Blunders, Eight-stringed Ukuleles and Random Winged Insects: Voran's blog

[Voran]

And unfortunately a not so happy post.

I found out one of my Facebook friends died of a drug overdose.

I didn't know him all that well but still sad to hear my friend is gone. No more jokes and stories and crazy blunderous chess games.

RIP Warwick. If you see a small stocky black cat named Zane please tell him I said hello.

 

[SkeeterAB]

I am so sorry. That is awful.

I know you would hate it if I recited any of the standard platitudes in these circumstances so I won’t write them here.

Anita

 

[Voran]

Yeah I dearly wish he'd found his way to something less destructive than cocaine.

 

[Voran]

Feel a bit rough today because I somehow managed to make a spectacularly stupid blunder that lost me both rooks.

Oh well. It happens.

 

[Voran]

Also on the subject of chess and general cerebral stuff...I had some broader thoughts on intelligence and nature vs nurture.

I have this theory that we all have a dormant reservoir of intelligence that we end up not using because there's no real social and cultural reason to use it.

I was labelled gifted as a child. I could multiply 5-digit numbers in my head on the fly. I used to do it as a party trick to freak people out. Sounds superhuman...right?

But wait a second: was it really that my brain was special and better than other people's...or was it simply the case that no one had told me I couldn't?

I was 7. I was deadly naive. I simply didn't know that mathematics was a 'hard' subject that only 'smart' people could comprehend. I saw a movie about a child genius and I decided on a whim that I was going to be a genius too. I had no mental blocks holding me back and no sense of noooo this is hard using up mental energy that could go to calculation.

It also doesn't help that in western cultures the childhood and teen peer culture is against achievement and smarts. I remember other kids having a field day taking the piss out of me because I used 'long' words. Examples being 'morbid' or 'obscure'. And this was seen as totally normal and I was the broken one who needed to learn 'social skills' and probably had Asperger's. Knowing two-syllable words was seen as a disorder.

We could take some lessons from Asian cultures. I know they have their own problems but they at least appreciate that the brain is a gift.

 

[Voran]

Gotta love the internet. Two GMs announcing that they have to pee before their chess match.

 

[Voran]

A company are giving away free tungsten carbide rings as part of a promo event.

I just giggled and drooled a little and had an adrenaline rush at the same time. I looooooooooooooove tungsten carbide rings. I am Smaug but with tungsten carbide.

 

[Voran]

10th place out of 57 people. Not bad given I'm the only one up there in the top ten in a sea of 2000s and up. The user 'mutbgheithak' is me.

Hourly HyperBullet Arena: Standard ½+0 rated #ws5GyFDf

57 players compete in the May 3, 2024 Hourly HyperBullet Arena. ½+0 rated games are played during 27 minutes. JaffaCakes takes the prize home!

lichess.org

 

[Voran]

I want to play some more but I just don't have adrenaline left in me. I'll eat a bowl of noodles and play some more hyperbullet tomorrow.

 

[kkimura]

Noodles! The breakfast of champions!

 

[Voran]

Trying to watch the movie Arctic Void and the male lead actors range from okayish looking to vomit inducingly ugly. It's getting hard to care what happens to them. Also Jim the sea captain is creepy and gross and I want him to go away.

 

[Voran]

I can't enjoy this. I can't get myself to care if these characters get mauled by a polar bear. LOL.

 

[ploverwing]

I can't enjoy this. I can't get myself to care if these characters get mauled by a polar bear. LOL.

Are you cheering on the polar bear?

 

[Voran]

Are you cheering on the polar bear?

Yes

 

[Voran]

Side note: I love polar bears. I wish there were a tame version so I could have one.

 

[Voran]

Woohoo just got invited to play vs my old friend GM Raven Sturt in a simul. He's not streaming but it's nice to see him.

I miss our old dynamic where I donated money every time he said the word doo doo. (Context: he always said doo doo instead of s** because he liked his show to be family friendly and I found it hilarious and never let go of it).

 

[Voran]

Working on my short scifi novellette. Finding I really have to push through a lot of 'shoulds'. I keep putting myself under pressure to write long-ass passages just to write long-ass passages. And I tell myself no...writing is not about shoulds. When some caveman or cavewoman first came up with a story about a sky deity or a three-headed monster, they weren't fussing and handwringing about filling a word count.

This is an experimental format I'm playing with anyway. I'll be interspersing chapters with abstract art, quotes, facts about sleep, EEG-like waveforms, symbolic glyphs, diagrams of molecules and whatever else I feel like playing fast and loose with. It's a story about people misusing technology to stay awake for long periods and I basically want the story itself to come off like it's sleep deprived but trying to stay awake long enough to bear witness to something.

 

[Voran]

I was in a low mood this morning. No real reason other than the estrogen drop all women get once a month.

But I got a nice annihilation sequence in one of my daily chess games and...yup. I am back to my real self.

Nothing is quite so fun as the ol X-shaped maneuver where the bishop and queen work in synchrony. Good night. Go sleepy byes now.

 

[Voran]

I got to pet a delightful little cat today. Super silky plush tabby with big adorable green eyes. She's someone else's but I got to give her a lil shoulder massage

 

[Voran]

I won my 30-minute game despite being down a rook tonight. I figured there was a chance I could lever open the pawn protection around the king so I set about attacking pieces such that they had to move then sending my queen in.

It's been hard getting out of a slump but it has most definitely been worth switching to longer time controls. I can practise thinking skills much more effectively if I have half an hour on the clock.

I still enjoy blitz and rapid...but they're for fun not for serious improvement.