january 17 2006
Since Daniel doesn't solve many of the helpmates I give him, I gave him a helpmate #6 tonight (and a helpmate #6.5 by the same author). I added a helpmate #3 particularly devious. 
Knowing his spirit of contradiction, he is capable of starting with those ! During the dinner, the pedagogical concern (preparation for the world solution contest at the end of the month, organised by the world champion Michel Caillaud, who honoured us with his presence this evening, and hosted in our premises: a great premiere) led me to present a (fairly easy) non-fairy selfmate (6#), the weak point of the Saint Lazarists. If they didn't like it, I promised never to show them any more selfmates.
A Knight as strong as a Queen? Yes, with the help of a colleague, if the Queen cannot centralise. Then another feat by both Knights. Finally a stalemate from another planet.
A small combination of Karpov's future coach. Despite the material equality, he shows that the black position is a nightmare.
The game of the day is the most memorable of this great Tartar player whose client was none other than... Tal: three wins out of four as far as I know! He didn't need to know Shirov's future motto ("fire on board") to behave like a recidivist arsonist. An excellent test: if this game bores you, I advise you to retrain in... I don't know. Checkers, bridge, backgammon: all boring. Poker: only for thieves. Maybe Go is the only one left. But you'll have to go through the tea ceremony. I prefer rum.
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