Graag gedaan;) succes verder

 Photo by Thorwulfsson: Lewis Chessmen, 12C
http://www.flickr.com/photos/midgardarts/906738512/








I said ok, dank u  -   when I resigned

So that's what the Dutch guy said back. Graag gedaan;) succes verder.

It went 46 moves, and on the 44th I stepped into a Knight fork where he got my Rook leaving him with a big advantage. A winning advantage.

Up until then it was very tense but there was a chance I would win with two pawns poised close to Queen promotions, but once the Rook was gone it was soon clear that there was no chance any more and he would eat those pawns before they could make it.

As I mentioned before when it is hopeless it is good form to resign if you're playing a gentleman, although when fighting pirates it is for blood and there's no quarter given nor expected.

And So Having Lost,  I Have A List of Reasons, Not Excuses

It was two in the morning and I was half asleep, and maybe he knew what time that is here, but in any event I could have just stopped playing in my sleep. He only had one knight, so I should have seen the possibility of the check and double attack on the Rook that finally made it hopeless.

And anyway I started off boldly and recklessly using an Icelandic Gambit, where I go two pawns down from the beginning, even though he is 400 points above me in ranking.

So he beat me both games, and there are no more with him in this tournament.

But he's the only one so far to beat me.

And he is number four out of the one hundred, so it would have been a big thing to have beat him. That would mean I could be up there too. As it was I made him think pretty hard from March 21 until now. The first game featured a dramatic event I am calling the "Buzz Saw Attack," where I tore him apart and left him lucky to only be a Rook and Pawn down. But he ultimately won the first game.

I think the title means 'done with pleasure, further success,' too bad rampjaar and brigade daendels have been quiet lately or we'd get a proper Dutch translation. Still might if Peter or someone can help out. The chess player lives in Nieuwerkerk a/d IJssel.



But I Beat the Scots Guy For My First Real Tournament Win

On the bright side, at the same time the Scots guy, who is the next best and who did split with the Dutch guy, stepped right into one of my traps at long last so that I could do a similar double check attack on his King and Bishop, forcing him to guard the King while I win his Bishop, which in that tremendously tense game was enough to cause him to resign to me, on his 44th move. He didn't say anything, but promptly started up the next game.

It seems odd to see a Scotsman select an opening known as 'The King's English,' but that's what he is doing, no doubt meant to throw me off. Little does he know, almost anything would throw me off just as well.

The game I won, he was using a King's Indian Defense with the fianchettoed Bishop while I had started off trying to do a Queen's Gambit. That game was so tense it lasted exactly as long as both games with the Dutch guy. But I got an advantage fairly early on by a Knight, and the tension was from not letting him ever get it back, until finally the loss of his Bishop left him down two pieces and he gave it up. It is harder for the mighty to fall, since he is in second place and trying to catch the Dutch guy too.

I moved up to fourth for a day, then yet another guy I'm playing beat another other guy, the #9  (the one who got my Queen last week) so he took fourth and I fell to fifth, out of ten, in the Standings.

Meanwhile during the week, I got that Queen back from #9 at the cost of a Rook, and then this morning got back the Rook too so I have made a complete comeback against him. Still too early to predict a win, but I am confident in that one.

Then there's another guy where I have got way ahead in material, like two pieces plus I just forked his Queen out last night, so that one he'll need a miracle for me not to beat him pretty soon.

So I am doing way better in this tournament than I would expect, considering that I only even qualified for the minimum rating a day before it started, and now I've got up to fourth or fifth place, from number ten, and have reason to think I'll end up even higher once some more games end.

This other guy who bumped me, #4, is exactly dead even with me with just a few identical pieces left and probably many would have drawn that game, but he seems to be more of a Pirate type. You know what that means.

Tricking the Nemesis

My regular Nemesis took the whole week off even though he has responsibilities as the tournament director.

But he got back in the game and he's beating me in our one remaining private match. My rating went up for beating the 1737 Scots guy, but not quite enough to catch the Nemesis by about one game.

So I came up with a trick. I convinced him to try a novelty system called the Chicago Gambit, which is also called the Irish Gambit. It's like a typical set up where the center pawns face off, then the Knights come out--but then one Knight takes a pawn, then the other Knight takes the Knight, and then the first guy brings up another pawn.

Net result, it was a stupid move to take the first pawn and lose a Knight for it. Apparently the inventor was quoted as having said on his death-bed, explaining his bad unsound gambit, "I hadn't seen the King's Pawn was defended."  So it seems this gambit is a sort of Irish joke...but maybe not, as for the price of a Knight for a pawn White does get a perfect solid pawn center phalanx that is usually very hard or impossible to get.

So if it really is unsound, like it looks, it's an easier than normal chance to beat Mr. Nemesis, by using a trick.




Sticky Paints In Stock At The Stores

I finally pulled out of chess long enough to get seven bottles of fresh acrylics and most of them are so old as to be sticky. It's like the stuff from tubes, and artists mix it all the time, so it may still be usable off a palette with some water added, but it's pretty annoying to have the new paint turn out older than the old paint.

I bought colors suitable for the American Civil War with a view to getting some 1/72 figures for that, but didn't yet and pulled out my American Revolution project instead.

But when I did I found the Alamo project that I had primed a month ago and did blue for coats and pants across the lot, actually more thinking of the 1845-47 US-Mexican War than the Texas War of Independence of 1835-36. So I painted a little over 100 figures for that, 83 Mexicans and 26 Americans. They are nowhere near finished, but they are more than started.

I've been accepted to the new a d program, with an outfit out of London, UK, so presumably it'll be more Euro-friendly or should be anyway. Better for customers, a bit worse for me as it's a middleman that wasn't there before.