Prague 2000, tourism, love, oh well

This is a web page of pictures from backgammon tournaments I've gone to, mostly. Every now and then I get around to fooling with it. Like right now! I'll put up pictures from tournaments within a few days or a week or a year after playing in them, depending on my whim. I stopped playing for a while, and haven't really started up (well, I happened into Las Vegas Dec 2003, took 3rd, and again at the 2005 Paris Masters and Open, where I won a jackpot or so).

For playing backgammon I was just hanging around on Gamesgrid (www.gamesgrid.com), where I would spin my wheels playing the bots.

Then I started playing on Play65, where the jackpots are automated (I wonder why they don't do that on GG) and they have occasional money-added events. Also, every now and then a chouette at Beronni's in Menlo Park, and I even made it to the Monday Evening Chouette in North Oakland.

2006: So much for Play65. I don't know what they've done, but I can't get on there. I get some ridiculous error message. And they don't respond to my demands for my money.

Then I was mostly found on Truemoneygames, which I got into again via poker. See below!

Now (Oct 2006) it's Party, Stars, TMG and FullTilt; I must wonder how that idiotic religious nutcase 2nd generation crook Frist's bogus law will change my habits. Or place of origin. Bloody hell.

Best gear is new Wolverine boots. Steel toes again, but they're light, like Rockports. Weird lacing. It may be a while before this pair looks like Arnie in Terminator.

And supersocks: I got a couple pairs of some Australian socks, they seemed great but bunched in the toes; then I found "ingenius" boot socks at the Outdoor store. They are the absolute nuts. I spent $18 on a pair. I got another pair. I'm throwing money at socks...

I am now more a poker player than anything else. I was just filling out some form on a poker site (Littlewoods I think) and it asked for "profession" and didn't have an option "online poker player." that felt wrong. It was Gabe who finally pushed me into playing, with "prepping" by Bob "Coach" Ciaffone and Shino. Once I was going, Pete was my main mentor, and of course Diana. And Jinelle even gets some backhand credit, dragging me onto TMG to help her game, when as they say, the teacher learns more than the student...

I had a "result," a mere ten weeks after taking the game up. I played in some little Sunday tournament on Party Poker (where I am "ekwity:), and .... well, I paid $26 and won $36. How could *that* be bad?? (Okay, I'm leaving out a few zeroes...)

Oh yes, I am also: noted commentator on Chess.fm !! Alas, you can no longer simply check it out, since it now requires ICC membership. But there is a trick, trial membership.

I mostly do live realtime commentary to major chess events. For example, once of my first jobs was to cover Cap d'Agde 2003, which had 11 of the top 12 players in the world! [Anand beat Kramnik in a fine last game to take first!]

Sep 2004: I did a couple rounds of Dortmund (including the game Kramnik-Leko, a "sample" before their upcoming match). I am certainly not the player I used to be, but we have fun and do manage to get into the games.

Jul 2005: going to cover Biel in a couple weeks. I've been there a few times, my first wife's mother lives just six blocks from the site!

2006: Chess.fm is now officially the "ICC Webcast," part of the Internet Chess Club (www.chessclub.com). See you there as well! (ID ekw) (I *do* play the odd speed game...)

March 2006: Okay, that was a while ago! I didn't realize this has been going on so long! I've just been covering both Linares and the US Championship in San Diego. 32 games at once?!?? Crazy. The only person to complain was the woman doing the synched chessboard, "you talk too fast!" SORRYY....

EinsteinsCoffee

What I'm on: Fry's junk model "Great Quality" laptop (I needed something when my Sony Vaio stopped powering up), Canon Powershot S100 Digital Elph (time for a new one), Mozilla Firefox, cygwin, (g)vi(m) in a telnet window.