Okay, it's a no-brainer: Queen takes Knight at f6, for reasons explained in other posts.
Sigh. I am seriously unhappy with the current condition of this game. You know, I spent years developing the habit of not using my Queen right away. I considered it the sign of a weak player. So, what do I do? Yeah, that's right, I play weak. I'm an idiot who sucks at chess.
Oh, and I ended up staying home today. I was not feeling the best; achy with a slightly nauseous stomach. Well, the achiness has gotten worse, and I am having little flare ups of stomach contents that are tickling the back of my throat. Not cool. It also goes a long way towards explaining my pessimistic mood with this game.
Oh, and I ended up staying home today. I was not feeling the best; achy with a slightly nauseous stomach. Well, the achiness has gotten worse, and I am having little flare ups of stomach contents that are tickling the back of my throat. Not cool. It also goes a long way towards explaining my pessimistic mood with this game.
As bad as it looks, retaking with the P instead was worth considering. Once in a while doubled P's can have their advantages, and this might've been one of those situations. First they would have buttressed your KP, your only strong point now in the center. Next, for a while at least, it would have kept a White Bishop from showing up on the G5 square. Also it would've opened a file for your Rook or a little bit of a diagonal for the Bishop. Lastly, it would have kept the Q from again being out of place, on a square that comes more natural to a Kt.
I still have plenty of time to screw it all up, Rook, so I wouldn't be too pessimistic at this stage. For the record, I never thought to move my bishop to g-5, as you mentioned. That might not have been a bad move. But even if I'd thought of it, I still wouldn't have done that -- the pieces as they stood were already in a complicated-enough situation for my tastes, and moving my bishop to protect my knight would have further complicated matters. Naaah, not interested. So I opted for the knight-for-knight trade-off instead.*
My next move is rather blah: pawn d-4 takes pawn e-5. Big shock there, I'm sure...
(*: No horses were harmed in this Old Testament-style transaction...)