Chess Report

 One last note from Paul Morley's account of David Bowie before it's consigned to its upstairs shelf alongside Lou Reed, Marc Bolan and Tony Visconti. He includes Bowie's list of 100 books which might be a project to replicate one day but he also says Bowie spent a lot of time playing chess later on. Perhaps that's what we creative types ( ! ) do when the urge to produce new work diminishes, something abstract, with ideas but ultimately meaningless. 

It's a while since I reported from the front line of Lichess. I was floating aimlessly in the 1600's at Bullet, which is 2 mins + 1 second per move, and left it at 1677, which is only Top 29%, bearing in mind that the bottom 30% are likely to be players that gave it a go, got beat a few times and didn't go back. I returned to Rapid, with 10 mins on the clock. I had reached an all-time high of 1993 in February 2022, had a shot at the landmark rating of 2000, lost and slithered down to 1894. So, in the last six weeks I rebuilt that to 1981, Top 8%, almost within touching distance of a personal best and another shot at 2000, but now I'm back at 1946.

2000 could happen. There will be a celebration here and I'll immediately switch to Blitz so as never to ruin that rating again. Meanwhile, I persevere. I'm not sure if it's therapeutic or addictive but it has its moments of both inpsiration and despair. 

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Next up in books, I should return to the History of Writing. I don't think I can quite face the horrors of Phil Spector after the interminable elusiveness of Bowie.

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I understand the remaining Beatles and Stones are making a record together. I'm not convinced that's a brilliant idea. It's better than doing some more Fawlty Towers for sure but almost any idea would be a better idea than that.