THE QUEEN'S GAMBIT

If you haven't watched this film on Netflix, you've missed something important, especially during this time of isolation. This film is about the game of chess and what it takes to become the best player in the world.

Who would have thought chess, of all games, could rival the Superbowl for competitive tension, a game demanding intellectual strength, not physical.

I play chess, albeit poorly, but enough to appreciate the subtlety and intellectual acumen required to play a game in complete silence, a cerebral dance, with no physical contact or verbal communication. Chess is more than a game, it's a competition between two players competing with strategy, logic, and imagination. Chess is the ultimate mind-game, it stretches the will to win, it drives the combatants to the edge of their mental and emotional capacity. Chess is a medieval war with kings, queens, castles, and knights played on a checkered battlefield.

If you've never played chess, this film may initiate you into a community of players that play online, the combatants range from beginners to Grand Masters, the ultimate level of expertise, the Ph.D.'s of the game.

The protagonist in this film is a young woman named Beth Harmon, an orphan, with a troubled past and an opioid addiction. Beth is brilliant, she possesses a unique talent but her weakness for drugs and alcohol almost derails her ambition for becoming the best chess player in the world, a game dominated by Russian men until an American woman arrived in Moscow to play for the world title.

In chess, when you have your opponent in an untenable position, unable to make the next move, he knocks his king over and declares you the winner.

I had stored my board and pieces away in the attic after our last move but this film jump-started my interest and I'm now playing on-line and watching videos on opening moves, including the Queen's Gambit.

an opening in which a player makes a sacrifice, typically of a pawn, for the sake of some compensating advantage.

Chess will help you through this Pandemic, it will strengthen your memory and satisfy your competitive spirit.

Your Move?

Comments

CHAOS REVISITED

" a state of utter confusion or disorder; a total lack of organization or order." Isn't four years of this enough, seriously? The constant media drumbeat, TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP, dominating the headlines, the news shows, and our conversation. This did not happen by accident, this was a calculated strategy by a certified narcissist. "Narcissism: a mental condition in which people have an inflated sense of their own importance, a deep need for excessive attention and admiration, troubled relationships, and a lack of empathy for others." The Trump supporters say that "this is just Trump being Trump" that, my friends, is precisely the problem. Now that he's lost the election and his sycophants in Congress have replaced their horns with silence, if not acceptance, wouldn't you think the man would suck it up, acknowledge the inevitable, exhibit a modicum of humility and devise an exit strategy that would highlight his accomplishments not feed his addi...

SILENCE IS APPROVAL~Jewish Meme

How often do we learn something awful, clam up, and ignore it, hoping it will go away. It never does, it just gets worse and our silence becomes its enabler. Life is like that, we don't want to get involved. We have enough to worry about and ignorance, after all, is bliss. Wrong, ignorance is acceptance. The easy analogy is governance. We sit in a management meeting or a board of directors where we become aware of something nefarious and keep silent for fear of being disloyal. To speak up takes courage and courage has consequences. When a whistleblower comes forward they are vilified, they become the victim of power and power corrupts. We've seen this in Washington for years, management teams being selected for their weakness rather than their strength. Weakness breeds indecision and silence, strength breeds courage. A new administration always starts with a ray of hope that the management team, aka the cabinet, will be outspoken and advise and consent with courage, no...

A NEW NORMAL, OR IS IT?

The more things change, the more they stay the same, “plus ça change , plus c'est la même chose “ – Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr, 1849 COVID-19 is raging across the country, case counts are setting new records day after day with deaths a lagging indicator. President-Elect Joe Biden is on course to put the nation's health #1 on his agenda with the appointment of a new commission to advise him on mitigation and containment strategy. Joe knows he's not a medical expert, much less a trained scientist, COVID is not a political issue it's a national health issue, it's an economic issue, it's a jobs issue. An election will not control COVID-19, science and leadership will. We'll have a new administration but the same problem, what's needed is public acceptance of a strategy driven by science and common sense. "Ah, is it just me or does anybody see The new improved tomorrow isn't what it used to be Yesterday keeps comin' 'round, it's just...

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