We remember from last week that we left Dorothy and her friends, and Princess Ozma and her crew, all tying to rescue the rightful Queen of Ev and her ten children. The Queen and her children were being held captive by the Nome King. Dorothy and Ozma were successful. And all returned to Ev where a huge celebration was held. The Queen told her rescuers they were welcome to stay in her land as honored guests. But Ozma said she needed to return to Oz to rule over her people. And Dorothy wanted to get back to her Uncle Henry in Australia and help nurse him back to health. So Ozma used her newly acquired magic belt and transported Dorothy to Uncle Henry's side.
And so ended Book 3 of 14, Ozma of Oz.
Now we find ourselves in Book 4, Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz.
Uncle Henry's health and disposition improved greatly when Dorothy returned to him. He decided he was well enough to return to his ranch in Kansas. He and Dorothy had a pleasant voyage back to America, and he went straight back to Kansas while Dorothy stayed a short while, visiting family in California. Her visit over, Dorothy and her pet cat, Eureka, and her cousin Zeb, were riding in a buggy pulled by an old horse named Jim. Then a big earthquake came.
Dorothy and her friends were swallowed up by a big crack in the ground. They fell, and fell, and finally landed in a glass city. Many of the buildings there, all made of glass, were damaged by rocks which rained down as a result of the earthquake above. A second “rock rain” followed shortly, caused by another quake above. And with this second, another buggy came down. A little man stepped out of this buggy and Dorothy happily recognized him as her old friend, the Wizard of Oz.
The Mangaboos, the vegetable people of the glass city, were not all happy with these new arrivals and chased them out of their land. They escaped into a big cave in the side of a mountain and wandered through other strange lands and had many adventures including fighting off an attack by Invisible Bears, and escaping from vicious wooden Gargoyles who captured them. Now they find themselves in a huge cave nervously surrounded by hungry young dragons who are waiting for their mother to return with food for them. They're hoping for an elephant, or maybe an ox...
Yesterday midday and into the evening I was seriously stressed out. Much more so than I mostly ever get. And that carried over into last night, where sleep was really hard to find. Think I got maybe an hour or two at most of actual sleep.
This morning I calmly made the phone calls that had to be made, and worked through the different facets of the problem that had been stressing me out. Later in the morning while following news reports here in my room I dozed off in this comfortable chair for... maybe two hours.
Mid-afternoon while listening to relaxing music I made my way over to that bed against the wall and found another good two-hour nap.
Now, working my way through Monday's mid-evening, I am rested and relaxed. And I'm looking forward to a good healthy night's sleep. Hope you have one, too.
This morning I won a club-based tournament correspondence chess game using an extremely unusual 3 pawns Checkmate. The image above shows position of pieces at game's end. You can see that the g6 pawn delivers the mating move, and the White King's only possible flight squares are covered by the h6 and f5 pawns. Of course, my Black king is protecting the h6 and g6 pawns, and my White Queen is also covering the potential g4 flight square; but pawns so seldom get top billing for their offensive power, that I'll let them have it here.
I was working on my games this morning at one of the online correspondence chess clubs I belong to when I received a message from Manchester UTD inviting me to join their club. Curious, I checked it out and learned their chess club is sponsored by the official YouTube channel of the famous Manchester United Sports Entity. You know, the Manchester United Red Devils? The soccer team, etc.
Anyway, I signed up and registered for their upcoming “Premier League 2025-26 R5 Manchester UTD vs Chelsea Football Club” match, with a start time of Oct. 06, 2025, 1:45 PM. We're allowed 3 days per move, which is the time control I prefer. So...
When we left Dorothy Gale and her yellow hen, Billina, last week, they had washed up on the shore of a land called Ev. They had an adventure with the Wheelers, and they met a new friend, a mechanical man named Tik-Tok. Tik-Tok proved to be a valuable and knowledgeable friend as long as Dorothy kept him wound up with a golden key.
He told her much about Ev, which lay across the deadly desert from the land of Oz. He explained to her that Ev used to be efficiently run under their King, but the King drowned himself in the ocean after he sold his wife and ten children to the Nome King.
Dorothy was imprisoned, locked up in a tower by the Princess of Ev, after refusing to give her her head. While in the tower, Dorothy saw coming across the deadly desert on a magic carpet, a delegation from Oz which included her old friends the Scarecrow, the Cowardly Lion, the Tin Woodman, and a company of soldiers. They were led by Ozma, the Princess of Oz, who had just learned that the King of Ev had sold his wife and children to the Nome King. And she was come with her army and friends to rescue them. When they learned that Dorothy was held prisoner in the Castle they freed her and her friends, and they all went to find the Nome King in his underground Palace.
They are now in the Palace of the Nome King, trying to free the rightful Queen of Ev and her ten children.
The last few days I've been bothered by a number of minor, but time-consuming little tasks that prevented me from focusing on my daily prayers as I should. Early this morning I put those tasks behind me; and today I focused more on the prayer regimen again. Good! I need to keep this up!
Maybe if I say more of the prayers in Latin that'll help my focus going forward.
I won another Correspondence Chess Tournament Game a few hours ago with another Queen-Knight Combination Checkmate. As you can see in the image above, my Queen at h8 delivers the mating move to the Black King. She is covered by her Knight at g6. The position of our armies at game's end is shown above, and our full move record is here: 1. d4 e6 2. a3 Nc6 3. Nf3 h6 4. e4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. e5 Nh7 7. b4 d6 8. g3 Be7 9. Bg2 g5 10. exd6 Bxd6 11. d5 exd5 12. O-O Bg4 13. Re1+ Kf8 14. Qxd5 Nf6 15. Qd3 Qd7 16. Bb2 Bf5 17. Qd2 Qc8 18. Nd5 Nxd5 19. Qxd5 Bxc2 20. Rac1 Bg6 21. h4 gxh4 22. Nxh4 h5 23. Bxh8 Kg8 24. Nxg6 Qd8 25. Bb2 Kh7 26. Qxh5+ Kg8 27. Qh8# 1-0
