Position after 21 moves:

click for larger view

I now played 22.Qc4+ and my opponent -- a 2300-rated international player - resigned.

This one - the Cork Masters - is significant for a few reasons. In 2005 it doubled as the European Championship, with a shedload of GMs: not only did I not play, I didn't even bother going in to watch, though I live maybe a mile from the venue. No detectable interest in chess at that point.

Somehow, a year later, the addiction returned and Cork 2006 was my first tournament in 17 years. I guess my two-year parole is almost up now.

"No waaay, man -- it's a Squid Eating Dough in a Polyethylene Bag, Fast'n'Bulbous ..."

Skrjabin's 3.rd symphony playing on my pc now. The ending of it is the only Skrjabin I really like. It's also the only music he wrote that he regretted writing.

I read a review of Sibelius' 2.nd symphony in the magazine Gramophone many years ago. The reviewer hated the music and said <It's not worthy of the 20.th century> (it's from 1902). Thinking about the 20.th century and its' wars - what exactly does <not worthy of the 20.th century> mean? Maybe it's a hidden compliment?

Hi <Dom>!!

Just wanted to thank you for your comradely "huzzah" on my miniature, and also for the very interesting literature points you made at <Crabbin's House>. I always love reading you and <Crabbin> and <Mack> when you talk that "book talk" kind of talk. Talking. I like books!!

I like to watch, also, like <Paddy Chayevsky>. However, I only watch TV on the <Inert Net> now. Does that count?

<Crabbin>, as he always does, also made some great points.

You know, it's almost as if he's a well-published, well-qualified, well-respected, well-traveled literary scholar specializing in Narratology...

Strange...

Anyhoo, <Doggimus> says it's <hotter than a monkey's bum in Oz>!!

I'm afraid I had to open up a very rare (these days) <can of whup ass> at the <Crabbin's Table>.

No letters, please

(I hope--)

(crosses fingers, uses ignore function).

Best regards,
<An Englishwoman>

This post doesn't make any sense, does it?

(sorry, but I love that line of yours and will inevitably use it again and again.)

Wilde: "I wish I'd said that..."

Whistler: "You will, Oscar, you will..."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-4U...

Enjoy:

I think that "_____" qualifies you as a conceptual artist. Maybe also a minimalist. Probably not any kind of realist, though, as it's hard to visualise bat pee emergining in a Euclidean horizontal.

Maybe in the batcave?

Partly because I've got no ear for 'real' music and tend to over-focus on the lyrics, if any. Though I also like pre-romantic composers like Vivaldi and Bach: some kind of lucid formalism that seems to affect the same part of the brain as chess and mathematics.

BTW, thinking about your Chesterton 'challenge', I decided it would be futile to pick out some sentences and say "Look! Isn't that witty, exquisite, etc" ... it wouldn't be very convincing, and the Chesterton 'thing' isn't easily broken down into pieces - it also works at the level of the text as a whole.

Larsker last word before I put you on ignore>

I saw <Ocean's Eleven> from 2001 this weekend on DVD. It's a movie about a gang robbing a casino in Las Vegas. I thought it was bad - and as always in such cases I go to imdb.com and read what other people think.

My main problems with the film are that 1) The plot is full of holes. 2) The characters are uninteresting - partly because the plot is so unrealistic.

So I go to imdb.com - and people there see all the flaws that I see plus many more - but they still love the film. They love the actors, the pace, the music, the dialogue.

The reviewers there (normal people) deliberately ignore the flaws and enjoy the rest.

It dawned on me that the director (Soderberg) was making fun of the rob-a-casino movies. My only problem was that I didn't think it was funny.

Returning to <Thursday>, maybe some of the same things can be said. People see all the flaws that I see - but some still love the book for a number of reasons.

I can't think like this. Practically every book, film etc has its good and bad points. As a critic, I can make a conscious decision to focus on one or the other (editors tend to prefer this) or to try to explore the ambiguity (which makes editors unhappy).

Many good movies are full of plot holes. Some -- David Lynch comes to mind -- are nothing but plot holes with a little connecting tissue. But it doesn't necessarily matter.

Almost *all* films are 'unrealistic' in one way or another. Most of the ones that strive not to be are boring. There are a few exceptions, but I'd choose hole-filled imagination over gritty realism any day.

I haven't seen any of the Ocean's 11/12/13 series, but I interviewed Steve Soderberg once in London. He'd made Sex Lies & Videotape, was on the verge of fame and doing his first publicity tour, and bursting with ideas. These days, he seems to alternate between commercial films and personal ones, which is a good strategy if one can make it work.

Sure, <Thursday> is outdated. Yet, perversely, it seems to have something to say about several current obsessions: terrorism, conspiracies, policing, human rights, religious fanaticism, usw.

BTW, I try not to have rules in this forum, don't delete stuff and have nobody on my ignore list. But <Jess> is a very good friend, and I'd rather not see her attacked here. Neither of you - in my opinion - is anything like what the other imagines, but such misunderstandings occur all the time in this medium. Just don't escalate, okay?

Hmm. That little coda and the main topic may have more in common than I'd realized. Do I *have* to be the one pleading for tolerance and moderation and (what's so funny about) peace, love and understanding?>

As an apocryphal headmaster once said to his little charges: "Some children have been behaving very childishly".

I'm too lazy for actual research, and in any case I could've got his name wrong: I think I used to misspell it as Katy Lymov or Katalimov ...

Some further digging: the vast majority of these were endings running to 50, 60 or 80 moves. Taking 25 moves as an arbitrary cutoff for the 'grandmaster draw', I found Boris had played six draws lasting 25 moves or less.

Five of these can be eliminated: they went the allotted distance, reaching 24 or 25 moves before running out of steam.

That leaves just one. A 10-move draw from 2002, from round 12 of the last major tournament of Katalymov's career, the 2002 World Seniors. He played black.

Donchenko vs Katalymov, 2002.
1.Nf3 Nf6
2.g3 d5
3.d4 g6
4.Bg2 Bg7
5.0-0 0-0
6.Bf4 c6
7.c3 Bf5
8.Nbd2 Nbd7
9.a4 a5
10.Qb3 Qb6
Draw agreed.

Katalymov's only short draw:

click for larger view

I can't say I blame him, in this symmetrical position. I've actually had this position as White, though today I'd prefer the more active c4 to 7.c3. Once the Queens are opposed on the b-file a draw becomes very likely.

Still, it seems a shame to finally concede a GM draw after so many years of rejecting them. Perhaps he was tired, or unwell, or already dead?

Yes, <dead> would also explain the symmetry. I choose to see this game as a final act of unbalanced balancing, a final surreal gesture from the Nabob of Anti-Boredom.

"There is a House in New CG
It's called the Rising Frog
It's been the ruin of many a poor boy
His mother, and her dog."