So connecting is the obvious move.

But in my study journal I mentioned that I don't count enough, so I'll do that first and then decide on what to do.

Well, I looked into counting, but since he has nothing to count yet and I have cash bottom right and top left I'm gonna say I'm ahead.

We took a few months break from the game, so I guess I have a better perspective of it now.

Overall it is looking great for me(I got handicap stones, duh) and both the bottom and the right are not really alive.

I think I made two big mistakes so far:
- I let him get too much in the center
- I didn't resist hard enough on the left side

Overall he doesn't have anything definitive yet, just a bunch of aji, so as long as I don't screw up too bad this should go great.

I also had another look on the left, I already wrote those stones off, but there are quite a few interesting moves there. D13 and B9 come to mind, but for now I'm happy to just answer his pokes at my stones.

Take the base!

Bad shape, but pretty much every variation that I read trying to kill the bottom seems to fail because he can play there.

It looks forcing enough and I don't see any really urgent places elsewhere.

I can't see a way for him to kill me. If he finds a way, he deserves to win.

Even if black may not be able to kill everything, this is problematic :

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ ---------------------------------------
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . X . . . O . . . . O . . . . |
$$ | . X X X . . . . O X O . . X X X . . . |
$$ | . O . . . . . . . X . . . . . . X X . |
$$ | . . O . O . . . . . . . . . . O O O . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . X . . . . . |
$$ | . . X . . . . . . . . . . . X . O . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . O O X X . . . . . . . |
$$ | . O . X . . . . O X . X . O . X . O . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . O X X O X X . . . . |
$$ | . . O O . . . . . . O . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . X . O . . . |
$$ | . O X O . . . . . . . . . . X X . . . |
$$ | . X X . . . X X X . X X . . O O X X . |
$$ | . . . X . . . O X X O . . X O X O O . |
$$ | . . X X . X . O 1 O O . . . O X X O X |
$$ | . O X O O O . 3 2 . . . . . . X . X . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . X . X |
$$ ---------------------------------------[/go]

His last move threw me off a bit, it seems like if he blocks now I can just cut at h2.

Seems like I kept sente, which is great.

I'll do some reading, but if I don't find anything too menacing, the next step is probably to poke his group on the right side.

S8 looks promising, but I gotta see weather or not that actually threatens a kill.

I don't think anything too threatening can happen in this area.

Unfortunately I did not find a good move on the right.

This move should be fine, it strengthens my weakest group and helps me in an area where he has a lot of potential aji.

Optimistically, if I control the entire endgame, I still see a 20 point gap - he did well on the bottom, and I believe the top was a great place to play next ( I would have played on top myself if I had gotten sente).

So I can't just aim for endgame. In Korean, this might qualify as a 승부수 - do or die move.

Hane seems like the natural move, I did some light reading, but there are too many variations to make an educated guess, so lets just go with my gut feeling.

I did not find a definitive way this ends in disaster, so that makes me feel slightly less worse.

No particular reason.