[1:28 PM]
Should tell the (Town) Chess Club thing before end of day?
Silver Jr. has been wanting to go to where he can play with live players (besides me and especially since I'm no longer competitive) for a while now.
Finally satisfied that his emotional 'tude when losing could handle it...and various snow and wind storms past.
I took him last night.
[1:34 PM] Mr. Blue:
where is it?
[1:36 PM]
Uuuuuhhhhhh......(Town) somewhere. You'd find it just looking it up before I could point it out.
So we got there and there were two guys
One on his computer the entire evening doing who knows what but it wasn't chess
The other Silver Jr. played and beat once
And then two others showed up.
I did not want to play
I CAN play...but my long memory left impressions of "chess people" even though I hadn't hung with any since I was a kid
1st guy leaves
[1:39 PM] Mr. Blue:
Sounds like he must be getting pretty good at it
[1:39 PM]
He is
Junior is vs #2
#3 asks if I'll play
"Sure!” (“F**K! Exactly what I wanted to avoid.”)
[1:39 PM] Mr. Blue:
Is it an official meeting or just anyone can show up anytime?
[1:40 PM]
You can contact them and ask for a couple freebie visits, which I did for him.
All four of the guys who showed up for the evening were older than me.
[1:41 PM] Mr. Brown:
Old guys playing chess in the park
[1:41 PM]
Oh no, much worse
These were competition player since school days and actually studied it...for fun...for decades
[1:42 PM] Mr. Brown:
I bought chess cause Junior wanted to play
Beat him every time
I'm not going to let him just win
lol
[1:42 PM] Mr. Blue:
When I went to a get together with my dad's side of the family i was surprised they were playing chess
They're a low-brow bunch
(literally as well as figuratively)
[1:44 PM]
I like chess, but I don't like that kind of chess
[1:44 PM] Mr. Brown:
Strategy chess
[1:45 PM]
The chess geek is almost the poster child defining “geek”
This is my assessment as a gamer geek, a game designer geek and a chess player.
Chess is ancient and it's fun and it's a good game
But – gods don't strike me and may Junior not hear me say it – it's not that good. Not good enough to waste that much life on.
[1:46 PM] Mr. Blue:
OK as a hobby, not a lifestyle
[1:46 PM] Mr. Brown:
Not unless its like poker where you get lots of money
[1:48 PM]
Right...in which case I respect a chess player because a poker king is a lucky halfwit next to a chess grandmaster
[1:48 PM] Mr. Brown:
Yes cause you actually out play the other player – there's nothing random.
[1:48 PM]
You can be skilled at piloting a poker table but it's nothing like what these chess people do
[1:49 PM] Mr. Brown:
Lots of those guys are 5 steps ahead
Or have the entire game planned in their head before you even move
[1:51 PM]
The one I played against admitted to "playing and studying so much that I've burned out a few times"
I translated that quietly as "I obsessed and went insane"
[1:56 PM] Mr. Blue:
How'd it go then?
[1:57 PM] Mr. Brown:
Sounds like he at least beat one once
[1:57 PM]
He beat #1 because the guy goofed and surrendered.
He played a total of 7 games and lost 6
#2 started out as an interesting fellow to overhear chat until he started seeming odd and ultimately started seeming like he had Asperger's.
[1:59 PM] Mr. Brown:
Ran out of normal people talk, huh?
"Oh no, I ran out of predetermined talking points"
[2:05 PM] Mr. Blue:
how long did the games last?
[2:14 PM]
The kicker with that guy was "I used to be in a club. It was '73. We had a place at Smith and Maple in town. The X building. You'd go in the west side door. Then down a 20 foot hall and then there was an elevator. And you went up 2 floors. Turned left and down 30 feet through a green double door, then a left. And we had two suites and they were hot and uncomfortable. It didn't smell good there. One Tuesday in May, the 15th, we had... etc."
Meanwhile nobody was talking to him at all.
Games were probably 15 mins. No timers
I don't like them, myself.
Junior likes playing speed games but all of them said it's good for practice but not for real games
[2:26 PM] Mr. Brown:
Speeds up the brain a bit, having to go faster
[2:26 PM]
Leads to mistakes
[2:26 PM] Mr. Brown:
yes
[2:27 PM] Mr. Blue:
How do timers even work? You have X amount of time to make a move?
[2:27 PM] Mr. Brown:
Yes
[2:27 PM]
No. The timers are time limits for total games, per side
So you play for x seconds...hit the button and the other's timer starts and yours stops. Run out of time it doesn't matter if you were winning or not.
In short...artificial and stupid IMO. Good as an exercise and toy. Serves to kill out anyone who just wants to filibuster or whatever, but that sort of person shouldn't be competing.
[2:27 PM] Mr. Blue:
Yeah
[2:30 PM]
All 5 of us were contemplators
We like to study the board.
I played 2 games with #3 (who used to be a national master so I had no chance) and then we watched Silver Jr. and #2, and then Silver Jr. played #3.
[2:35 PM] Mr. Blue:
15 minutes seems pretty good against some chess autists
[2:41 PM]
Anyway...game one I did fair
[2:43 PM]
Game two I messed up 2 things early and I surrendered my queen as officially blundered because I F'd up fair and square. Ended up locked in a section and eventually couldn't do anything else.
My guy went into giving me some suggestions how to play.
I was interested
I picked up a few things
Problem is there was about 40 things
AND
He started referring to the previous positions of the pieces ... from our first game.
Like I'd remember every move. I'm sure he did.
Anyway...learned some bishop and knight stuff.
We chatted about some other stuff like AI and chess. More board techniques.
Watched Silver Jr. and then they played while the other Asperger fellow talked about old chess games...and everything else
At one point he started reciting the lyrics to a Vietnam protest song that was sung at Woodstock.
Which he didn't go to.
He's rated 2399.
"He's a point short of Grand Master and they wouldn't give it to him."
"No. No. I recalculated that. It was 2399.75"
(doh)
Anyway
Silver Jr. loved it.
:S
So I'm torn
He loves the game much more than I do and has ambitions to go far
I'm just not sure he's insane enough
(driving home...tone of voice used by a father to check if son is attracted to girls) "So uh...you studying diagrams yet?"
"Huh?"
"Oh! That one guy...said he studies diagrams. Said he burned out a few times and quit the game. Guess that ...uh...can drive you a little nuts."
"Hmmm...nope. No diagrams."
(exhales in relief)
"You just need to play a lot more, like I do. Play online and stuff and you'll get caught up. But I definitely want a membership. Mine would be $23 a year. Yours would be 60-something."
"How do I want to put this... I really don't want to invest anything like the kind of effort it would take to do this. I'll bring you out but I don't want to be a member."
[3:59 PM] Mr. Blue:
Those chess guys would probably be crazy no matter what
They just happened to land on chess
[3:59 PM]
Entirely possible
[4:00 PM] Mr. Blue:
Instead of math or poker or whatever else
[4:00 PM]
Thing is, chess is faboo for the mind (in moderation)
It's like learning the basics of troubleshooting
You automatically gain "troubleshooting thinking" no matter what sort of practical troubleshooting you learn.
Chess you get focus and patience and thinking ahead and analyzing position and process and all that.
And if you get REALLY into it, you uh...you...um... https://66.media.tumblr.com/aa4d46d46b6b91fabb2ee193c54099ed/tumblr_nw84a7vmbj1r0hgato1_540.gif
[12:43 PM]
So...the classic song... "Sometimes When We Touch". Still gets occasional play. I know none of the lyrics except part of the chorus.
And I didn't think about those til fairly recently either.
You know how you notice...things...?
Like years later?
Vis -
“And sometimes when we touch
“The honesty's too much
“And I have to close my eyes
“And hide
“I want to hold you till I die
“Til we both break down and cry
“I want to hold you til the fear in me subsides
...
I want to hold you til I die??? Til we both break down and cry???
https://media1.tenor.com/images/a65cffa52ee9fd6f6d19fee484d7a3ae/tenor.gif?itemid=3535836
[12:45 PM] Mr. Brown:
lol
[12:46 PM]
"That's so ... sweet. Look, I think we need to see other people."
I think her version of breaking down and crying involves pleas of "Please let me GO!"
[12:53 PM] Mr. Brown:
Wait I was just taking a nap and now I'm tied up
What the hell is happening?
LOL
“It puts the lotion on its skin”
[12:55 PM]
LOL
