You know, as a chess player, I'm always after that "perfect" game. Well, perfection is hard. But here is a darn good Sicilian Defense game of mine. I say it's darn good because, well, it's just a great game, soup to nuts. I played the opening, middle game and endgame well. In addition, I hardly made any mistakes. In any given chess game, I'm apt to make several mistakes. But there is only one in this game, and it wasn't a critical one.
I have the black pieces. Enjoy.
I had gone into Martina's backyard with the dog, and I had brought a newspaper so I could entertain myself while the pup and I played fetch with a stick.
The newspaper was a German one and there was an article in it that I had wanted to read. The article was about Princess Diana's death in Paris. I guess the newspaper had decided to publish the piece because July 1st will mark what would have been Diana's 60th birthday.
The article was an hour-by-hour account of the aftermath of the horrific car crash, told from the perspective of one of Diana's former drivers, a man named Colin Tebbutt. After the accident, Tebbutt was given the job of facilitating the return of the princess' body to England. One of his duties, according to the article, was making sure that Diana, even in her state, looked presentable. He arranged for her to have particular clothes and make-up on.
Anyway, as I was standing there, playing with the dog and reading, I got very much into the article. Especially interesting was a part where Tebbutt began describing how Diana looked when he first got to the mortuary in Paris. He said that she had a sheet covering all of her body except her head, and she only had mild bruising on her face. Put another way, he said that despite what the reality was, Diana mostly looked like herself.
Now, up until this point in the article, I had been able to understand all of the German on the page. However, as I was reading this description of Diana lying in the mortuary, I came across a word I didn't know: "zerzaust." The article said Diana's hair was "zersaust."
For the life of me, I couldn't figure out what this word meant. I tried to extract the meaning from context but couldn't. So what did I do? I marched through that backyard (with the dog right behind me...after all, she's gonna follow me; I've got the stick), walked into Marty's house, made my way into the kitchen, and, with zero preamble, asked Martina, "What does 'zersaust' mean?"
Without asking any questions, Marty told me that it meant "wild"; "all over the place."
That made sense. I figured "zersaust" probably translated to "disheveled."
I thanked Martina, and the dog and I went back to the backyard, where we continued to play fetch and where I finished the article.
But there was just no way I would have been able to keep reading without having first defined that word. I just needed to know.
"Can you watch her?"
"Yeah, I'll watch her."
"She'll probably stay with you."
Yeah, she always stays with the person who's got the stick. But she did go after me that other time. Well, it doesn't sound like she's going after me. Is that a hornet? Holy shit, that thing looks big. Better not make that thing angry. I'm glad I went swimming. Weird how that can make you feel better. Should probably shave now, too. My beard will be softer. Yeah, shave and then a shower. It's the best time to do it. It's funny how when I was writing about song lyrics before, I wrote them down how I heard them, not how they really are. But who cares, though. If that's how I heard them, then that's how I interpret them. Who cares what the author wrote. And, anyway, "all but love is dead" is so much better than "all but life is dead." Why would he have made it "all but life is dead"? What could that mean? No, no, all but love is dead.
Let's see. Where's the shit? There's no way I'm not going to find it. Ah, OK. Eww, flies are on it already. Well, of course, what do you expect? Flies eat shit. They have their purpose, too. I hope I don't get any flies in the doggy bag. No, I think they all flew away once I came. Yup, there we go. Don't want to leave any poop on these people's property. Wow, I feel a lot better after swimming. But I should shave now. It's the best time. Beard is soft.
Anyone who knows me knows that I'm always listening to music. In fact, I truly believe that Spotify is one of the best inventions ever. It's like a magic music machine. As someone who grew up in the '8os and '90s, it's hard to fathom that nowadays you can just open Spotify, enter a song and, boom, it's there. I remember having to go out and buy a CD if I wanted to hear a song. I even remember requesting songs on the radio.
But I digress. Really, what I want to mention in this blogpost are two awesome lines from two separate songs. The songs themselves were new discoveries. One of them, "And I Love You So" by Perry Como was recommended to me by Spotify. When I first heard the song, I thought, "Oh, that sounds nice." But when I heard the line I'm about to mention, I immediately added the song to my library.
The other song I want to talk about I came across when I was watching the '90s movie Benny and Joon. The song, "Have a Little Faith in Me" by John Hiatt, came on during a montage, and I just instantly thought it sounded awesome. Again, when I read one particular lyric later on (that lyric is also below), my love for the song was cemented.
So, without further ado, here are two awesome lines from the songs.
The book of life is brief/And once the page is read/All but love is dead/That is my belief
When your secret heart/Cannot speak so easily/Come here darlin'/From a whisper start/Have have a little faith in me
How is he able to bring his score up so high? What am I not doing right? Christ, I've been playing chess for how long now? 20 years? I mean, my score is OK, around 1800 on chess.com and 2000 on lichess. I suppose if you put those two together it would be 1900. And 1900 isn't that bad. I could definitely live with 1900. But what I don't understand is, like, when I'm not playing that well, and my score is around 1800 or less, well, that is not that far from what my score had been when I wasn't studying to the extent that I am now. I don't know. I probably shouldn't get that discouraged. I mean, if you think about it, for as long as I could remember, I wasn't able to get anywhere near 1800. Now, 1800 is the score that I have if I'm not playing well. Still, I feel like my score should be higher. I mean, look at some other players that I know. They have super high scores. But, then again, I don't know what they did to get those scores, how much time and effort they invested. Remember, you played for so many years. You didn't necessarily study. You should focus on quality. You should focus on the quality of your games and the depth to which you can understand certain positions. Don't worry about score. Score will follow.
My throat is itching. My nose is itching. I have a tingly feeling in my nose like I have to sneeze. I try to scrunch up my nose to try and not sneeze. Whoops. Can't do it. I sneeze. When I sneeze, I am able to tell that it isn't going to be just one sneeze. My nose is tingling again and it feels as if dust has flown up in there and needs to come out. Achoo! Another sneeze. My scalp starts itching. I'm sneezing, my scalp is itching, I'm hot and I feel like I could rub my eyes forever, just to make the itching stop. I wish that I could wash my face, but I can't. I'm at a basketball court, and there's nothing around me but trees and pollen and flowers and sunlight. Achoo! Every time I sneeze, it makes and my nose and the pallet of my throat tingle even more. If I were to blow my nose right now, clear liquid would come out. Blowing my nose wouldn't help anyway. Often when I blow my nose during an allergy attack, it only makes things worse. It's almost like you get everything out, only to make room for the new particles. Might as well not blow your nose—just stick with the devil you know. Achoo! My face is hot. I try and just shoot the basketball, but I'm rocked by a huge sneeze. This feels tiring to my body.
