Motley Kamuka

I've gotten 2 very strong opinions expressed to me playing chess online. A French flag flying person thought I was Russian because I put the international flag. Part of signing up you pick a flag to represent you and when Trump was president I was too ashamed to brag that I was American. And as a Buddhist that's the most important thing about my identity, nation isn't that important. I do get goosebumps when there is a good national anthem at sporting events. I am proud of a lot of things about America, that we abolished slavery, that we gave the women the vote, and on and on. There are so many things that seem to so obvious to me, that we don't do like restrict guns somehow so the ongoing slaughter doesn't continue.  Anyway, this French person thought I was Russian and quit the game in disgust.  The second irate person didn't like that I used the fool's trap, attacking f7. He really was offended that I used that on him and scorned me, and then sent me a mes...

 I've played a lot of chess. I started 2 years ago. I finally said during the pandemic that I ought to play chess online. I play 10-20 games a day. It's really quite rich and exciting. I sometimes play with too many distractions around me, and lose, but I want to play so badly I'll choose it when I can't completely concentrate. Concentration is key, to think about all the moving pieces, and possibilities. There are well worn grooves of action that are created by playing a lot. If they do this, I do this, and bing bang boom, it takes many moves to get to the place where I actually have to think. I play 5 minute games which are called "Blitz" games, because they are exciting. I find 10 minute games boring at times, I lose interest. They are called Rapid. World Championship games are   I lose a lot. I think I have to lose 10 games from not moving up a pawn to give the king options, before that becomes a standard part of my moves. I think I'll win so I don...

I read about bongcloud opening  in a Guardian article about the double bongcloud open between two grandmasters. So I went to Chess.com and played a game with the bongcloud opening. And I won with 4 seconds left in a 5 minute! The idea is you do the most stupid opening and that throws your opponent off. Hilarious. Sometimes when I play people who don't know how to play it's quite complicated because all the patterns are thrown off.

I love chess, and now play every day with people all over the world. The world has really changed since I was born. I love the Petrov's Defense: Urusov, Lichtenhein Defense. I just beat someone in 5 moves. I have tutored kids. I love forks and pinning a piece protecting the king. My rating went down when I got Covid. I wonder if it's also documenting my cognitive delays. I also had difficult breathing but I just kept pushing and pushing walking and I think that's gone away. 1079 was my peak rating, and I sunk to 862 rating. The flat line is when I was doing blitz instead of rapid because I wanted to speed up my game a little by playing games with less time. Sometimes my desire to play is stronger than my desire to protect my rating. I think that accounts for the dip at the end there.  I don't play after 5pm, usually even after 330, because I get tired at night. When I don't care about my rating and want to play in the evening I do. My rating is so low, I know it...