dang stupid keyboard.

<Goday

dajg!

OK start over.

<G'day Dom>!!

I'm going to try to analyze your <Swarm> game now.

I'm on CHESS VACATION all week so I'll be wallowing in chess like an <old Hippo> wallows in mud.

(Hippos are very happy in the mud)

JFQ, Special "Jr. Analysis" Chess Division

Dom Swarm

1.e4 e6 (My opponent actually *was* French ... and it's nice to make folk feel at home, innit?) 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e5 c5 5.a3 Ba5
The dreaded Swarm. A bit ropey at GM level, but fun for humans. 6.b4 cxd4
7.bxa5 dxc3

<5.Ba5! Indeed. I think 99% of White would expect Winawer and I doubt any of them would Blitz move 6 from here. 6.b4? is in theory, but the alternative main line 6.Bd2 looks uncomfortable as 6…cxd4 and there really isn’t a good square for the Knight-->

<Shreddies Shows Black up almost a pawn after 7.dxc3 here. Why doesn’t EVERYONE play the Swarm???>

<Fans of “The Pin” might consider 7…Qxa5 here OTB, which falls immediately to the embarrassing 8.Qxd4!... Note to self—don’t play 7…Qxa5 if I dare to play the Swarm>

8.Qg4 Ne7
9.Qxg7 Rg8
10.Qxh7 Nbc6
11.f4 Qxa5
12.Ne2 (?)
All theory, but this is weaker than Nf3. White plans just to round up the c3-pawn, which is not actually such a great idea.

<What an exciting opening! Opposite wing attacks and the pawns are dropping like flies. Black’s c-pawn looks like a bone in the throat and so I guess 12.Ne2 looks tempting or even necessary, but Shreddies agrees with Dom that 12.Nf3 is more sane…>

12 ... Bd7
13.Qd3 Nb4 (shazam! I found this over the board and played it quickly...) 14.Qxc3? (Oops. 14.Qd1 was required. This loses at once, but I took the scenic route.)

<12…b6 might be considered to give the a6-f1 diagonal to the traditional “bad” black LSB, and monkey around with making it difficult for White to castle Kingside>

<Heh SHAZAM indeed! Good tactical vision Domo—the Knight is of course immune but one needs to take off “chess blinders” to see this ahead of time OTB>.

14 ... Nxc2+
15.Kd2 Qxc3+ (?!)
(Not stopping to see 15...Nxa1! 16.Qxa5 Nb3+ regaining the queen)

<Yes, after 14.Qxc3 White loses immediately (no Queen!) in all variations, and failing to spot 15…Nxa1, the refutation to 15.Kd2, can certainly be forgiven especially OTB. I’m not OTB here and I didn’t see the “saving knight fork” that refuted 15.Kd2. Sigh. >

<Well here’s to the “scenic route” as White is in Shambles here. Black’s a pawn up with a better pawn structure, up the exchange, has active pieces, while white is passive, disorganized, has zero King safety, and has zero pieces working in harmony. Domo’s swashbuckling Nb4!! Seems to have psychologically punched the enemy’s lights out- no matter what the continuation, after White fails to find Qd1 (only move that saves), Black (our hero) gets to crush White like a bug. Very pleasant for Black to play from here. Here’s a question. Nobody needs an engine to figure that White is totally lost here. Shreddies puts him 4 pawns down. Where is the respect???? Even Fischer wouldn’t play from here. Suffice it to say, Dom deals with this discourtesy by energetically torturing the cheeky beggar for 12 more moves. >

19.g3 Rc8
20.Kb2 d4
21.Bd2 Ba4
22.Bb4 Rc2+
23.Kb1 Kd7
24.Nc1
Here I intended ...Rgc8 to increase pressure on the white king; then I looked at ...Rh8 before noticing that it gave back the exchange. Then I decided to play it anyway. White goes downhill very fast after this.

<Our hero slaps the blackguard in the face, giving back the exchange for a devastating killer attack—akin to unleashing 10 starving wolverines on a vole… CHECKMATE OTB!! How embarrassing for White!! Chess is a cruel game… White may have been under the illusion that he had a chance of some kind after Our hero gives back the exchange for the attack, but accurate and flashy play CRUSHES HIS Ego.

I should think that it would be incumbent upon white to actually APOLOGIZE to black after the end of this game.

I mean Really!!>

24 ... Rh8
25.Bb5+ Bxb5
26.Kxc2 Nxg3
27.Rg1 Rxh2+
28.Kd1 Nf5
29.Rg8 Ne3+
30.Ke1 Rh1+
31.Kd2 Rd1#.
Fin.
<Thrilling Swarm, Dom! And very fun and instructive to analyze with my “assistant Shreddies”. I am going to try the SWARM myself now!! Although I shall be training against Shreddies before I try it on Yahoo.

Heh. I’m going to try the French defence!! White better make the right moves so I can play the swarm, or I’m resigning.

WELL DONE DOM!>

And if you want to play the French, be ready for the dread Advance, 3.e5. I've got a crap score against it.

Sigh. Anotonioni, Jack Nicholson, Maria Schneider. Where are they now?

"I'm pissed because it's Christmas"

This is a Grinch-like heresy in American, but an everyday fact of life in (Hiberno-)English.

What *is* Christmas? Really?

I ask this before I can figure out the causal link with "I'm pissed"

"If winter comes, can spring be far behind?"

vs

I'm a former Catholic and member of an <exegesis> support group.

My literal response to a rhetorical question did not make the Hit Parade. Then how about a littoral response to the tongue twister "She sells seashells by the seashore"?

carried a subtlety that WAS perhaps missed.

Viz, "I'm pissed" ALSO means "I'm drunk" in America and Canada.

The fact that it also means "I'm angry" is never a source of confusion due to context.

One could even say "I'm pissed that I'm pissed.." without confusion (I'm angry that I'm drunk).

HOWEVER.

If you say "I'm pissed because I'm pissed" then you need extra info.

RE: VIZ: EG:

I'm angry because I'm drunk,

OR

I'm drunk because I'm angry.

Then there's this one:

"I'm pissed that you got pissed simply because I'm pissed"

there is no way of knowing if the last "i'm pissed" means angry or drunk, unless you were the wife in this scenario.

I hope this clears a few things up.

PLEASE DON'T DELETE THIS POST AS IT'S NOT BREAKING THE GUIDELINES.

I feel your pain. No doubt you intended something like: 'It's interesting: the ECO code is C02...' and then had a Frank Spencer moment, changing tack midway. Dithering is the root cause of every single one of my grammartastrophes.

<Joewms>

The greengrocer's apostrophe is thus called because it is a common feature in the marketplace:

FOUR POUND'S OF BANANA'S FOR A QUID

50p FOR EIGHT CLEMENTINE'S

ORANGE'S GOING CHEAP (or, indeed, 'HALF-PRICE ORANGER'S', as I saw the other day)

etc etc.

That <grocer song> is truly horrendous!

I haven't checked out your game on <gameknot link> yet but I certainly will take a close look at it soon.

Hard chee'se old boy. For the record, now that you have mentioned a song with 'Jack' in the title, I will find it impossible not to sing 'Watch Me Jumpstart' all day now:

'Watch me jumpstart, I'm Maximum Jack
Shot through the cosmos like an alien attack
Film finished fade into black...'

Or, if I get bored of that one, maybe 'Blimps Go 90' will start playing for forever and a day in my mental jukebox:

'Senator sipping on Gentleman Jack
"Oh boy," they told me
"now don't you look back"

Don't you worry - I promise to not
I'll join your canary court
& fit into the slot
Say now what have you got?'

Or, if on the off-chance the most catchy song in the entire world leaves my brain, perhaps 'Sleep Over Jack' might enter instead:

'You're gonna @#$% up my makeup
You're gonna make up my @#$% up
They call me Sleep Over Jack
Now serving confident product
Ice-pick in the heartrate
And you will never be next'

Your explanation of what a Grocer's Apostrophe 's, 's also perfect.

A dozen is 12. Twelve dozen is 144, or a gross. And a grocery is 144 gaucheries.

It's better to be pissed off than pissed on.

The verb 'to jack' also has some interesting meanings and can be modified in many ways. But we won't go there.

It's a MAN'S LIFE in <Frogspawn>!