bright colors and rainbows. I think I'm going to change it to Scottish type color schemes, but all Scottish colors are ugly: Forest greens with dark blues with burnt oranges. Yuck. Gag me with a spoon.

Strength

Alright, confession time. I'm no good at fencing. My form is awful, my point control is garbage, my footwork is sloppy, I'm not really fast, my power is low, though I am agressive (which isn't really a strength in all honesty), my reflexes are pretty poor, my disengages are too wide, my feints are too obvious, I never fully extend my arm, not to mention how often I pull it back, my back foot always comes up when I lunge, my hand still instinctively covers target area, otherwise I let it hang by my side like a dead animal, I hunch over while I fence, I lean in to my attacks making me totally vulnerable, but not quite as vulnerable I am when I jump, which I do with lots of regularity because I am stupid, I lose my balance when I attack and just barely manage to catch myself, I lose focus as the duel progresses, I am neither gifted nor hard-working, I don't exercise or practice often, in total I only fence an average of two hours a week.

I do have one strength however! Winning. For some inexplicable reason I win a lot. I think the reason is because I don't do what people expect me to do (which pretty much sums up my life.) In short, I don't do the right thing, therefore I win. It's a pretty sweet deal. In actuality, when the rubber hits the road, I don't really care whether I'm a good fencer or not. I only re-started fencing so I could see my friends often and I don't really have any desire to excel competitively. It would eat up my time, my life, and my money, all of which I value more than excelling in competitive fencing. As long as I have enough skill to enjoy it, I'm content.

Phantom Thief Duncan

As we all know, there is no building that Phantom Thief Duncan can't enter when he puts his mind to it. Yesterday, Coach Bart sent an e-mail saying "Fencing has been changed to the ARC." (Aquatic Recreation Center) Unfortunately, the ARC had held an opening ceremony that very evening and closed early. Fortunately, phantom thief Duncan was on the case and after futilely yanking on every door to the outside, found one that was unlocked that led to the boiler room. I wandered all over the ARC and finally concluded that the fencing club was NOT there. (Although they might have been in the pool, since I didn't find those either.)

When I got back from school, I opened my e-mail account and found an e-mail from Coach Bart that said "Sorry about the confusion. Apparently the ARC closed early. Fencing next Tuesday!"

Meaning that I began my life of crime, illegally entering a locked building, for no reason. Sheesh.

Summer of Forgotten Dreams

Today I woke up and realized I hadn't even started revamping Super Program yet. Darn. There were a lot of things I intended to do while I was here, but it seems that all of them have been forgotten. Mostly I've just been running around doing political stuff interspersed with break time wherein I read political books. I also read political magazines and watch political news. I am so politic'ed up! Yet, I haven't done anything that I wanted to do. For some reason, I'm not that upset about it either. I'll just take it on the chin and dedicate some empty day at home to it.

Oh happiness!

Just the other day I got help via phone from Uncle Billy to recover the hard drive of the computer that has strayed from the path of God. It was really complicated and stuff, but it all worked out in the end. I have now recovered a lot of things that I probably didn't need. The most important thing I've recovered, however, is the data for SUPER PROGRAM!!!

This summer he will undergo and alteration... He will become more powerful, less flippant, able to calculate scores within seconds, efficient enough not to exit every ten seconds for lack of memory, with the capacity to sort people into pods based on who they have already fenced and who they need to fence, putting everyone's scores into separate areas so that you can't easily compare them, and it will probably solve World Hunger too. Of course, Don Heath Bar will probably not allow Super Program (Or his new altered improved Uber-ified name) to see the light of day if she has anything to do with it, but hey, what's a super hero without a super villain?

Hot-blooded

I have found that I enjoy direct elimination tournaments more than pod tournaments. Pod tournaments, I see now, are like removing the burning blood from competitive tournaments, which is sort of boring.

Only when you get past the nasty taste of having rigged all the pods against all the little children can you really begin to enjoy the full glory of the direct elimination tournament. When Forrest first saw he was in a pod against Dylan, first he thought it was a joke, then he thought we were insulting him, and then when he found out the truth he felt all bad for having beat Dylan. I agree, it is a cruel aspect of the tournament, but a necessary one. Otherwise, the direct elimination brackets would be all screwy and bizarre. You see, the second best person will be kicked out when he meets the best person, right? So therefore it should be arranged so that the second best person will meet the best person in the final round of the tournament.

Speaking of bizarre and screwy, it was pretty bad today. This was mostly caused because one of our directors flipped the outcome of one of the matches so that Annie beat Matthew instead of the other way around, which was how it actually happened. Therefore, Annie placed in the top 8. Her first match she lost, though, so therefore Dylan, ranked below 8th, advanced to the second round and made the matchings all funny. It also meant that someone better than Dylan who should have been in that spot was kicked out in the first round. SAD FACE!!! :(

Another weird coincedence was that all the aggressive fencers were on one half and all the defensive fencers were on the other half. One half had Elliot, Quinn, Aaron, Alex, Forrest, Etc. The other half had Dylan, Annie, Emerald, David, Etc. Jacob was in with the defensive half and at one point asked me why that was. I just stared at the brackets for a while and said something non-obligatory. Whatever.

The best part that was by the time you got to the final four matches, there were only the four best fencers, who today were Elliot, Jacob, Quinn, and David. The matches were hot-blooded and manly and full of fighting spirit and stuff. Twas epic.

Positive Attitude

I decided to challenge myself and see if I can write only positive things for an entire week. It might get kind of boring to read, but stick with me. You can comment on my posts and tell me whether I'm succeeding or not or you could just tell me at what point you got bored and stopped reading. It might be a little tricky because I have fencing camp all week and there's nothing that negatively affects your attitude quite as much as pain and exhaustion. Still, fencing camp was lots of fun and I regret that so many of my friends couldn't come to it. See, I even have a sad emoticon: :-(

Heather's Petty Hatred of Super Program

Today I made sure to ask whether I would be allowed to use Super Program during fencing today. Heather said she needed to look at it first. Of course, she has already looked at it but she said she hadn't given it the thumbs-up.

O.K. Whatever. So I showed it to her. She glared at the screen for a while and then asked: "So in effect people are climbing higher on the backs of others?" (Exact quote.) I actually prefer to think of it in a more positive way. I told her it wasn't like that at all and that she was just trying to put a negative spin on it.

The next exchange was really weird and stupid so I'll put in a script-type format for full effect:
Heather: Well you know the people look kind of... you know...
Duncan: Hmm. Should I put in a person's crest instead of a representation?
Heather: Ah! I would totally let you use Super Program if you did that!

...

I worked really hard on those pin people. Maybe I'm just not an artist...

Heather then suggested that it look more medieval. If that's all it takes to make her happy, then fine. Although it will mean a lot of work for me. If anyone has any suggestions on how to make Super Program medieval, let me know.

Honor Matches

It finally happened: someone cheated on super program. Two little boys put down two matches that they didn't actually fight. I asked the boys themselves two questions: Did you really fight these and who directed? The answer was predictable: They were "honor matches."

They both claimed to have beaten my younger brother. I had been directing Connor's (my brother) matches and when I went to the computer I saw two matches that I knew Connor hadn't fought. I asked Connor about it and he said he never fought those matches. It's really annoying because I can program all day but I can't make a program that senses lies. It really is dependent on honesty.

I can't think of a tactful way to break it to them that they can't lie. I've never been one for tact. I'm going to have to talk to Heather about this.