ripper offer spotter like me. If I can get caught than so can you..
But don’t let me put you off ripping off. Ripping off is good.
Cast your mind back to end of that glorious year 1972.
Those of you who were not born then can take it up with your maker
when you meet again. (hopefully not too soon.)
Ask why you were ripped off and born so late.
Winter 1972.
Fischer had beaten Spassky and the unparalleled media chess feast
was slowing down. But not in the Chess magazines. There the how’s
and the why’s of Fischer’s win were being discussed in earnest.
Hi, Endgame Ernie here, this week…
“Get back in you box you.”
You said ‘Ernest’ I thought this was my bit..
I said ‘earnest’ you cretin. Now go away.
Sorry about that, now where….
Hi fans this week….
“What are you doing?”
I always follow Endgame Ernie.
“Endgame Ernie is an idiot and so are you now get lost.”
The how’s and the why’s of Fischer’s win were being discussed in
great depth in the chess magazines.
Well it came to light that Fischer had been using a ‘Red Book’
of Spassky’s games. The ‘Red Book’ was infact a folder of Spassky’s complete
games gathered together by Bob Wade.
(No Data Bases or computers then so you can imagine the time this took and apparently
Fischer was not pleased with the original layout and asked Bob to do it again!).
The book market had been swamped with Fischer - Spassky books, there were
7 or 8 in English alone and who knows how many in other languages.
So an alert publishing company, in this case Pitman Publishing, spotted an angle
and went for Rip Off No.24 and in 1973 produced this:
A magnificent example of jumping on the band wagon and pulling a fast one.
They did not claim this was the ‘Red Book’. They had no need.
Mentions of the ‘Red Book’ were everywhere.
So when a book of Spassky’s Best Games appeared in a bright red cover
the hype did the rest. A perfectly timed classic rip off.
Well not quite. This is actually a good and enjoyable book.
Great games, very nicely noted up by Soltis without all the computer vomit
you get these days. The Rip Off that worked!
So now it’s only natural to show a Spassky game from this book.
How about one that is not in most Mega-Data Bases.
Spassky playing a Latvian Gambit! (but let’s call it by it’s proper and
correct name. The Greco Counter Gambit. Changing the name to the
Latvian was publishing rip off No.33.)
These are the games you want to look at and digest at our level.
A great player in tactical mode. They will take you up a level.
A piece sac for the initiative and tactics in action.
J. Muratov B. Spassky, Russian Ch (Qualifying round) Tallin 1959.
A few months back Silverstriker ran a prose competition in the General Forum.
There were quite a few entries and the winner was decided by votes cast from
RHP members. This was the winning entry from MIKE169.
Tick
by MIKE169
Chiappini’s is an old gas station.
It looks like all gas stations did in the 1930’s, 40’s and 50’s before they lost
their mechanics and became self pumping mini marts.
Their two pumps sit under a roof attached to their store which also serves the
small community of Melrose, Florida as a drinking establishment.
He didn’t have much truck with the Chiapinni’s having had a falling out a number
of years back but he still set up next to their establishment and sold Mayport
shrimp to any commuter passing the intersection where Chiappini’s sat where State Rd.
21 crossed State Rd. 24.
Everyday he picked his shrimp from the shrimpers up at Mayport, north of Jacksonville,
and carried it back in two big ice chests to his spot at the roadside. He’d put up his
table and umbrella and sit through the heat of the day as customers lazily pulled their
cars to the side of the road got out and examined the shrimp and bought or did not buy
depending on whatever fancy they took.
This was his routine.
It didn’t pay much but no job in North Central Florida paid much these days.
Tick wandered down Rte 21 with his dog Leb. His head was down and the man could discern
the nature of the problem. Tick, short for Bostick, was an 11 year old towheaded boy
whose home was half a mile from the crossroads where the man sold his shrimp.
“Have a seat Tick. What’s on your mind?”
“Nothin’”, said Tick scratching Leb’s head and ears.
The man knew however.
The day was a North Florida summer day with high fluffy clouds surrounded by heat you
could almost eat. Tick had been pretty much quiet in the 45 minutes he had been sitting
alongside the man as he sold his shrimp.
Whenever he came to the man it was to get out of the house. Things weren’t good there.
After a couple of hours the man asked Tick if he’d watch for customers as he wanted to
get a beer. He bought Tick a Pepsi and headed across the street to the Blue Water.
It was hot and the Blue Water’s fans, just about moving, pushed the heavy air this way
and that but never enough to generate so much as a breeze.
Kimmie was tending bar as it was Kerry’s day off and the man’s entrance distracted Kimmie
who had been looking out the window enjoying the heat and traffic from the confines of
the dark bar.
“I see ya got Tick again.”
“Yup” answered the man as Kimmie served him a cold Budweiser from an ice chest.
A voice down the end of the bard said he had seen Vel at the Keystone Saloon last night.
“Drunk as a balled owl and half as smart.” Vel was Tick’s father.
“I thought as much”, said the man though whether it was Keystone, Hawthorne, Waldo
or Starke made no difference. Vel knew them all.
The man had known many men like Vel. The area was full of them. Nice young men once.
Then lost. Never to come back. It happened that way for some reason.
Angry at everything and everyone who stood between them and whatever it was they wanted.
Roy Orbison’s “Blue Bayou” oozed from the old juke and curled around the inside of the bar.
The man finished his beer and headed back to the table and Tick and Leb, who now laid
immobilized by the heat beneath the table.
The man laid down a bowl of water Kimmie had sent over so that Leb might not die of the heat.
Leb looked up and laid his head back down not up to the effort.
Round four o’clock the traffic slowed and the man began to pack up his gear.
The unsold shrimp would be sold the next day at half price. As he and Tick loaded everything
into the back of the man’s pickup a beat up mid 70’s Pontiac pulled up next to the man’s truck.
“Get in Tick!” It was Vel the man knew him.
“You okay Tick?” asked the man.
His head down he said “Yes I’m okay. Thanks for the Pepsi.”
The boy and Leb moved to the car and Vel said “Leave that dog!” The boy turned to the man
whose look told him it was okay. The boy got into the front seat and Vel sped away.
Leaving the man and Leb to finish the day.
The thread accompanying this blog is Thread 147914
