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Chess, Sven & Meditation
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Ideas & Questions
- Hits: 548
Online, playing Chess VS Sven at Chess.com. It beats the endless well of Reddit.
I learned Chess in my early 20's from a friend, Milan. Which is to say I learned the basic moves, the "rules", and was largely self-taught.
A flaw which I passed on to my own children.
There was a reasoning I applied - that I should be able to "think it through" - but the game after only a few moves offers exponential outcomes and consequences, and the "think it through" requires a level of prodigal thinking that so far eludes me. Even after the first three pair of turns the game offers 121 million possibilities, and this number quickly expands to more possibilities than there are atoms in the universe.
I'm playing against a robot, "Sven", 1100 ranking, and it brings to my attention how poor my strategies are.
Nine, even Ten times out of ten I can beat him - but I am blindsided by how often I don't. How many "Blunders" - missing obvious consequences to stupid moves - "Mistakes", poor moves when better were available, the number of turns it takes me to finish up what should be a straightforward execution.
It's not about winning - in the right mood that's not the issue, it's about getting quick enough that these obvious stupidities are overlooked in the advancement of the game. That certain openings should be routine - and they for the most part are - but vary from the script, think for yourself and you're quickly in over your head. A missed fork, a straightforward "seized your queen", it's rare the game at this point that passes without some inadvertent or unplanned sacrifice - rare that I can see that the game developed without my helping stupidity, rare that it passes without a mistake or blunder or missed win.
It's good, it makes me think, and what I think most of all is that by teaching my children - simple enough - I probably inculcated a lifetime of prejudice against the game - I didn't go through and teach the advantages of setting up defenses, looking over the whole board, the unconscious recognition of better and worse moves, the ability to predict advantageous outcomes over trifling exchanges, in short, I taught them the rules and told them to think it through when - in fact - this can only take you so far, which is not very at all, you need to master established strategies without thinking, most of the game is wrapped up in memory and repetition of moves designed to advance and free your pieces, very little of it involves thinking - certainly at this level.
Anyways, my thoughts on Chess, the goal to defeat Sven without thinking or committing blunders, mistakes, 100% of the time, before advancing to play Nelson, who I can beat perhaps 50% of the time but who's wayward queen still forces me into dumb moves and entirely predictable outcomes, the overall goal to play a respectable game with a human opponent, practice, practice, and maybe time to watch a few explanatory videos...
Avoiding Stormy
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Stormy
- Hits: 523
Since moving to town I've been avoiding Stormy. The last couple of visits he rather tried my patience, and I'm terrified that if he finds out where I live I'll be marked by the neighbors as a nuisance with his constant visits, panhandling and unsolicited gifts. But - the few times I've run into him on the street he's insisted I go to pick up my scrolls - they've been piling up outside his apartment...
And so, today, after an unsuccessful morning of prospecting I head over. And there's a lot of shit. A dozen bags, purses, etc, all tied together with sting, yarn, rubber bands, you can't pick up one bag, you have to take them all, and god-damned, this place was clean for a full 2 weeks and now I have to do a major unboxing...
That's it, though, the food goes in the garbage and all the dumb-ass toys and books he's lifted from the free piles scattered around Nelson are going back to his house!
There does appear to be a lot of scrolls, though, so it seems like I have my reading cut out for me.
Damning the News
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Rants
- Hits: 898
Not that there is news anymore, to find it you have to search the deep web. Most of what you read is Op-Ed, Postmedia basically is the Fox News of Canada, (Calgary Herald, National Post, Etc.), a lot of opinions, very few facts and almost always entirely irrelevant or out of context.
For example all the news surrounding the Vaccines. The efficacy, the drawbacks, misgivings, blood clotting, etc.
All this is controversy for the sake of print space and advertising. More people will die driving to and from getting the vaccine than will die of complications from the vaccine. Countless more people will die because they didn't get the vaccine, their heads filled with doubt fueled by irresponsible, scientifically illiterate journalism. Until everyone gets the vaccine the pandemic will continue, people will die and lockdowns will become a part of life.
Reporting on "Complications" with various vaccines is irresponsible, and click-bait journalism that leads with headlines like "Blood Clotting" only later in the article to advise you it's still comparatively safe are not only unethical but dangerous.
That's it, that's all.
Back to Work
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Blog
- Hits: 527
Back to work, open 'til close. There are a lot of outstanding bills to be remedied, and I'm paranoid that we'll be busy - crazy busy, busier than I can handle.
These fears are for nothing. The restaurant is dead. The lockdown - essential travel only - has scared off the Albertans. For good reason. A few of the locals, regulars, people that you'd missed over the winter, hardy diners who don't mind braving the cold winds, variable spring, they come, and there's time to properly serve them, chat to them on the deck.
Between tables, sweep, clean, "make busy", but this can go on only so long, the owners tell me to "bring a book". Here, that is unheard of, but that's how dead we are.
The Ferry Landing, signs advising travelers to "Stay in their car" - it used to be exiting your car on the ferry was prohibited, now - even on the Ferry Landing. We call to clarify - no, they mean on the ferry, but the sign doesn't say that, and people, a year and a half in, have been blindly conditioned to unquestioningly accept authority, and are staying in their cars.
Time passes. The slow murder of innocent days. When the weather turns - if it turns, business will improve. But it's unlikely, given the State of Alberta vs the State of BC's numbers - that the border will open this summer.
The first night after work I celebrate at the 7/11 buffet. 2 cheddar smokies, with all the fixings, hot peppers, mustard, sauerkraut & onions, heaped high with processed cheese squirt and chili. Mmmm-mmmm-mm.
Now, this should be a straightforward sort of in-out deal, a 24 hour turn-around to a short-notice explosion, 2 minute warning to find a washroom, pull over, whatever, 7/11 is a dodgy proposition at best, made more so by working in the service industry. But a man has to eat. And so - the rest of the week - waiting. Is it coming? When is it coming? How is my belly?
Days pass. This is unheard of. By now there should have been the standard 7/11 explosion, an eleven second eruption of fury that rings the bowl, a black tarry viscous mess of abysmal digestion that clouds the bathroom, chokes the senses, asphyxiates even the author, shitsicles dangling from the toilet seat, but my belly is suspiciously quiet.
There are, however, little foreshadowing's, vapors, emanations as you pace the restaurant, sour, pungent smells that warn of disaster...
In the meantime there's the wanderers. A 50 something lady that showed up in the parking lot of the restaurant, green Subaru station wagon, out of gas. She just wants to park there until ....
...there's no plan. The owners help her out with some gas, get her off the property. Every year there's a few, they come here from God knows where, looking for God knows what, even they couldn't tell you. They just come, arrive lost, and then disappear.
She's not disappearing as quick as they'd like. She's driving from the ferry landing to the Superette, then turns around and drives back. A hundred yards, if that. And forth. We watch her from the back loading dock while the sun sets. It's no wonder she has no gas. She comes into the restaurant, looks at the menu - no mask, not surprising, and then leaves. She parks at the top of the road and spends the night in her Subaru.
After a week of this the police come, the car leaves, driven by an officer or towed or maybe of her own volition. Who knows?
Every day check the weather, still too cool for the patio. The forecast, invariably wrong, even when it's just a case of "Observe the weather", check your phone. It's wrong. A forecast 18 degrees turns into an 8 degree afternoon, with wind chill. My phone tells me it's lovely outside. The patio is empty.
Hours pass, when customers finally show up you're more irate that they came than glad to see them. This is how bad it's gotten.
Thank goodness for Ken. Poor Ken, he's bearing the brunt of my boredom. Chris and I, we make up "Facts about Ken", and then share them with him. Like that Kens can just split in 2 like cellular mitosis, and one of the Ken's will immediately leave to go dig himself a basement someplace. The other stays with the restaurant. Or that NASA has to track the position of every Ken on earth to effectively pull off a space launch. Or...
...it's the same sort of inanity, over an over. We're all bored out of our skulls. Me and Chris revisit Peter Caine's Bigfoot videos. The ones where he shows off the Bigfoot Penis and then milks it for Bigfoot Sperm.
I have an idea, involving Bigfoot Sperm and making Ken a Bigfoot surrogate father of the species...but he's not hearing it, won't hear it, and I'm getting angry "It was the last one of the species and they only gestate for 14 months and I can't believe you're that selfish..."
The restaurant is slow and it's killing me but I take some comfort in knowing that it's been harder on Ken.
Monday, a full 4 days later and 7/11 makes it's departure in much it's usual style. Now for a couple of much needed days off. As slow as it's been I'm not used to standing around for 9 hours a day and it's taken it's toll.
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