<JANGIMM: You contribute to the stress too much. >

The best Bufonisms around are produced by you two hyper-literate types. QED.

Alternately, the slogan was worn by people who'd been fired from the set - it was largely shot, if I remember correctly, in a vast Mexican water tank which was either radioactive or polluted or both... many strange illnesses and no doubt an occasional mutation resulted. Or maybe it was Survivors of The Abyss (STAB).

Something like that. Hollywood psychotic megalo narrative form would dictate that (a) everybody was fired (b) the movie never got made (c) then Cameron was fired from his own movie (d) enter the slogan (e) compromise...

Yes, wildly implausible.
I'll have to come up with something better than that. cheers, D.

PS. The play I was writing about was brilliant, thanks...

PS2. Vox Pop on the Radio now - 'What's the worst thing your dog ever did? Answers: (1) He ran after cars
(2) He tore the cushions
(3) He was pretty mad
(4) He was pretty extreme
(5) We ran him over and killed him.

Dom, don't know if it violates copywright or whatever, but I'd be very interested to read your review of the play you attended... If this is a possiblity, you could email it to me as a text attachment to my address: <jessica_fischer_queen@hotmail.com>

Even if you can't, if you trust me with your email, I'd love to send you one of the comedy pieces I published in a journal here in Canada-- It's only 5 or 6 hundred words-- up to you, your call, you OVEREDUCATED funny guy.

We have played 16.f5 to reach this position (Black to play):

click for larger view

After 16...Rc8 this position arises (with White to play):

click for larger view

My second thought is, if he wants to fiddle about on the c-file, fine with me. Let us start to improve our position on the other side. We can move forces there to increase the pressure. Nd4, maybe? Let's look at these and other constuctive moves on the K-side.

16...Rac8 17.Nd4 gxf5 18. Nxc6 Rxc6 19.exf5 e5 20.Ra4, when the rook is flexible to swing to the h-file if need be.

If it was not you, then the culprit might catch this post.

I read "Music of the Spheres," and the sequel "Seven Mysteries of Life" in the early seventies. I have them on my bookshelf still.

When I "graduated" from reading print material, I carted hundreds of books off to the Used Books outlets. I could not part with the Guy Murchie volumes, though I was certain I would never set my eyeballs on those pages again. (My, how dramatic!)

I didn't expect to find anything, but I went online and searched my Library of Congress recorded books catalog. I'll be damned! The Guy Murchie books were there.

I ordered them and will have them in a couple of weeks. "Music" is 24 hours of tape, "Seven" is 36 hours. That's 60 hours of earball reading time! As they say in my New York hometown: "Oy vey, that I should live so long!"

I wanted to get this down, Dom, before we return to our smart-ass ways.

18.g4 gxf5 19.exf5 e5 20.g5 d5! (not …exd4 21. Bxd4 Bc6 22. Rae1 Re8 23. gxf6 Bxf6 24. Qg4 Kf8 25. Bb6 Qd7 26.Be3 which gives white a significant advantage) 21. gxf6 Bxf6 22. Nxd5 exd4 23. Nxf6+ Qxf6 (evaluation +0.18). Play might continue 24. Qg4+ Qg7 25. Qxg7+ Kxg7 26. Bxd4+ f6 27. Ra3 Rg8 28. Rc3 Kf7 29. Kf2 Bxf5 30. Rxc8 Rxc8 and appears to lead to equality IMO.

18.g4 gxf5 19.exf5 e5 20.Nc2 Kh8 21.g5 Rg8 22.h4 Bc6 23.Nb4 d5 24.Nxc6 Rc6 (evaluation +0.10 near end of line)

I hope he waits. There's just one of him, and 4-500 active players on our side. An extra 24 hrs would help us to coordinate our response.

The forcing lines - with moves like 16...gxf5, 16...exf5 and 16...e5 are dealt with elsewhere. See the forums of <jepflast> and <twinlark>, among others.

I'm working to the assumption that he plays another waiting/developing move like 16...Rc8.

It has been pointed out that this is less likely when he's just blocked the c-file with ...Bc6, but I don't really buy that. The Ra8 almost certainly belongs on c8 anyway. It gives him the option of ...Rxc6 instead of ...bxc6 if we're foolish enough to play Nd4xc6, giving up a good knight for the Bc6.

It also prepares action down the c-file. There's nothing concrete, but one can visualise situations where Rc8xNc3 is playable - if, for example, the Nc3 was providing vital support to e4, and the exchange sac made white's position implode.

I repeat, this is not applicable now. But we need to be alert to such possibilities.

Another such possibility is ...Bb5, possibly backed by a Qd7, and hitting our Pd3/Qe2/Rf1. Currently, Nxb5 seems more than adequate for White.

We don't have much analysis of the less forcing lines after 16...Rc8.

Perhaps RV could get Rybka to look at 17.Bh6 (17...Re8 18.fxe6 fxe6 19.d4!?)>

Tempus fugit, and I no longer like that line. Now I think 17.Nd4 is best, which basically transposes into 16.Nd4 Rc8 17.f5. Rc8 isn't Black's best against Nd4...

I can't say I like this move much. Unless there's a very good attacking line, it's too committal at this point. Okay, it does threaten g5 and f6, but what else?

After 17.g4 gxf5 18.gxf5 Kh8, I don't think White has anything. Optically, maybe a little more attacking space - but the white knights are a long way off, the rooks aren't quite ready to swing into action, and Black has serious counterplay on the g-file.

Fritz doesn't like this g4 idea either. Its eval drops to 0.01 =, where other lines are more like +0.75.

Engine-generated lines usually consist of fairly plausible moves for both sides. Except in certain sharp tactical situations, these are almost never the moves that a human - amateur or GM - would play. So the longer the line, the further it drifts from plausibility. And this danger still exists even when the human player intervenes in centaur mode.

In fact the main thing revealed by such analysis is the quirks of the particular engine. In a position like ours, two different engines routinely generate different moves, evaluations, etc.

As an experiment, I pitted Ruffian (White) against Fritz (Black) from the position after 16.f5 Rc8. White came up with the - seemingly plausible - idea of quickly doubling rooks on the f-file. But Black played ...e5 and ...d5, and White was going backwards within a few moves. Here's the main continuation:

16.f5 Rc8 17.Bh6 Re8 18.fxe6 fxe6 19.Rf2 e5 20.Raf1 d5 21.h3? d4 22.Na2 and White soon lost.

It's an extreme example - and Fritz is stronger than Ruffian anyway. But Ruffian is not a weak engine - this was a clear case of the horizon effect in action.

<It's now up to Topalov to prove himself and others that he wasn't just one day fly.>