2022 has been quite a turbulent year. The most remarkable thing, the one that will stick in people’s minds for the longest, is probably the Carlsen-Niemann controversy that erupted during the Sinquefield cup this summer. On second place, there is the fact that Carlsen relinquished his world championship title. A clear third place was taken by the fact that this very website got a big makeover, the mundane impetus being some incompatibilities with some plug-ins that keep the whole shebang running. Still, there was time to add a bunch of tournaments, games, and posts about chess in popular culture. In this post, I’ll tell you my favourites and my, well, unfavourites.1
The worst of 2021
We started the new year very weakly with a medium-sized helping of mediocrity. There’s no jokes that land, mainly because there’s no jokes, even barely any attempts at jokes. I think my subject was too realistic; I don’t deal well with real things.
CIPC #270: Kavanagh GC S3 E5, The ties that bind
This was another piece of lukewarm nothing, this time served with a sauce of weak courtroom puns. Weak puns are sort of my bread and butter and they’re certainly not out of place on this blog, but there’s a different, unforgivable sin in this post: the diagram has no alt-text. Boo!
CIPC #273: Murun Buchstansangur, Problems Problems
“It’s not much”, I wrote in this pot, and “Perhaps she’s just lazy”. That’s also true about this post: it really is not much and it really is quite lazy.2
CIPC #297: Ivo op zondag 27-03-2022
This was a failed project. I was convinced there was something to write, rant, and rave about, but it was all just a damp squib. And I prefer my squibs sec.
The best of 2022
This post had been germinating for quite some time before it went online. And it shows. There’s quite some content and some of it is even pretty good! Admittedly, the quality decreases at the end, but there’s enough on average.
CIPC #266: Agent Provocateur ad
I’m not sure why I like this one. Perhaps it’s the vague sensibility of the positions, perhaps it’s the pair of alt-texts. Or perhaps the perfume is working. Fact is, I do kind of like this one. So much s that it makes this list. But admittedly that’s not saying a lot.
Sure; the positions are mostly boring — but there’s three of them! And a serial killer gets unmasked in this post! Game developers are confronted with the stark reality of their imperfection! A reader chimes in! What more could you possibly want?
CIPC #300: Arturo Pérez-Reverte, La tabla de Flandes
I don’t necessarily think this was my best effort last year, but it’s the one I enjoyed writing the most because for once I got to discuss retrograde analysis on this blog. May the coming bring bring much more retrograde analysis to this blog and your life. Happy new year!
1. [Of the regular posts. This extra one doesn’t count, I have just decided..] ↩
2. [So is this short .] ↩