Now writing, now taking a break. Playing chess online against the bot "Sven", whom I should be able to beat with my eyes closed, only - for some reason, I don't.
Inaccuracies, Mistakes, Blunders.
Sven, he's a barometer of my mental wellness, 1100, my chess rating should be substantially better than this, only - it's not. My mistakes - blunders, are trivial, yet still they recur, there's no "long term strategy", merely move, move - ooops, the blunderbuss of my incompetence, inattention, keeps the game running to 20, 30, 50, even 150 moves.
Games I should win with my eyes closed.
There are days when I win - it seems that it is the day that decides, not my ability - some days, the games are short, victory is swift. Others - defeat inevitable and invariably prolonged far beyond what I should be comfortable with. There seems to be no common denominator - play drunk, hungover, sober as a judge - there's something else going on upstairs that decides even before I wake how the day will proceed.
Now - I know this game. I've played it - on and off - 35 years. My real ranking should be in the low 2000. Minimum. I used to play a friend, Milan, in the cafe's of Edmonton - we were evenly matched, meaning to say that both of us were bad - but I recall playing him once - he had me cornered - his checkmate assured, when somehow a light went on in the back of my brain, and I saw a full 7 moves ahead, my way out - an epiphany of sorts - and playing them through won the game.
For the record, chess masters only "see" 2 or 3 moves ahead - merely they know what moves are better, what moves are not - and so the game is built largely upon habitual responses to every foreseeable move.
But this is it - the game - it plays itself in the back of your mind, it's not playing the game that's so difficult, it's getting myself out of the way so that the light in the back of my head can play, me, I'm casting an incompetent's shadow on the board, it's not Sven, it's me defeating myself.
And this I am finding highly annoying.