viewAnother Win With Black
Today I learned that I won another Correspondence Chess with Black. Yesterday my opponent playing the White pieces resigned after my 28... Qd4d3 fork put his King in check while attacking his undefended Bishop at the same time.
After his next move to protect his King I'd take his Bishop, of course, and my material advantage then would be even stronger. Checkmating the White King would happen quickly once I activated my other major pieces. He was right to resign the game when he did.
The position of pieces at game's end is posted above, and our complete move record is below.
1. d4 d5 2. e3 a6 3. f4 Ng8f6 4. Ng1f3 Nb8c6 5. c3 g6 6. Bf1d3 Bf8g7 7. O-O O-O 8. Nf3e5 Nc6xe5 9. fxe5 Nf6e4 10. Qd1f3 Ne4g5 11. Qf3xd5 Qd8xd5 12. c4 Qd5d8 13. Nb1c3 b6 14. Nc3e4 Ng5xe4 15. Bd3xe4 e6 16. Be4xa8 Bc8d7 17. a4 Qd8xa8 18. c5 bxc5 19. b3 Bd7c6 20. Rf1f2 cxd4 21. exd4 h5 22. h4 Kg8h7 23. Bc1a3 Rf8d8 24. Rf2xf7 Qa8b7 25. Ra1a2 Qb7xb3 26. Ra2a1 Qb3e3 27. Kg1f1 Qe3xd4 28. Ra1e1 Qd4d3
0-1
And the adventure continues.
Published on 19 December 2020 ~ 14:50 Central Time.
#RoscoeEllis #blog #SeniorLiving #chess
by Roscoe
viewChanging the focus
We're constantly thinking about how to make our little Christmas corner better. How to make it more accurately reflect the way we think about this holiday.
As originally set up, the two trees with their colorful lights left the Nativity set in shadows, barely seen. And we didn't like that at all. Our focus is on Jesus and we wanted the Baby Jesus and the Nativity set to draw more attention than the two lit trees.
At the moment we have the lights on the big tree turned off, the little tree is lit, and we have a bright light shining directly down on the Holy Family and other traditional characters of the set. Most likely this is how it will stay for the rest of Advent and through the traditional Christmas season.
Of course we do reserve the right to change our minds and make more changes if we want to.
And the adventure continues.
Published on 18 December 2020 ~ 17:00 Central Time.
#RoscoeEllis #blog #SeniorLiving #Christmas #lighting #decorations
by Roscoe
viewTonight's Basketball
Hopefully I'll be able to wrap up the day's work within the next few hours and enjoy this evening from the big recliner in the front room with Kindle in hand and the radio bringing me live coverage of some good college basketball.
The adventure continues.
Posted 15/Dec/2020 ~ 11:30 Central Time
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by Roscoe
viewAnother win with White
Last night I won another Correspondence Chess game with a White army when my opponent playing Black resigned after my 32. exd7+. No, that revealed check from my e1 Rook wasn't checkmate, but looking at our board at game's end (the graphic which leads this post) we can see that mate was inevitable and only a few moves away. So he was right to resign when he did.
The full move record of our game follows:
1. d4 d5 2. c4 dxc4 3. Nc3 b6 4. e4 e6 5. Nf3 Nc6 6. Bxc4 a6 7. O-O Nf6 8. Re1 h6 9. d5 Ne5 10. Nxe5 Qe7 11. a3 Qc5 12. b4 Qd6 13. Ng4 Be7 14. Nxf6+ Bxf6 15. Bb2 exd5 16. Bxd5 Rb8 17. Rb1 O-O 18. b5 Qc5 19. e5 Bh4 20. Ne4 Qxb5 21. Nc3 Qc5 22. Ne4 Bf5 23. Nxc5 Bxb1 24. Nd7 Rbd8 25. Nxf8 c6 26. Bxf7+ Kxf7 27. Qf3+ Ke7 28. Ng6+ Ke8 29. Nxh4 Ba2 30. Qxc6+ Rd7 31. e6 Ke7 32. exd7+
1-0
Black's sad decision to sacrifice his Queen for my Rook at 22... Bf5 was his downfall. From that point onward in our game my White Army began a relentless slaughter of his remaining Black pieces.
It's interesting to note that I seem to be getting more comfortable playing the Queen's Gambit Opening that I've been trying to learn over the past several months. I like that.
And the adventure continues.
Posted 11/Dec/2020 ~ 10:30 Central Time
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by Roscoe
viewSuch a little thing...
... in such a rough environment.
The picture at the top of this post was taken last Saturday morning, but it looks essentially the same today.
The thin black line seen in the lower part of the photo is the Google Fiber trunk cable laid above ground and stretching from one end of my block to the other. There is one just like it on the other side of the street.
Before the road work began last week, that trunk cable lay under the street, buried in a trench where the lighter colored horizontal line can be seen just beyond the curb in the picture. After the road work is completed the cable will be buried again in a new trench to be dug.
Until it's reburied this thin cable is intended to remain above ground, exposed to the elements and to all the road work and people passing by and cars driving over it 24 hours a day. And if it's damaged I lose connection to the Internet until the break is repaired.
GOD I'll be SO relieved when all this work is finished!!!
And the adventure continues.
Posted 09/Dec/2020 ~ 10:45 Central Time
#RoscoeEllis #blog #SeniorLiving
by Roscoe
viewWhat's to do on a cold, rainy December day?
During this year of Covid, when I self quarantine anyway, a good option is to stay home where it's warm and dry, work on chess games, and watch college football. That's been my plan today and it's worked quite well.
A most pleasant surprise came late afternoon when I had a video chat with my daughter, son-in-law, and great-granddaughters. That was fun.
After the video chat it's back to football until Svengoolie later this evening.
And the adventure continues.
Posted 05/Dec/2020 ~ 18:10 Central Time
#RoscoeEllis #blog #SeniorLiving
by Roscoe
viewBefore I get knocked off the Internet today....
... and I know that's going to happen, just don't know when or for how long, let me post this:
This will be a transition day of sorts, as I move away from what has become too much reliance on the Internet. Pen and paper will once again be my primary tools of choice; offline computer use will be a temporary staging area for my data (writing, pictures, etc.) before dumping selected and edited parts of that into "the Internet cloud" where it can also be stored and shared.
That short paragraph leads the Random thoughts: section of today's listed and logged post which will go online near the end of my day, (hopefully). And it signals a pretty major change in how I intend to do things going forward.
Before I could get this blog post online, I was knocked offline. Today's outage begins at ~09:15. I'll publish it as soon as I'm able. [/sigh]
Aaaand... the Internet is back at 16:15. But who knows for how long?
And so the adventure continues.
Posted 04/Dec/2020 ~ 16:20 Central Time
#RoscoeEllis #blog #SeniorLiving #Internet #options
by Roscoe
viewExpect me to be offline...
... for significant periods of time from now until 18 December.
As I mentioned in yesterday's post a City of San Antonio road crew is in the process of tearing up, then resurfacing the street in front of my house.
Many of us who live along my street access the Internet via Google Fiber. And the Google Fiber comes to us via underground cables that are buried under the street. The crew tearing up the street are making no provision to protect those cables. They break the cables and we loose our connection to the Internet until the cable guys can come along behind them and fix what's been broken.
Yesterday's outage for me was two and a half hours in the early afternoon. Today's outage for me was three hours in the evening. I spoke briefly to the guys fixing my cable tonight and was told that I could expect similar outages on a daily basis until the City crew was done with their work. That's expected to be 18 December.
So... long story short: don't expect to see me online very often until their work is done. And if I'm not replying to you during that time, it's probably because I've been knocked offline.
And so the adventure continues.
Posted 03/Dec/2020 ~ 20:40 Central Time
#RoscoeEllis #blog #SeniorLiving #Thursday #Internet #offline
by Roscoe
viewIn front of my house this morning...
... is seen one of the big fleet of trucks, scrapers, caterpillers, and other assorted machines that are busy moving up and down my street. The city is in the process of repaving here and, as those of you who have seen this done before know, that's quite an operation.
We've been told this work will continue until December 18. So things will be rather noisy and sometimes smelly around here until until then. And driving out of and into our driveway may sometimes be tricky. But watching this work from my front porch is an extra source of entertainment.
That work did have me frustrated for about 2 ½ hours today. The crew tearing up my street managed to break the Google Fiber cable buried under the pavement. I was without Internet for awhile and was... umm, let's just say I'm MUCH happier now!
And so the adventure continues.
Posted 02/Dec/2020 ~ 14:30 Central Time
#RoscoeEllis #blog #SeniorLiving #Wednesday #truck #Internet
by Roscoe
view“Ah, the lemon lady!”
This morning while I was raking leaves in the front yard a neighbor who was out walking her dogs stopped on the sidewalk and we had a chat. As we were talking she asked if I liked lemons. “Sure,” I answered, “Sylvia uses them all the time in her cooking.” She explained that the lemon tree in her back yard had plenty of ready fruit and said she'd be happy to bring some over.
She and her dogs went on down the sidewalk and I got back to my raking. Looking up a short time later I saw her coming back with a small bag. ““Ah, the lemon lady!” I called out to her with a smile. She set the bag of lemons down on a small table we have on our front porch.
After finishing my yard work for the day I carried my tools around back and brought the fresh lemons inside, setting them on the dining room table (seen above) for Sylvia to see when she got home from work.
And the adventure continues.
Posted 01/Dec/2020 ~ 13:50 Central Time
#RoscoeEllis #blog #SeniorLiving #lemons
by Roscoe