Terrapin Invitational Tournament Mirror at Guelph (11/21/09)

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Sat Sep 05, 2009 11:05 pm

The University of Guelph is pleased to announce that we will be hosting a mirror of the University of Maryland's Terrapin Invitational Tournament (TIT) on November 21, 2009.

Location
The tournament will take place in the MacKinnon Building at the University of Guelph campus in Guelph, ON. A map of Guelph and its surroundings, with the campus marked, can be found on Google Maps here, a map of the campus can be found on the university website here (MacKinnon is denoted "MACK"), and information and photos of MacKinnon can be found here. We ask that all teams arrive at 9:00am in lecture hall 117, which is the ground floor if entering from the north side of the building, or the second floor if entering from the west or south sides of the building.

Questions
This is a packet submission tournament of regular difficulty, head edited by Chris Ray, with assistance from Mike Sorice, Jeremy Eaton, SteveJon Guth, Jeff Amoros and Rebecca Fischer. Teams attending this mirror are not required to write a packet, but certainly may and are encouraged to do so for discounts outlined below. If you are interested in writing a packet, please refer to the packet submission information outlined in this post. Participating teams are encouraged to refer to last year's edition of the Terrapin Invitational Tournament for difficulty, which can be found here on Christian Carter's packet archive.

Side Events
We will be hosting RMP Fest II, a Religion, Mythology and Philosophy doubles tournament, after the completion of the main event, with a probable break between the two for dinner. Cost is $5 per Division II player and $10 per Division I player.

Field
Section will be updated as information is available. There is a tentative cap of 28 teams.

Ottawa (1)
Western Ontario (1)
Toronto (2)
Waterloo (2)
McMaster (3)
Guelph (dependent on staffing requirements/field size)

Expressed Interest

Rochester

Eligibility
This is an open event, meaning teams composed of any players, regardless of school affiliation, may participate in this tournament. Teams of high school students certainly may participate in this tournament, for significant discounts, and are urged to do so if they are interested in participating in a well-written tournament of this difficulty level.

Teams traveling from the United States
For American teams who would like to attend a delayed mirror and/or are interested in competing in Canada, information on traveling across the border can be found here. According to the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, every traveler must have a compliant document for entry into Canada and re-entry into the United States. Although "compliant" is not exclusively limited to passports, the other options are limited, so a passport is your best bet. More information can be found in the posts below. We can offer plenty of floor and couch space, so if you decide to stay in Guelph but would rather stay for free, be sure to let us know and we would be happy to fit you in somewhere. For hotel accommodation, there is a Delta hotel beside the campus (link here), as we as a Best Western, and a list of all Guelph hotels can be found here. Regarding driving distance, Google Maps tells us that Guelph is:

(hours:minutes)
9:06 from Washington
9:00 from Boston
7:39 from Chicago
5:17 from Pittsburgh
4:57 from Cleveland
3:24 from Detroit
3:00 from Rochester

Pricing:
$100: Base fee
-$50: Packet submitted by Saturday, October 10th
-$25: Packet submitted by Saturday, October 17th
-$20 per team for American schools
-$15 per competent moderator
-$10 per 200 miles traveled
-$5 per working buzzer system with eight lights
-$40 per team of high school students
Minimum fee: $50

If you are a solo team or are a small team paying out of pocket, we are certainly willing to negotiate additional discounts. If you wish to pay by cheque, it may be made out to University of Guelph Quizbowl.

Registration
To register, please contact Chris Greenwood at greenwoc AT uoguelph DOT ca, being sure to include the number of teams and buzzer systems you will be bringing. You know you want to!

If you have any questions, feel free to contact the e-mail address above or post here. Thanks, and we hope to see you in Guelph on November 21st!

adosreme · Post by **adosreme** » Sun Sep 06, 2009 5:34 pm

Waterloo will definitely be interested in competing in this, though I won't be able to say for sure how many teams we would have until late September when we acutally have our first full club meeting (Waterloo's clubs day is later this year than usual and we won't have had a meeting with all the new members until the last week of September).

Also, in terms of side events, what kind of thing do you have in mind? If you are planning to produce it yourself, then I would in all likelihood be willing to help you write questions for it.

MicroEStudent · Post by **MicroEStudent** » Sun Sep 06, 2009 6:24 pm

I'd like to say RIT would bring a team, but I have to verify that no one has finals on that Saturday as that is the end of our quarter.

swwFCqb · Post by **swwFCqb** » Sun Sep 06, 2009 10:16 pm

Case Western is tentatively interested as well. If my driver can go then expect to see one team there.

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Tue Sep 08, 2009 2:52 pm

Camelopardalis wrote:Passports are not yet required for entry into Canada

I have not kept up-to-date on our foreign affairs, but I think that all entries back into the US require a passport or passport equivalent. There were two phases of passport application backlogs: one for the air travel deadline a few years ago; one last spring for the land crossing deadline.

adosreme wrote:Also, in terms of side events, what kind of thing do you have in mind? If you are planning to produce it yourself, then I would in all likelihood be willing to help you write questions for it.

I believe he is referring to side events being produced for various fall tournaments in the US. I, personally, am going to take a pass on anything that extends beyond the usual Saturday timeframe, though: my cramped TA schedule means I'll be bringing assignments to mark with me...

adosreme · Post by **adosreme** » Tue Sep 08, 2009 3:07 pm

bsmith wrote:I believe he is referring to side events being produced for various fall tournaments in the US.

I just checked out some of the ones from previous tournaments and they look fun. I'd probably be in for that.

Post by **DumbJaques** » Tue Sep 08, 2009 3:29 pm

The side events scheduled to run with this tournament at other sites are Walden III, the Social Science/Philosophy set, and RMPfest II (unsurprisingly, all religion, mythology, and philosophy). Both are tossup only.

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Tue Sep 08, 2009 5:41 pm

bsmith wrote:
Camelopardalis wrote:Passports are not yet required for entry into Canada
I have not kept up-to-date on our foreign affairs, but I think that all entries back into the US require a passport or passport equivalent. There were two phases of passport application backlogs: one for the air travel deadline a few years ago; one last spring for the land crossing deadline.

bsmith wrote:
adosreme wrote:Also, in terms of side events, what kind of thing do you have in mind? If you are planning to produce it yourself, then I would in all likelihood be willing to help you write questions for it.
I believe he is referring to side events being produced for various fall tournaments in the US. I, personally, am going to take a pass on anything that extends beyond the usual Saturday timeframe, though: my cramped TA schedule means I'll be bringing assignments to mark with me...

Sorry about the delayed response. Yes, we are considering mirroring a side event being produced for fall events in the United States. We need to consider room availability and field interest, but we'll be able to get things organized in that regard soon.

Mike Bentley · Post by **Mike Bentley** » Tue Sep 08, 2009 7:23 pm

I'm pretty sure you need a Passport or a special driver's license to get back into the US. It shouldn't take a huge amount of time to get a passport, though.

MicroEStudent · Post by **MicroEStudent** » Tue Sep 08, 2009 8:18 pm

Bentley Like Beckham wrote:I'm pretty sure you need a Passport or a special driver's license to get back into the US. It shouldn't take a huge amount of time to get a passport, though.

If you get it expedited, it looks like 2-3 weeks http://travel.state.gov/passport/get/pr ... _1740.html.

Post by **theMoMA** » Tue Sep 08, 2009 9:04 pm

Did these rules change recently? I don't have a passport, but I did get to and from Canada several times in the 2000s.

Quantum Mushroom Billiard Hat · Tue Sep 08, 2009 9:05 pm

The rules changed in the last year or two.

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Wed Sep 16, 2009 10:31 pm

Side event update:

Thankfully, we've been able to book space to hold a side event Saturday evening after the completion of the main event. However, as expected, this means that we will unfortunately only be able to hold one side tournament. So instead of me choosing one of RMPfest 2 (religion, mythology and philosophy) and Walden III (social science and philosophy) to suit my preference, I put it to the prospective players at this site: which of these two would you rather play? With permission of the editors of the respective sets, we will host whichever is most popular among the people playing here.

Regarding passport information, relevant links can be found here:
Canadian government travel information
U.S. Embassy in Ottawa passport requirement information
Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative
More information about travel into Canada
Air travel between Canada and the United States

It appears to me that American citizens or permanent residents traveling into Canada do not need passports, but do need two of the relevant documents outlined in those links and the links in the first post. However, any traveler flying into Canada does need a passport, as per the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative. Canadian citizens or permanent residents traveling into the United States do need a passport.

EDIT: Okay, from the U.S. government, "EFFECTIVE JUNE 1, 2009 Travelers entering the U.S. through a land or sea border must present a passport or WHTI-compliant document." WHTI-compliant documents for U.S. citizens include: "A passport issued by the U.S. Government, a passport card, a valid trusted traveler program card (FAST, NEXUS, or SENTRI), an enhanced driver’s license (EDL), a Military ID with official travel orders, or a U.S. Merchant Mariner Document."

MicroEStudent · Post by **MicroEStudent** » Mon Oct 12, 2009 11:52 pm

We will be unable to bring a team as people will not be in town following finals.

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Tue Oct 13, 2009 4:27 pm

We're still coming. An Ottawa packet is still in progress.

PS: Guelph's hotels are more expensive than Ottawa, and no quizbowl trip is complete without the cheap hotel experience (we don't need a free place to stay, just lamenting that there won't be any... "adventures").

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Fri Oct 23, 2009 12:13 pm

We managed to get cheaper reservations at the Best Western, which is across the street from Guelph. This gives us more flexibility for a side event on Saturday: if any of our Ottawa teammates want to leave after the main tournament, the hotel's right there.

Of the two options, I'll put my vote down for RMP Fest, but I'm not 100% sure I'll play. With what looks like a rather small field, you may just want to split whoever is left into 4 teams, and do a round robin with final.

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Sun Oct 25, 2009 9:33 pm

Some awesome news: we've come to an agreement with Bruce Arthur to mirror RMP Fest II after the main event (Religion, Mythology, Philosophy; tossup only). For now, I'm thinking we'll run it as a doubles tournament, but this might change based on interest. Costs will be $10 per Division I player and $5 per Division II player (CDN$). We'll probably have a break after the main event for dinner, and then reconvene in Mackinnon for RMP Fest. If you're interested, please post here or let me know by e-mail at greenwoc AT uoguelph DOT ca or, if I don't respond (likely because of our spam filter) christopher DOT john DOT greenwood AT gmail DOT com, so that I can get a rough estimate of the number of players we will have.

With four weeks to go, the rest of the tournament preparations are still on track, and we've had interest from McMaster, Toronto, Waterloo and Ottawa. If anyone from Western, Queen's, RMC, Wilfrid Laurier or McGill would like to attend, give me a shout at the above e-mails or post here. Similarly, we'd be thrilled to have some teams from south of the border at our site; obviously, if another site is closer, you should certainly go to that one, but for Michigan, upstate New York and parts of Ohio, southern Ontario is probably closest. The offer to house people for free still stands.

Hope to see you there!

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Mon Oct 26, 2009 8:07 pm

Philosophy student Eddy will join me in a partnership for RMP Fest. That's one category covered...

For the main event, we will have 5 people, but we are planning half-game subs so we won't be available for any part-time staffing.

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Thu Nov 05, 2009 11:18 pm

Field has been updated. For those playing, a reminder that we are hosting RMP Fest after the conclusion of the main event. Teams for which Guelph is your closest location, come to this!

swwFCqb · Post by **swwFCqb** » Sat Nov 07, 2009 12:29 am

Case will be bringing a team to this (whether it will be 2 or 3 people we have yet to determine) with 3 buzzers (pending any issues with them from now till then). Nobody from our team will be staying to play RMPFest however.

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 3:18 pm

swwFCqb wrote:a team [...] with 3 buzzers

I forgot to mention...this is sweet (and much appreciated).

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Mon Nov 16, 2009 11:30 am

For the "eight light" definition, we have one buzzer set. We have another one that has seven signals, but I don't think it's worth bringing.

We're also getting the distance discount.

adosreme · Post by **adosreme** » Tue Nov 17, 2009 9:43 am

Waterloo is confirming 2 teams and 1 buzzer set for this weekend.

swwFCqb · Post by **swwFCqb** » Wed Nov 18, 2009 6:15 pm

So, I hate to be that guy, but seeing as 2 guys who were planning on coming needed to drop for very legitimate reasons (leaving me alone), and the fact that I have no vehicle to even come by myself, Case will very regrettably not be able to show. I hope our absence (along with the absence of our 3 buzzers) does not cause any major issues come tournament day. Sorry again

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Thu Nov 19, 2009 1:42 pm

Barring any changes it looks as though we'll have a 9-team field for this, which is a decent number. If it makes the schedule easier, we'll try to scrounge up a Guelph house team, but this may not happen, as we'll have 8-10 staffers and midterms just ended, so several others are going home for the weekend.

It looks like we'll have a fair amount of buzzer systems. For reference, I'll keep a running list of buzzers below. If any of this information is incorrect, please let me know, as we'll certainly need 4-5 sets.

Waterloo - 1
McMaster - 1
Toronto - 2
Ottawa - 1
Western - 1

Also, a reminder that we're doing RMP Fest after, so plan accordingly if you'd like to play. We'll have a dinner break between the two events, and then a quick sign up after with everyone that's left.

Information about start time and the like is in the original post, and parking lots can be found on the campus map, also in the original post. I'm not sure how much parking costs, but I'm pretty sure it's not exorbitant.

If you have any questions, don't hesitate to e-mail or Facebook me. See you Saturday morning!

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Thu Nov 19, 2009 2:28 pm

Camelopardalis wrote:I'm not sure how much parking costs, but I'm pretty sure it's not exorbitant.

I'm not planning to park on campus, but Guelph's parking website seems to suggest that parking fees in visitor lots are only enforced on weekdays. There is a visitor lot in the space enclosed by the Johnston building, which is just north of Mackinnon.

maxis7 · Post by **maxis7** » Fri Nov 20, 2009 7:39 am

Sorry for the late notice, but it looks like we are going to have only one team for this, along with 1 moderator (Rico) and 2 buzzer systems. Sinan and I do plan to stay for RMPfest though.

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Fri Nov 20, 2009 8:27 am

If it becomes 8 teams, we can do the round-robin + 4/4 split like we had at Thunder.

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Sat Nov 21, 2009 10:40 am

For those wondering, this tournament is underway. The final team count is:

Waterloo A
Waterloo B
McMaster A
McMaster B
McMaster C/Guelph
Ottawa
Western Ontario
Toronto

Alas, even Guelph is not immune from an incompetent booking department!

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Sat Nov 21, 2009 2:51 pm

At lunch, after 5 rounds, the standings are:

1. Toronto (5-0)
2. Ottawa (4-1)
3. McMaster A (3-2)
4. Western A (3-2)
5. Waterloo A (2-3)
6. Waterloo B (2-3)
7. McMaster B (1-4)
8. McMaster C/Guelph (0-5)

After the remaining two round robin games, the teams will be split into 4-team top and bottom brackets.

OntarioQuizzer · Post by **OntarioQuizzer** » Sat Nov 21, 2009 3:09 pm

Lunchtime stats here: http://www.andysthoughts.com/TerrapinFa ... dings.html

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Sat Nov 21, 2009 7:51 pm

This tournament finished about half an hour ago. Toronto won with a perfect record of 10-0, followed by Western Ontario with a record of 7-3. We should have full stats up later tonight.

Top individual scorers were (in PPG):
1. Will Nediger, Western Ontario - 87.86
2. Sinan Ulusoy, Toronto - 81.43
3. Chris Lionel, Toronto - 41.43
4. Ben Smith, Ottawa - 31.67
5. Andrew Almas, McMaster - 27.14

And the top novice player was:
6. Eddie Roue, Ottawa - 26.92

We'll probably have 7-12 people sticking around for RMP Fest, so we'll read 4-5 rounds of it when everyone returns from dinner.

OntarioQuizzer · Post by **OntarioQuizzer** » Sun Nov 22, 2009 7:10 pm

Full stats: http://www.andysthoughts.com/TerrapinFa ... dings.html

Prelim stats: http://www.andysthoughts.com/TerrapinFa ... dings.html

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Sun Nov 22, 2009 8:11 pm

Thanks to everyone who came yesterday, and congratulations to Toronto for your win and Will for your scoring prize. Thanks also to all of our staffers, including Andy Saunders, Rico Catibog, George Hutchinson, Laura Harper, Nasim Omar, Calder Hutchinson, Jeremy Levick, Jacqueline McMillan, and our stats-keeper and co-TD, Tom Minard. Thanks also to Chris Ray, Mike Sorice, and the rest of the editors for an enjoyable question set. I hope everyone had a good time, and we hope to see you all again at ACF Winter at Waterloo in January.

Final standings:

Upper Bracket
1. Toronto (10-0)
2. Western (7-3)
3. McMaster A (5-5)
4. Ottawa (4-6)

Lower Bracket
5. McMaster B (6-4)
6. Waterloo B (4-6)
7. Waterloo A (2-8)
8. McMaster C (2-8)

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Sun Nov 22, 2009 11:26 pm

I am tired out from driving a cramped Hyundai Accent that had a defective cruise control, but:

Thank you for hosting the tournament, and also thanks for delaying it to this date essentially for my sake. Pam has taken (and is reading) my prize, so she thanks you for that.

To anyone considering attending a Guelph tournament in the future: the Best Western was the cheapest hotel and it got good marks from the Ottawa crew.

maxis7 · Post by **maxis7** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 12:19 am

Thanks to Guelph for a very well-run tournament - it certainly was a fun day.

bmcke · Post by **bmcke** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 1:11 am

Things that may or may not have happened at Terrapin Invitational in Guelph:

- All the rooms may or may not have buzzed with "humping" when 50 Cent was accused of dry-snitching.
- When a bonus part mentioned The Origin of the World, Will Nediger may or may not have turned to his teammate and said, "That's the painting I was telling you about."
- Ben Smith may or may not have sought high fives to celebrate his power on "landfills".
- The Toronto team may or may not have refused to stand up and cross the room to collect their prizes.
- Sinan Ulusoy may or may not have gone two years without reading a book. He may or may not have decided break this streak for his new copy of The World's Most Dangerous Places.
- When I asked if the hotel scrambled eggs were good, Ben Smith may or may not have declared, "I don't get pleasure from food."
- The tournament staff may or may not have all worn bowler hats.

I really liked this tournament! Thanks to Ben for driving and getting points, Britney/ Pamela/ Eddy for laughing at my jokes, Chris for having a tournament, moderators for reading those long bonuses, scorekeepers for faking an interest, opponents for being class acts, and anyone else I hung out with this weekend.

Who wrote the bonus about Theseus?

Post by **DumbJaques** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 11:07 am

Who wrote the bonus about Theseus?

Freelance submission by this author

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 12:20 pm

bmcke wrote:Ben Smith may or may not have sought high fives to celebrate his power on "landfills".

As someone who has taken four engineering courses related to pollution and waste (air, wastewater, landfill, and green engineering, plus lots of side topics about how to clean up the tar sands), I have no problem with 1/1 "trash" being replaced with 1/1 literal trash...

edit: The Alfredsson avatar is getting a short break in honour of the landfill tossup.

women, fire and dangerous things · Mon Nov 23, 2009 12:24 pm

bmcke wrote:When a bonus part mentioned The Origin of the World, Will Nediger may or may not have turned to his teammate and said, "That's the painting I was telling you about."

That's because it came up in practice last week!

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 1:27 pm

Oh, I also wanted to point out how much I enjoyed the fact that there were 3 people (10% of the field) in their first year of collegiate quizbowl who had played in either the Ottawa Quizbowl Tournament or Toronto Winter Invitational last year. High school quizbowl wins! (Nudge, nudge, other Canadian universities, who may or may not want to host tournaments for their local teams)

Windows ME · Post by **Windows ME** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 1:35 pm

- Sinan Ulusoy may or may not have gone two years without reading a book.

[not true, but yes, most of my literature buzzes are off books I haven't read]

He may or may not have decided break this streak for his new copy of The World's Most Dangerous Places.

...I'm already on page 100. DP rocks!

Theory Of The Leisure Flask · Mon Nov 23, 2009 2:01 pm

Glad you liked the "landfills" question. In case it wasn't obvious, I wrote it as the geography/academic choice tossup.

ETA: Not to threadjack, but how do you clean up those tar sands? Inquiring minds want to know.

Post by **theMoMA** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 3:22 pm

The real question is: who wrote the question on "bogs"?

MikeSoricePr0xy · Post by **MikeSoricePr0xy** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 3:53 pm

theMoMA wrote:The real question is: who wrote the question on "bogs"?

This is Sorice's second rule of bogs: stop talking about bogs!

gentleunwashed · Post by **gentleunwashed** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 5:17 pm

I have to violate the second rule of bogs to ask: what is the first rule of bogs?

Also, if people are commenting on and correcting Brendan's assertions, I'm going to jump in and point out that not all the staff wore bowler hats; I wore a green and yellow striped toque knit for me by my aunt. Far more classy.

Skepticism and Animal Feed · Tue Nov 24, 2009 7:54 am

Did RMPFest happen?

Camelopardalis · Post by **Camelopardalis** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 8:31 am

Whig's Boson wrote:Did RMPFest happen?

It sort of happened. We had a convenient 8 people left, so we played in 4 doubles teams. Unfortunately, we only managed to squeeze in 3 rounds before the Toronto folks had to catch their bus home and not long after that the building was to close. That said, the Chris Lionel/Sinan Ulusoy got some sort of prize for getting some questions. Overall, everyone seemed to really enjoy the few rounds we did play, and few of the tossups went dead (from what I remember). Thanks for the enjoyable set!

EDIT: Clarity

adosreme · Post by **adosreme** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 11:26 am

Camelopardalis wrote:Overall, everyone seemed to really enjoy the few rounds we did play, and few of the tossups went dead (from what I remember). Thanks for the enjoyable set!

I'd like to second this. I originally was not planning to play RMP but eventually did end up participating. The few rounds we did were a lot of fun and I'm glad I didn't end up on the sidelines.

bsmith · Post by **bsmith** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 12:48 pm

Can I (or the general public) get the packet set?

Theory Of The Leisure Flask wrote:ETA: Not to threadjack, but how do you clean up those tar sands? Inquiring minds want to know.

Al Gore will hate us, but our department is researching options that ultimately lead to burning (but it's cleaner burning...

). Some professors are investigating ways to crack the heavy stuff into burnable fuels, thus reducing what gets sent to the waste ponds. Of the tar tailings from the refineries, there are options like using detergents to extract bitumen and crack it or using some microorganisms that can tackle the tar and produce biodiesels.

Water could be separated from the tailings and recycled using anything like membranes, adsorbents, or good old distillation, but those options are costly and oil companies would rather not bother unless they are forced to by the government...

Anyway, my research is not involved with the oilsands and this is mostly just what I've picked up from the department seminars (I estimate that half of the Ottawa chem eng grad students are doing something related to oil).

Back to regular discussion...