Typing Part Deux

I guess we can give you a provisional license to blog...

I only got 91, four fewer than I put on my resume and about 15 fewer than I actually type, but I was taking the test on my Macbook, whose keyboard I hate (I can never type the "a" properly).

indeed, Elayne. i've heard that mac users are slower, but i patently refuse to "go there". honestly! really! i do!

hi, Rook. a near-minnesotan here (sioux falls, sd) via Karlo's place. i had about three minutes to spare today for actually getting out and reading the blogs i subscribe to. looks like i might have to add yours to that never-endingly-ever-growing list that i rarely get to read in full anymore.

thanks for what you do.

I only got 38 words. Then again, I run a printing press for a living, so don't even try to bust my chops on this score...

To be sure, the basic openings are pretty limited, so Jim can have a general understanding of chess principles (attack through the center, deploy forces as a military maneuver, exploit the opposition's weaknesses after analyzing the setup to determine what they are).

I used to play chess with the chess club in Bloomfield, NJ on Friday evenings (for a while until I had a social life that included a woman). There was one guy who must have known every "book" move in the world. I played him for twenty games in a row (this is a true story) from the first time I played him until the last over a string of Friday nights. He'd make a move and I'd make a move and by the second move he'd tell me which opening I was using, according to the book, and then he'd tell me which variation I was using. So in the very first game I made a completely ridiculous move as soon as possible, but I did it intentionally. I analyzed his position and attacked it from a direction that wasn't in any book, deliberately sacrificing a piece in order to gain a positional advantage. I continued to do that for the twenty games and I beat him the first nineteen in a row. I was never rude to him, but I used to laugh about him all the time to myself. Nineteen games in a row. I once gave up the entire left side of the board and about 8 points as you measure the value of pieces and checkmated him in 23 moves on the right side of the board. I left that bishop and rook hanging intentionally just so he'd pull his pieces away from his king. See, once he wasn't playing someone else's game out of a book, he had no idea what he was doing. He did beat me in that twentieth game and he bragged about it like he was the greatest chess player who ever lived. Mind you, I'm not saying that by way of criticizing anyone here. It's just an anecdote I like to tell, though it does illustrate how learning the standard moves and variations without an understanding of the underlying principles of chess is not terribly valuable. Learning the standard moves and variations coupled with an understanding of the underlying principles, however, gives you a good advantage. Those principles, in my opinion, are far and away the most important aspects of the game. If you know them, you can beat anyone because you recreate the "book" moves.

On the other hand, I'm a crappy chess player.

I'm a crappy chess player as well. And I have not got the openings memorized. Instead, I have a computer game that can tell me if I am still in book.

However, I must state that I make my moves without looking to see if I am in book. I check that out after deciding on my moves.

Oh, and I am sure you meant this to be on some other post than this one about typing. [sign] I guess I'll let it slide this time.

Hehehehehe

Hell, I do that all the time too.

Oh! Your comments are at the top of the post. I went to the bottom and, after reading it, clicked the comments there. I kind of missed that heading.

Interesting that you check the computer to see where you are in terms of the classics. When I used to play chess competitively (I was first board on my high school chess team my last two years there...I was the best player on the worst team in the league. We won one match all year and I was four for ten) I spent a lot of time learning "the classics" and reading about chess. But back then in the early Renaissance we didn't have these computer thingamabobs, so I was constantly looking for someone to play chess with me. I practiced playing games against myself, but it isn't easy to do that since you know what your opponent is trying to do.

I am proud to say that I won every single game I played against myself. Unfortunately, I still wound up with a .500 record in those matches.

LOL! Thankfully, you stated you played against yourself and not with yourself. That would have been embarrassing.

Well, in THOSE games I not only won every game, but there were no losers.