Life In 19x19

It seems that by writing their progress here in the forum, people want to increase the pressure for them to continue their studies in the way they have announced. Like if somebody wants to quit smoking, he first tells all his friends that he will quit smoking.
I can buy that argument, but smoking ...

Is there some sort of utility for searching your KGS archive to find out how many games you played with a particular member?

Is there something about Go and keeping a journal? I seem to come across a lot of blogs and journals.

I was thinking about this as I was reading Kirby's topic on How do you stop thinking about rank?

There's a fun element to seeing my rank move up but, at least for me, there's a mild concern that I haven't really developed all the requisite abilities to be duly promoted.

The KGS rank graph is an ...

Per the forum's advice, I'll probably be setting-up an account for blitz games. It'll settle at about 11k since I'm currently at 9k when not playing blitz. That's assuming that the adage holds that a player loses about 2 stones of strength when playing fast games.

I suppose it's reasonable to ...

Joaz Banbeck wrote:What part of California?

East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area. I paid a visit to the Berkeley Go Club a few weeks ago. Just happened to be in the neighborhood and saw a sign in the hallway of this building.

I've looked at the rank graphs and game rosters of some of my opponents. Some of them have hovered at their current ranks for month ... even years.

I can't help but wonder if I might plateau as some of my opponents have. I would imagine that even a leisure player with a desire to improve would ...

So blitz games can be a good idea.

Should I go ahead and just dive into them or does it make sense to first cultivate more experience in carefully thought-out slower games? I imagine myself mindlessly throwing down stones at points that "look" right. I don't feel that my sense of "shape" is yet ...

I recall an old saying, "If yer so smart, why ain't ya rich?"

It does seem that thinking in Go makes me ... play better Go.

In Graded Go Problems and in one book on fuseki, the authors write about creating a "framework" in the opening. Maybe it's just me but I find it odd to call it a framework when the most extended positions, and even the central ones, get attacked, split, enclosed or killed. Seems like a lot of these ...

I see a lot of blitz games on KGS. I haven't played any yet. I've been using the default settings (30mins plus byo) and making a lot of use of the available time to think, ... and think, ... and think before I make a lousy move.

Is there something to be gained by playing blitz or is it just a ...

Thanks all. This was rather revealing about the books.

This is thinking too hard. You have no evidence either way, so don't make an assumption about losing that might affect your subconscious!
Thanks for your concern. Perhaps I am giving it too much consideration.

In any case, working out these ...

I'm finding myself scoring only 70% correct as I'm entering the last 2/3rds of Graded Go Problems for Beginners Volume 2. Clearly that means I'm not a solid 20k. Yet KGS ranks me as 9k. Is this because some of the more deep-reading 20k situations (capturing stones, life-and-death, etc) happen ...

Many thanks Araban!

Someone had told me that a KGS instructor names "shygost" (not sure if I have the name right) had a checklist of self-questions to ask before putting down a stone. I think the first three went something like this:

⋅ Am I safe?
⋅ Is my opponent vulnerable?
⋅ Where ...