I am enjoying Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. I'm already 300pp in. I feel it has barely started. It is great. I might finish it by the end of the week if I read somewhere besides the train.

I wonder how strong the Nook's chess engine is. Obviously, the whole question of "chess strength" is a tricky question wrought with difficulties. Somebody commented that it's likely based on gnuchess, which is a "weak" engine, but weak is rather relative. Gnuchess plays at a strong expert or weak master level on computers commonly made around 2004. It's probably a little stronger on modern hardware, but the Nook is a limited machine.

This also makes me wonder about go ratings. Go is a cool game. Computers suck at it. Go strength is not completely standardized in that a 1-dan amateur in one country may not quite be a 1-dan amateur in another, but neither is chess. I was wondering how high somebody like me could reasonably expect to get. In chess, one could definitely expect to get to the B-level with some work, A-level is attainable with hard work, and Expert level is theoretically within reach of most with enough hard work and good instruction. Anyway, so, could one expect to get to a shodan rank? Is that about as tough as getting to Expert in chess? I don't expect anybody on the site to have any answers.

BTW, it's hard to google around for local information about go.

UPDATE: USGO seems to claim shodan level is within reach for most with some serious work. Interesting. And that there's a club right by the train line. I don't have time for this right now, though, especially with school starting up in a little over a month. But, maybe it's something Teh Wife and I could learn and play recreationally. It has a built-in handicapping system and it won't be as shockingly one-sided as our games of chess or Scrabble (not that I have better linguistic skill than her, but I play like a Scrabble player while she plays like somebody with a good vocabulary and she has no interest in devoting a few hours to learning 2-letter words and strategy). At least, until I study the game.

Yes, I don't have time to take this up and play in a club right now, as the club meets on Tuesdays, I'm serious about strength training 3x per week, and I will have classes in the fall on Monday and Wednesday evenings. And I'm supposed to be studying for that exam (I am a little...). Playing regularly against human beings in person is the most important part of improvement in any game or sport.

Incidentally, it seems my gym is right by a chess club. Seems to be open every weeknight until midnight. It was nice back in the day when I had a chess club and a gym right in the neighborhood instead of slightly further away.

I'm rambling. This post was supposed to be about animal genitals.