Oza Baltimore - Day Two

It is the day afer the Oza and I am very tired. I didn’t get home until after 11:00 PM and it was a long trip home with much to think about. I slept until 9:00 AM to recover, which is a few hours past my usual wakeup time so I am rested, yet groggy.

Day two of the Oza started off well with a win which brought my record to 3-1, and provided the promise of at least a face saving result of 3-3 by tournament’s end, which is exactly what I ended up getting.

The day started off with the fourth game, in which I played black. It was a peaceful and fairly uneventful game which was quite close through the late middle game. It was touch and go though, and was anyone’s game. Fairly late in the game my opponent attempted to invade a solid corner and tried to set up a ko for life, but I declined to play it because it really wasn’t a ko at all. It just looked like one. Then later on we were putting finishing touches on the edges of territory. I played a move which I expected my opponent would realize was atari against six stones. This move required that he capture one of my stones to save his six. I never saw it as a potential trick play, and I never though that he would miss the threat. It had to be played eventually since it was forcing and would gain a point for me and lose a point for him when he took, but I guess the move was played late enough that it was not perceived as the real threat that it was. That move turned a possible win into a sure win. But at the end of the game we determined that it had not been game deciding afterall, which made me feel much better about it. I’m sure my opponent felt better as well. No one likes to win or lose a game based on that kind of oversight. After pushing around the stones during the scoring phase and seeing that it was a clear win we never actually bothered to come up with the exact number of points, but it appeared not to be over ten, yet less than twenty.

After my third win of the tournament I was destined to meet stronger opposition in the form of a 9 kyu during my fifth game. At least I got to play black again. I lost this game by 18.5. The dan players who reviewed the game afterwards liked my position early on… up through move 70, in fact. They said that I lost the game because I failed to invade the lower left corner at the 3-3 in a timely fashion. In addition to that, I had earlier failed to extend from a three stone wall on the bottom in favor of adding a stone to a framework in the upper right in response to an approach move which I thought would be followed by an invading pincer. Late in the game I did attempt the invasion at the 3-3 after it had been reinforced with an additional stone by my opponent. I made a valiant effort at life, which failed. I probably should not have forced my opponent to connect three in a row to make the killing nakade shape, which I knew he was strong enough to recognize as the killing move. People are known to make mistakes, however, so I did force that move on the off chance that the proper response might have been missed. I stopped short of capturing the nakade and making him throw in to complete the kill. Having made the nakade in the first place there was no doubt in my mind that he would throw in. I see no point in playing a truly insulting move. After game five I was 3-2 and feeling optimistic about the possibility of winning again, especially since I was not likely to meet a 9k again. However, another win was not to be.

My sixth and last game was against a 10 kyu. I had the white stones in my hand again, which is never easy for me, but I gave it my best shot. Up until this point all of my opponents had been clearly at least twenty years younger than myself, although I had played only one child. My last opponent was in my own age range, and obviously experienced. My opponent took a fairly clear lead in this game, and gave me some trouble with a group along the top which he made annoyingly small, and then attempted to kill. He had stones on either side of the eye which bordered the upper side. He did a hane on the first line and when I did atari he did hane on the other side so that I could not block without being captured. I expected this after the first hane. I could read that far, but I saw no choice but to atari his first hane and see where it might lead. As much as my atari was probably death, failure to atari was SURE death. After his second hane from the outside I considered resignation, but I looked more carefully and I realized that if I threw in and he took I could squeeze and he could not connect to the second hane due to a shortage of liberties. I had not seen that until my atari and his second hane were in place. I would never have been able to read that situation a year ago even after the addition of those two moves, and I am certainly glad that I didn't talk myself out of continuing based on how far I actually could read. I've been known to do that on occasion. When I threw in my opponent appeared to be surprised, but he then read it too, and connected out the stone that was short allowing me to save my group. After I managed to live along the top my opponent knew I could read… at least a little bit. Another highlight of this sixth game was my invasion of the upper left, which was necessary because I was behind. I thought it was destined to die, but I managed to make it live. I am going to have some stronger players look at that position. I thought I knew the killing move for my opponent, but after trying it for black in a variation I found that I was able to refute it. Maybe the invasion did deserve to win afterall. Stronger players will be able to tell me. Since it was the last game of the day I didn’t have anyone look at it yet, but I will load it up on KGS for some friends to take a look. After living in the upper left I thought I had a chance, but I needed more to win. I next managed to reduce the lower left quite successfully by jumping across a 3rd line stone from the 2nd line to the 2nd line which my opponent could not cut off. After that I counted myself ahead by a couple of points, but I think I may have been wrong. In any case I had a group in the lower right that needed an extra stone thrown in to avoid seki, and I was afraid that I could not afford to play that stone and gambled that my opponent would view it as alive. As it turned out my opponent jumped into that group. I avoided death, and got the seki I deserved. I’m still not sure if it cost me the game or not, but I did lose by about ten points, and I think there were only eight points in that territory to begin with, so throwing in a stone would have had me down by three points at the end if that were the case. The game brought my opponent’s record to 3-3 and my own to 3-3 so I figure we both got what we deserved regardless.

Aside from my first game loss, my three wins came early in the tournament. I consider myself lucky in that respect because I was able to play stronger players in my last two games. I played white three times and I played black three times. The beauty of the system is that even though it is nearly impossible to go 6-0, it is also nearly impossible to go 0-6. If your rating is accurate you are going to hit a wall somewhere and your fortune will be reversed, whether that means eventually winning, or eventually losing. 6-0 records are for children, beginners, and players who don’t play regularly enough to have their rating keep up with their improvement. And every once in awhile I guess someone else has a couple really good days, in which case they deserve to go 6-0.

One positive for me to focus on from this tournament is that my stamina was obviously up, and I credit that as much to physical exercise as to lessons. Heaven knows I don’t play enough, nor do I do enough tsumego. I have recently started doing cardio activity on an almost daily basis, which is supposed to be as good for your brain as it is for the rest of your body. Another positive is that aside from my swift resignation in my first game, all of my games were reasonably close. I include the second game resignation because if it had not been for cutting off a group the game would have gone on to completion, and it would have been a close one, which I think I still would have won.

In spite of telling myself that 3-3 if good and fair, I will admit to some disappointment that I had not been able to pull off a 4-2 record given the difference between my AGA rating and my KGS rating, as well as the observations of so many that my play has improved dramatically in the year since retirement. The breakthrough they have been predicting will come some day, but apparently the time is not now. There will be more tournaments soon. For now I must focus on study, stamina, and playing. These are the things that will make the difference in the long run.

I am very happy to have gotten so much analysis from stronger players between games at the Oza, and I am going to seek even more review online to add to the lessons to be learned from this tournament. I may have had three losses, but I only had one game to be ashamed of.

I had a great time. I have a Yang workshop coming up in four weeks to look forward to in the Chicago area, which will be followed the next week by the New Jersey Open in Princeton, which will be followed a month later by a one day tournament at The University of Pennsylvania. My Winter go calendar is full, and life is good.

Oza Baltimore - Day One

The Oza has been great fun. I've had an opportunity to meet NannyOgg, Flameblade and others for the first time as well as the opportunity to touch base with old friends from across the East Coast at least.

I played the lightning round at the reception the night before the first day of the tournament. There were four players to a table and we played three games with one player staying put and the others rotating around the table. Time constraints were 10 minutes basic time, sudden death. I don't play blitz online, so it was not like me to do this, but I had a glass of wine in one hand and a go stone in the other, and it worked out okay. I actually managed my clock very well, and won one of those games. It was fun.

In the main event I went 2-1 in the first day.

I played my first game against a very young girl who was quite a strong fighter, and who I observed later forcing resignations from her future opponents. I was in lightning go mode from the evening before, and unfortuantely got drawn into a quick game, which I resigned ten minutes into the game from a hopeless position. The slips hadn't even come out. How embarressing. Given the fact that four hours had been devoted to the round, I had time on my hands. My opponent had played a Chinese Opening, which I did not know how to handle. Later Massaki Hamaguchi, who is mh online and our Wings 2008 League King, showed me how to handle the Chinese opening as white, and also how to handle some other common opening situations to avoid a fighting game.

In my second game of the day I played black. I got to play my usual opening of 3-4, and 4-4 with a low knight's move shimari extension from the 3-4. I actually got to extend from that shimari in the optimal direction down the side, which surprised me since I nearly never get that opportunity. The game was ultra peaceful. I played quite solidly and succeeded in getting at least a 25 point lead. I then cut off a group, and a resignation swiftly followed. What was really eventful about this game, however, was the successful invasion which I played very lightly which drew praise from even the dan players.

In my thrid game of the day I was white again playing against another Chinese opening. Thanks to the advice from mh I knew enough to appoach the 3-4 with a large knight's move. But what really made me proud of my win in that game was that I came from behind in the end game and kept sente. Although I should have gone after the two double sente end game moves one move earlier, my opponent answered my small move in the middle of the board, and I went on to get those two sente moves by extending to the second line from the third line in both cases before doing hane from the second line to the first, thus maintaining sente and going on to get the other really big end game moves. The two double sente end game moves alone won the game, which was W+8.5 with komi being only 6.5, so I actually won it on the board by 2 points. It was slow, solid, and close.

I can hardly wait to see what the second day brings.

Go Blog You Should Read

I have added a fairly new go blog to my list of links. It is Sol's Blog of Go and Fun

Sol.ch, is a strong dan player, a regular poster on Go Discussions, and has just recently decided to enter the world of Go Blogging. He has done so in a big way with posts full of real go content including diagrams from his games. I've enjoyed reading his posts, and have responded to a couple of them.

If you haven't discovered this blog yet, please stop by and take a look.

All About Life And Death

I am having another lesson tomorrow. In my most recent lesson I was told to do more puzzles meaning more life and death. I have a few ways to study life and death. I have the problems that come with SmartGo. I have The "Get Strong At Life And Death" book. I also have the Davies "Life and Death" from the Elementary Go Series. I have read through parts of both of these books from time to time, but have never read straight through either one of them. I also have "1001 Life and Death Problems" from the Mastering The Basics series of books.

But the jewel in my collection of life and death books is the two volume set by Cho Chikun "All About Life And death", which is currently out of print.

The way I study my collection of go books, not just life and death, is way too random. I flit from topic to topic rarely finishing one book before I have torn into another.

I want to set a goal for myself to really spend time with the Cho Chikun books and play through all of the diagrams in the two volume set of "All About Life And Death". I started yesterday with my single convex yunzi stones which made it really easy to pick up the stones from the variations without destroying the initial positions. I am working through Part 1 - Life and Death On The Second Line, and have gotten through Pattern 9.

I might make sgf files of each of the patterns so I can upload them to KGS and present them to my students. There are 346 patterns in the two volumes. Creating the sgf files would be good reinforcement. I wouldn't bother to add the comments to the files because I would have the books to refer to during the online analysis of the positions. If I did an sgf file with multiple positions for each Part I would have ten sgf files representing the patterns in the book. For instance, Part 1 is Life and Death On The Second Line and it consists of 22 patterns.

Perhaps this is just some crazy task I won't complete, but it would be really nice to have those files on my tablet to review. That way I can look at the position without seeing the continuations on the pages of the book. It would be a good way of reviewing the information to refresh my memory from time to time.

I need to able to recognize more positions from sight without having to read them out each time.

Single Convex Yunzi Stones Arrived Today

I was so happy to get my single convex yunzi stones from Yellow Mountain Imports today. I placed my order on the 20th so it only took eight days for them to arrive.

The first thing I noticed is that the white bowl is significantly taller than the black bowl, but they seemed to be about equally full. Upon examination it became clear that the black stones are not only smaller in diameter than the white stones, which was expected, but also noticably thinner as well, which I didn't expect, but was certainly fine, and makes sense given the fact that if they were the same thickness they would be out of proportion.

My bowl for the black stones was a bit lopsided, which I found to be quite charming actually. The lids fit amazingly well. I actually had to work a little the first time to open the bowls. I can imagine transporting these bowls strapped into my Ishi travel bag without worrying about the lids coming off.

I have not washed nor treated the stones with oil yet, and I am not sure if I am going to bother to do so. I like the feel of the stones as they are. I really like the thickness, and since I bought the smaller stones they fit well on my Japanese sized board. They are a little more difficult to remove from the board than double convex stones. I find it easier to remove them with a thumb and index finger rather than with the index finger and middle finger that I use to place them initially.

Where these stones really shine is in game review when it comes time to play out a variation. I decided to try them out with a game from Go World. I chose the first game in issue 95 (Summer of 2002). The game was titled "Meinen Magic in the Fujitsu Cup". Even though I have the Go World Digital Archive I happen to have a hard copy of that issue. I found the game in Smart Go and made a copy of it to load in my Go World tab in Smart Go and renamed the record GW095-01. Pak Yeong-hyeon was white and O Meien was black. I read through the commentary for each figure before I added the stones to the board so I would know to stop for commented moves and to play out variations. I clicked through the record on my tablet pc and had my hiba board next to it. As I clicked through the game I placed the yunzi stones on the board. When I came to a variation I put out the stones upside down. It was so easy to remove the variations after I was done playing them. All I had to do was look for the flat stones and pull them off the board, and I didn't have to worry about messing up the main line of play.

These stones are a pleasure to use and a value when you consider that you are getting stones and bowls for one reasonable price. I would recommend them as a first set of stones to anyone.

I'm actually thinking that I might like them better than my slate and shell stones that I paid over $500.00 for. Maybe I will sell them some day so I can buy more go books.

I am considering using these to mirror my online games to slow myself down and to force myself to read looking at real stones instead of the computer screen.

I love my single convex yunzis.

Going To The OZA in Baltimore

I was on the fence about this for a few weeks, but I finally decided that I am really going to the OZA in Baltimore this year. This will be my first time at the OZA, so I am really excited. It will also be my first tournament since starting my lessons with Mr. Yang again. I notice that there are a good number of players near my strength (11 kyu) already registered for the OZA, and that can only get better as the event approaches. This was not true when I first considered going. At that time I would have been pretty much alone at the bottom of the field. It was looking pretty lonely in the double digit kyus, but now I have plenty of company. It seems I can look forward to even games after all.

I can also look forward to finally meeting the primary inspiration for my go blog, NannyOgg from KGS, who is the author of the Shodan Challenge blog, a link to which has been in my list of links since the inception of my blog, along with Chiyo Dad's blog link. Nanny has been an inspiration as she has detailed her journey to Shodan.

New Go Stones

I broke down this morning and finally bought the single convex yunzi stones that I have been wanting from Yellow Mountain Imports.

I have been wanting these to use in reviewing games, and my frustration yesterday over being afraid to try the variations in the games I was reviewing (for fear of losing my place) made me dust off the Pay Pal account and make the purchase.

I can hardly wait for these stones to arrive.

Studying With Go World

The three back issues I had ordered of Go World arrived.

Last night and this morning I replayed the first three games in Go World issue 111, which were the games of the 3rd Toyota & Denso Cup: Cho U vs. Yi Se-tol. I played them on my hiba board with my slate and shell stones in front of the Christmas tree. It was a pleasant experience, but I don't think I got the most out of it. Although I read the commentary, I didn't actually play out the variations, but just looked at the variation figures. I think I need to get some single convex yunzi stones for reading through my Go World collection. After carefully placing the stones of the main line on the board I was afraid to add the variation stones for fear that I would get confused and be unable to get back to the main line. If I had single convex yunzis I wouldn't have to worry about this, and could just pick up the inverted stones of the variation without even having to think about it.

One thing I noticed is that it is taking me less and less time to find the next moves in the main line diagrams. I'm not sure why, but I figure it has to be a good sign. I am also not sure what I got out of replaying the games, but I figure it couldn't have hurt.

Yang Lesson Today

I had my biweekly (fortnightly) Yang lesson today. We played and reviewed two games as usual.

At the end of the second game review I was told that I had done well today with territory, but that I had done poorly with life and death. That was an understatement. Today my life and death was terrible. I'm never really sharp with it, but I am usually better than today.

I was advised to do problems. I think I will drag out "1001 Life and Death Problems and work my way through the one move problems again.

I recorded my game reviews with Camtasia Studio again. Each review was roughly 34 minutes in length and took up 20 megs of disk space.

Go World Digital Archive - A Go Retiree's Dream Come True

I recently purchased the entire Go World Digital Archive from Kiseido... 108 glorious issues of articles, commented games, and "news", now history, of the world go scene.

At the same time I ordered the archive I subscribed to Go World to obtain future issues. Shortly after that I ordered the three back issues necessary to fill in my collection from where the digital archive ends at issue 108 and my new subscription begins at issue 112.

I had subscribed to Go World back in 1995, and have issues 72 through 97 in hard copy. I allowed my subscription to lapse at the same time that I stopped taking lessons. This was a bad decision in both cases. What could I possibly have been thinking?

I now have all 108 issues of Go World installed on my Motion M1400VA tablet PC, which happens to be the optimal go study machine. It is over three years old, but still going strong, and since go applications demand so little, I am hoping to get another two years of carting my tablet to workshops and tournaments. It's not everyone who has a three year old piece of hardware that still turns heads. I do.

But I digress... this is about the Go World Archive.

I began my exploration of the archive at issue 1, and had started to enter game records. But a quick read of the html index that came with the archive suggested that I look up the games in SmartGo . I decided to look for a game from issue 96. I first tried searching by name, at which point I discovered that I was not able to copy the name from the archive, but had to type it out instead. This inability to copy might be a security feature designed to prevent partial copying of the file, or it might be that the use of jpg images and OCR make this impossible, but it is inconvenient nonetheless. When I typed one of the names of the players I could not find any corresponding files in the library. I assumed that I had not entered the name the way SmartGo wanted to see it, so I sorted the records by date and found the game easily among the other 12 or so records for that date. Because I wanted to be able to add the variations shown in the commentary without altering the library file, I decided to rename the file and save it in a folder dedicated to holding sgf files from Go World which I have reviewed. I named the file GW096-02 because it is the second game review in the 96th issue. This folder of files should be a handy way to keep track of which games I have reviewed. I also created a new tab in SmartGo to display these records.

There is enough material in this archive to keep me occupied for a very long time.

A couple days ago someone asked me online, "Who is your favorite pro?" If he had asked "Who is your favorite teacher?" I would have said Yilun Yang without hesitation, but I had the feeling he was asking me about a playing style preference. I told him that I didn't have a favorite pro because I have not reviewed enough pro games to know whose style I like. I always felt that reviewing pro games was not very productive at my level because I won't understand most of the moves. But now it feels as if my lack of pro game viewing is a big gap in my appreciation of the game of go, which I intend to change through the use of the Go World Archive.

If I find a favorite pro I'll post about it.

Reviewing Lessons - Found Interesting Commentary

I love the way Mr. Yang teaches using even games. He leaves opportunities along the way for the student, or presents him with challenges. You can't assume that he is playing his best. You can't assume that you can trust that if he made a move that it has to be a good one, and that you should not challenge it. You have to evaluate the board just as critically as you would when you play any other opponent to look for the mistakes and weaknesses. Later in the review you find out which moves were not optimal, why they were played, what you missed, and what you could have done better.

Because of this style it is impossible for me to judge how well I am doing because the bar keeps moving. I might think I am doing really poorly when, in fact, I am doing quite well. That was illustrated by the commentary in one of my lessons I took five years ago that I reviewed today...


goddess [-]: gee I seem to be in a lot of trouble now
goddess [-]: I did hane cause I was obviously weaker
goddess [-]: but this result doesn't seem good
goddess [-]: let me try to read it
pala [-]: you did well, and i did badly today
pala [-]: that is why you will feel uncomfortable
goddess [-]: oh
goddess [-]: like when I play my tournament games
goddess [-]: and the opponent doesn't play like the people at the yang workshops
goddess [-]: and it makes me crazy
pala [-]: right
goddess [-]: well I am going to spend some time thinking now
pala [-]: that is why i have to play wildly

Back To 7k on KGS

I have fallen down on my promise to play rated games with greater regularity on KGS. I had planned to play one rated game a day on weekdays for a total of five rated games a week. I wanted to do this primarily to keep that question mark away from my rating. My resolve only lasted for a couple of weeks. I had settled in at 8k after a few weeks of rated games and then I had stopped, probably because I was devoting so much time to reviewing my past lessons.

A couple days ago someone I recognized from Go Discussions who was two stones weaker asked me for a game. I asked if he wanted a free or rated game, and he chose rated. With some measure of fear I proceeded to play the rated game fully expecting to lose. I went into it willing to lose cheerfully, sacrificing myself on the alter of go to encourage someone weaker than myself. Afterall, isn't that what we are supposed to be doing, and what others before have done for us? It is impotant to play white even if you don't feel comfortable doing it.

I was losing, but found a chance for a great double atari late in the game which brought it to a conclusion in my favor, and I was instantly 7k. The first thing that went through my mind was that I would avoid playing rated until Thursday so Mr. Yang could see my 7k even if it was to disappear later.

I have my next lesson tomorrow. I hope that having reviewed so many former lessons will help my game.

Reviewing My Former Yang Lessons

I have been reviewing my former Yang lessons to get rid of those pesky triangle marks I referred to in a recent post. But I also wanted to reveiw them to get back in the spirit of things now that I am taking lessons again.

I decided to begin with the first lesson game Mr. Yang and I played on KGS. Since November 13th I have reviewed 61 games spanning a time period of one and a half years. When I got to game 111a I had a good laugh because that game was played right after I had "beaten" at 4 dan on KGS and had become 5d? as a result. It was a joke, and I never used the game to play rated after I achieved the rank, that was never the intent so the administration didn't care since I was not going to corrupt the system. Also KGS was a lot smaller in those days, and I don't think it could be done now because the current rating system would probably not allow that rank to linger as long as it had five years ago when I played my little joke. I think I kept the vanity rating for a couple weeks.

Here is some of the commentary from the next game I played with Yang:


pala [-]: now w has two weak groups
goddess [5d?]: yes
pala [-]: not good, attach to weak stone


One interesting thing about having the rank of 5d? is that I found that I was treated very differently than I had been treated as the 6k that my rating had drifted to previously. Everyone wanted to talk to me and play with me. I had been fairly well known, and thought I was popular, but people I had never met before started coming out of the woodwork to speak to the female 5d. After a few weeks I turned off the rank and went back to life as usual, and was much happier.

SmartGo and EverNote - Perfect Together

The more I use SmartGo the more I am convinced that it is a "kick ass" go study tool. The review of my previous lessons with Yang in SmartGo has promted me to look more closely at how SmartGo handles the markup of sgf files. I find that I am in love with the way SmartGo reads coordinates from the file and places letters on the board to show these moves. (Until I actually understood what was happening I found it really confusing to have letters appearing on the board that I knew I didn't put there.) In the past I used to spend hours tediously adding triangles to mark moves referenced by coordinates so they would be easy to find. SmartGo saves me the trouble. This feature works especially well for me when I use the markup style of showing next moves with capital letters rather than lower case because it avoids the confusing duplication of letters in lower and upper case. Seeing A, a, B, b drove me absolutely nuts. But the best part is that if my way of viewing things isn't your way of viewing things, you get to have it your way. It's like SmartGo is the "Burger King" of sgf editors. I am now in the process of going through my lessons and removing all of those pesky triangles that I don't need anymore.

As much as I love SmartGo, I still cling to CGoban on occasion because of it's fantastic move tree, but the coordinate markup feature of SmartGo has forced me to take a closer look at the SmartGo tree, and I am getting used to it even though it doesn't offer the fully expanded glorious visual map that CGoban offers.

The title of this post mentions a program called EverNote. (Follow the link to buy it cheap.) I have used this program for years to collect recipes, and web clippings, and emails with registration keys for software... all the things you jot down and don't want to lose. In all that time I never actually thought about the value of this program for studying go until recently. The program is basically an endless tape of notes which you can categorize and search. I created a category called "go study journal" and I have been putting in all of the nitty gritty details of my go study... the stuff that absolutely no one is interested in, even though they might think they are... the stuff from which I choose to spare you. I can use a tool in EverNote called the "universal clipper" which not only allows me to do a screen capture ala SnagIt, but actually deposits that screen shot into an new note in the "go study journal" category, where I can then add text to annotate it.

Evernote happens to be running a special promotion until the end of November which will allow you to purchase it for thirty dollars off the regular price. It is too good a deal to miss, and you can use it to organize every other area of your life as well. I have absolutely no connection with EverNote, other than as an enthusiastic user. And I would love to see other go players benefit from its use in go study so I bring it to your attention here.

Had My Second Lesson On Thursday

I had my second lesson with Mr. Yang in my new series of lessons which I started two weeks ago. It is actually lesson 134 with Mr. Yang if you count the lessons I took previously from 1998 to 2003. I know this because I named my lesson game records with numbers, and the last two lessons I took in 2003 were named 132a and 132b. Of course that doesn't count the few times we had spent our lessons reviewing games I had played with people at my own rank.

On Thursday we played two games and reviewed them. I did screen capture videos of the lessons as I did two weeks ago, and will probably continue to do this. It takes longer to watch the videos than to click through the sgf files because the time spent thinking of alternate moves in response to Mr. Yang's questions is in the video. But it is a good way to get a feel for the flow of the game before using the sgf files. So I watch the lessons in video format two or three times.

When I took lessons previously I would edit the game records to move comments back in the record so they referred to the next move rather than to the current move. I started to do this in 2003 when I moved my lessons to KGS because it emulated the style of commenting that Mr. Yang used when he commented games off line.

My first 12 lessons were on IGS and I found it difficult to edit the game records to include the variations and the comments so I found myself getting behind in the editing. So at the 1999 go congress I asked Mr. Yang if he would play a game with me for one hour and then spend the other hour of the lesson time commenting the game offline and sending it to me. It was an unusual arrangement, but because I was a weak player I could not remember the comments and variations to insert them into the game record like a strong player would be able to do after the lesson. So I think it was a good way for me to take lessons. We started that arrangement in August of 1999 after the go congress and continued with it until January of 2001 when we started lessons on KGS.

I guess you could say that one of my claims to fame is that I was the first student to bring Mr. Yang to KGS for lessons. Others followed, and the rest is history.

Started Lessons With Yilun Yang, 7p Yesterday

After a four and a half year break I decided to start lessons again with my teacher Yilun Yang, 7p. I always loved the lessons I took with him from January of 1998 through March of 2003 (over five years). The main reason I stopped when I did was because I was not playing enough, nor studying enough, to justify taking the lessons. It was always good entertainment for me and a social event as well, but it couldn't be called studying go if I wasn't doing anything outside of the lessons to enrich my study.

That was then... this is now...

I'm retired and I have the time to play, study, and review my lessons.

Speaking of reviewing my lessons, I have discovered an exciting way to save my lessons for future review. I have a screen capture program called Camtasia Studio. Yesterday I used it to record the screen during the review of my lesson games. I sized the game window at 800 x 600 and captured only the window in which the review was taking place in order to keep file size down. Mr. Yang and I played two games in our two hour lesson. The first review resulted in a 40 minute video file. The second review resulted in a 30 minute video file. I can replay these files as often as I want and relive the review exactly as it occured in real time. I have replayed them each twice already.

Back in 1998 when I first took lessons, in the spirit of sharing, I made my lessons public on KGS in the Wings Go Club Room. They were in the late morning on Saturdays so it was a good time for most people in Europe or the United States who wanted to watch. At the time I thought that it didn't bother me to have people watching me play. I think I was fooling myself, however, to think that I wasn't self conscious, and that it didn't effect me to have all those people watching... as many as ten or more people at a time. It is probably one of the reasons that I stopped taking lessons when I did. So this time my lessons are in the English room at a time that is convenient to me, and they are private. I feel a little selfish about this, but I have to do what it right for me.

I had been thinking of starting lessons again ever since I retired, but it was a recent post to the Go Discussions web forum asking questions about your go teacher that really pushed me over the edge and got me to send the email asking about starting up again.

I am really happy to be doing this, but it is very important to me that I keep focused on what is important, which is enriching my love of the game, not improving my rating. It's not that I would mind improving my rating, but I don't want to lose sight of what is really important.

My First Crane's Nest

We have all seen the Crane's Nest in our studies of life and death. And since everyone else has seen it as well, our opponents may see it coming, and it is rare for it to come up in actual play. I played a Wings Go Club League Game last night which gave me my first opportunity to play the Crane's nest. I hope to eventually learn how to post a game record here, but for now I will just put up a couple of screen captures of this interesting game. Anyone who wants to see the setup of the position can look at my info as buzzsaw on KGS and bring up the buzzsaw-Kireta game of 2007-10-16. I was white.

Here is the Crane's Nest:

This capture was satisfying, but didn't give me nearly enough of an advatage to win the game. It happened fairly early in the game, and my opponent clearly outplayed me throughout the opening. and was leading by about nine points when I made a fatal cut that resulted in the capture of nine stones. My opponent went on to atari the cutting stone so as to make life along the bottom. The 18 point swing was enough for me to win the game with a final score of +12.5 for white.

Earlier in the game I had attempted a throw in at t7 which made the cut of r4 a failure because the black stones along the right still had two liberties and black could atari from s4 since there was no shortage of liberties for black on the left. Naturally I tenukied at that time. It was only after the final liberty of the black stones along the bottom was taken that the cut worked since either atari would result in a loss for black, albeit the atari from r3 made the most sense.

8k Again

I did what I promised and sought a rated game on KGS after my last post.

I played a 10k and at the end of the game I was 8k again.

I had a really good time reviewing the game with a 5k who happened to watch the tail end of it. We went over the corner I had killed to try a few variations.

Life is good again.

Hoboken Tournament Results

I attended the Hoboken tournament on Sunday. I enjoyed the time I spent with friends, especially a fairly new go acquaintance from the Montgomerville club who I got to know well during our hour and a half ride to and from the tournament.

However, this event turned out to be the worst tournament experience I have had since my very first tournament in 1997 when I (through ignorance) entered three stones stronger than I should have at the U.S. Go Congress in 1997 in Lancaster Pennsylvania. I went on to lose the first five tournament games of my career sending my self esteem plummeting lower each day. The low point of that week was when I spent several minutes sobbing in the ladies' room after resigning to an eight year old 26 kyu who claimed not to know better than to use her IGS rating as an entry rank. (This was back in 1997 when IGS ranks were really really tough). There is only one game per day in the main event of the congress so I had plenty of time to ponder my first dismal experiences with tournament play back in 1997. It's a wonder I bounced back, but I did.

One thing these two events had in common was the number of children I played, about 75% of my opponents were very young children. In both cases I also had a tendency to allow the first game of the tournament to set a bad tone for the rest of the event and it was a downward spiral from there on.

It's not that I mind playing children, because I really don't. I also don't mind losing. What I dislike are ugly games filled with really stupid moves, and that is what I seemed to end up playing over and over again on Sunday. The lowest moment was the point at which I forgot what color I was during a ko fight in my second game and made a "threat" against my own corner. It was a mistake from which I knew I wasn't going to recover, not so much because it would lose the game for me, because there was plenty of time to recover from it. I just wasn't in the frame of mind to recover, so I promptly resigned after that move. It was about ten minutes into the game and I had hours to ponder my stupidity before my next match. I even reprised my crying jag in the ladies' room from ten years ago after my ko debacle. This clued me in to the fact that I had reached an unusually low mental state. I had been proud of the fact that I hadn't sobbed in the ladies' room in many years. It just felt like deva vu all over again.

Having just experienced a two week streak of losses online which resulted in a ratings drop from 6k to 9k, due to the lack of a calm mind, I should have foreseen poor results and taken them in stride. But I allowed it to eat away at me, which only made matters worse. At home you can walk away from the computer. But at a tournament, aside from wasting time with a bye, you are pretty much stuck, especially if you are depending on a ride.

The highlight of the day was between the 3rd and 4th rounds when a 3k friend and I played a rengo game against my traveling companion who was also 3k. So basically, I was a handicap to my partner, since I am 11k (and playing much worse to boot). The purpose of the rengo game was to see if my partner could play simply enough so I could follow. He had said that his style is on the wild side. He tempered his moves for my benefit, and we actually did quite well. He was able to set up a net that I saw, and that brought the game to an end. My traveling companion played his side of the game without a partner.

My results for the day were 1-3. And I am not particularly proud of the fact that my win was against my smallest opponent of the day, who happened to have lost all his previous games. Not only was I a failure, but a bully as well. Well, not really, I just tried to play my best, and I happened to win one game. As for my rating... I was close enough to 10k at the start of the tournament that my three losses are unlikely to result in a drop to 12k, and even if they did, that just means easier games at the next tournament so I'm not concerned with the statistical results, just getting back on track with my game mentally.

Now I am off to seek a rated game online. I can only drop so far before I meet up against opponents I have a chance against.

Blogging is good therapy.

Down Down Down

Well I guess it can only go so far, but the meteoric rise has turned into a meteoric fall. I played my rated game today. I gave three stones to a 9k and after that loss I dropped another game to hit 7k, which I hope is as low as it goes.

I look forward to the time when I don't change rank with every game I play, win or loss. That should happen soon as I add to the data the server has to work with.