Texsox

Gee Brando, sometimes I think you could do a fine job

That is the most vivid description of a chess board and sadly I never got to that level. I bored in intricate positional battles and prefered a quick gambit, attack, simplify, and hope for a pawn and rook end game. My tournament play was greatly enhanced when I was listening to a 13 year old kid say; that to simplify his play he decided to learn one opening really well and a defense for e4 and d4. From the mouth of babes I decided in addition to limiting my opening study I would study rook and pawn end games. I was amazed how many times I could create the situation that benefited my style of play. My rating went from mid 1500 to 1800. Then my talent took over and I stagnated. I really dislike on line play. I enjoy the heavy feel of a 3X wood piece. The sound of silence, the look, feel, and sound of an analog clock. When I see these electronic clocks and guys playing speed chess it just isn't the same. Same thing with on-line and what became of postal in the end. Too many people, to aid their fragile egos, resorted to using computers to play for them. I never understood how people could feel good about a victory gotten by cheating. A friend of mine talks about how lines of play turn on and off like lights on a dance floor when he looks at the board.

One of my all-time favorite books. If we were to cast the movie here who would you cast for Lord Wotton?

Ranking is becoming problematic now a days. With speed chess becoming popular how does one compare? Should only tournament play be included? I do not think Aron Nimzowitsch was all that strong a tournament player, but My System is The difinitive book on positional play. I doubt there is a player the past 40 years over an 1800 rating that hasn't dog eared a copy of that book. Looking at traditional champions I would put Garry #1 and Fischer #2. I do not believe that Fischer ever reached his potential. His genious was like a gyroscope spinning at an unbelievable rotation. The slightest bump and he was crazy. Plus there was zero support for chess champions in the US so he basically beat a Russian team in 1972. As for the third, I've enjoyed Capablanca's games, if Karpov had been born in a different time he may be more highly regarded, I am being told by friends who actually live where decent chess is played, that Anand is amazing. I no longer am a member of the USCF, and have not followed the current players. Petrosian, Spasky, and a few others are up there. I am almost forgetting Tal, a personal favorite when he just starts blasting away. And as an American I should probably mention Morphy, but I have a hard time placing him near the top 5 or 10 for that matter.

I just found out I will need to travel to Chicago in the next month or two. I am trying to hold this off until mid April Which series will be easier to get good tix for, the Home Opener or Yankees the following week?

I am not a Krausse supporter, but it is hard to gather the rest of the team while drafting at the bottom year after year. Look at Minnesota, they haven't won a series and they have one of the top 3 players in the league.

What American Presidents have Won a Nobel Prize? I believe Woodrow Wilson (D) and Teddy Roosevelt ® and Jimmy Carter (D) And Bush joins another noted American President William Clinton who was nominted in 1998.

I try and sneak into the land of winter for just a couple of days and BAM! Dallas gets it's worst winter storm of the year. Frickin' snow in Texas. 3" it looks so nice my my hotel window, but eventually I have to drive in this crap. 39°F Snow Feels Like 33°F UV Index: 0 Minimal Dew Point: 28°F Humidity: 65% Visibility: 0.6 miles Pressure: 30.10 inches and steady Wind: From the East at 9 mph Nightmare Pic Here I will never gloat about my almost always perfect weather again.

mommy?

I tried watching it but the damn Hooters waitresses kept getting in the way. I love those buffalo shrimp and they have crawfish now.

But they do try sometimes. The point is every other major sport, except boxing, tosses players out for fighting. To me hockey is a freak show for allowing it. This week: Disney On Ice NHL Boxing on Ice The sport is too cool to resort to sideshow theatrics.

That was one that intrigues me. The problem as I see it is they are trying to make hockey a made for TV sport and of the big 4 it is the worst on tv. I would argue that Football is better on tv than in person, basketball is marginally better on tv, baseball is a draw, and hockey has to be seen in person. First off good hockey has no natural breaks in the action for tv timeouts. No NBA style scoring No deep strategy like baseball No huddles like football With the helmets and hard to pronounce names not enough "stars" Not enough kids play due to cost of equipment and ice time. Do whatever they like. I'm not certain making rules changes that result in more 8-5 games is necessarily going to help unless 13 goals pools become popular. I love the game. I wish it was more popular. May I also add it doesn't help that the most pathetic, worthless, bumpling, mother f***ers in all of sports are the owner and GM of the Hawks. Reinsdork would be better.

I could do without the fighting. It is my least favorite part of the game. It fighting is so cool, why doesn't the NFL allow it?

I have to check my Edinburg Roadrunners schedule for next season and say hello to Mr Bevington. Maybe he'll autograph one of my Sox jerseys. FWIW, it is a nice league. It was formerly the Texas-Lousianna League until it expanded. I'm a little surprised he fell this far. After all he did have a winning record in the majors.

LOL but my wife does I sent you a PM. Like the ghost of Christmas Future this amazing MD took me on a little tour of my life if I didn't make some changes and fast. I was lucky the two biggest worries were not as bad as we thought. In the course of that, they discovered a few other issues that were knocking on the door. I was shown a nice demo of how to inject your belly with insulin and a very graphic display of a full blown cardiac arrest. At 6'1" I looked at some charts and thought I should be 190 to 200. After they took some measurements of what my old cross country coach called a runners wrist, they told me 165-170 is a better weight. I was thinking breaking 200 was going to be imossible, now I'm suppose to be shooting for 170 without :puke A little laser and a biopsy was the best news.

Thank you everybody. I am back in my Dallas hotel room and finally have an internet access. I've been running between a trade show and getting some tests run. Most of the results have come back with mixed results and I have some diet and exercise to do. I am borderline everything from being about 30 pounds over weight 220 6'1" The most serious stuff, that had my MD the most worried, turned out to be fixed with a little office procedure. Hopefully I will be walking a bit better. Garth said it best: I'm much too young to feel this damn old Lord, I'm much too young to feel this damn old

Fisher shows how close genius and insanity are linked. As a player it is nearly impossible to compare ratings from different eras. The USCF has seen an artificial creep in rating over the years. Kasparov is awesome and a match between him and Fisher in their primes would have been very entertaining. Regardless of outcome he is easily in the top 3 of all time. It is unfortunate he is wacked in the head. As a person I have zero respect for him. Back in the mid 1990s the US Open was played in I believe Morton Grove or Des Plaines. I have the program back home. I remember after my game ended early and in defeat an older gentleman was kibitizing and rolled back my game about 30 moves and was offering some advice. We got to talking and he mentioned he was part of Fisher team in Iceland for the World Championship win over Spasky. He said they thought Bobby was crazy thinking the Russians were bouncing radio waves off him and using other spy techniques to aid their guy. Later, a couple Russian players (Lev Albert?) immigrated and mentioned the KGB had officers there looking for ways to help their player. Chess has been ruined IMHO by speed chess. I still prefer traditional play of 40 moves in 90 minutes. Now they are playing game 5 minute with electronic time keeping that will add seconds based on move speed. I guess I'm too old. Brando, chess peaked in this country during the Fisher era and has dropped again. When I was last in Chicagi there was only about 2 or 3 decent clubs that met nightly and there were many weekends without any tournament action. I use to enjoy postal but that has gone away for the most part against the internet.

I have seen him a couple times since the 70's and enjoyed each show. Tonight's the Night, Georgie Boy, Reason to Believe, we played Forever Young at my son's Christening, and a bunch of others are very meaningful to me. He also did a nice remake of Van Morrison's Have I Told You Lately. Van Morrison's version got me through a particularly rough stretch of my life. Steff, have a great time. Rod has reinvented himself several times, from his Do you think I'm Sexy days to love song crooner.

My tap water starts out from the Rio Grande, the most polluted major waterway in North America. We RO filter our drinking water, from our city water. I've also dumped all my aluminum backpacking cookware in favor of somethign coated. The sanitation standards in the countries that grow our food in many cases are not up to US standards. We now see port a potties in all the farm fields. Not so in South America. After realizing and seeing that I now wask all my produce a little bit extra. If you don't have your health you don't have anything.

Adios for a couple days while I get a couple things taken care. In the great words of Mickey Mantle "If I knew I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself" If all goes per schedule, I should be back Sunday afternoon. Mathew 9:12

In the interest of full full disclosure I am also Brandofan, ban that one as well

I was at the between season coaches meeting for a parochial middle school league. THe girls b-ball coaches were complaining about the poor officiating. I looked at them and told them for $11.50 per game, that was as good as they would get and if they really wanted it fair, have the girls call their own fouls.

They have a waiting list for the procedure. Seems people travel from all over the southwest to visit them. They are very nice and recommend the massage prior to the colon cleansing. I am thinking it would be a good idea.

Man, I'm thinking Hawaii 5-0. I just want to be the guy on the beach who smiles as they "Book 'em Dan-O" Plus I think I would look better in black and white

After reading this I decided to look into a gift certificate for a previous co-worker Looking for a fun and theraputic vacation at the beach? Here is their web site