Land of the Sky, Asheville, NC 4-6 February 2022

So this is the first weekend tournament I am playing in of 2022. My plan is to play and travel as many as seem feasible before I run of money and have to return to world of the employed.

I started out my journey from the east coast of North Carolina traveling along the most boring interstate known to me (I-40). With a breakfast stop and a Walmart expedition out of the way, it was six hours to my destination. Boring is good right? Along the lines of the no news is good news.

I landed at the hotel, Crown Plaza Resort of Asheville, around 4pm which allowed me to get some down time in before the 7pm first round. After setting in and unpacking, it was time to head down.

The time control was 40 moves in 2 hours with 30 minutes for the second time control and a delay of 5 seconds. I haven't been through the game other than to enter the moves in, but it was a long 5 hours and 75 moves to lost by a doozy of a blunder at right around midnight. I was so sure of my move that after my opponent made his 74th, I immediately made mine with no thought to re-check it.

Slept in Saturday morning so I didn't do any chess related activities. Just relaxed until my 1pm game which came too soon. I'm not sure where my brain was, but I simply got crushed in the second round. On the plus side, I had plenty of time between rounds to get food.