As I get older (and I think that's why), I'm much more interested in how chess works than whether I win a particular game. I want to understand a bit more before I die; I'm less interested in whether I'm better on a particular day than someone else is. So if I sometimes get a bit caustic about chess as a sport, that's why.

My interest is mostly in the older games, where the titans of the past discovered the principles we show off by knowing now.

20221011 Whitehat1963 (Jun-06-08): NATO has a chess tournament? I guess they had to find something to do after the end of the Cold War and dissolution of the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact. And wouldn't you know that it ended up in detente! Dionysius1 (Oct-11-22): Hi <Whitehat1963> Better in detente pissing out than outside detente pissing in.

20220226 I've no intention of playing competitive chess again, or even improving my game. But I'm enjoying the heck out of this site. It's friendly, provocative and with the great little ignore button if some kibitzers get a bit out of their tree for a while. Lots of features to explore particularly around ways of searching. And I like the family feel to it through Daniel and Susan Freeman.

20220212 <Daniel Freeman: At that point, I committed a cardinal sin of chess: I bluffed. I had fallen in love with my conception so much I decided to play it anyhow, hoping that my young opponent wouldn't be savvy enough to find the best defense. Bluffing is for poker, not chess.> Don't I ever know the feeling! Rest in peace Mr Freeman D Freeman vs Robson, 2004

20220202 "Botvinnik once wrote 'Chess is the art which expresses the science of logic as music is the art which expresses the science of acoustics' " Becoming a Grandmaster, by Raymond Keene. Batsford, 1977. p 35

20220102 For Milunka Lazarevic, chess was a "symbiosis of all arts". https://en.chessbase.com/post/milun... A "female Tal", she was a passionate if rather stern chess teacher, who would exclaim with joy if a pupil made a particularly good move. One of those people I'm very glad existed, even if she might have been uncomfortable to know. Giants aren't all friendly, just as saints aren't all easy company.

20211018 Though I loved being in Wales [as a student 1974-78], I got the feeling to be Welsh you needed to have been born there, ideally more than once. United States Championship (2021)

20210909 Words to live by: 0ZeR0: Alas, almost doing something on the chessboard counts for little.Carlsen vs A Tari, 2021

20210810 I've renewed my premium membership just now, so let's see if I can't contribute more & use the premium facilities a bit more and have fun.