Off On A Tangent

I lost:

I played very well last night and won my game.

5 … h6?  This is a terrible time-wasting move, and I knew it right away.  I took advantage by playing 6. c3 to either take the middle or a huge lead in development.
Instead of 7. Nxc3, I should have played 7. Bxf7+ Kxf7 8. Qd5+ Ke8 9. Qh5+ Kf8 10. Qxc5+ d6 11. Qxc3  and won back my pawn with a great position.  I did see that I could win a pawn that way, but I didn’t see that I could keep a tempo via 9. Qh5+ and I was worried about taking a risk when I was very happy to play the Goring-gambit Nxc3.  I see now in the on-line database that white wins nearly all games from here using both moves.

14 g4! I thought this move was my shining moment in the game.

15 … Kh8? I don’t think this helps and it wastes time.  I thought he needed to play Ne7-g6

16 … hxg5? I was looking at 16 … h5 17. Bxf7 g6 18. e5 Qe7 19. e6 Nd8 with some interesting possibilities.  But after the game, my opponent said he didn’t see 17 … g6 in which case after 17 … Qe7 18. g6 and now the bishop is protected and g5 is open for white’s knight.

I lost as white:

Yesterday was Jaime’s first birthday.  He got a ton of presents - too many, really.  But Vivi had a good point that if we put them away and gradually bring them out throughout the year, then we can just consider it like an upfront investment on a year’s worth of toys.  Good idea, except Christmas is coming!  We’ll be in Chile, and I’m not sure if that will mean more or less gifts overall.

Jaime continues to talk more and more.  For about an hour after waking up in the morning, he just doesn’t shut up, and he’s getting very vocal about things he wants.  He’ll scream mercilessly to get me to pick him up, and he’ll run away with things he knows he’s not supposed to play with.  He’s turning into a little devil :-)  Which makes his mother proud, if you can believe it.  Actually, his mother’s whole side of the family is immensely proud about how stubborn and willful he can be.  They respect that sort of thing.

I lost my game last night :-(

Here it is. Got suckered into playing From’s Gambit, which I don’t know very well. I’m black:

Notes:

5. … h5  Not as strong as g4 6. Nh4 Ne7

8. … Be7  Again, would have been better off playing Ne7

11. … hxg3 12. hxg3 Be6 13. e4 Qd7  Would have been much better.

After 13. … f5 things just go rapidly downhill for black.