Go Go Go!!
This is one of those “all inclusive” posts. I just wanted to give a status update on everything (for the few that might pass by).
In school, I’m doing fine. I’m in an oceanography class which is very interesting but not yet totally relevant to my thesis, which will be on undersea acoustic networks. This has left me with limited time, but class this semester isn’t nearly as time consuming as my Ocean Engineering class last semester! This means that when I should be researching I have “procrastination time” that can be used to play Go!
I’ve played a lot of online Go so far this semester (and it’s only February)! So far I’ve played 16 games in 3 weeks! The first half (or so) of these were versus KGS Bots in order to get a real rank, but after becoming solid, I’ve reached 1-kyu and will hopefully creep upward from there. I’m not really sure where I should be, but my games tend to be pretty close around the 1-2 kyu levels… I’ve so far crushed most opponents weaker than this (let’s hope that continues ;).
I do need to concentrate a bit more when I play online. This was always a problem for me in the past and it certainly continues today. The game I lost today (vs. 1-kyu) was a disaster because I got cocky (usually an online only syndrome), and I nearly lost another but for a lucky break: my opponent (2-kyu) allowed me to connect my dead group (I really should have connected when it was threatened).
All-in-all, the completion of my fifth year of Go (I’m at about 4.5 years) could be the one that sees me become a solid KGS dan player. I’ll be marking July 3rd on my calendar!