The Cup and the Fly

August 4, 2015

A fly is buzzing around your table and generally making a nuisance of himself. What is the best tool for getting him to leave you alone? (A) A flyswatter (B) A machine gun (C) A cup The answer is (C). A flyswatter won’t work, unless he is unusually slow or you are unusually quick, because […]

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Failure Modes

August 1, 2015

In my latest Matrix Chess game against the computer I failed in an interesting way that actually involved winning the game. See what you think. Position after 15. Nb5. Black to move. FEN: rn1qk2r/pp4p1/3bb1P1/1N1p1p2/3Pp2p/5P1P/PPP1N1K1/R1BQ1R2 b kq – 0 15 I’m playing Black in this game, and I set Shredder’s strength to 2114 (somewhat lower than […]

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A Dash of Daisy

July 31, 2015

Let me go off-topic briefly for another update on Daisy, the puppy that my wife and I adopted from the animal shelter in April. First shocking news: She’s getting bigger! I mean, who would’ve thought, right? One day you bring home a spindly little four-pound fluff ball with wide eyes and geeky ears, and before […]

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“I love the past. Everyone in it is so stupid.”

July 24, 2015

I was doing some random web-surfing today, when I ran into a jaw-dropper of a thread on Google Groups, from 2002. Wrote Larry Tamarkin (a master from New York) in rec.games.chess.politics: Having played some of the great young talents of the last 20 years, I can give some perspective on the strength of the players […]

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Matrix Chess IV

July 23, 2015

For those who haven’t been following, “Matrix chess” is my name for a training technique where I play a blitz (10-minute) game against the computer but I am allowed to take a time out at one point in the game for as long as I want. It gets its name from the Matrix movies, where Neo […]

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Final ChessLecture Posted; Closure

July 17, 2015

Today my 157th and last ChessLecture went online, and I am now officially “retired” from CL. I already explained my reasons for leaving in an earlier post, so let me just say a couple things about the last lecture. First, I want to apologize for the slightly less than perfect sound quality. I was recording […]

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World Open Superstars

July 10, 2015

Last weekend the World Open, the second-biggest open event of the year in terms of prize money, took place in Arlington, Virginia. I didn’t go to it this time. (The last World Open I went to was twenty years ago, and interestingly enough it was the last event that I began and ended with a […]

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Browne’s Autograph

July 5, 2015

Just yesterday I found something that I didn’t know I had: the scoresheet of my game with Walter Browne! I should have included it in My Browne Story, but when I wrote that post I didn’t realize I had it. Omission rectified. Does anybody collect scoresheets of games against celebrity chess players? Just think of […]

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NPR Interview Airs!

July 3, 2015

My interview for “Only a Game” aired on National Public Radio last Saturday… and they forgot to tell me! You can still listen to it online at the Only a Game website. Although any publicity is good publicity, I have to say that I’m a little bit disappointed. I hear things like the throat-clearing at […]

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ChessLecture: Returns and Farewells

July 1, 2015

One of my readers, Paul B., said that I should record a ChessLecture on my last-round game from the National Open, and I agree with him. I am planning to record the lecture today, called “Returns and Farewells,” and it will probably be posted in a couple weeks. I’m going to announce there and also […]

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