GOOD MORNING, Thursday! Always an intimate little gathering with my blog readers… It has been a while since I last wrote a ‘coffee’-column and truth be told then I must confess that I look forward to it! I usually start with a few ideas on the paper in front of me, and then let inspiration and coffee take over…though today I notice that the paper has quite a bit of back-logged items on it. Oh well, let’s just see how much I can plow thru this morning…
Where to start?!
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“The Barisieur”
Now here is a great invention! The Barisieur, as it is called (I have no idea why) is designed to get an unmarried/divorced man out of bed by brewing a freshly cup of coffee on his alarm clock and letting the seductive aroma do the rest. Hey, why not! While not quite as effective as a fire-alarm, the upside is evident.
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I miss James!
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Now here is a good laugh that caught my attention a little while ago. I did not even know that there was such a thing in cycling as the ‘Tour De California’! An Avila Beach, Calif., coffee shop is being criticized after allegedly posting an obnoxious sign on its front door announcing plans to close today “because of a silly ass bike race.”
”The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) and Chuang’s Company are recalling coffee because it contains undeclared milk. Anyone with an allergy to milk could have a serious reaction if they consume this product. No illnesses or allergic reactions have been reported in relation to the consumption of this product.
The recalled product is Old Village White Coffee in 600 gram (15 sticks x 40 grams) packages. All codes where milk is not declared on the label are recalled. The UPC number is 8 888353 362530. It was sold in British Columbia, Ontario, Quebec, and possibly nationally.
If you purchased this product and are allergic to milk, do not eat it. Return it to the place of purchase or discard. If you are not allergic to milk, this product is safe to consume.”
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THE KASPAROV–MOBILE!
I found this on twitter this morning…
Apparently, Tromso did not have any white horses available…
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RUSSIAN WOMEN’S TEAM DOES PR!
OK, I lied: I recognize Karpov and Karjakin in the background. But what a great way to promote your team and give satisfaction to fans and sponsors alike. Isn’t the social media great!
Remember, this is the defending Oympiad champion team! A team that Kasparov did NOT want to see in Tromso because of a series of misunderstandings on the part of the Tromso organizers and the RCF (Russian Chess Federation). Kasparov tried to expoit this unfortunate incident for political gains in his campaign to unseat the current FIDE president. He wrote on the 17th of this month, BEFORE the crisis was successfully resolved, with typical Ayn Rand coldness:
” Would permitting this devious maneuver (editor: Kasparov is referring to the attempt by FIDE to get Tromso to change their controversial decision) be fair to all the other teams that followed the rules and registered on time?… Either we have rules and accountability and professionalism or we do not…The Russian Federation is neither ignorant nor innocent in this case. They have sacrificed their players by seeking unfair advantage and FIDE attempted to bully the Norwegian organizers into allowing it….I have nothing but sympathy for all of the players on all of the teams excluded due to the incompetence or misconduct of their federations. All lovers of chess share their disappointment and outrage….But we must focus our frustration on those who break the rules, not on those who respect them.”
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LASKER AND STEINITZ RELATED?
Maybe! Being a history buff, this revelation came as a kind of a shocker earlier this week while I was reading a fascinating interview on ChessDom with Gilad Japhet, owner of My Heritage.com.
”I studied whether Wilhelm Steinitz, the world’s first chess champion, was related to Emanuel Lasker who was the second world chess champion and took over Steinitz. Both of them were Jewish so I figured they might actually be closely related, something that was never realized until now. The answer is affirmative! The two of them are related although I don’t think they realized it themselves back then!”
Here is the precise connection between Lasker and Steinitz:
click on image to enlarge
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Inessence, according to research done on Japhet’s initiative, Emanuel Lasker is Wilhelm Steinitz’s first cousin once removed’s husband’s wife’s nephew’s sister’s husband’s uncle’s wife’s second great niece’s ex-husband’s brother. If that sounds like a mouthfull, then it is.
After disappearing from the chess world for a full ten-years (his last tournament game was played in 2004), grandmaster Alex Lesiege showed that he was alive and well when he participated in a BLITZ tournament held during the recently completed Canadian Open/Quebec Open:
”Four Quebec GMs came out Thursday night to compete at Cafe Kuchini in the regular “Tournois de Miguel” event: GM Anton Kovalyov, GM Bator Sambuev, GM Thomas Roussel-Roozmon, and the very special guest: GM Alexandre Lesiège, playing his first blitz event in…. a decade if not forever.
In the photo you can see GMs Roussel-Roozmon and Sambuev (both center) watching the last-round game between GMs Kovalyov and Lesiège. This game — the last of the evening — ended in a draw, one of only two Anton conceded on his way to scoring a Fischer-like 21/22!
Playing at a time control (3m+2s) which didn’t even exist when he last played serioulsy, Lesiège — incredibly — showed very little signs of rust: against a 12-player RR with an average rating of over 2400 (!), his only weak round was when he dropped one game late in the evening against the tournament’s lowest rated player: David Gunapalan.”
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Tweet of the Norwegian National Team at a press conference this week. Must be difficult to play in your own country, as well as having the world’s best player included. Jealousies, rivalries, pettiness…On the other hand, a healthy positive attitude can catapult Norway into the top-10 (with a bit of luck on the side, perhaps).
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Kirsan Ilyumzhinov with a pretty alien…that spaceship looks a lot like a commercial jet!
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Canada’s own Ashley Tapp dreaming of chess on a Greek beach
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Could it be that women are taking over the chess world? LINK
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Georgia and the 2018 chess Olympiad
One of the least discussed items on the social chess-media is how FIDE is going to decide which country gets the 2018 Olympiad. Both Georgia and South Africa have put in excellent bids. Georgia’s bid is worth atleast 20 million dollars! Probably South Africa is comparable.
The intriguing thing is that if Kasparov is elected FIDE president, then the bid will likely go to South Africa. If not, then Georgia will likely get the bid. This has reprecussions on how the ECU (European Chess Union) campaign goes during the Tromso olympiad. Unfortunately, one of these excellent olympiad bids will become the victim of politics.