Miscellany

Hola! I'm slightly sunburnt, amazing considering I spent most of the day hidden under the umbrella on the deck... Lots of women's chess going on but I'm being lazy this vacation, I'll have to catch up on all the news next week. For now, just a few things to enjoy and then I'm outta here to settle down with the last Harry Potter novel (I'm on page 255). The Ghost in the Chess Machine - a review of a novel about "The Turk" machine. I got interested in linguistics and etymology because I wanted to learn more about the meanings of the words behind the names of the chess pieces. One of the books I read on the subject of language was written by Merritt Ruhlen and it introduced me to a whole different view about how the world works. Here's an article about Ruhlen and others continuing their quest to discover what they believe must be the first language spoken by ancient mankind. Judit Polgar is competing in a tournament, the MonRoi Grande Prix is going on, the Canadians are having their national women's chess championship this week, and a women only "North Ural Cup" attracted lots of the big names in women's chess. Read all about at Susan Polgar's chess blog. Potter awaits...