What's Going On?

Hola darlings! I've been too busy today. It all started at the office where we are inundated with individual income tax and fiduciary income tax returns that are all due on April 15. Eek! Then, in a way that is too convoluted to go into here, especially when I'm sitting here contemplating getting toothpicks to keep my eyelids up long enough to finish blogging for tonight! Anyway, I was revisiting much older personal research (some going back to 2003, double Eek!) on the elephant in the Middle East and Egypt. Through something dondelion mentioned in this week's Random Round-up at Goddesschess, I discovered a new clue and started following it back into my old research, and into new research. The result is - I'm totally confused (nothing new there) and exhausted; but it appears to promise new insights into our quest for the origins of chess -- I should more properly say into our quest for the origins of boardgames out of which chessly concepts arose. Is that utterly obtuse and opaque? LOL! I sound like a candidate for a seat on the United States Chess Federation Executive Board! Seriously (har!), I'm going to work on a little something to present here - or at Goddessches - about the history of the elephant and how it came to be used as a piece in chess. It's now article 6 (7?) in line with other articles I'm working on. Sigh. Anyway, please check out dondelion's March 29, 209 edition of Random Round-Up at Goddesschess (right hand-column, scroll down to Random Round-Up) - it's really good stuff and if you read all of the info provided at the links the results will take you along paths where you can join us in our never-ending game of "connecting the dots" in the never-ending quest for the origins of chess. I also did a quick update at Chess Femme News, a sort of random round-up of my own relating recent news of chess femmes.