by scribe | Mar 25, 2011 | literature, ruminations
When I was writing my most recent post, I learned a few things about Wikipedia. First of all, I was unaware that Wikipedia has a Featured Article every day, probably because I never actually enter Wikipedia through the “front door.” I always end up there...
by scribe | Mar 24, 2011 | literature, people, tournaments
As long-time fans of the Peanuts comic strip know, Charlie Brown’s favorite baseball player is one Joe Shlabotnik, whose claim to fame is that he gets sent down to the minor leagues and bats .143 (which is really bad). He epitomizes the same sort of lovable...
by scribe | Mar 8, 2011 | literature, off-topic
Some of you might have noticed that I had a short pause in my blog posts (two weeks, to be exact) before yesterday’s post on “The Art of Doing Nothing.” In case you were wondering, the reason is that I was writing the last two chapters of my next...
by scribe | Feb 21, 2011 | literature, off-topic, openings, ruminations
Ok, I’ve been waiting to do this for a couple months. Today I finally checked out Google’s “Ngram Viewer,” which lets you see how the frequency of use of various words or phrases in the English language (and other languages) has changed over...
by scribe | Feb 1, 2011 | current news, literature, people, ruminations
Today (February 1) is the official publication date of a book that will certainly be avidly read and discussed by many chess players and fans — Endgame, Frank Brady’s second biography of Bobby Fischer. As part of the publicity effort on behalf of the book,...
by scribe | Jan 17, 2011 | current news, literature, off-topic
Today I am going to depart from my usual ideological purity and succumb to the lure of crass commercialism. Yes, I want to use this posting to promote my new book, What’s Happening in the Mathematical Sciences (Vol. 8). I’m afraid that you won’t...
