by scribe | Sep 26, 2009 | Chess Lecture, games, people, positions, tournaments
In one of my very first posts in this blog, I profiled a Bay Area youngster named Erik Kislik, who at that time was an expert with a rating about the same as mine (2115). I described him as being an incipient chess hobo — a person who cares only about chess, who...
by scribe | Sep 22, 2009 | chess clubs, Chess Lecture, openings, tournaments, US Chess League
I’ve been kind of quiet since my last post, “Blogging from 32,000 Feet.” No particular reason, except that I haven’t had a lot to blog about. So this is going to be a kind of random grab bag of news. Feel free to send in a random response! The...
by scribe | Sep 7, 2009 | Chess Lecture, Chess Life, games, tournaments
On the final day of the U.S. Senior Open I completed my Summer of Disaster in appropriate style. In round 5 I played one of my favorite opening lines against Tim Rogalski: the Fritz Variation of the Two Knights Defense. As it turns out, Tim is an aficionado of the Two...
by scribe | Aug 31, 2009 | Chess Lecture, endings, games, off-topic, openings, tournaments
I am typing this blog post on a new computer! Kay started seeing advertisements on television for the Dell Lollipop netbook computers. They’re small, they’re inexpensive, and best of all (to her) they come in cute colors! Women are different from men....
by | Jun 29, 2009 | chess clubs, Chess Lecture, games, openings, positions
Yesterday Jim Parker organized a blitz tournament at Round Table Pizza in Capitola. This is yet another idea for keeping the chess “scene” going in Santa Cruz now that the Borders Chess Club is no more, and I think it was a big success. We had eleven...
by | Jun 28, 2009 | Chess Lecture, openings
Yesterday I was thinking about two of the ChessLectures I have given this year that featured a surprisingly early (to me) h4. First, the game Krush-Esserman, which I featured here in December and lectured on in January: 1. d4 f5 2. c4 Nf6 3. Nc3 g6 4. h4 Bg7 5. h5!...