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I do something similar with the phases. I recently got back into it after a lengthy break. I think the only restrictions on free accounts are limited puzzles per day and no access to the video lessons. When I got back into it I did a bunch of that stuff but now I just play a couple games here and there when I have time.
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Whenever I can manage it (not that often I would like) I play with my dad - we use lichess.org to connect from far...
I also teach my kids...
"The only place where Success comes before Work is in the dictionary." Vidal Sassoon, 1928 - 2012
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The good news: my older brother taught me to move the pieces and "play" before I was five.
The bad news - my game has deteriorated since then.
| Ravings en masse^ |
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| "The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein | | "If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010 |
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Yes I do! My handle is "cliftonmt"
I would say though, that I much prefer playing on a real board with three dimensional pieces. Staring at a 2D board, I miss obvious things that I would normally see otherwise. Not sure why that is, but I'm a much better player on a real board.
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Interesting, because I would say it's the other way for me. A 2D board is much easier to keep track of, the pieces just appears so much more clear.
Having said that, I do play better on a 3D board simply because other people seem to miss things easier.
Certainly not playing anywhere near an advanced level though, so that is probably a considerable factor in it too.
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I haven't played over the board in probably 15 years. I don't know anyone personally that plays and I live in a relatively small city. I'd be the opposite of you. I'm sure I would blunder constantly on a real board until I got comfortable with the perspective again.
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Sent a friend request. I won't be playing tonight though. Spent the good part of my evening emptying out a closet and sealing up some baseboard cracks. Had house spiders scaring the living daylights outta me by crawling outta the closet right next to my bed (and head  ).
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I played pretty almost everyday in the last years of high school (but I never got a book of chess and started to learn openings or things like that), since then I have only played sporadically.
It would be nice to have some games, but I am not sure if I will be up to a "tournament", only for casual playing. And I don't mean, that I wouldn't play with all CPIans wanting to, I just don't like to have the "must play" component.
Additionally, I imagine it will be a bit difficult to have some matches with the different locations around the world.
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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Yea. I meant more like just adding people as friends and playing when we get a chance or if there was enough interest starting a club on the site. Tournaments are fun but they can take a really long time and who's really got time for that? 
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I have had a look. Looks nice. I might register and see what happen.
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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If you do my user name is Rinsho (handle I've used since 3rd grade) if you want to send a friend request. I don't really have a schedule but I'm down for games when I'm on. If you end up not liking the site but still wanna play, lichess is another good site. I just personally prefer chess.com because they have the largest active user-base across all ELOs and a good anti-cheat system they regularly update/improve.
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I played since school (50 years ago) and got fairly good (rating ~1800). I beat a young Nigel Short once in a school tournament - I don't know how. He just said, "I see what you are doing there, well done!" and then he resigned and carried on against the other seven opponents he was playing simultaneously. I spent a long time going back over the game to figure out how I "won" but never did.
Then one day, in an international tournament being held in Cannes, I lost six games out of six. My team-mate (a master) won six out of six, and that was it. I never played again.
- I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.
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That's awesome  I've never had the opportunity to play any "real" players or join any sanctioned tournaments. If you still had the move set from that game I'm sure the modern engines could give you an idea of how you won! They've come a long way in just the past couple years.
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United for a short time (3)
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nope
[edit] but I think I see where you got that [/edit]
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wed?
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yep 
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Did you reply to the right post? This answer was a joke, and my serious one is below!
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Yes - 'wed' is short for Wednesday.
Not sure where you got 'one'.
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as one = united, and at one = one o'clock
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Saturday morning, slept in a bit, that usually means 7 AM, and was contemplating taking a walk before the heat struck. Laurie texted me – “there’s a yard sale at the Free Columbia House!” As I’ve been looking for a few specific things (that’s a different story) I thought, what the heck, I might as well take a gander, and that’s a good motivation to get out of lingering mode and into walking exercise mode.
But first, cats need breakfast. Hanging plants need watering. Might as well do the dishes too. Hmmm, litterbox needs cleaning. All the while, I’m wondering what things someone else is acquiring, and I’m becoming more and more conscious of the effect of how a small delay can have far reaching consequences. None-the-less, it felt right to not rush out the door. Even when I did finally exit the house, I stopped to take some pictures of some flowers on my walk up the hill to the center of Philmont where the Free Columbia House yard sale awaited.
I arrived at the intersection of Main St and Maple, and there a tenth of a mile down Maple I could see a throng of people hovering over various and sundry cast away objects which were obscured from view, somewhat reminiscent of vultures circling the decaying carcasses of dead animals.
So, decision time – do I turn left now or do I complete my loop by going up two more blocks, hanging a right up another small hill to the Philmont Reservoir, another right to walk along the reservoir, then a final right onto Summit St that, when it intersects Main St, turns in Maple Ave., and to which my walk always takes me past Freedom Chiropractic and the Carriage House where I used to live – many untold stories of my adventures in the Carriage House!
This was another inflection point in the process – if I turn left right now, I know what awaits – the yard sale. If I stay the normal course, the walk is the usual walk and nothing particularly odd happens, unless you count gazing at the turtles sunning on a log in the middle of the reservoir, or the goslings, now almost grown, still following their mother, Canadian, goose. What effect will my turning left vs. continuing straight have? I did not know, but as the question was very conscious, I decided to continue intuitively forward - the yard sale could wait some more.
As I walked, just before the second block where I turn right, there was a yellow swallowtail butterfly in the middle of the road. It appeared to have a damaged wing from the way it was flapping and flailing furiously but could never get more than a few inches off the ground. A sad sight, perhaps it had an encounter with a car that left it injured but not dead. Leaving it there to meet its final doom by the next passing car, no, that felt so very wrong.
Traffic is pretty light on Main St., even without the COVID effect of reduced business and people still staying at home because frankly, there isn’t much to do anyways. So I ambled into the right side of the road and tried to catch the butterfly. Not an easy task with a flittering, fluttering, distressed winged insect! I was a bit dismayed when a car whizzed by me, avoiding me, but not really slowing down.
There it was, I realized, the first effect – that car, if I hadn’t been in the middle of the right hand lane, would have been the end of the butterfly. The loop of causality and doom had just been altered. At that moment, I caught the butterfly. It stopped its wild flapping and just, well, paused, in the semi-open fist of my hand, closed enough so it couldn’t escape, open enough so as not to crush it.
There’s a lovely garden, a big garden, that a young couple has been nurturing, including building a raised platform for the various large leafy green things they are growing. Their property is edged with these lovely rose bushes (or something similar to rose bushes) and I decided I would carry the butterfly up to their garden and leave it to live out its final hours among something beautiful. As I approached the property, it started twitching in my hand, I assumed that was approval and not panic.
I found a candidate rose-like bush, and bending over, opened my hand, placing the butterfly on a leaf. It sat there for a while, seeming to take in its new bearings, like a blindfolded person that is led somewhere and then the blindfold is removed – what, where am I? It sat there long enough that I thought, hmm, maybe it’ll stay there long enough for me to take a picture of this microscopic essence of sunlight – yellow wings gleaming, edged with the black of night.
But the swallowtail had other ideas. It suddenly launched itself into the air, nary a sign of injury, and with full, powerful, beating of its wings, lofted itself some 200 feet into the air to come to rest far above on a tree branch. It seemed miraculously healed of whatever was ailing it on the road!
What effect did I have on the life of that butterfly? What effect will it have on the little village of Philmont, or even further? What was it that led me to do several small chores, delaying my departure? What was it that asked of myself the question, do I want to turn left to the yard sale or continue my walk? Listening, I took a course of action that affected something, I know not what.
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Marc Clifton wrote: What effect did I have on the life of that butterfly? What effect will it have on the little village of Philmont, or even further? What was it that led me to do several small chores, delaying my departure? What was it that asked of myself the question, do I want to turn left to the yard sale or continue my walk? Listening, I took a course of action that affected something, I know not what.
If you believe in free will, the question is unanswerable. If you don't believe in free will, the answer is incomprehensible.
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I think you just changed something in Beijing. I'm not sure what it was, but surely it was something.
I'm retired. There's a nap for that...
- Harvey
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