Particle Back on Tour!

Funny photo from yesterday

My former spouse took this picture of my daughter and I playing our air instruments in the kitchen yesterday while listening to The Dead playing "Hey Pocky Way!" Ah, like father, like daughter!

Mike Watt on Kelly Clarkson album

Okay, so I'm four months late hearing about this. I was scanning through magazines today at Barnes and Noble, and I saw Mike Watt on the cover of Bass Player Magazine. I was surprised to learn that he appeared on Kelly Clarkson's album.

Watt is one of my favorite musicians. The first time I saw him was with his band, fIREHOSE. They were incredible. This man lives and breathes music. (I think I've seen him before eight or nine times now, and each time is a joy.)

I think it's cool and unexpected that he took part in this project.

Celebration!!!

I'm very excited today. It is our son's third birthday! I can't believe how fast the time has gone!

I've been busy running errands in preparation for this evening. I'm hoping to grill some hot dogs and hamburgers for us and our guests, even if we get some rain.

I have a little quiet time right now and I'm listening to the August 3, 2003 Dead show that I took my daughter to.

There are two things that are special about this show for me. The first was that I was my daughter and I got to listen to the music that I grew up with. We ran into one of her best friends there and her parents. We had a great day!

The second is that this show was one week after Melissa and I found out we were going to have a child together. I was processing the fact over that week, and it was an intense week for both of us. It was during Eyes of the World that I felt a sense of peace that everything was going to be okay. :)

Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world,
The heart has its beaches, its homeland and thoughts of its own.
Wake now, discover that you are the song that the morning brings,
But the heart has its seasons, its evenings and songs of its own.

Lyrics by Robert Hunter

---------------------------------------------------
I: The Music Never Stopped > Dupree's Diamond Blues > Minglewood Blues, Big River*, Desolation Row*, Johnny B. Goode*, Aiko Aiko > Althea > Cosmic Charlie

II: Jam > New Speedway Boogie > Brown-Eyed Woman > She Said She Said > Cold Rain and Snow > Smokestack Lightnin > Eyes of the World > Drums > Space > Standing on the Moon > Samson and Delilah
E: And We Bid You Goodnight
*-w/ Bob Dylan (keys and vox)
(Bob Dylan opened)

Lots of action, much less thinking...

I have had a great last week, as spring has finally arrived, we have gotten some much needed sunshine and biking, and so forth. Last week we had a large project (insulation) completed, and I had an interview.

I enjoyed blogging when I had plenty of time to think, but as I am getting busier with many things, I am going to blog only occasionally. I think this change is due to moving from winter to spring, and I am thankful for that! Although the winter was neither a brutal nor long one, I was so ready for the sun to return!!!

Who has read "The World is Flat?"

Yesterday I received a piece of advertising email from MK Press for a book called The World is Flat? Note, this is not by Thomas Friedman. Rather, it is a critique of his book.

Part of the email read:

Thomas Friedman’s recent New York Times bestseller, The World is Flat, asserts that the international economic playing field is now more level than it has ever been. As popular as it may be, some reviewers assert that by what it leaves out, Friedman’s book is dangerous.

“The world isn’t flat as a result of globalization,” say Ronald Aronica and Mtetwa Ramdoo, business analysts and authors of a critical analysis of Friedman’s book. “Globalization is the greatest reorganization of the world since the Industrial Revolution,” says Aronica. But by what Friedman’s book ignores or glosses over, it misinforms people and policy makers.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am interested in checking this out, as I enjoyed Friedman's book, and I would like to read this critique. Any thoughts?

Reflections on The Omnivore's Dilemma

On Monday evening I finished reading the last few pages of Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma. I had had a busy week, so it was good to relax and finally complete it. It was a both an enjoyable and thought-provoking book. I consider it an equal with Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat in terms of its importance.

Dilemma has become a well-talked about book. For example, our weekly alternative newspaper, City Pages, had an article last week, You Are Where You Eat, which discusses some of the Twin City area grocery stores, including Whole Foods. Pollan's experience with shopping and eating food from Whole Foods was one of the four meals discussed in his book.

That experience wasn't highly praised by Pollan, which created some public dialogue between Pollan and Whole Foods' John Mackay. (Some of that discussion is highlighted in the City Pages article.) I think Pollan's critique is important, especially since Whole Foods is a major player in the organic food market.

From a personal standpoint, I appreciate that I had the time to read The Omnivore's Dilemma. I have been made more aware of how my food choices affect the ecosystem. On a practical day-to-day level, it helped me be more appreciative of cooking. Our family's life is often very busy, and I have been taking a more conscious effort in preparing better meals in terms of higher quality ingredients and some presentation to make that family time special.

Tags: Michael Pollan, The Omnivore's Dilemma , family life

TCCL 2006-07 is now completed

I would like to thank David Kuhns, the tournament director, for running this excellent event. The Twin Cities Chess League is an enjoyable experience and one of my favorite events of the chess year.

I would also like to thank my teammates, Kelly, John, and Blaine, for giving it your best each week. We had many good games, and although we didn't end up with a great score for the season, I feel like we learned plenty this year, and I look forward to next September to play stronger chess.

Thanks also to Will for subbing in December.

For those Minnesota chess players who have not yet heard of this event or who have not yet played in this, I would highly recommend it.

Tags: Twin Cities Chess League, chess

The Final Round: Number Seven of the TCCL is this Friday

We will be playing our last round of the season this Friday against The Defrocked Bishops. I have very much enjoyed this season and look forward to next year.

Tags: Twin Cities Chess League, chess

Spring is only two weeks away!

I am getting enthusiastic about the arrival of Spring. Although there are a couple of feet of snow to melt in my neighborhood, the temperature this weekend will get up above 40 each day. So, there will be slush aplenty, but that will only bring us closer to the 20th! I am getting excited to start bike riding again and getting outdoors regularly with my family!

Reaction to latest FDA decision

Yesterday I saw a little snippet running along the bottom of my TV as I was watching CNN. The Washington Post reported that the FDA will be approving an antibiotic for use in treating a bovine respiratory disease. This antibiotic, Cefquinome, is also used as a last resort against certain human infections.

I am not pleased with this, and this helps to make me willing to only buy beef raised from cattle that are grown free-range. There are plenty of reactions to this story, including this one, which illustrates how antibiotic resistance develops.

It seems that the FDA is not practicing science in the public's interest!

Tags: organic food, FDA, antibiotics

My round one game in clickable format

Here is my first round game from the Minnesota Open.

Important article on Peak Oil

One of my online friends, Terra Praeta, pointed me towards Dave Pollard's latest blog article, this one on peak oil.

For those who are unfamiliar with the term, peak oil is the point in time in which half of the world's oil has been extracted. By estimates from many geologists, we are at that point.

"So, we still have plenty of oil left" is a fair comment. However, as Pollard points out, it takes more energy to produce a gallon of oil now than it did in the past.

Quoting:

"The amount of energy needed to produce each barrel of oil has increased from the equivalent of 0.04 barrels at the start of the oil boom (when we were busy converting our economy to be oil-powered) to over half a barrel today. If this trend continues (and there is nothing to lead us to believe it won't), by 2030 we will be using more than a barrel of oil equivalent energy to produce every barrel of oil."

This reasoning is the same reasoning I have used to critique ethanol production as it is currently produced. Cellulosic ethanol is another means that is gaining momentum.

If you are interested, please read The Party's Over, which talks about peak oil in more detail.

After reading Pollard's article, I turned down my thermostat and put on a sweater. (Thanks for the reminder!)

Tags: oil, peak oil

Andrew Sullivan's Quote of the Day

Andrew Sullivan highlighted an article from the New York Times on Stewart Brand. I think Sullivan's comments and the original article are both worth a read. Brand is a lively creative thinker.

Pessimism is a powerful force, but optimism and creativity are important tools for our survival and evolution in our complex world. Even as scary as global warming can appear, most people I have talked with seem to have their heads on straight. They deal with the facts and do not seem to be pulled under by the fear of what could be. Rather, they have the motivation to create workable solutions to aid in our survival.

Checking In: Check It Out

The snow held off long enough this past Saturday to allow coaches, tournament directors, and students to show up at North High School for the bi-annual Check It Out Chess Tournament for Minneapolis Public Schools. It was my first time helping out with this.

It is a K-12 tournament broken up into three sections: K-3, 4-6, 7-12. There were roughly 160 students who played in this one, which is pretty good considering the snow held many people back from driving this weekend.

I was mainly responsible for the computer work for the 7-12 section, but I also helped adjudicate a couple of situations. The students treated each other well, and they played seven rounds of chess.

I thought this was a good tournament. There were some students who were getting their feet wet by playing in this, while others were fairly seasoned and knew their stuff.

I had a good time, despite a somewhat slow drive back home after the match in the falling snow.

Tags: chess, scholastic chess, Minneapolis, Minnesota

My experience in the 114th Annual Minnesota Chess Open, part IV: Wrap-up

Saturday was a very exhausting day, and I was disappointed with my results (0-3-1) as well as with Saturday night's game. I knew I'd be sitting at the bottom couple of tables, just as I did for the last two rounds of the HB Tournament last year.

I was on the second to last table, and one of the players on the last table said, "Tough to be here, huh?" I agreed. But, I think it is important to remember that although we are sitting at the highest numbered tables, it does not mean we have lame or uninteresting games. My last round at the HB Tournament last year was a Rook, Knight, and Pawns (mine) against a Queen and Pawns (his) endgame. My opponent did win, but I made that one as difficult as I could. I enjoyed playing it, especially as I was considering withdrawing for the last round and just watching the top boards.

Also, a player should not let a low score interfere with appreciation of well-played games against good opponents. As I checked out the pairing tables, I saw that my first round opponent was sitting on Board One for our section against the eventual winner of our section, Chris Gill, who I played in the Minnesota Class tournament in December. I thought, "Well, if I got a draw against the first board player, I can't be doing all bad."

Back to my own game: I was pleased to be playing Black against Steve Helmueller for the fifth round. We played in the Minnesota Open last year, and he and his wife are very nice people. I spoke with both of them last year.

Steve played 1.d4 this Sunday morning, as he did last year. (No one played 1. e4 against me this time, so I got great experience in Queen Pawn openings this tournament. I needed the practice.) We had a very interesting position after the first five moves:

1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 d6 3. c4 g6 4. b4! I never saw that before, but I enjoyed the novelty and engaged in a game that certainly did not come from any rote memory. 4...b6. 5. e3 Bb7. This was going to be a memorable game!

(I've already entered it in Chessmaster and will look at the analysis later, but I wanted to enter it and show it to the readers as I thought it was a tricky game.)

We had a middle game that featured my winning an exchange of my Knight for his Rook, but as the endgame developed, I wondered now if having played 21...Nxb2 would have been better by depriving him of one of his Bishops which featured so prominently in the endgame.

We traded down to a Rook and two Bishop vs two Rooks and Bishop endgame, with many Pawns left on the board. Whereas I felt I had the end before the endgame, I saw any real or imagined advantage disappearing. Steve used those two Bishops quite well, and I am sure I could have resigned much earlier. However, I was trying to hang in there and be sure I was evaluating everything the best I could.

When I resigned, I gladly shook my opponent's hand. I spoke to Steve's wife shortly thereafter, and told her about our tough game that he won. She told me that he enjoys playing chess against me. That made me smile, which came through my tired visage.

Rich and I met for lunch, and I told him that I was thinking about withdrawing for the last round. One of the perks was that I would get home early, not making my wife a "chess widow" for any longer this weekend, and have some time with both her and our son.

When I got back to talk to the TD, I found that I got the 1-point bye for the last round. That is a bit humbling, but should not have been unexpected. One other nice thing came out of that, though. Besides making it home early, which was greatly appreciated by all three of us, I got to play an extra rated game against a new member to the USCF. It was her first rated game. I thought she played a very good game.

So, this ends my stories about this weekend's tournament. I will be posting most of the complete games later.

Tags: Minnesota, chess

In case you missed it: Garry Kasparov on Russia

Yesterday I went to my favorite coffee shop, Fireroast Mountain Cafe, to get some beans. Lisa, one of the owners, asked me if I heard the story with Garry Kasparov on NPR earlier in the day. I did not, but I found it on the NPR site here. Garry explains the state of Russian political life.

Tags: Kasparov, Russia, politics

My experience in the 114th Annual Minnesota Chess Open, part III: Chess and music

My parents are occasional readers of my blog. My mom said "If I didn't know you, I'd say you were obsessed with chess and music." Yeah, that's very accurate.

Besides my chess equipment, the other important item I brought with me this weekend was my iPod. ( Melissa bought it for me for a Father's Day present, and I have shown my appreciation by using it often.) In preparation for the tournament, I added some new music to it. My staples for the Thursday Knighter events are live shows from The Dead, Hydra and STS9. I describe these latter two as "electronic hippy music."

But because this was an entire weekend of chess, and I know how grueling a tournament is, I downloaded some more driving music, including KMFDM, Skinny Puppy, Tool, and The Red Hot Chili Peppers.

After my four hour game with my friend Rich and a short lunch break, I came back to play number three seed, Lonny Arvidson. (I did mention that I was playing up almost every round.) Before we got going, I started the Chili Peppers.

I got Black again, as in the last game, and he played 1. d4. Since I felt like I laid everything on the line with the Dutch in my previous game, I did not want to play that again. Rather, I played a King's Indian Defense against Lonny.

I had a good opening and middle game in which his pieces were not in ideal spots, and mine were putting lots of pressure on his. However, in the late middle game, where I think I have the greatest difficulty, the position became simplified, and Lonny ended up with a passed Pawn. His remaining pieces were able to coordinate an attack while continuing to push that Pawn to Queenhood. I resigned on his 40th move.

Neither of us used that much time, as we each had 50 minutes left on our clock. The upside was being done quickly, and having some time to recover for the final round of the day at 7 p.m. However, I was very exhausted from the 6-1/2 hours of chess I already played that day, so I savored every minute away from the tournament hall.

Just after 7 I walked into the hall, ready to face my next opponent, Kevin Lu. He is an elementary grade student and a quiet one on the outside. However, his game was everything but quiet.

I played White this time, and we got into a Sicilian, specifically 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3. His 5th move was e5. I've only played against this variation one other time, and not knowing that the proper response was Ndb5, I played 6. Nf5. His 6th and 7th moves were d5 and d4. Already my position was a goner, and he kept on coordinating his attack against my very poorly placed pieces.

I tried to keep myself going while listening to KMFDM and Tool, but music was far from my problem in this game. It was my only horrible game in the tournament, but one in which I wish I had known the opening theory.

Tags: Minnesota, chess, music

My experience in the 114th Annual Minnesota Chess Open, part II

The highlight for the tournament for me was Saturday morning. I had stayed a long enough time on Friday night to find that Rich had drawn his game, even being a piece down. Incredible! Before I left to go back to the tournament, I told Melissa that it would be a hoot if Rich and I were paired, since we each had a 1/2 point. I wasn't sure how many people drew on Friday night, but there was a chance.

I saw Rich just moments before I walked over to the wall chart for round two. Yep, "Rich Durocher v Joe Erjavec." I got a big smile knowing I was going to play my friend. (And we agreed the day before that we would get lunch and coffee together. The good thing about playing each other was that we would both be done at the same time!)

The first move was 1. d4. I hadn't played the following for a while, but it was time for me to break it out again....f5! I played the Dutch.

Unlike my last post, I'm not going to get into the details of the game right now. Rather, I want to talk about the spirit of the game. I feel such a spirit of fellowship, despite the fact that chess is extremely competitive.

Rich and I played an extremely hard fought game. I thought both our openings were strong, we made the position as complicated as possible for each other, and despite the fact that the game was going long (it ended up finishing after 2:15, a four-hour game), I kept focused on playing my best game, as did Rich.

During the game, I kept thinking about this Zen parable that I found in an old book. I posted it on my website with credit to the author. I don't think it's been reprinted since 1970, which is a shame, because it is a delightful paperback rich with nuggets of wisdom.

He had me in a bind, and I opened the position up with some mild complications by sacking my Knight for two pawns to open up some lines against his King and other pieces. He defended well, including having to face some repeated checks. Once the position was simplified, though, he had a Bishop and Pawns against my Pawns, and he won the game.

We did get to go out for lunch, but it was not too casual, as the next round was supposed to start at 2:30. But it was nice to have a few minutes of downtime to recover and talk about the game that we just finished! It is never enough time, and soon we were back into the throes of battle against new opponents shortly thereafter.

Tags: Minnesota, chess

My experience in the 114th Annual Minnesota Chess Open, part I

My perspective in writing this piece and those to follow in the next couple of days is that of the drama of any player playing under the intense conditions of a chess tournament. The first time I played in the Minnesota Open was in 2003, where I played up two sections in the Reserve section, the same section I played this weekend. At that time, when my rating was over 300 points less than it is today, with a corresponding shortage of knowledge of the game compared to today, I ended up with a mere 1.5 points--I had a draw and a one point bye for one of the rounds. So begins this story...

On Friday night, the Minnesota State Chess Association had its annual board meeting. The first part featured a report by Roger Redmond on the financial state of affairs of the MSCA, while the second part featured leaving President Shu Lee's words on the state of the MSCA. We elected a new board, which is composed of myself, Ed Conway, Kevin AhTou, David Kuhns, Roger Redmond, and two new members, Dan Peplinski and John Flores. (Welcome, again, Dan and John! Thank you for running and joining!)

At the conclusion of the meeting we began the 114th Annual Minnesota Open chess tournament. I was playing in the Reserve section (U1700). As my current published rating is 1391, I was playing in the bottom third of my section. (My seed number was about 40). So, I played up nearly every round.

My first round game was White against 16th seed, Hindson Her, rated 1540. It started out as B14, the Caro-Kann Panov-Botvinnik Attack. As regular readers of my blog who are interested in chess may know, I love playing the Black side of the Caro-Kann. This was possibly the first time I played the White side of the Caro in a rated game.

This game was fairly even for the first 14 moves, with both of us finding natural feeling moves. We each had about 95 minutes on the clock after his move.


At this point, although I was almost certain that he was going to move that Knight to d5, I had a good 15 minute think about my next move. As I tend to be an aggressive player, sometimes committing too early to an attack, I did not want to play too crazy a game. I played the quiet 16. a3, and he did move his Knight to d5.

That a3 was problematic later on, as it provided a target for his pieces after he hunted a pawn with 20...Rxc3. As you can see, three of his pieces are trained on that square, while I had but one defender.


However, this was where I ignored the Pawn and quickly complicated matters with 21. Ng4. I had a little bit of breathing room in terms of the time crunch, but I was still behind. We played a few more moves, and I got some sweet relief with Qd2, threatening the Rook and taking advantage of a mating attack on the weakly-protected King.


Hindson took 20 minutes on this move. I was able to get up, release the tension I was feeling, and looked at some of my friends' games. (My buddy Rich was a piece down in his game a few boards over from mine against a lower-rated player.)

When I saw that he finally hit the plunger, I was just three minutes down, 47 to his 50. He played 23...h5, attacking my Knight. I was impressed, and I figured out what would go first, my Knight or his Rook.

I played 24. Nh6+. The follow through was Kh7, 25. Nf5 Qf8 26. Qxc3 exf5, leaving ugly triple pawns!


We had some interesting endgame play in which he was going for the mating attack with 31...h3, while I was trying to trade down and take advantage of the triple pawns. We each had some errors, and we played to a draw on move 39.

Hindson and I talked after the game. This was his first major event since high school. We complimented each other on our play and wished each other luck for the remaining games.

I was pretty tired after this 3-1/2 hour game, but I was reminding myself and some of my friends that "tomorrow, we have three of these!"

I went home excited and got a good sleep after waking up Melissa with my chatter about the first round and the night in general.

Tags: Minnesota, chess