What is this 'grok' Phil? a totally ugly expression, who is
responsible
for this manufactured execrance, this blight on the English tongue? &
'craick' - egads!..

Kirk. He often says it about Spock to Jim.


It's actually from Heinlein's "Stranger in a Strange Land."

AND its borrowed by Kirk. Dunno if Heinlein ever knew Gene Roddenbury (sp?)
but I think StarTrek made all sorts of nodes to SF writers. Phil

Matt

Phil Innes wrote:

What is this 'grok' Phil? a totally ugly expression, who is
responsible
for this manufactured execrance, this blight on the English tongue? &
'craick' - egads!..

Kirk. He often says it about Spock to Jim.


It's actually from Heinlein's "Stranger in a Strange Land."

AND its borrowed by Kirk. Dunno if Heinlein ever knew Gene Roddenbury (sp?)
but I think StarTrek made all sorts of nodes to SF writers. Phil

Matt



Bleeding Startrek (trekkies pls. note) I'm not now or ever a fanatic of
this reduntant TV show Dr.Who is more my style. However it seems that
one (1) Heinlein is the perpetrator of the vile expression 'grok'..

IMHO one of the most beautiful women players is Almira Skripchenko (who I
believe is married to Joel Lautier of France). See this page (be especially
careful to scroll to the bottom of the page...)

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=1361

Anna was apparently at the last Canadian Open in Kapuskasing, Ontario and a
friend of mine claims that she is a very delightful lady and not hard on the
eyes at all...

Regards,
Kerry Liles



"Dick Schneiders" wrote in message
...
Actually, she was another GM, as I understood it, name of Anna
something-or other. I didn't see her play at all, but I think she was
going to be in the tournament the next weekend. She was introduced to
the scholastic players there for the scholastic tournament that
Saturday. But you're right about one thing, she's definitely someone
I'd like to take on over the board! So to speak!


Wow!! That was Anna Zatonskih?? I had heard about her but didn't
envision
that she would be so young and attractive. She is going to be helping out
with
Karpov's chess school that he set up in Lindsborg last year. Since I live
so
close, in Salina, perhaps I should begin to take this game a bit more
seriously. :-)

Thanks for the information.

Now I just have to figure out a delicate way to explain to my wife why I
all of
a sudden have a renewed interest in chess.

Dick Schneiders

michael adams wrote:
What is this 'grok' Phil? a totally ugly expression, who is responsible
for this manufactured execrance, this blight on the English tongue?

Robert Heinlein, according to the OED.


Dave.

--
David Richerby Addictive Mexi-Windows (TM): it's
www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~davidr/ like a graphical user interface that
comes from Mexico but you can never
put it down!

Thanks. The "face" of chess certainly seems to be significantly better than it
was a couple of decades ago when I was playing and following the game.

Dick Schneiders

IMHO one of the most beautiful women players is Almira Skripchenko (who I
believe is married to Joel Lautier of France). See this page (be especially
careful to scroll to the bottom of the page...)

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=1361

Anna was apparently at the last Canadian Open in Kapuskasing, Ontario and a
friend of mine claims that she is a very delightful lady and not hard on the
eyes at all...

Regards,
Kerry Liles



"Dick Schneiders" wrote in message
...
Actually, she was another GM, as I understood it, name of Anna
something-or other. I didn't see her play at all, but I think she was
going to be in the tournament the next weekend. She was introduced to
the scholastic players there for the scholastic tournament that
Saturday. But you're right about one thing, she's definitely someone
I'd like to take on over the board! So to speak!


Wow!! That was Anna Zatonskih?? I had heard about her but didn't
envision
that she would be so young and attractive. She is going to be helping out
with
Karpov's chess school that he set up in Lindsborg last year. Since I live
so
close, in Salina, perhaps I should begin to take this game a bit more
seriously. :-)

Thanks for the information.

Now I just have to figure out a delicate way to explain to my wife why I
all of
a sudden have a renewed interest in chess.

Dick Schneiders

It was a late morning round, but it finished well in advance of the time to eat
the noon meal.

I wasn't close enough to hear who first offered the draw, but it was probably
Donaldson. Do players in professional tournaments often offer draws that are
refused? Is it considered bad form to refuse a draw, if the position is truly
stagnant? Do draws get offered from untenable positions very often? In other
words, does this get used in an effort to get-away-with-something in
professional level tournaments?

The interaction between players in agreeing to a draw is not notated in any of
the books or games I have played through. It is a very curious tete-a-tete
that isn't common to any other head-to-head encounter I can think of. Can you
imagine Tyson saying to Hollyfield - Would you like to call it a draw? :-)

Dick Schneiders


I watched them play that game and was amazed when they agreed to draw after
only 16 (or was it 18) moves. Very few pieces had been removed from the
board
and I was shocked when they stopped playing.

With the difference in their ratings, I would have expected Karpov to play
on
hoping for some small positional blunder from Donaldson.

Dick Schneiders


Was it close to dinner time? Most likely Karpov wasn't in the mood
for a fight. I'm not taking anything away from Donaldson. He
probably played well enough where Karpov didn't feel like going to
war. Just an opinion.

EZoto

I am sad to report that the word "grok" has not yet made it into the Collins
Cobuild dictionary. This dictionary is based upon analysis of words actually
used in print in the past decades and stored in the "Bank of English". Now
surely you grok the significance of this. If we all use the word frequently
enough, it is bound to eventually be deposited in the bank! And to think,
Phil grokked the introduction and together we can work toward the logical
completion of his grok.

John

"Phil Innes" wrote in message
...

What is this 'grok' Phil? a totally ugly expression, who is
responsible
for this manufactured execrance, this blight on the English tongue?
&
'craick' - egads!..

Kirk. He often says it about Spock to Jim.


It's actually from Heinlein's "Stranger in a Strange Land."

AND its borrowed by Kirk. Dunno if Heinlein ever knew Gene Roddenbury
(sp?)
but I think StarTrek made all sorts of nodes to SF writers. Phil

Matt

On Fri, 19 Dec 2003, Ed Seedhouse wrote:

Well, he used it in that novel it is true. However it is originally
from a considerably earlier Heinlein novel. Anyone want to take a
shot?

No! I can't stand the suspense. What earlier Heinlein novel is that??

Kirk. He often says it about Spock to Jim.


Not even once!

On Thu, 18 Dec 2003 20:54:19 -0600, Fred Galvin
wrote:

On Fri, 19 Dec 2003, Ed Seedhouse wrote:

Well, he used it in that novel it is true. However it is originally
from a considerably earlier Heinlein novel. Anyone want to take a
shot?

No! I can't stand the suspense. What earlier Heinlein novel is that??

That would be "Red Planet". This was one of his earlier "juvenile"
efforts, and if memory serves, it was the first one I read when I was
around eleven or twelve.

The earlier book has the planet basicly the same as the planet in the
later novels, with the same martians speaking the same language. I
think knowing this yarn makes "Stranger in a Strange Land" a much more
interesting read, myself.

When "Red Planet" was published it was fairly consistent with the
astronomical knowledge about Mars of the day, whereas by the time
"Stranger" was published we knew pretty well for sure that Mars was
nothing like that.

Actually I think Heinlein's so-called "juvenile" books are generally
of considerably higher quality than most of his later "adult" books,
with the notable exceptions of "Stranger", "The Moon is a Harsh
Mistress", and "Time Enough for Love". Interestingly all three of
these books have characters derived from earlier novels.

Ed