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Chess training resumes. Question of the week: “why can’t a Queen castle?”

After half-term hiatus, my Sunday morning junior chess training resumes.  As ever, the session is a source of enlightenment for me (as well, I hope, for the students). 
I can report the break has not affected the retention of earlier lessons by the students. 
For example, one has become somewhat entranced by the utterance of the magic term ‘j'adoube’, as defence against the other magic utterance ‘touch a piece, move a piece’.
 If anything, he has stretched its use to meaning “I’m taking that  move back”

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Ed Davey. Don’t laugh at him, he’s not a fool.

Written and spoken by Tudor Rickards

In the 2024 General Election in the United Kingdom, The Liberal Democratic Party leader Ed Davey began to attract media coverage for a series of events which were unkindly described as political stunts. Davey was widely mocked by the press, and by the general public who appeared mostly confused about them.

An irate journalist for the Telegraph vented feelings implied by other media commentators

“[T]here is something a little depressing about a party that once served as the voice of Britain’s radical consciousness reducing itself to Davey’s aquatic antics. He managed to capsize his paddleboard no fewer than five times. That suggests either that the Lib Dem leader is as poor at watersports as he is at meeting aggrieved postmasters, or that he is truly desperate for attention”

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On naming Liverpool’s new football manager … the case for Nominative Determinism.

The story came to life for me today, when William, an acquaintance of mine who is an avid football follower, suggested that you had to have a special sort of name at present to become a manager at Liverpool FC.

"They used to pick managers with solid English or Scottish names", he continued,  " -  Bill, Kenny, Joe, Bob and Roy."
I resisted saying that Roy Evans was Welsh ...

"Anyway, then they went foreign. After Jurgen Klopp, they needed someone with similar sort of name and selected Arne Slot".

I was about to pour scorn on the idea, when I remembered the theory of Nominative Determinism. A little research, and I came up with evidence which goes back to ancient Roman times...

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Wit and Wisdom: Election special, 6 November 2024

Composed by contributors to “X”
Collated and spoken by Tudor Rickards
8.00am
Times are GMT. Posts from 3 - 6 November

@elonmusk
Last election, I didn’t know a single independent/swing voter who was voting for Trump. 
This time, I don’t know anyone who isn’t.
And one person after another has confided in me that they’re voting for Trump, but they’re afraid to say so publicly, because it will affect their friends/job/customers.
Crushing defeat is coming for the oppressive. big government machine represented by the Kamala puppet.

@hodgetwins
Every man in the United States has to go vote for Trump on Tuesday
It don’t matter if you got to stand in line for 12 hours, NOTHING stops you from voting for Trump
Your country needs you now more than ever 
(TR: Message for men only?)

@FroemelAndy
I will swim through raw sewage for Trump!

@WallStreetApes
I don’t know a single person who’s voting Kamala Harris. Every video I come across is saying they’re voting for Donald Trump with the entire comments section saying the same thing. Every social media poll is a Trump blowout yet somehow the votes & polls are telling us it’s close

@RoryStewart
I haven’t changed my mind on Kamala Harris winning comfortably. And I’m looking forward to the elaborate explanations from the polling companies on why they failed to predict the result.

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Wit and wisdom, November 1-4 2024

@cjhancock
People say I have an elevendency to exaggerate.
@mustard99
Same here, I go to Elevenerife on holiday.

@at a prayer meeting for Trump
“But I want you to know and we want you to know we believe you are a vessel. You are a chosen vessel”
@jemmaforte
The Titanic?

@TollytB
Everyone should try blindfold archery.
Go on, give it a go, you don't know what you're missing.

@cynicalboomer
Reporting on a discussion on Fox News over wives deceiving their husbands about how they voted
jesse: if i found out my wife secretly voted for harris, "that's the same thing as having an affair... that violates the sanctity of our marriage... that would be D Day"

 @lesmartin7
Why do so many people get simple sayings wrong? 
Answers on a coastguard please...

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Dilemmas of Leadership Chapter 2: Dilemmas of Destiny and Development

Written and spoken by Tudor Rickards

Faced with an important leadership problem, a helpful approach is to arrive at a simple either–or statement which expresses a way of thinking as a dilemma.

Sometimes this is enough for an idea of resolving the problem to occur to you.

At other times, deeper thinking may be required, often of a creative kind.

A powerful thinking trigger is to convert the problem into a how-to statement which becomes the starting point for ideas for addressing the problem. These usually suggest different actions than those indicated in the original dilemma.

A simple example

Jan’s dilemma

We don’t know whether to spend our holiday celebration with my parents, or with Greta’s parents.
Greta’s parents live close by, and have plenty of room for us to stay.
Jan’s parents live a long way away, and have no spare room if we visit.
Which ever we chose, the other parents will be unhappy ...

Stop the video here if you want to explore ideas of what Jan and Greta might do.

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@jdpoc John O’Donnell
Remember, clocks go back tonight.
If you're a Tory, back to 1953.
If you're Reform, back to 1932.
If you're Jacob Rees-Mogg, back to 1741.
And if you're Nigel Farage, you just demand that 'Clocks Should Go Back Where They Came From."

@disavowtrump20
Jeff Bezos has forced The Washington Post - the newspaper he owns - to not endorse in a presidential race for the first time 36 years because he’s worried Donald Trump will take away his government contracts. 
@askDinaDoll
So apparently the only billionaire with courage is @taylorswift13
@EveNewtonJobs
and Beyoncé 

@Keir_Starmer
This is a landmark week for Britain. 
For the first time in 15 years, our Budget will put working people first.
The truth is, the Tories left you to pay the price for their chaos.
We will clear up their mess. Step up in tough times, not stand back. 
We will deliver change.

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The club of 1984. A walk down memory lane

Written and spoken by Tudor Rickards

10.45am, Monday 28 October, 2024
I am sitting in Bold Street Coffee (est 2010)
It’s one of a range of coffee shops and rather swanky bars which have replaced the West wing of the old Manchester Business School off Booth Street West.
I’m about to join the 40 year reunion of MBA graduates at what is now the Alliance ManchesterBusiness School.
Manchester has changed. Its Business School has changed. Goes without saying, I and the MBA grads have changed. Beyond recognition?  I hope not.
I eventually find my bearings and locate the impressive facade, inside which I hope to find archeological evidence of its ancestor.
The usual mutual pleasures of recognition at a reunion. James has organised the event with military precision. He remembers something from one of my lectures. Postpone Judgement, he adds.
Glorious flattery. Thanks Charles.
We straggle in.
 Another surprise. Our reception committee is fronted by an old friend, Lisa Sanberg. We have a clumsy consensual huggle. To the left of the reception area there is a spectacular mural in the Greco-Mancunian style representing Ascent of Man …Chester 

Our conversations return to recollections of the titans in our shared time in the roaring eighties. 
The competitions for the Goat, greatest lecturer, top in consulting earnings. The Prof who won the drinking prize for waking up one morning not remembering where he was or how he got there…

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Cricket’s dirty secret revealed. 

I am utterly gobsmacked. Flabbergasted. Dumbfounded. Discombobulated. Shocked to my underparts. Shaken and stirred. My entire sense of reality upset.
This morning, early enough for me to suspect I had been dreaming, I heard the hideous truth about the cornerstone of everything British, the game of cricket.
I am not alone. 
Scales dropped from my eyes. 
It is six thirty am, during the last week of British summer time. I am avoiding getting out of bed, listing to a sports bulletin from Rawalpindi in Pakistan. 
The commentator announced England has won the toss on what he described as a very unusual pitch.
If anything his description was an understatement.
Selection might have given a clue. More spinners were included by both sides. The preparation of the pitch was not some much unusual as surreal. 
Every effort had been made to produce conditions favourable to the spinners. Serious technology was deployed including gigantic air blowers, backed up by patio heaters. Scratch marks scarred the pitch. A groundsman had been observed dragging a sack of nails its entire length. 
In case you are wondering, this not an exaggeration, but as reported by the commentator.

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Monday, the 21st of October

The East Cheadle second team begins it season with a lengthy trip to a newcomer to the league Glossop.
Our new captain Jim continues to show off the luxury of driving in his super new BMW. His enthusiasm stretches to picking up various members of the team transporting us to the event.

The pick ups are executed smoothly. we set off into the night. We have every reason to be confident. Glossup has had a bad start to its first season in the league. in their last match, they lost all their games to a modestly ranked team in the league. For once we were not going to be out ranked on each board.

We arrived at the desolate streets of Glossop apparently deserted by its inhabitants. Even the car park was empty and we fumbled our way eventually finding the entrance to an unusually impressive building which housed the club.

Inside, we were welcomed by a clubroom of remarkable opulence. Light. Warm. Plenty of room between the Chess boards. And a unique innovation, a trolley with coffee and refreshments.

We were strengthened by new member Dan, leading as our highest ranked player. On board two, James, another first team regular with dispensation to play for the second team.

Board three was Captain Jim, I was on Board 4, and with great courage, the team was completed by Keith, still recovering from a nasty fall and bearing the bruises for all to see.

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