I've decided to dedicate a lot more of my time to improving at Go, but not only that, to "keeping" the strength I find.

I'm not going to get into how strong I used to be or am now, but I will just state right now I am rated KGS 1 kyu, and that my plan is to join the Korean-style insei league in September. I plan to run with them for at least four months although we will see what happens.

Additionally I will be memorizing Shusaku's games, and when I have memorized at least 150 moves (or till completion) of a particular shusaku game I'll update this page. I'll also update it when my rating on KGS improves or you know, stuff like that which someone might want to write in a study journal

If you're interested in tsume go, I will be posting my edited tsumego collection later (maybe) which has been organized for use with gogrinder.

You're 2d AGA and 1k KGS? I'm 1k both places... Do you play badly online or do I play badly at tournaments?

_________________
That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.
--
My (sadly neglected, but not forgotten) project: http://dailyjoseki.com

Ok so, I'm going through the book "Invincible". I've memorized the first 155 or so moves of what I call "Game Number One" which is Shusaku (3-dan)'s first game as black versus Ota Yuzo (6-dan). It was played on August 13th, 1842.

Now that I have finished that I am working on what I call "Shusaku Game Number Two". It's the game he played as a 3 dan versus Yasui Senchi (7-dan) a year and a day later -- on September 14thm 1843.

I find that there are very many useful things in these Shusaku games. The games themselves are like mnemonics which help me to remember all of the things I have learned as well.

This memorizing stuff is interesting to me. Perhaps I will write more on my experiences memorizing (and not just list games) as well.

This is one of the reasons I'm considering posting my own journal in here. I'm just deciding what I would like to post, and if I want a more rigid or a loose structure to my studies (likely looser).

I've only just begun to try pro game memorization, and I feel quite the same way you do.

I have been promoted to 1 dan on KGS. I've been a little busy at work and playing lots of games trying to get my 1d back. Sigh, that's the one thing I hate about KGS - they are so notoriously slow at catching under-ranked players because they assume people do not improve at go.

However now I can relax a little and study more. I hope to have Shusaku game #2 finished tonight. I've also got game #1 up to 163 moves now. I don't see the benefit in going further since its just a ko fight right at the end. Counting or being aware of black's threats (which the book says are obviously more than white's) seems more important towards an understanding of the game.

My Go life is very busy these days so I haven't tried memorizing more shusaku games yet. Perhaps tonight I'll finish game #2. In my defense I'm rebuilding the usagi edition of goproblems.com, I've currently gone over everything 30k to 15k. That was several hundred problems. Nothing too hard yet, but there were a few ones that made me look twice.

I've also been hired to teach Go at one of the top highschools in the country here. What an amazing opportunity. So, of course, I'm also busy writing the textbook.

Writing this textbook has allowed me to look at the other Go books i've written from a fresh perspective. The introduction to the basic principles of Go is a lot smoother and faster, and makes a lot more sense now. I think part of this was because I had to keep the English as simple as possible. It's also clearly delineated for me the difference between go fact and go theory. Reading versus intuition.

I'm going to be studying a lot of tsumego in the coming months! And memorizing more shusaku games!

Also, I am joining the Korean Insei style league that breakfast is running come September. It looks like it's going to be an exciting school year. If I am not 4 dan on KGS by Christmas I will be very upset.

I'm closely following your blog, waiting for new posts.

I appreciate that. I really do.

I am, however, hopelessly busy with my schedule. I need to write a textbook for the full-credit Highschool Go class I am going to teach. Plus I have to play my league games - I am now #1 in the Advanced Study Room's Gamma III room. Plus I begin the Korean Insei league in September. Eesh. I'll never finish this book!

Is that a good thing? :p

Oooh! First, that's cool, and congratulations for doing something so excellent. Second, is this something that's going to be publically available?

_________________
Someday I want to be strong enough to earn KGS[-].

It'll be a school textbook, you will be able to buy it if you want, but it won't really be advertised very much. I won't be giving that one away for free unfortunately, since it will be sold to students.

But I have a feeling it will be worth it. Some excerpts might be posted later. Let's just say I wouldn't write a book unless I felt I could come up with something unique... and this is, in a word, unique.. My goal was to take first principles and arrive at joseki, which I have been able to accomplish this time.. It was a rather smooth transition.. only took 50 pages too. Almost 100 diagrams so far, too.. lol

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Update for the end of September, 2010. Oh boy do I feel like ranting. This is going to be a rant. You have been warned.

I've been playing in the Advanced Study Room Beta I room and in the Korean Insei-Style League this past month.

In the end I blame myself for my poor performance, but still there are some critical (and negative) things I want to say. The performance of the majority of people, not only in the Advanced Study room, but the Korean Insei-style League, really upset me.

In the Advanced Study room, there were a number of people who did not play any games at all this month (in the beta I room). Further there are a number of people who only played (essentially) 2 or 3 games -- but what is worse is that because of the hyperactivity factor, from my perspective those games were played against the worst possible people; the people who were promoted. It became not a matter of who was stronger or better or who was more active, but just luck that among the top 4 people, 3 of them managed to play one game against someone who didn't play anyone else; causing me (and others) to have difficulty finding other games to match up.

1. chemboy613 15:5 (75% win ratio)
2. lebertran 14:6 (87.5% win ratio)
3. usagi 12:1 (92.3% win ratio)

I made the minimum number of games easily, but in the end I just couldn't be hyperactive enough to win. Even if I lost 6 games in a row to two different people I would have been in the number 2 spot. (This is why playing both lebertran and chemboy no longer mattered; I could lose all my games against both of them, but I would still need to lose six games with 2 other people to get #2). What's the chance I would lose six games in a row with my record in the ASR? 100%, I didn't care, I just wanted to play and I couldn't.

As there was in essence no way for me to win the ASR this month, and not really due to time constraints (I was often on for 4-6 hrs a day). This really pissed me off. There are over 200 people in the ASR now, and it's become clear to me that the flaws in the ASR system are nearly insurmountable. The 2 to 1 point system (in my eyes) completely failed. One person who I won't name (you can figure it out) had a score of zero wins and 21 straight losses in August. He remained in B-room. What? He was one of the people who did not play any games at all this month. I ask the question, why was this person allowed to remain in Beta I? Or even in the ASR at all? People like this ruin the league, no offense to that person, but there's no way around it; he (and people like him) should have informed the administrators they were quitting. People like that really ruin the league for everyone.

In the first two weeks I got 20 points and was #1 in the ASR. Over the remaining two weeks I couldn't find a game. Okay, I think, one game. That is really difficult to accept. But I am going to stop ranting about the ASR now because I have something else to rant about; breakfast's korean league.

Now, in the Korean Insei league -- I was really disappointed by my progress. In the beginning it was the same. I played something like 10 games in the first week or two then -- nothing. By the end of the month only two people had played the minimum number of games.

By the 2nd week I wasn't too worried. I had a 5-3 record, pretty okay for the way I was approaching my games. But by the third week it became apparent to me that I was not going to be able to get the minimum number of games. It wasn't that the people who didn't play many games never logged on. No, the frustrating thing was that they were often on. Several of them were on all the time. They just never played any games. It was strange. Some of these people beat breakfast in simul, so they were definitely capable -- they just didn't play any games. Now, before you think that it was because they had no time, no this isn't right - one person who was literally on all the time managed to play 15 games -- just not with inseis. Another played dozens of games, often 5 or 6 on the same day. Just not with inseis.

Another frustrating thing about this situation is that when asked to play they would usually just ignore you and log off. Or they would decline. There was always some reason why they couldn't play (even though they were online). My favorite was the guy who would log on, automatch, then log off.

I spoke with some other ASR members and Korean Insei Style League members about some of these people and the experiences were all the same. Mystery people who were online, never played any games, and never answered tells. The discussions were never accusatory, just inquisitive -- usually along the lines of sigh, I wish I could play this person, but they always decline!

I hope people who read this understand what I mean by all this, I am not really angry at any one person, just all of the slackers as a whole.

If I did not play Lebertran 3 times in a row (lost em all, too) no one would have made the minimum number of games. That's right, usagi, the guy who nearly beat Chemboy in hyperactivity in the ASR last month (after joining two weeks late) could barely get the minimum number of games in the korean league in September. That made me really mad. I was hoping beyond hope that I could focus on the leagues, play a game or two each day, and really focus on it.

But instead of being able to focus on league games, around the second week I often spent 4, 5, 6 hours a day waiting for a game only to not play. When I did get a Korean Insei league game the opponent would not discuss thegame, just exit the game after the game. That felt really hard for me because I was used to the KTL and the ASR where everyone always offers a short review. Heck even when I played Nata, she didn't offer any comment. Well she was really busy with her simuls and one of the games took too long and she had to go. But from all of this I got a bad taste in my mouth about the friendliness of the Korean League. It's a different culture than the KTL and ASR and I was not prepared for that. I will prepare for it for October and I will not let it throw me off my game again. But for September it threw me off. Then I stopped signing on to KGS. I started playing more Starcraft 2. SC2 was fun and relaxing. I began to dread signing on to KGS.

I began to hate go. For those of you who don't know I teach Go to chinese kids in one of the top Highschools here. Imagine that, a westerner teaching Go in Highschool in China. They kept adding more classes. And I had to write the textbook. i was so busy this month and last month I took time off work and just spent 10, 12 hours a day writing the textbook. It wasn't finished. It's a piece of garbage by my standards. It isn't what I wanted but everyone seems to like it. It almost killed me to write that book. The point I am trying to make here is that I experienced go overload. Too much go.

Then around the 2nd-3rd week of september I began to lose. A lot. Not playing and studying caught up with me. My record is 5-13 this month in the korean league. But, I can only blame myself.

As a result of all this I stopped studying go seriously. I stopped replaying shusaku games. Towards the end of the month I kind of got over my mental slump from the anger at the people who were not so serious. I got over it and stared playing again. but I lose so often now. It's difficult to concentrate on my game. Plus I have a LOT of pressure and a LOT of stress from my work as a teacher, especially since it's september.

It is my hope and my wish that I can rededicate myself to the korean insei league in October and really do a good job there.

Anyways I hope it's a beautiful October for everyone

A lot of what I had to say here is just because, as a westerner living in a small town in a chinese country there is no one to talk to about Go and to explain my situation and my progress. I just needed to say some things, maybe. Just consider it a diary entry. Thank you

The future looks bright. I ordered 10 go books and I am now accustomed to the culture of the korean league. Things are settling down. Let's go October!!

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The last two months have been a little harsh, trying to promote in the ASR and the KIL. Mainly due to the fact I live in Asia and scheduling regular games is a little difficult, especially because my schedule is rather fluid. I got kind of sick of spending 6, 7 hrs a day on KGS looking for games. Now it seems if I have any free time I pick up more and more teaching hours. So maybe it's time to stop playing so much for a while.

I feel I made progress, I feel I have the power within me now to promote (in the rating system), but I'd have to chalk it up to my games in the Korean Insei-style league and nothing else. It's a real pity that the KIL is but a shadow of what it could be -- so few people seem to play games there. Still it was the games with a large number of stronger players and taking their advice which helped the most.

So I'll be in "maintenance mode" for a while - if I can hold on to 1d or 2d KGS that would be fine for me. Right now I want to focus on my work.

"This warm feeling is C'est la vie" -Aino Minako

^^

2011 was a real disappointment for me financially so I have been burying myself with work. On the go front I have essentially finished my Kongzi software and will now be turning my attention towards go in some limited ways, shortly.

I am going to be taking the JLPT N5 soon, and soon making another push to learn more Chinese. To get back into go I'll be easing in via working on the Go Grinder project; however more likely I will just work on my JGoban software since the licensing for Go Grinder is a nightmare (GPL, but the original author is now selling it on iPhone). We shall see.

The other issue is that Diablo III will be released next month and not only am I a fan of the series and work allows me to become pro at such games, it's the first such game in history with a real money auction house. So I may decide to go pro at D3 versus push hard on Go. To top it all off I am considering starting training kung fu again. I should, I am pretty good at it and shouldn't let what I have been given die. Depends. I'd really like to come back to Go and clean up over there. Anyways, what have I learned from all this is quite simple. You must walk before you can run. You must build a house before you can attack. Anything else is futile.

Years and years and more years pass I'm still here and have the time and resources to play online again and put together a new Go website.

tsumego.ca

We'll see how this project turns out. One thing I have learned is that by helping others I learn, so, that's the point of tsumego.ca -- to provide a useful resource and increase friendship and communication in the community.

Welcome back.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.