I am on a trip. I am on a train. A train to downtown. Food. Water. Trips. Then it be chess but when I don’t know. No when. No alcohol. Progress. Much of it. Boredom. Much. One trip leads to another. Boredom dissipates and then there is another trip. What a day tripper this chess player is. And handsome also. Yes very.
Archive for the ‘My own endeavours’ Category
On a trip
Posted in My own endeavours, My own warped humour on May 14, 2023| Leave a Comment »
The tournament I cannot make
Posted in My own endeavours, On-line journal, Personal Interest & Experience on May 1, 2023| Leave a Comment »
If I were up for it, I would play in this.
But I am not up for it, Mentally I am not strong enough and I am awaiting results from blood tests. I cannot play chess. I cannot do anything. I just sit and wait and hope for a brighter future.
Mark. J. McCready 10.57pm, Monday May 1st,
Purgatory, Bangkok
The visit I could not make
Posted in Life beyond the chess board, My own endeavours, On-line journal on April 29, 2023| Leave a Comment »
Yesterday I had a plan. That plan was to take the skytrain and enter the city. Stop off at my favourite Indian restaurant for a vegetable curry. Get back on the skytrain and go to my hospital for my medication (I have hypermania), then go to the chess club. But that way go it did not. Within minutes of getting on the skytrain I fell critically ill. My whole world collapsed around me because the week before (subject of The visit that never was) I suffered so immensely from my life being threatened that I have been in a state of near collapse ever since. All I could do was hang on for dear life on the skytrain, try my hardest to walk to the hospital, collect my medication, and go back home. It was not very pleasant to arrive at the station I was supposed to get off to go to the chess club and then watch it go by but I had no choice, I was so sick mentally. By the time I got home, it wasn’t even 7pm but I had to fall into bed immediately and lie still all night long. Being the true hypermaniac that I am, of course sleep was not possible, and yes of course it’s not possible tonight also and no it won’t be possible tomorrow night either but these are trivialities. Like I said in the previous post, when your life is close to being taken away from you, you aren’t going to like it and you aren’t going to know what to do. What I didn’t say was it’s not something you can just walk away from and expect to be as right as rain the next day either. And what I couldn’t say was how sure I was of what was happening around me. Was I so startled that I couldn’t see things straight? The answers are coming, the answers are coming, a conclusion will be created… .
Yesterday, I didn’t have the power to play chess. I felt so wounded. I felt confused. I just wanted to go home, close my eyes and make everything go away. I could not speak to anyone, not even my own daughter. All I could do was lie still for many hours, not even hoping that my wounds would heal. I cannot put into words how hurt I have been and if that isn’t bad enough I must wait weeks before I can learn if I have been left with a terminal illness too, one which will eventually destroy my immune system and take my life from me.
Mark. J. McCready, 02.13 am, Sunday April 30th 2023
A quiet and lonely place where I have cried most days this week, Laksi, Bangkok.
The visit that never was
Posted in My own endeavours, On-line journal, Personal Interest & Experience on April 29, 2023| Leave a Comment »
Suppose that you have a job, you have income, and you have time off -like most of us. Suppose that you take holidays and like to factor chess into them. That could mean entering a tournament or maybe just visiting a club to meet locals and survey the scene there -with a few pics for your Instagram account, or Facebook or whatever your preferred social media platform is.
Does this sound quite normal or quite abnormal? I can assure you, having been posted abroad for almost a quarter of a century now, it’s common to meet chess players who travel abroad to play our beautiful game because the options are boundless all year round. A great many do it, but I apologize, I can’t give you an exact number. Instead, let’s just assume it to be in the tens of thousands of those who have and continue to do so. Professional players, of course, make their living by travelling and playing chess at the same time, some of whom are on record as stating they have done so in over 100 countries. Admittedly, I have only played chess in 6 different countries, posing as the official photographer in only one of them.
We all blunder in chess no matter how good we are. The only difference being the frequency with which it occurs. We blunder away in life too, although this may be less obvious, depending on how well you know yourself, your take on consequentialism, and various other mitigating factors aided and abetted by your own drunkeness, tomfoolery, absentmindedness, dubious driving habits…I could go on.
Let us suppose you twice intend to visit the very same chess club on your hols, putting in the necessary groundwork in beforehand, establishing where the club is located, when they meet, and so on. But it doesn’t happen. It doesn’t happen on your first trip. It doesn’t happen on your second trip. Why? How can a scheduled part of your holiday not come into play, and not just once but twice?
In asking such a broad question, invariably a multitude of plausible explanations arise. And not only that, crucial elements can be easily overlooked too. For example, what happens to people when they go on holiday? Do they stay the same or do they go into party mode and just want to have fun? After all, that’s what holidays are supposed to be all about right? Over the years I’ve seen all sorts of things go on including chess players spend thousands travelling half-way round the world to enter a prestigious international tournament and then weren’t even capable of making it out of their hotel let alone make it to the first round, owing to a drink problem so severe they were paralytic before the tournament began, as the tournament started, and then only got worse. I’ve seen GMs fly on in and party so hard they would resurface at each round looking either massively hung over or completely drunk still from the night before, causing them to behave erratically at the board and sometimes just resign on the spot. On one occasion a GM fell so far down the rankings, he was paired against one of my friends, who I have beaten in the past as we were both rated about 1900 then. Even my friend beat him because he was that hung over and didn’t want to play on!
Life doesn’t always go as planned, we all learn that as we mature. On holiday the likelihood increases as we tend to enjoy ourselves too much and this often factors in an excess of things, which aren’t good for us. Things like alcohol and drugs for example. Sometimes things develop which are good for us but derail our plans. You might meet a nice woman you want to spend time with, which might take priority over previously made plans. When you go abroad wanting to have a bit of fun, its hard to know exactly where it will take you, and for that reason what you had planned may not come about. As long as we’ve had some fun and enjoyed ourselves, our plans can be cast aside for another time, can’t they? Isn’t that how it goes?
I recently visited Cambodia, and its capital Phnom Penh. I see it as my second home in Asia because I used to live and work there and know the place pretty well. It’s a place where I can meet former colleagues, close friends, ex-girlfriends and enjoy a thriving ex-pat scene. It’s a city that has shown a greater degree of progress over the last 15 years than any other in south-east Asia and has a lot to offer. Not only that, the Khmer people are sincere, humble and hard-working. They are also very friendly and pretty good at speaking English too. They occupy a city untainted by tourism, and that cannot be said of the bigger cities in the same region. Unlike Bangkok, the closest major city to it, Phnom Penh isn’t a tourist trap full of hustle and bustle all day and all night long. Instead, it offers relaxing walks along the riverside, adorned by royal palaces and feels far more laid back. There are no roads gridlocked by traffic, only streets where anyone will offer their services to you if you need something or cannot find your way around. A stark contrast indeed.
But despite my efforts I never did make it to the chess club on both my recent trips and I am too ashamed to say why. Okay, well I was whilst writing the previous sentence but I am not now. On the first occasion my own very bad habits got the better of me and made me so sick I had to spend days in bed recovering, missing the opportunity, and on the second I was accompanied by an ex-girlfriend from back yonder and that…erm, well, dominated proceedings shall we say. Or should we say being a romantic old fool, I didn’t want to leave her side? Unabashed hedonism with no regard to the consequences was what wiped out the chance of any chess and it’s absolutely fine, it really is. On my list of ‘to do’ things it wasn’t very high up. And what is true of my chess is true of my life too. I have made so many blunders throughout my life that they are no longer soul-destroying, having just rendered hours of effort to emerge victorious no longer possible. When I blunder in chess and life, the result is always the same. I feel nothing. Part of me expects it at some point. If I do not blunder yes there is a sense of relief but that is all I am capable of feeling: that and only that. I am not sad that I didn’t visit Phnom Penh Chess Club. Why? Because holidays can and do go badly wrong sometimes. Crime exists everywhere. Only death is real when confronted with your own. And no you won’t like it very much. And no you won’t know what to do. Most certainly it will radically alter the nature of your holiday, and for me, trigger an arresting escalation from being robbed on a deserted street late at night, as happened on the first visit, where all I lost was all my possessions instead of my life. May I offer some advice? As Franklyn D. Roosevelt once said ‘the only thing you have to fear is fear itself’. If danger, or wrongly perceived danger, comes your way, just punch your way out of it. Twice I tried to do that and twice my soon to be opponent backed off super-swiftly. It’s just a shame I couldn’t keep it up. Almost all who threaten only do so to scare you into getting what they want. And they will do so mercilessly because at the bottom of it all lies the undeniable truth that in Asia: life is cheap. Turn the tables on them with real intent and watch what happens -and don’t take too long about it either! Tough when your life is on the line but necessary. It will stop your opponent from thinking about killing you and suddenly start them thinking about how to defend themselves instead. Anger -and yes I do mean of the explosive kind- is your saviour, and your only saviour trust me -just don’t kill anyone!
And on that note I had better leave it there once more proud of myself for employing a Nietzschean technique, which my professor described as ‘pulling the rug from under your feet’.
‘From the military school of life: That which does not kill me only makes me stronger’.
F. Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols
Comment from fan of the site: ‘I see this McCready is at it again, he loves to break the boundaries of chess just because he thinks its too conservative. He loves to trick you into thinking the content is chess-related then pulls you in different directions and inserts content that alters your emotions whilst reading. I take my hat off to him, he’s bloody good at it but I wish I hadn’t read this. Who wants to read about what to do if their life is threatened. He really is a bad sport this McCready fellow.‘
Comment from critique of the site: ‘I don’t like this post. That bloody McCready has put the fear of god up me! I was going to go to Rio De Janeiro but I think I’ll go to Bognor Regis instead! No I won’t! I’m going nowhere now! I’m staying at home! Bloody terrible post this is! Wish I hadn’t have read it now!’
Mark. J. McCready 6.39pm, Saturday April 29th 2023,
Laksi, Bangkok
The crassness, the contemptibility, the aspirations towards celibacy all come together on a night of chess!?
Posted in Chess in Thailand, My own endeavours on April 14, 2023| Leave a Comment »
‘Women, can’t live with them, can’t shoot them.’ Sean Penn, U-Turn
As a creature of habit I put no thought whatsoever into my visit to the chess club tonight. I go every week, so why should I? Why should I? I have a better question, how about you apply to life the things that chess teaches you like learning to think ahead before you make your next move. Then ask yourself ‘What might happen if I play out a trip to the chess club tonight?’
Of all the countries in S. E. Asia, I just so happen to be located in the sleaziest of them all; namely, Thailand. The capital is the main base of many I have around the world -and importantly it’s Thai new year at present. This means hundreds of thousands flock to the city centre to get blind drunk and have one huge water fight. Why did I not question whether it was a good idea to go into the city? I wish I knew. Was it nothing more than a preference to not stay at home all day long and to go out and do something instead? Why didn’t I tell myself that to stay at home is for the best sometimes? I just don’t know. I really don’t.
Hardly anyone showed up at the club but we rolled out a blitz tournament nonetheless. With the time limit at 3m 2s increment I under-performed as usual but that’s fine, I am quite used to it. But I went and let the whole evening be derailed by women, whilst in the chess club. What on earth possessed me to allow that you might wonder!
Firstly, I had some woman from New York state wanting to chat to me on Instagram, secondly I also had a former colleague wanting to hook up and bring two women along, one of which he made very clear was quite drunk, wanted to meet me and spend the night together, thirdly I had an ex-girlfriend sending me messages about how much she loves me whilst she was high on what the Americans call crystal meth.
Why could I not just see the night as a night of chess, ignore everything else, go home and go to bed? I just don’t know. So anyway, I met this fucking woman who wanted to sleep with me whilst I was dealing with my Vietnamese ex-girlfriend. My colleague was very drunk, she was too and so was her friend. Yes she liked me and made it clear we were to spend the night together but before that they wanted to party. It was now 11pm, so I started drinking too, so that we could enjoy the night together but with it being new year I wasn’t sure where to go after the English pub we were in closed. Festivities are supposed to stop at dusk but it never happens. The street I chose to go to was total carnage, the likes of which I have never witnessed. Rammed full of drunken idiots partying on like never before, in the street on the road in all the bars, it was everywhere, there was no escaping it. We were fucked and had to change location. What I thought would be a safer option was no better. The whole city centre was besieged by pissed up revellers, partying all day and all night. Acting like total fucking drunken idiots all the time, not knowing what they are doing or even why they are doing it. We got attacked en route numerous times thus completely drenched in water -and I got very pissed off indeed. Those with me could see I had become super-stressed, so when I said I was going home AND going home alone, there was no argument.
There was no argument but matters complicated further because the carnage was everywhere and I was trapped on the street I was on. Even though I had already said goodbye, I kept bumping into those I had spent the last few hours with -we were all trapped. The route I wanted to take out of the city I couldn’t because there was pure mayhem that way, so that meant a good 5km walk through more carnage to escape the area I was in. Taking a taxi out of the situation was impossible because they prey on tourists heavily downtown, and charge you extortionate fees to go anywhere, so I had to walk for kilometres just to get out of the tourist zone. All I could tell myself was ‘Mark, don’t hit anyone, please don’t hit anyone’ but I knew that was coming, I knew for sure. The second route I wanted out of the city was so blocked I knew it was a bad idea. I had to take a third route which involved skirting the Arab quarters, where thankfully no such partying continued. Yes it was a long walk but it turned out to be a wise decision. I knew all too well that about 3kms from the road I was on there was another major road parallel to it, one which led in the direction I needed to go in. I knew that tourists never go there so picking up a taxi would be easy, which it was. Sit in the air con drenched from head to toe I did, not relieved, not overjoyed, just very pissed off. I chose the wrong evening to socialize and start dating someone -and it came back on me big style.
Men and women are principally different and women are much smarter then men. Want to know why? Women only think with one part of their body; namely, their brain. But men think with two parts of their body. Yes their brain is one of them but also another part much lower down the body is used, and used with great frequency. But I don’t think with that part of my anatomy. I never have and I never will. Yes I love women because I love life per se but that’s as far as it goes. I don’t need to get laid. I did it more than enough times already thank you very much.
And so what should have been a quiet night of chess turned into a total fucking nightmare that I never want to happen in my life again. For the next two days the city is besieged with the same stupid shit. So I am staying at home and going nowhere until it’s returned to normal and everyone has stopped fucking about and acting like complete idiots. At times I fucking hate this place and with good reason. Never again will I go into the city to play chess during new year festivals -never again.
And the moral of the story is: ‘If you allow women to enter your life and have more than one, two or three on the go bear in mind that needs to be managed at all times and do not bow down to their wishes when festivities are at their worst because that is so often a recipe for disaster, as was the case tonight’.
Mark. J. McCready 02.34, Saturday April 15th
Laksi, Bangkok
Then everything must go…
Posted in Chess, My own endeavours on April 2, 2023| Leave a Comment »
“One is unable to notice something-because it is always before one’s eyes”
Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico Philosophicus
Do you know what or who you are? Do you really?
Next question. Do you see yourself as a creature of habit? If so, can you explain why you play chess and when you choose to? Is it always borne out of desire or, perhaps, lack of a better idea on how to pass the time? Aren’t you able to abstain from bullshitting yourself then bottom out the question instead? Not easy is it? Or is it?
“Nothing is so difficult as not deceiving oneself.”
Ludwig Wittgenstein, Culture and Value
Today chess exists in two main forms OTB chess (over the board) and online chess.
Online chess just got itself sacked from my life. I did that two months ago but it snuck back in. This time it’s sacked, sacked, sacked.
OTB chess. I have withdrawn from all tournament play and will only visit the chess club once a week -that is enough for me.
I am a philosopher, academically speaking, so by my very nature I have to question. I have to ask myself what do I want, how much do I want of it and why.
Once a week is quite enough, and that’s it. I focus on contentment and not improvement, that is what is pushing the agenda, and if that’s not enough, then everything must go…
“We are asleep. Our Life is a dream. But we wake up sometimes, just enough to know that we are dreaming.”
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Mark. J. McCready 22.22, Sunday, April 2nd.
Laksi, Bangkok.
Journey to the center of the earth
Posted in Chess in Thailand, My own endeavours on February 25, 2023| Leave a Comment »
That’ll be all folks.
Mark. J. McCready 10.07 am, Saturday February 25th, Laksi, BKK.
The unhindered, the unabashed, the unflappable.
Posted in Chess, Chess in Thailand, My own endeavours, Personal Interest & Experience on February 21, 2023| Leave a Comment »
“Man is by nature a social animal; an individual who is unsocial naturally and not accidentally is either beneath our notice or more than human. Society is something that precedes the individual. Anyone who either cannot lead the common life or is so self-sufficient as not to need to, and therefore does not partake of society, is either a beast or a god.”
Aristotle -Politics
What would he have made of those who opt for online chess instead of OTB chess I wonder?
The Unhindered
Been back in Thailand for over three months now I have. Meet every Friday upstairs in The Royal Oak pub, Sukhumvit 33/1 Bangkok Chess Club does.
A little noisy it is, a little cramped for space too, but for a club moved on every couple years or so, our latest home is tolerable. Whether good (il buono), bad (il cattivo), or ugly (il brutto), I will still like it and enjoy going there most weeks. It’s a stark contrast to what I left behind: life in the desert was getting to me, of that there is no doubt but now ‘unhindered’ I can do as I so wish -phew!
If anything, it has been a slow and gradual welcome return to the fold. In Bangkok for more than fifteen years to play chess now I have been, and make many friends along the way I did, most of whom are still here plying their trade OTB with a steady pint on hand by their board. Highlight of the week it is, play in the blitz tournaments I do always, even though play well I usually don’t. The topography of Bangkok Chess Club is a tough terrain, not just because the playing premises is subject to upheaval biennially…or thereabouts, but more so that several stalwarts aside you never do know who will turn up week to week. You don’t know how many also, with numbers varying between five to thirty usually. There’s a different bunch that make up the numbers as each week passes, predominantly ex-pats sometimes, predominantly local players sometimes, a mix of both usually. There’s a sense of continuity and impermanence stood side by side at Bangkok Chess Club, making each visit to the club both familiar and unpredictable. For me the overarching emotion in play is a sense of belonging. Neither a tourist nor resident, I am one who comes and goes, never staying for too long or too short a time. Not part of the furniture and not one of the passers by either, somewhere in between I am… .
Because of an unwitting and enveloping sense of ‘this is my home’ has grown and grown since my return to the club, it has made OTB chess a rock in my life. Always a pleasant night out where enjoy the occasion I do; the social aspect of the evening more dominant than the competitive side of it always it is… .
The Unabashed
Unleashed from the desert, now entering the city aka BKK was a breath of fresh air in itself. Just seeing people congregate on a sky train freely was enough per se not to mention seeing women in public, dressed as they so wish. Quickly, a spectacle was there to behold with nightlife awaiting. Having spent many years in Bangkok already, I knew everything was on sale, drink, drugs, women, anything I wanted, and plenty of it too. This meant that I started drinking alcohol in the chess club then was off out partying after it had finished ‘unabashed’. Cider was thy tipple in numerous bars in the red light district.
All this I had to reign in within a month or so because, as anyone can tell you, chess and alcohol do not mix very well. As the night went on, my play got worse and worse, reaching the point where I was blundering thus losing too frequently. It had to stop. So it did stop, and diet coca-cola soon took over. For sure thy cider enhanced the social aspects of the evening and assisted in mood elevation but on the chess front, it was not acceptable, so I pushed it out, and out it stays. Boycotting booze OTB is both good for my health and good for my wallet but what soon followed I didn’t expect. I curtailed partying too, and a month or so later, cut it out, and accompanying loose women I kept dating unsobered. Normality ensued, reigned supreme, and stayed put. There were no more cancellations to the chess club for the likes of her.
Her nickname is ‘Nan’, her real name ‘Pannada’ and she’s 29 years old. She’s from up north, Nong Bua Lamphu to be exact, and came to like me quite a bit that night she pulled me out of the chess club -which I took as a compliment. Certify I can, she has quite a body on her 🙂 (and before you ask, yes of course I’ve had my hands all over her countless times but no Luton’s handsomest chess player is not telling you what his favourite part of her body is and not through faulty memory because I was bloody drunk all the time!) What the picture, perhaps, doesn’t show you is that when she wears make up and dresses herself up she really is a very beautiful woman.
The Unflappable
Rather than fool around/about/again drinking excessively at the club, making bad videos for this site, I started to focus on my chess more and more week by week. At first, it was far from easy: online chess has altered my level of concentration when I play so much, too much in fact, making me prone to make mistakes more because online chess is rather unserious, a corollary of which being concentration levels are nominalized. So step by step, I stopped online chess altogether, deleted the apps from my Samsung A8 tablet and focused solely on OTB chess aka the real thing.
Notice that with OTB chess the ability of your opponent differs much more greatly than it does with online chess I did and take some weeks to adjust to it took. Was rusty me off the pace with blitz being played at 3m 2s per game? Yes. So speed up I did. Gradually, my results began improving but only because I lost on time less often. Emotions during play had to be contained, something I put into practice by not allowing myself to give up if a mistake was made, for the simple reason you could still win on time. Taught myself to become ‘unflappable’ I have, and to focus solely on my next move during play became the norm. Adjusting to etiquette OTB, and FIDE rules too, has taken time. You can’t, for example, knock a piece over, press your clock, then put it back on its square. That’s illegal and loses you the game on the spot but easily done it is. And spotting illegal moves with so little time on the clock is not as easy as you might think, most often with kings not being moved out of check -immediate loss.
Three months have come and gone. The desire to act like a playboy do what I want has as well. What is left is a ‘to do what’s right OTB’ attitude. To win. To win more. And more still. The light at the end of the tunnel -pride in oneself! Chess has become a rock. ‘I am a rock, I am an island’ as Simon and Garfunkel once together sang.
Yes I do have a colourful life, don’t I? Quite unlike that of your average chess player, isn’t it? Wonder why? What if I told you under no circumstances whatsoever should I still be alive? And no I am not joking… .
‘I was sitting at home and had a profound experience. I experienced, in all of my being, that someday I was going to die, and it wouldn’t be like it had been happening, almost dying but somehow staying alive, but I would just die! And two things would happen right before I died: I would regret my entire life; I would want to live it over again. This terrified me. The thought that I would live my entire life, look at it and realize I blew it forced me to do something with my life.‘
Hubert Selby Jr.
Mark. J. McCready, 5.33pm, Tuesday, February 21st.
Chachoengsao, Thailand.
A French Defence with no d-pawn manoeuvre meets over-ambitious pawn centre. Checkmate soon follows.
Posted in Chess, My own endeavours on October 10, 2022| Leave a Comment »
Those who fool around with the French Defence must be unduly punished, and so I delivered checkmate.
Not your average chess player
Posted in My own endeavours on October 4, 2022| Leave a Comment »
-
Recent Posts
Archives
Categories
- Academia
- Bedfordshire Chess
- Chess
- Chess in Thailand
- Dear Ken
- Documentaries
- FIDE
- History of Bedfordshire Chess
- Humour
- Kasparyan
- Life beyond the chess board
- Luton Chess Club
- Meme
- Moves I could never play
- My daughter
- My own endeavours
- My Own Games
- My own warped humour
- On-line journal
- Personal Interest & Experience
- Postmodern History
- Quaint Chess History
- Reflections
- Reviews
- Selected on-line games
- Sources of inspiration
- Tournament Chess
- Trivia
- Viz inspired material
- Who wants to be a millionaire chess special
- World Championships Analytics
…on what this site initially became…on what this site is now becoming…on what this site cannot become…
Posts which McCready is mighty pleased with
Luton & The University of Bedfordshire Chess Club
01582 743921/07710036246 (Humuyan)Tuesdays from 7.30 pm, The Library, Ground Floor
Please go to:
https://www.lutonchessclub.com/Blog Stats
- 30,997 hits
-
Join 39 other subscribers
-
A side note on how to read old Tom Sweby's columns
-
Not perhaps, but quintessentially, Old Tom Sweby is best thought of as a passionate devotee to the newspapers he wrote for. He was well read and knowledgeable of the Bedfordshire chess scene and well beyond, given that he was the president of the S.C.C.U. once upon a time. He was generally well-respected and rubbed shoulders with many, if not all, of those eminent within British chess circles. It would, however, be a critical mistake to see his column is primary source material entirely. That it is not. You will also find secondary source material quoted too, and the reliability of that is not quite as Tom hoped. Given that he wrote for decades, this is to some degree inevitable, and after all we are all prone to error whether we realize it or not. Thankfully, with regards to old Tom Sweby, they are infrequent and for the most part old Tom continued to document events and developments in the Bedfordshire league from the get go as best he could but, of course, everything lies open to interpretation. Despite this, and generally speaking. this does indeed make him informative and thus worth reading. Dare I say his columns constitute a narrative describing the latest developments, match reports and changing nature of the Beds league...he knew his audience and wrote according. This manifested itself over decades but brevity was always in play courtesy of the restictions imposed by writing a column. Should you wish to read a in instrumental figure of the Beds' league post WW2, you are quite welcome to peruse what has been posted here... . :-) I should, however, point out that as the decades wore on he gradually moved on away from narratives concerning the Bedfordshire league towards affairs both historical and international. The reasons for this are multifarous, old age was a predominante factor presumably, however, the bottom line is with regards to how the Bedfordshire chess scene developed post WW2: old Tom Sweby is your go to guy. He wrote more about chess in Bedforshire than anyone else did but given he was a Lutonian and writing for a Luton newspaper there is both bias and greater coverage of his hometown than the rest of the county.
Gallery
-
- I’m either 10 or 11 here
-
- 1982, myself versus Brian from Sunderland.
-
- At the Thai Junior chess championships. My daughter of course.
-
- Pattaya 2011
-
- 2011
-
- Thai Junior Championships
-
- 2008
-
- 2011
-
- Around 2011
-
- 2011
-
- Pattaya 2009
-
- 2011
-
- Kuwait 2008
-
- 2012
-
- 2012
-
- 2011 BKK Chess club
-
- 2011
-
- 2011 Thai Open
-
- 2011 Thai Open
-
- 2013 approx
-
- Around 2014
-
- 2010
-
- 2012
-
- Around 2011
-
- 2011
-
- 2011
-
- 2013
-
- Around 2011
-
- Around 2011
-
- 2020
-
- 2011
-
- 2008
-
- 2011
-
- 2013 or thereabouts
-
- 2010
-
- 2017
-
- 2014?
-
- 2010
-
- 2024
-
- 2024
-
- 2024
-
-
To add comments, please see the bell at the top of the page.
McCreadyandChess 