Second Chess(Life)

Colonel Crockett of the very fine Chessvine points out that there's a social media site called Secondchess. Why have I never heard of it before? The Colonel sez:

SO ... what am I advocating?

A massive move toward that site! We need to not only keep it alive but make it thrive. It could rival other social media if people knew it existed. I'm asking people to get the word out. Start using it yourself, tell all your friends, post a link on facebook or other Social Media sites, offer prizes to club members who join the site. Whatever you have to do or are capable of doing! In order for chess to survive it must make this leap toward Social Media.

I signed up, and I encourage YOU to sign up and post a link on your blog. Also, I'm now on facebook. I have barely begun to explore the potential there for chess networking, but sheesh, I do have to make a living, raise a kid and actually play chess occasionally.

In other developments, Col. C also tries to somehow one-up my hottest chess photo of all time (see here) with his Cutest Chess Pic EVER. Hey, that's just some traffic bait! Meanwhile, Nether Letter Log offers up some candidates too, but the post title "Classic Chess Books" may not serve the traffic bait funtion all that well, sir!

Memorable Game 3: Strange Brew, I Beat a Master, A Shocking Discovery, etc. RLP - B. Davis 01.07.87 1-0

The only time I ever beat a USCF Master in a tournament game was strange brew indeed; I had been playing well in the previous weeks and was really looking forward to the game, but my opponent, Bill Davis, a 20-something guy who had passed 2200 a few months earlier, looked kind of distraught, or perhaps had been drinking or something...anyway, he didn't look happy to be there.

I had been studying the heck out of the Exchange Variation of the Queen's Gambit around this time, and his 7. ...b6 was a big surprise. It was a move that in similar situations had led to many brilliant victories by Pillsbury and Marshall back around the turn of the (20th) century. I knew it couldn't be good, so I buckled down and calculated the game line to the win of a pawn; except I guess he didn't want to lose that pawn...and allowed a mate in one. I was so shocked and even dismayed that I got up from the board instead of playing the mate, took a turn around the room to calm my nerves and when I came back he was gone, the clock stopped. I guess I was subconsciously giving him a chance to resign instead of getting mated inside of 10 moves, and he did.

I went on to defeat two USCF Experts (2000+) in the following months but this remains my only defeat of a Master. I've never felt any deep satisfaction with it, naturally. I think I need to go and get another...

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Choice Links

20 Undiscovered Island Gems - Not any more...

Cameron Diaz Wants a Bigger Butt - Yeah, sure...okay, can't resist; here is a further quote: "The planet needs a publicist. It's the planet, you know what I mean? She should be a star." No babe, the Sun is a star, the Earth is a planet, and not even a ----ing Hollywood publicist can change that little factoid.

The Other McCain (R. S., that is), explains How to Get a Million Hits on Your Blog in Less Than a Year. Kids, linkage is one key; another is Rule 5, that is, pictures of pretty girls. How important is this? Awhile back I noted that my link to the hottest chess photo of all time had already brought in over 12,000 visitors, and I didn't even show the hottie, just linked. Obviously I've been remiss in using these invaluable tips from the invaluable R. S. McCain, so here's a picture of...Cameron Diaz, of course.

Totally SFW, totally Rated G. I see no butt problems requiring surgery. We will see if a big traffic spike comes from this.

For a more, mmm, intellectual focus, try Kenneth Anderson's Law of War and Just War Theory Blog.

I think this is intellectual, and it's really, really, funny. The Conservatives Who Say F*ck. Warning: Strong Language. I hope you deduced that from the blog's title.

The author of Nether Letter Log, Aaron DeWesse, has seen the fnords. Have you? Also, Hot Sauce reviews! Also chess! Also, he signed up as a Follower of this blog. Have you?

My old friendly opponent Christpher Harrington closed his blog A King's Quest (still on sidebar--how lame am I at blog maintenance?) but has now begun the fine Humanity and Chess.

Choice no link: IM Mark Ginsburg hammers Dana Mackenzie for his horrible, terrible, fattening opening choices that might "get you killed as White" or whatever, just calls him "Dana M." without even linking to his blog. For this fairly serious violation of blogging convention and courtesy, I don't link to Ginsburg here. Now the cosmic scales are in balance. Or whatever.

Memorable Game 2: RLP - B. Zavodnik 07.04.86 1-0

The 1986 Pacific Southwest Open was one of my better tournaments, 3.5 - 1.5 and overall some decent quality games for my then-1678 rating. What I remember is that while my chess moves were pretty good, my chess gumption was excellent (if you have Rowson's Chess for Zebras there's a whole gumption chapter). I was willing to just sit there and play my best, as long as it took, and I seemed to be especially into the games and the tournament.

If I recall correctly this was one of those tournaments with an Open and an Under-1800 section. In Round 1 I defeated an unrated guy, and in Round 2 came up against Brian Zavodnik, a young guy near 1800 (I'm thinking teenager) who by 1991 was a USCF Master.

As you'll see, after 10 moves as White I already had a really bad position, but I still remember how I flashed on how Keres or Lasker or one of those guys would have handled it; Maximum Resistance! So I buckled down and after some inaccuracies by my opponent got back to pretty even, then blundered the Exchange. But for once I just played the position, with little or no thought about where we'd come from. And behold, he made some second-best moves, then apparently had a vision of a winning king-and-pawn ending that's...lost for Black.

Of course, despite all the gumption in the world, I could well have lost anyway. But overall, a very Memorable Game.

I think I've spent more time analyzing this one over the last few weeks than I've ever spent on any one game in my whole career, maybe six hours in total. So I hope the analysis is good. I certainly found plenty of mistakes by both players!

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Juneau Chess Club Blog

I have put up a new Juneau Chess Club blog. It's just bare bones right now, but I'll be doing upgrades, links, etc. Hopefully my fellow JCC members will want to blog there. It would be great if someday it could rival Streatham and Brixton, but that's an awfully high bar...

Anyway, go ring up the Site Meter, it's currently at 1.