Lynx

Jan 26, 2014_

Watching the Gu Li vs Lee Sedol games. Very exciting!

July 26th

Hmmm.. Go is the uber.

Dec 29th

3d KGS.

YES! ^.^

Nov. 6th

Feel a new strength to my Go. Either way, I need advice.

I can get 4 go books. Which ones should I get? I want to radically improve my reading. I also want to get good yose problems.

1. Get Strong at Endgame.

What else?

Nov. 5th

Hectic days. Sadly, I had to stop lessons with sendol; a huge blow to the cause. Very invigorated by new ideas, though, and my reading is starting to improve; oddly enough, because I'm trying to do problems that are impossible for me to solve, but force me to strain my wit.

October 18th

I've always been annoyed at those who describe their own "playing style" because that idea seems to apply only when you understand enough to have a style. Nonetheless...

I would say that my style as B is greedy, staking out terriory, and trying to build solid positions to prevent W's center from getting too big. As W, just invade, play, and kill things by accident. I rarely like to die, and tend to live in many situations where I should not have. Usually through the use of a strange tesuji/weakness that I only force through because of luck.

I hate kos.

October 16h

Lack the fire.

October 12th

2d KGS (!).

October 9th

1d KGS.

October 1

The board feels so much smaller / so different than it has in the past. I looked at a position and felt like the play was vain, just trying to build a territory in the face of overwhelming thickness.

I had a 10 game winning streak on my Quickpaw account. I beat a 2d even game with komi on lynx. I feel like I'm improving.

My reading, on the other hand, isn't where I want it to be. After enough time, it's hard to get motivated and keep on the grind.

September 25th

I saw a beautiful variation in a game of mine that sendol, seonsignim, showed me. He shows me so much, but I feel like my game is stinky and icky. So much of it is uninspired and a walk through the darkness.

September 18th

Ennervation. Flame and shadow.

September 8th

I'm ready to make the puszcht to 2k. I can read very well; solved a 6d and 5d life and death problem today, and both in about 3 minutes, so feeling good. I do not have good intuition of size and worth though.

August 28th

Tempted to give up go. I'm no good, and probably will never be that good anyway.

RBerenguel: How can you say you are not good at go? Compared with who? How good do you want to be? Keep it up and play just for fun for a while!

August 26th

Guanzi Pu: Questions asked: 77. Solved: 16.

Hehe :P. I wasn't trying that hard, just spending a minute or so per problem, but still, nifty. :P

August 21rst

Life is really sad. A deep melancholy shade seems to be scrapped underneath its canvas, and though we coast from glossy orange happiness to mellow blue, we often find ourselves in less joyful areas.

Sigh.

Anyways, back to 3k on KGS, and hope to be a dan sooner rather than later. 3 months maximum to dan level. Developing reading is a very strange thing. How does one really improve it? Have I improved it at all? Dunno. All I know is that I was looking at a problem I had a lot of difficulty a long time ago and solved it within a minute.

That's progress I guess.

But I want to be able to solve guanzi pu level problems. That's my litmus test, and bah, will I ever get to it?

Dunno.

I leave back to the STates tommorow. Back to "real" life, back to decisions and such... who knows where the road goes?

August 11th

Promoted to 3k on KGS. Yay!

In terms of reading, I've been working on simple shapes. I have great visualization, and can see deeply and intently...if I so choose to do so. What I do not have so well is a powerful sense of variations/picking the right moves.

The Guanzi Pu problems are downright diabolic, and far beyond simple answer. The Segoe Fighting problems are all solved, except for about 10-20 VERY hard ones. Obviously, I need something in between, preferably something at the Segoe Level A.

Arks :)

August 2cond

"...and a coat they borrowed from James Dean..."

Argh. Feel weak today. Don't have anything solid to work on and feel stagnant.

Life is silly.

July 31th 2006:

Feeling better than yesterday. Played 2 games so far today, both wins. Both weren't great games by me, so nothing to be excessivly proud of. The second game was fierce. I messed up big time and let myself get too heavy. He had me dead at one point, but declined to read at all and a desperate play led to his collapse. He then took a pile of stones that was alive, neglected their health, and resigned after they died.

What I liked about that game was the mindset I had. Though I played badly, I was thinking. I wasn't rushed or anything. I have a long way to go in terms of strategic thought, but I am certainly honing my reading ability, and, when I choose to apply it, it comes through.

Addendum

I have lost a good attitude to Go well, because it's so stiff in my head, and it's lost its beauty. A strong player decided to give me a review today, and that alone opened my eyes to a whole new move, and did a lot to clear my frustration.

July 30th 2006:

Not enough sleep, or poor quality sleep, or whatever.

Not thinking clearly today. Lost 3 games. Very demoralizing. Needless to say, I am demoralized. Worried that this means that I've gained nothing for all my work. Wouldn't care if it were a one day thing, and it probably is, but argh.

June XAA? 2006:

Solved a tricky problem today. Made me feel good to solve 25 move problem in 5 minute :).

June XT 2006:

Figured out that I only get into the "reading" mode when I am doing hard problems under a clock; I have little to no chance to solve them, I have only a minute, but I feel like I can find something, so work as quickly as possible to get the solution I want.

I think this is a good way to work.

Mindest during games is not optimal. Determined to stay focused and keep an eye on strategic ideas.

Question for readers: My only "skill", if you will, is tight fisted, close quarters fights, where my opponents seem to lack in reading, not bothering to look more than 2 moves ahead. Yet in all other areas of the game, I am lacking.

A) How does one improve their strategic thinking? B) How does one play in an "arguementative" style, which will result in tactical, reading positions?

Played a 3 stone handicap against a 6k, and almost won. Misread a situation in the center, lost 20~ points, and lost in the end by 7.5.

Am happy, though. My level of play was certainly higher than his, and I feel as though I have improved.

June XY 2006:

There is this "switch" where my heart rate speeds up (though it soons steadys), my mind focuses, and I start to think a little differently. A "reading" mode. Hopefully this mode of focus I can apply to over disciplines, such as Mathematics! Eh.

June XX? 2006:

Today tried to study for some tests and couldn't really do much. Feeling icky. Oh well. Want to "escape the country". Called my travel agent a short while ago ;).

Serious study.

Holy Crap. Today the weirdest thing happened. I was showing one of the hardest problems in a tesuji book, then...well, I felt my heart pump a little faster, and then...my mindset sort of changed, if that is the word -- altered? improved? who knows? -- and now I'm seeing clearly farther than I have ever before. My mind is thinking much more tactically. Really, really, odd.

Working on Guanzi Pu. Finished (almost) Segoe. Proud of that :). ^^

-->

the problems in that collection are far too hard. Bah. I currently don't have anything to study, so am learning fuseki from pro games. Dunno.

How to improve/ I need good problems :) ^^.

Bill: Check these out.

http://www17.plala.or.jp/trachan/Bekkan.html (Japanese)

http://www.airgo.com.tw/dayAnslist.asp (Chinese)

http://www.h-eba.com/tsumego/ (Japanese)

http://wqshdq.home.shangdu.net/sht/sht.htm (Chinese)

Lynx: Thanks :).

Collection of How To Improve? Improving Reading

Rukis is a powerful player.

Miscelaneous: Have been involved somewhat with a wiki on buying guides, and contributed an article on buying gobans! May also try writing about buying study guides and other materials for Go; we'll see.