"They hurt you at home and they hit you at school..."

"Of course I also have g4 here ... and then this, and this, and this, and White is very good. But maybe if Black plays ...b6 he has chance of draw? So I play quiet move, like so ..."

I suppose I'm vaguely responsible, too, for cultivating this faux-outlaw-chic attitude. Annie tells me it's outdated, but I just do a Brando rebel shrug in my virtual leather jacket. "Whaddaya got, man?"

Then one of life's finest idiots stumbles by, seething with true resentment and *really* looking for trouble. Doesn't understand one word in ten, but picks up some oblique reference to naughtiness past. And deduces that I have been a thorn in the side of CG these many years, and the masses will flock to him in gratitude if he does a Mubarak on me.

<outdatedness> Jazz is outdated too, etc., so I tend to regard it mostly as a pré, shan't eye?

heh - I do have to admit that your characterizations when mad make me laugh generously.

Like in: <Doesn't understand one word in ten, but picks up some oblique reference to naughtiness past.>

About The Fountain, I have no idea. Hope you enjoy.

Some random and rather self obvious points:

1. I, me, myself, am not really all that into the unique posting/humor style that most of the regs here are. I have found a simple solution to that. I occasionally post, involve myself to the point I lose interest and go on my merry way until some time in the future I am interested again. Sort of how I treat classical music. Not really my thing, though I can work up some interest for a while and then go on. I don't think anyone has a problem with me doing that. I haven't yet been chastised by the Doyenmeister or classical music enthusiasts.

2. Try as I might, I can't think of a single post by <chancho> that anyone could ever find offensive. I was surprised to find my handle listed there but shocked to find he made the list.

3. I have had some disagreements with you here and you didn't bite my head off or call me a closet Obama supporter, so I am not sure why anyone would feel such outrage.

5. While most of us post more about not-chess-stuff, I didn't care for the false claim we never post chess-related-stuff. I didn't see anyone else correctly predict 36 plies of a team game.

Nevertheless you may be a positive influence here. Not only did I put somebody on ignore, but I then used the words "I don't care". I'm getting tougher. Or more short-tempered.

That idiot, and I must try to stop going on about him, got just about everything wrong -- from who was who to who did what and why. And it's rarely a good idea to kick open the door of ... anywhere, really, whether a church or a crack-den ... and start abusing the regulars.

Ok - certainly one to watch, and what striking contrast to a post I read just now over at OHIO's gaffe by LF, showing how much of a bad judge of character he is, for which I feel sorry, but not in any way responsible.

I'm reminded of two Jazz Classics:

- The Best Is Yet To Come (re the former - The Tree Of Life - no spoiler intended)

I'd never properly understood why 'standards' were so popular in jazz. He explains that jazz is really based on standards, but with every riff and solo a unique experience. I'd foolishly thought that 'original' work by Myles or Mingus must be superior in some way.

He also explains how 'classical' music split in two about 50 years ago, into an avant-garde serialist wing based in universities, and a more traditional 'musical feelings' wing writing movie scores. I see that two of the finest exponents of each branch -- Babbitt and Barry -- died in the last week. I liked the work of both, what I've heard.

And he says nobody is tone deaf, just that some of us are conditioned into thinking we are. But then our ears/brains do astonishing stuff like recognizing a phone voice after one word, despite shifts in pitch, timbre, etc.

I know the feeling of wanting to go to a party, but you haven't got an invite; what's more, you started out with a sixpack, but now you've only got one beer left...That situation *can* be pretty funny. Definitely a good start on a joke. But not if you show up looking like Jason Voorhees.

On a more scholarly note, my friends in the music school here also say that no one is tone deaf. they say we hear just fine, but that it is our ability to reproduce what we hear with our voices that is the issue. they also claim that even total "non-singers' such as me can be taught to sing. I have never put it to the test.

Part of <ADC>'s act involves challenging people. A kind of verbal besting or shaming. A chessgame is a kind of challenge too, and it's easy to notice that people who hang at CG.com can be very intellectually competitive. But when two people sit down to a chessgame, they've made an agreement to play - to see that challenge to a conclusion. The people who go to <ADC> shows have also made a kind of agreement to take what he dishes.

<Lennonfan> Just once. Just once, I'm going to try to explain to you. Others already have tried, and you haven't listened. But contrary to what you seem to believe, I have a long history of engagement with all kinds of people. Maybe one reason I have so many friends here.

Now. I'm not thin-skinned, and I don't care what childish names you call me. I might care if it was a friend. But I'm a writer, and I spent years 'insulting' people - humorously and with no ill intentions - in print. So I'm pretty bulletproof, y'know?

Calling me and certain of my friends 'moronic' was *not* a good way to start. That's why I wanted you to leave and not come back. Look at it from my perspective: a new and unknown person, using very hostile, aggressive and badly-written language, turns up in my gaff. Do I get out the welcome mat? Nope. But as it's a first offence, I only use pepper spray.

I wasn't 'bragging' about the ignore thing. I was having qualms about it, because I *hate* using it, and I never did before, and I *hated* using it on you. But - you may not actually have noticed this - you can be rather relentless. And I got sick of it. You'll never understand this, but I was actually being kinda playful and gentle when I "called you names". If I'd *really* done you verbal violence, you'd know about it.

Sigh. You probably think I'm bragging, or something. You really seem to have a vast capacity for misreading people.

I could also have told you that I have a long and amiable relationship with the people who run CG. They know me and trust me. Somebody like you (new-ish, in-your-face, gobby-git-on-speed, humourless) *reporting* me is actually quite funny.

Yep, I'm cryptic. Yes, I talk in riddles. Some people even expand their minds by working them out.

One truly hilarious aspect of this is that I think I remember you now. Before it took its present form, didn't you have a bio about being a child chess star who spiralled into 'drug addiction' and got a bit messy but is mostly better now ...?

Forgive me if I'm wrong about that, but something rings a bell. And one of my mottos is "Combinations and chemistry are your only men". I've been around that particular turf too. I just hope it didn't make you turn to religion. God being a concept by which we measure our pain, and all that.

Thing is, I'm pretty tolerant. It takes all sorts, and all that. I don't know whether you really have much experience of internet communication and talk sites, but your manner here has led many people to assume you're 'just a troll'. As in somebody whose main purpose is to annoy others and is happy to provoke a response. I'd guess that a majority of premium members on CG use 'Ignore' at the first hint of a troll.

I don't. Partly because I'm interested in what makes people tick. And I don't think the 'troll' profile really fits you. It's mainly an American thing, or a wannabe American thing, and you're neither, I think. But you really have to quit the relentless aggression.

I'm not actually around on CG all the time, which is why I unbarred your access to this forum and wandered off for a few hours.

Here's the deal. You moderate your language. Try to understand that *you* are the one trampling on other people's cyber-turf, not me. Try to listen, and learn something. And do something - not about your spelling as such, but about the way you use it. You write like somebody whose brain is fizzing and popping with a combination of ideas and resentments, some good, some bad, some misguided ... and you haven't time to express them properly. So take the time. Read over your posts and edit before sending. Try to have second thoughts occasionally, and you might persuade people you're having thoughts in the first place. Rather than just reacting like a meat-puppet on steroids.

Slow down. Pay attention. Zen.

In return I offer nothing at all but the wisdom of the lobster.

Sigh. Never gonna work, is it?

You just do what you have to do, and I'll probably have to restore the ignore thing later, much as it pains me.

Carry on the way you are now, and you'll be kicked off the whole site. Prediction, not warning. It won't be my doing -- as I said, there are many less tolerant folks around. And you made a *huge* mistake in singling out some (I don't mean me) for attack.

Oh, I'm bored. Last bit of advice: focus on chess, try to make some friends, take it easy.

And leave me out of it. We're never going to see eye to eye, are we?

There. One entire post without reference to furry mammals popularly thought to have suicidal tendences, or to little pricks.

That's true generosity, my friend.