Fried Something.

I played a blitz game against my niece Monday morning. I tried out what looked and felt like a Fried Liver’ish attack from the black side. I lost. I lost miserably. Against a little girl.

I got to a point where my knight scurried up to c2, putting white in check, and attacking a rook on a3. Of course white’s queen could take, but I had a bishop on f5 defending. She took, and slapped the clock. Then I just left the queen there, and played something else, which I can’t remember, because that was the point that I went into shock when QxBf5 occurred on the next move.

I’ve discovered a few things. First, caffeine is not necessarily the best thing for a chess player. Secondly, I’m in my 40’s, and my brain needs longer than a minute to play a good game of chess (but I still think it’s the most fun way to play). And third, I need to find the rule book that my niece follows – The Laws of Pecial Rulez Chess.

The most important thing I learned though, was that at 44 years old, I can still learn an opening, and make the decision to use it when I feel like I can. Most of you reading this are probably saying, “Yeah. Duh”, but this is big for me. I’m having to re-educate myself. You see, I probably knew this opening attack front and back 25 years ago, and I may have played it against someone before. I might have won using it. But I can’t remember. So even though I lost, I scored a victory.

A few moves later, I extended my hand to resign, but then I remembered – when playing against my niece, no resigning allowed. This is known to us as one of the Pecial Rulez.