Two Fun Games At Club This Week

 

Sunday, November 1st

I solved my Spaced Repetition problems, and did a little game review today.

Monday, November 2nd

I did some Attack and Defense problems on Tsumego Dragon.

 

 

Tuesday, November 3rd

I lost my NAOL game tonight by 24.5 points.  It was a disappointment.  I feel like I don't know how to play go.

The November season of BenKyo League is now active.  We have six groups this season.  Each group has six or five members per group.  What this means is that in most groups 40% of members will win one-on-one lesson time with Ben. This is not allowing for ties, which can result in even more members winning lesson time.  In October we had a three way tie for first place in one of our groups.

Now is the ideal time to join BenKyo League. When you join, please message me (buzzsaw) on Ben's discord to let me know that you have joined. Also let Ben know that buzzsaw sent you.

 

 

Wednesday, November 4th

I attended the Princeton Go Club tonight for the first time in three weeks. I listened to the All Thing Go podcast on my way to the club, getting there at 6:00  pm, playing two games, and leaving at about 9:45 pm when I finished the podcast on my way home.

My first game was with Hochul.  This was my fifth game with Hochul.  In our most recent game we had used a reverse komi equivalent to seven stones of handicap.  I had won by 5.5 so we decided to maintain the same handicap, but this time we used stones instead of reverse komi.  Hochul won this time by 4.5, so the handicap is still a good one for us.  He tells me that I have multiple opportunities to hurt his white stones, and I am sure that Ben will tell me about that.  I failed to see white's weaknesses. I felt pushed around, and it felt pretty terrible at times.  I nearly actually cried when a second harassed group seemed destined to die. I wasn't even sure how I pulled off living.  Some of the things I played may have carried more threats than I realized, or maybe Hochul saw how close I was to breaking down, and had mercy on me. There were essentially two large groups that nearly died during the game, but no more than a few random stones were actually captured.  I was simply harassed and reduced, reduced, reduced all over the board.  I don't feel so bad about a 4.5 loss. It felt good to have lost within a margin that was respectable.

 

My second game was with Fred.  This was his return to the Princeton Go Club after decades.  As we chatted during our game, we learned that our association goes way back to the early years of the new century. It was at that time that we attended multiple Yang Workshops in Gaithersburg, Maryland. I was between 18k and perhaps 13k during those years, and Fred was 1k, so we were never in the same group, and were only in the same room during the lecture segments of the workshop.  That may account for why I didn't remember his face, or it might just be my aging brain. For our game today we decided to try a two stone handicap game with me taking black.  I managed to win by 27.5 points, which surprised me.  I'll admit that it was a high to win that game. The next time we play we can try an even game and see how that goes.

I had a great night at the club.  I had a really close loss, and an unexpected sizable win that came with a walk down memory lane.

I am going to be scheduling two 60 minute Semi-Private Lesson with Ben to review these two games.

Clossius was assigned to review my NAOL game tonight.  I messaged him and told him that I would be at go club, so I could not attend live, but I would watch the video later. I asked him to drop me a link to it, which he did.

 

 

Thursday, November 5th,

I watched a BenKyo League Title Tournament game today.

Friday, November 6th

I created problems for the NAOL game that Clossius reviewed for me on Wednesday night.

Saturday, November 7th

I did 57 Attack and Defense problems in Tsumego Dragon.

I played my NAOL game for next week today at 3:00 pm.  It was a peaceful game which I won by 18.5 points.  I tried something different for this game.  I decided to make Malcovich comments.  I had plenty of time to write them since I don't really use my time.  Making the comments calmed me, and I think it helped.  When I stopped making the comments I think I started to play faster.  I counted a few times, and I was confident about the game.

You Should Be Watching NAOL Reviews

 

Sunday, October 25th

We had a long BKL admin meeting today.  It lasted nearly three hours.

Monday, October 26th

Oh my god! I went to do my Internet Go School problems this morning, and found that I had lost five vacation days because I was so focused on something else, and I forgot all about doing my problems.  I am down to six vacation days, and dangerously close to losing my streak altogether if I get forgetful again in the near future.

 

 

 

 

Yes.  I clicked through the 100+ problems and marked them hard without even looking at them. That's what I do.

I listened to the Star Point podcast Episode 142: Too Peaceful, No Fun.  In this episode he  mentions the famous OGS rank re-calibration of 2021.  At my level it turned out to be a five stone calibration from 12 kyu to 7 kyu.

I worked on problems for a recent game with Hochul and created 50 problems for the game. That was super fun.

 

 

Tuesday, October 27th

I played a four stone handicap game with a BenKyo League member today.  I managed to win by a small margin.  It was a fun game. My opponent played very well, and would have won if not for an error in which he played a self atari. I don't like to win that way, but a lesson was learned.

I participated in the BenKyo Study Group tsumego class today.

I won my NAOL game.

 

Wednesday, October 28th

I listened to the latest episode of All Things Go.  It is S6.13 Tang Tianyuan on Going Pro, AI Cheating Suspicions & Teaching Across Borders.

I decided not to attend go club tonight.  I watched NAOL game reviews instead.

I watched Clossius review at 7:00 PM, and I watched Ben review at 9:00 PM.

Ben was in the middle of reviewing my game when someone ended the session for everyone.  Ben needed to finish the review offline.  I'll be able to see the rest of it when it gets published.  The guy who starts reviewing at 10:00 PM is going to have to be told that Ben routinely puts in overtime and that the session should not be ended for everyone.  While you may not be participating in NAOL as a player, you can watch the NAOL reviews after the fact.  Reviews are recorded, and the videos are published weekly in a blog post on the USGO website.

 

You will find the NAOL Review Blog in the 4th row of blogs immediately below my own blog.

 

 

Thursday, October 29th

I spent four hours tonight working on stuff I can't talk about yet.

Friday, October 30th

I spent a good deal of time creating problems for some of my recent games.  One of them was the NAOL game that Ben reviewed for me Wednesday night.

Saturday, October 31st

I spent more time creating problems today.

Today is the last day of the October season of BenKyo League.  I watched a league member get in two games in a row for the league today.  I watched two other last minute league games as well.  I love seeing the end-of-season flurry of activity. For me, today was about watching rather than doing. Tomorrow starts our three day transitional period between seasons for BenKyo League.  The next season of BKL starts late in the day on November 3rd.

There is no better time to join Benkyo League.  If you join please tell Ben that buzzsaw sent you.

 

 

I Blundered in My NAOL Game

I didn't go into a lot of detail this week, and there are no images either, so this was really easy to post.

 

Sunday, October 18th

I spent a great deal of time today solving problems created for my recent games.  

 

Monday, October 19th

I didn't sleep well last night so I am taking a rest day.

I listened to the latest episode of Star Point.

Tuesday, October 20th

I lost my NAOL game tonight.  I was ahead, and it was almost over, and then something bad happened.  I made a mistake and I suffered because of it. I lost the game by 14.5 points. I'll have Clossius look at it on Friday.

Wednesday, October 21st

I didn't go to club tonight, but I did listen to the latest episode of All things Go.  It was a brief episode.  It was the final episode of a series for beginners. After finishing it though, I saw that there was another episode, Go's Enduring Appeal,  to listen to, and so I did.

Thursday, October 22nd

In my lesson with Ben today we reviewed a game I played with Parker last week at the Princeton Go Club. We spent the full 90 minutes on that one game.

Friday, October 23rd

I had a lesson with Clossius during which he reviewed five of my recent games. Two of them were NAOL games.

Saturday, October 24th

I watched Ben's Group Class live about reviewing your own games.  It is the second in a series.

 

What Happens at Club Doesn't Necessarily Stay at Club

 

Sunday, October 11th

We had a long administrative meeting for BenKyo League today.

 

Monday, October 12th

A game I played five and a half years ago ended up being drawn to my attention last Saturday.  I managed to find it, and noticed that, in the chat of the game, I mentioned that it might get reviewed the next day because I was starting lessons with Clossius. 

Anyone who wants to view the game can see it here.

 

I decided to take a look at my first lesson with Clossius, which you can find here. It was live streamed. The game I played the day before did not get reviewed.  It turned out that Clossius was more interested in reviewing something else. Viewing this lesson was a major walk down memory lane for me. I have been taking lessons with Clossius now for five and a half years.

 

This was the first time I had a lesson on Twitch so there was some misunderstanding at the beginning about the fact that I needed to mute the Twitch Stream.  You can skip over all of that. There is mention of my involvement with the American Yunguseng Dojang, which I continued with from 2019 to 2024. I did five years of AYD. Clossius mentions that he has me as 12k on OGS, but that was before the famous rank adjustments.  The adjustment put me to 7k. That was a five stone increase in rank for me, and it is shown retroactively in all games from before the adjustment.  During this lesson Clossius reviews a game I played on KGS with one of my 6k accounts. My OGS account was 7k.

 

This lesson was exactly one year to the day before I started lessons with BenKyo Baduk.  My lesson anniversary with both of my current teachers is January 13th.

Today I listened to the newest episode of Star Point.  The title of the episode is 140: Honing Your Go Sense.

 

Tuesday, October 13th

I participated in the BenKyo League tsumego class.

I won my first NAOL game of the 24th season by 0.5

I played three games on Fox tonight using Better Baduk as a playing interface.  It worked really well.  I might end up giving up my subscription to Parallels Desktop since the only reason I subscribe is so I can play on Fox.

 

 

Wednesday, October 14th

I listened to the new episode on All Things Go tonight.  I listened to about thirty minutes of it on my way to the Princeton Go club. 

I played Parker who had to take 104.5 points of reverse komi this time. That is his own fault because he keeps winning. Tonight his winning streak came to an end. I won the game by 21.5 points, and Parker will be back to 91.5 points of reverse Komi next time. Hopefully I can chip away at that over time.

I then watched Andy and Parker play a game. They used a clock with no main time and five periods of 30 seconds byo yomi.  I told them that this information was going into the blog, and I joked that if something happens at the club it may end up in the blog.

There was some discussion tonight about the video of the lesson I had with Ben last Thursday, which I posted to the club Discord server.  Andy brought up the fact that Ben had likened strategy in go to holding cards in Magic The Gathering.  Parker has not watched that video yet, but was interested in doing so.  I am going to be listening to the video again soon to create go problems from the reviews of the two games that Ben and I covered in that lesson, so I will pay particular attention to the references to Magic The Gathering when they comes up.

I listened to more of the All Things Go podcast on my way home from the Princeton Go club, and I am finishing up the rest of it at home right now.  I think that listening to the All Things Go podcast going to and from the club is going to become a weekly tradition.  It makes sense that I do it with All Things Go rather than Star Point because Travis, the creator of All Things Go, is actually a member of the Princeton Go Club.

 

 

Thursday, October 15th

Tonight a few of the Princeton Go Club members watched Parker play his NAOL game.  I was able to participate in that because the game was at a time other than the default playing time.  A few of us gathered in the voice channel on the Princeton Go Club Discord, and commented on the game as it took place.  Parker was doing great, and then he made a mistake that turned the game.  I felt his pain. We all felt his pain.  Discussion continued post game.

 

Friday, October 16th 

Members of the Princeton Go Club gathered again on Discord to watch the NAOL game of Andy.  Discussion continued after the game, but I needed to leave for my 8:00 pm scheduled activitiy. I proceeded to lead my tsumego group.

 

Saturday, October 17th

I worked on a lot of stuff I can't talk about yet.

2700 Days in a Row

Most of my post this week is dedicated to my weekly visit at the Princeton Go Club. 

 

Sunday, October 4th

I logged into the Awesome Baduk discord and noticed a video for Bent Four in the Corner for the 10k to 15k level, and I watched it.

Monday, October 5th

I hit a new benchmark at The Internet Go School, I have completed 2,700 days in a row.  Well, not literally in a row. You earn vacation days, and if you miss a day, and have a vacation day to use, you keep your streak. On the day I hit 2700 days in a row I had nine vacation days left.

 

 

 

I spent a good deal of time reviewing games today.

Tuesday, October 6th,

I listened to the new Star Point podcast and the new All Things Go podcast. I should probably save one or the other of these podcasts for later in the week to spread out the go podcast goodness a little bit.  I'll have to think about this.

I attended the BKL tsumego group.

More Level 2 problems in Tsumego Dragon

• 33 Loop/Ko

I spent a good deal of time working on go problems created from a recent lesson with Ben.

 

 

Wednesday, October 7th

I attended the Princeton Go Club tonight which made me really happy because I was unable to go last week. I played two games, and had a great time.  Winning both of the games was a plus, but I think I would have been equally happy if the games had gone in the opposite direction by the same margin. Both of the games had very small margins. These are the types of games I like. The games where I die big, or simply lose by huge margins from bleeding point, are both demoralizing, but I think I am taking them well. When I lose by fewer than ten points I feel as if I played well, but a little less efficiently than I should have.

The first game of the evening was with Hochul.  We played a game with 78.5 points of reverse komi. We based the level of komi on the results of three games we played one night in quick succession. That was well over a month ago, so it was definitely time for us to play again.  All three of those games were five stone handicap games. The first two games ended in early resignations by me after something died. Ben told me, when he reviewed those games, that both of those resignations were premature. Hochul and I got the last game to go to scoring in an attempt to get a handle on what a proper handicap ought to be. It ended up being a fairly decisive victory for Hochul. We decided that, as a result, a seven stone negative komi equivalent would make sense.  I won our game tonight by 5.5, which makes us believe that we have found a good handicap.

Here is our game on Better Baduk.

 

Terri vs. Hochul 

 

 

The second game was with Andy.  We had played three times previously, and have not yet zeroed in on a proper handicap.  Our most recent game was three stones, but had been quite a while ago, so we decided to try three stones again.  I asked Andy to choose between reverse komi and stones.  He chose stones. We had a very close game, but I squeaked out a victory.  So it appears as if three stones is a good handicap.  I've won twice at three stones, and I think that we probably ought to observe a three-game kadoban with rank changing after three consecutive wins for one player or the other.  I was disappointed in my recording skills in this game because I messed something up on the game record and had to abandon recording very near the end of the game

I found out later that I had accidentally given white 7.5 points of komi when I set up the game.  I later fixed the metadata to reflect the correct komi.  Better Baduk gave me this message when I did that.

 

 

 

Here is our game on Better Baduk. This link reflects what the AI estimates the score to be when I stopped recording with the corrected komi.

 

Terri vs. Andy 

 

 

Hochul was kind enough to fill in the extra stones on the board to replicate the final board position.  I took a screen capture of that, and here it is. (However, this result still reflects the 7.5 komi error.) So it is probably actually B+ 10.5 

 

 

Andy brings out the best in me according to Better Baduk's estimate of my rank in the game with him compared to my rank in the game with Hochul.

Against Andy, I am 5 dan.

 

 

 

 

Compare that to the Better Baduk estimate of my rank based on the Hochul game, where I am 8 kyu.

 

 

 

Thursday, October 8th

I started my day with spaced repetition problems on The Internet Go School.  I lost another vacation day earlier this week, but it is what it is.  I just have to be better about remembering to do my problems.  Today I came upon an easy problem and had to laugh because I will surely be dead when it will come around again.  I will be well over 100 years old in 34 years.  

 

 

 

 

BTW, this is not a one move problem, but it was super easy.

I had a lesson with Ben today. We reviewed the two games I played last night at The Princeton Go Club where I will share the reviews.

 

Friday, October 9th

I again spent a good deal of time working on creating go problems.

I lead my usual tsumego group tonight.  We used Tsumego Hero.

 

 

Saturday, October 10th

I attended Ben's Study Group Class today.  The subject of the class was reviewing your own games. It was a great class.  One of the things Ben recommended is to review the game without AI first and, assuming you are using OGS, drop a variation for every move you feel is questionable, or that you want to follow up on.  I tend to be guilty of not reviewing my games myself. I depend on my teachers to review them. I have a lot of lesson time to spend, and relatively few games to review, so it is easy to get them all reviewed by my teachers.  Ben's class today convinced me, however, that I will get more from my lessons if I review my games on my own ahead of time.  I've already noticed that when I have bothered to click through recent games before a lesson, I get more from the lesson. When asked for alternative moves I am more likely to come up with good ones, and the game feels more fresh.

 

 

 

You Should Be Playing In NAOL

 

I have been so late in getting out last week's journal entries, that I am combining them with this week's journal entries, so here you will find two weeks of my ramblings about go.

Week one

 

Sunday, September 20th

I reviewed my the 60 minute lesson I had with Ben yesterday.  It was the lesson in which Ben reviewed the game I played with Kyle at the Princeton Go Club last Wednesday.  I created 22 problems for that game in AI Sensei. I use AI Sensei problems to review the things that Ben went over in our lessons, so the problems are sometimes remembrances rather than problems in the usual sense of the word.  I wish there was a way to share the problems, but that is currently impossible to do. I am thinking that I need an alternate means of summarizing my lessons for future review. I want a way to cut to the meat of the lessons without having to listen to every minute over again. I thought that AI Sensei problems would provide me with that means, but the lack of control I have over viewing them has been disappointing.

 

 

Continuing with the Level 1 problems in Tsumego Dragon:

• I did Snapback and Throw In Tactic for a total of 48 problems.
• I did Vital Wedge, Squeeze Tactic, Shape, Connect & Die, and Eye vs. No Eye for 29 problems
• I did Double Threat / Atari, Capture Race, Endgame (Yose), and Opening Basics for 84 problems
• I did Mutual Life, Liberty Shortage, and Bamboo Snapback for 14 problems
• I did Loop/ko and Double Loop/ko for 5 problems.

I think I have done almost all of the problems from Level 1 now.  I may be missing a few based on the math of the groups from today and yesterday, but it is not going to be worth my time to try to track down the few problems that I missed.  I'll try to be more systematic with Level 2 when I start doing that level.  My main goal is to go through all of the problems up through Level 3.  I'll probably repeat that periodically.

 

 

Monday, September 21st

Here I go with Level 2 of Tsumego Dragon. 

• 46 Capture problems.
• 58 Connecting problems.

There were new episodes for both Star Point and All Things Go.  I listened to both episodes. It is great to have fresh episodes every week.

 

 

Tuesday, September 22nd

I had a really bad night sleeping last night. I woke up at about 4:30 am, and unable to go back to sleep.  Since I have an important NAOL game tonight I took a nap in the afternoon so I can try to be fresh for my game.

I lost my NAOL game tonight.  I did finish Season 23 at 4:1 

 

 

Wednesday, September 23rd

Here I go again continuing with Level 2. To avoid missing any problems I have decided to do the categories in the order in which they appear in the app, rather than grouping them based on similarity.

• 17 Disconnect
• 29 Double Threat / Atari

I attended the Princeton Go Club.  Parker and I played two reverse komi games.  He keeps winning, so he had to take on increasing amounts of reverse komi starting with 78.5 for the first game, which I lost, and then 91.5 for the second game. I've arranged lesson time with Ben to review both of these games.  I've scheduled two 60 minute lessons. We will cover each game in separate lessons.

 

 

I had to leave the club at 9:00 pm to get back in time for an NAOL review with Ben.  My game was the last of three he was scheduled to review between 9:00 pm and 10:00 pm.  I got back home by 9:30, to find Ben still holding forth on the first game, which did not surprise me.  Ben gives great reviews for NAOL and spends more time than the twenty minutes per review he is contracted for.  This particular session lasted for two and a half hours, and he ended up spending over an hour on my game alone.  It turns out that I didn't play that poorly, which made me feel better. I made a mistake with a reduction that ended up getting contained, and then I handled the fight that resulted poorly. I should have run farther with those stones before making them live. 

If you have an AGA membership, and you are not playing in NAOL, you are seriously missing out. Season 23 just ended, and it probably won't be long before they open up registration for Season 24.

To peak your interest in playing in the NAOL, I will provide you with a link to Ben's most recent set of reviews. Mine is the last game.

The link provided will start at the beginning of my game review. 

 

 

BenKyo's NAOL Review S23 R5

 

 

Thursday, September 24th

In my lesson today with Ben we played a teaching game with a lot of discussion during the game. I felt like I needed more immediate feedback, so I wanted to give that a try.

 

Friday, September 25th

I lead my usual tsumego group in the evening at 8:00 PM.

 

Saturday, September 26th

Back to Level 2 problems in Tsumego Dragon.

• 100 Capture Race

Week Two

 

Sunday, September 27th

I played a game on PlayGo. gg, and felt as if I might not have played a bot this time. I have a lesson with Clossius this Friday. I should play a few more games to make sure I have enough material for him.

 

Monday, September 28th

I missed a day of spaced repetition problems on the Internet Go School, and am now down to 10 vacation days. This happens when I have a bad night of sleep, am too tired to do problems first thing in the morning, and then forget about them for the rest of the day. I was too tired to engage in any go activities on Tuesday, but I could have at least clicked through the problems to avoid losing a vacation day. I should just do that on a day I am too tired to do the problems first thing. It is way to easy to forget to get back to them.

 

 

 

Tuesday, September 29th

I discovered the problem with spaced repetition this morning when I went to do my problems and found two days worth of problems waiting for me and another gap in my progress graph.

I worked on Level 2 problems in Tsumego Dragon:

• 38 problems of Discovered Cut, Endgame (Yose), and Opening Basics
• 48 problems of Net
• 50 problems of Ladder

A cool thing about the net problems is the ability to see the opportunity to break the bamboo.  When you do a whole series of net problems the unfinished bamboo shape starts to jump out at you.

I attended the BenKyo Study Group tsumego session today.  We had nine people in attendance.

NAOL is now on break between seasons, so there was no NAOL game to play tonight. As a result I was able to schedule a lesson with Ben for 8:00 pm, when I ordinarily would have been playing an NAOL game.  It was a 60 minute Semi-Private Lesson.  We reviewed the first game I played against Parker at the Princeton Go Club last Wednesday. The second game will be reviewed on Saturday afternoon.

 

 

Wednesday, September 30th

I spent some time reviewing a few recent games with AI, listened to the most recent All Things Go podcast, and stayed up until midnight because it is the last day of the September season of BenKyo League.  We have a three day transition period during which time we prepare for the new season, and I like to get a head start on some of the administrative tasks associated with the transition.

Thursday, October 1st

I had a meeting with Ben today and we worked on some cool stuff I can't talk about yet.

I can't believe that I missed another day of problems on the Internet Go School.  That is two vacation days lost this week. I am down to 9 vacation days. This has to stop.

I watched a couple BenKyo League members play a game in the evening.

 

 

Friday, October 2nd

I had a two hour lesson with Clossius.  He reviewed five games for me and we finished up the lesson with a few problems in Tsumego Dragon because I ran out of games and had about ten minutes leftover, not enough time for a game even if I had it.  We did spend time looking at my 53.5 point loss against Katago, and we reviewed that game in Better Baduk where it was played.

Clossius likes the UI of Better Baduk.  I do too.  It is very attractive.

Saturday, October 3rd

I lead a tsumego group this morning for the BKL Study Group. I shared my screen and we used Tsumego Dragon.

Oh god no! 

 

 

 

I missed another day of problems on The Internet Go School, and I lost another vacation day.  Three vacation days lost in one week!  This insanity had got to stop! I am not only burning up vacation days I am wasting my money, especially since my reaction to missing a day is to click through the problems rather than to solve them.

The 3rd of the month is the night when Ben announces the beginning of the new season of BenKyo League.

Go Magic's Life and Death Volume Two is out!

I started it tonight.

 

Tackling Easy Problems in Tsumego Dragon

 

Sunday, September 13th

I mostly just did my Internet Go School problems and took a break from other go study for the day.

Monday, September 14th

The new season of Star Point has begun.  Of course I have devoured the new episode.

Tuesday, September 15th

I watched Patrick stream his NAOL game and stuck around for the review. I had no game of my own to play today because I played two NAOL games last week. Therefore I must wait until next week to see if I can finish Season 23 with a 5:0 record for probably the first time.

 

 

Wednesday, September 16th

I decided to try playing against AI using the Better Baduk web app. My second game against Katago ended up going to end game with me losing by a mere 53.5 which totally amazed me. That has to be a fluke.

 

buzzsaw vs. Katago

 

I listened to the latest episode of the podcast All Things Go.

While I was listening to the podcast I decided to do some easy go problems.  I opened up a set of all categories of problems at Level 1 on Tsumego Dragon.  I found it really easy to concentrate on the podcast and solve problems at the same time.  I usually do sets of a specific category of problem, so it was interesting to have all of the categories coming at me, and to think about the goal of the problem before I solved it. One of the things I noticed was that I was actually reading the problems all the way through before solving them, which is not always the case with Level 3 problems. I am at Level 3 with the Tsumego Dragon Assessment system.  There are 569 problems in the set I am working on.  Perhaps I will try to do them all in one day.

Oh crap.  I was chipping away at the Level 1 problems and I inadvertently exited by clicking on the wrong "back" button when I wanted to revisit a problem after clicking ahead to a new one.  It took me out of my problem set with no way to return to my random order of problems. I had finished half of them already. I'm not starting over again today, but I will make it a point to try getting through all of the Level 1 problems at some point soon.

I attended the Princeton Go Club tonight as usual.  I ended up playing Kyle again.  He played two games at once. When we have an odd number of people someone often ends up playing a simul game so everyone can play.  Kyle took black against Parker and and white against me. Here he is considering a move he is about to play in his game with me. Notice that I am using Better Baduk to record my game.

 

 

 

 

 

I lost, as usual. I have only won one game against Kyle, and that was due to a snapback fluke, so I don't put much stock in the win. I'm asking for 26.5 points of reverse komi next time, moving from a two stone handicap equivalent to a three stone handicap equivalent.

Thursday, September 17th

I had my usual lesson with Ben.  We spent the entire 90 minutes on the game I played with Kyle, not last night, but the week before.  I've already schedule an additional 60 minute lesson to cover the game from last night.  That will happen on Saturday.  I've already dropped today's lesson link into the Princeton Go Club Discord channel.  Ben spent time in that lesson giving me some 3-5 joseki to commit to memory. I am going to practice those joseki on an actual board.

 

 

Friday, September 18th

I was upset to notice this morning that I had failed to do my Internet Go School spaced repetition problems yesterday.  I'd had a terrible night of sleep Wednesday night, and didn't do my problems first thing in the morning.  I had a nice streak of doing my problems every day for a while which I ruined on Thursday. I need to do better with following through on my problems even when I don't get a good night of sleep. I will admit that I disposed of the larger number of problems by marking them all hard. After all, tomorrow is another day. (Channelling my Scarlett O'Hara.)

I am feeling unfocused concerning my go studies.  I'm not sure what to focus on next. There is so much to do. I decided to take the time to watch my lesson with Ben from yesterday, and at least do some screen captures of the 3-5 joseki suggestions.

Tonight I lead my usual one hour tsumego group.

 

 

Saturday, September 19th

Today Ben's Group Class was BenKyo's Opening Principles Revisited.

I decided to do all of the Beginner Level problems on Tsumego Dragon this morning. There are 307 of them. I finished them all in one sitting. I am definitely going to do all of the problems through Level 3, and it is nice to have the easiest ones out of the way.

Level 1 consists of 569 problems.  At some point I will try to solve all of those problems without losing track of things like I did the first time I attempted it. I think the best way to manage this is probably to select a few categories at a time to break up the sessions so they are no more than 100 problems per session.  I probably ought to take note of which categories I am doing in each session so I can be sure that I am not duplicating categories in later sessions.

Ben and I had a one hour lesson in the afternoon to review the game that Kyle and I played on Wednesday at the Princeton Go Club. That lesson is also being posted on the Princeton Go Club Discord.

 

I completed 375 of the Level One problems tonight.

• I started with Connecting and Disconnect which yielded 70 problems at Level 1
• I moved on to Capture which yielded 170 problems at Level 1
• I then did Three Point Eye, Four Point Eye, and Five Point Eye yielding 42 problems at Level 1. (there were no problems at Level 1 for Six Point Eye, and Nine Space Eye)
• I then did Making Eyes, Taking Eyes, False Eye, and Corner Life and Death for an additional 51 problems at level 1
• I ended my problems for the evening with Net and Ladder for an additional 42 problems at Level 1

That is enough for one day. I'll work on doing the rest next week.