Chess Life

Amazingly I received a postcard from the USCF today. It begins with,

Dear former USCF member:
WE WANT YOU BACK!

The offer goes on to describe savings in regard to subscriptions. I am impressed. So I will rejoin the USCF, not that I know anybody in chess nowadays. But it seems to me that their offer is a bargain. I have a stack of CHESS LIFE more than a foot high. This might add another couple of inches.

Which brings us to a chess game I was playing over today. My opponent was a certified A-player who would later become an expert at least. The game ended in the fog of confusion which precludes accurate history. In other words I stopped recording the game when seconds became precious increments of time. Here is the game. I played Black:

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.f3 O-O 6.Be3 Re8 (This might be the Saemisch Variation of the King's Indian Defense. In any case we both knew it fairly well, having played it from time to time. I rarely played the KI, preferring the Nimzo instead. Why did I play this defense on that night? We will never know. I don't remember.) 7.Qd2 e5 8.d5 c6 9.Nge2 cd5 10.cd5 Nbd7 11.Ng3 Nc5 12.Be2 Bd7 13.h4 h5 14.Bg5 Qb6 15.Nf1 Na4 16.Ne3 Nc3 17.bc3 Nh7 (Remember that we were totally involved in in the game. Our clocks were ticking. Time was running out for both of us. Yet we needed to allot enough time to each move in order to ensure that there would be no 'surprise' in the immediate future.) 18.g4 Ng5 19.hg5 hg4 20.fg4 Rac8 21.Bd3 Qc5 22.Rc1 b5 23.Rf1 b4 24.c4 a5 25.Ke2 a4 26.Rb1 Rb8 27.Kf3 Rb6 28.Nc2 b3 29.ab3 ab3 30.Na1 (There is no more abject position on the chessboard for a knight. I must have been savoring the moment)...Rfb8 31.Rb2 (being gassed here) Bf8 32.Rh1 Qc8 33.Qg2 Bg7 34.Rhb1 Ba4 35.Qd2 Bf8 36.Qa5 Bd7 37.Rg1 Ra6 (I think this game control was G90. That is, each player had to finish his game in 90 minutes. There is no time information on the scoresheet.) 38.Qc3 Bg4+ 39.Rg4 Ra1 40.Rb3 Rb3 41.Qb3 Qc5 42.Qb2 Ra3 43.Ke2 Qa7 44.Qb1 Qd4 45.Rg1...

The scoresheet ends there with the comment ' 1/2 - 1/2 around move 60 - 65.'

The notes on the back of the scoresheet read: "I got in Emerson's face about his smoking in the room. He got REALLY pissed. I called the NTD. Also, I was originally scheduled to play O'Neil but NTD changed the pairings. No Friday night chess. This is the last night at FH-III."