by scribe | Apr 3, 2021 | chess clubs, games, openings, people
Two posts ago I wrote about the Santa Cruz chess “scene” as it was when I first moved here, in the late 1990s. I didn’t mention that Monterey also had a little bit of a chess scene. A forty-five minute drive away, on the other end of the Monterey Bay...
by scribe | Mar 28, 2021 | endings, games, people, tournaments
In the next year of my chronicle, 1999, I got the opportunity to play three present or future U.S. champions in one year: Hikaru Nakamura (champion in 2005, 2009, 2012, 2015, 2019), Roman Dzindzichashvili (1983, 1989) and Walter Browne (1974, 1975, 1977, 1980, 1981,...
by scribe | Mar 23, 2021 | chess clubs, people, ruminations
Before I go too much farther in my chess chronicle, I should say a little bit about the chess scene in Santa Cruz, which was very lively when I moved here in 1996 and very moribund now. When I moved here, you could play 5-minute chess any day of the week at the Santa...
by scribe | Mar 22, 2021 | endings, games, openings, people, tournaments
One of the best things about living in California is the fact that you’re so close to Hawaii! Close in a relative sense, of course. It’s 2400 miles from San Francisco to Honolulu, which is about the same as the distance from San Francisco to Washington,...
by scribe | Mar 13, 2021 | games, off-topic, people, tournaments
And now let us begin the downward half of my chess chronicle! I jest, of course. The last 25 years, since I moved to California, have been the best of my life, both in chess and otherwise. On July 29, 1977, I wrote in my diary, “Daddy asked me what I thought...
by scribe | Mar 5, 2021 | chess clubs, off-topic, people, ruminations
“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” That’s a line from John Lennon’s song “Beautiful Boy,” released in 1980 on the Double Fantasy album, and it’s always been one of my favorite song...
