My Memorable Games #5 Handshakegate.

Part of my reason for drawing these up has more to do with the people and places than the actual games themselves.  Let's face it, I'm nowhere close to a GM, so these games (and especially my early ones) are definitely NOT a showcase of excellent chess.  I still have 2 more milestone games to get to, but I'll mix those in later.

Some of my entries will focus on rivalries.  Players I have encountered multiple times, not only in USCF play, but in club and casual play.  And yes...sadly, some of the people I will talk about here have passed on.  Such is the case in today's entry, in fact, of all the players I know of that have passed, this one was probably the toughest for me personally, due mostly to the fact that she was my age.

So anyway, yes, it is common in modern politics to slap the word 'gate' at the end of anything controversial or illegal.  Don't worry, I'm not doing that with every entry.  This incident goes back to the 1991 NC Scholastic Championships.  In one of the games I showed last week, I mentioned that Edwin had offered me free transportation and room space for this tournament.  What I wasn't aware of was that I was to help chaperon his Elementary school team in exchange.  So after 3 days of very little sleep and with this being my first multi day tournament, by the end of it, I was pretty wiped out.

This game was enough of a blunder fest, that I actually pulled my scorebook out of my closet and doublechecked the game score.

I don't remember the end of the game or what happened afterward. Under the circumstances, I'm sure it wasn't my most gracefull exit.

The next Friday, I walked into the Raleigh Chess Club and was, and no...this is no exageration...verbaly assaulted by Julie, LOL.  She went on a pretty decent tirade and lecture about sportsmanship and how much of an ogre I was.  I asked her what she was talking about and she responded, with a fairly stupified look, "...well, you didn't shake my hand of course!"

It's out of character for me to do something like that intentionally, so I can only figure I didn't notice.  I appologized to her for it and figured that would be the end of it, but it wasn't.  She returned the favor in our next USCF game and held it over my head from that point on.  Over time though...it did become one of those inside jokes between us.