14DogKnight

I started playing chess late at age 21.  Joined my first chess club a couple of years later. It was the Riverside Chess Club in California, dubbed by Chess Life Magazine as "the strongest such organization in the country", and that included the likes of the New York powerhouses, Manhatten and Marshall.  Our members included 3-time U.S. Champion GM Larry Christiansen, 1973 California State champion IM David J Strauss, 1977 Junior H.S. Champion and winner of the 1979 American Open 16-year-old FM Perry Youngworth.  Perry could have been a GM if he didn't quit chess.  I used to watch him demolish Strauss (sorry, David) at blitz every Monday at the club.  I even took lessons from Perry for awhile.  We also had many other notables such as multiple Toronto Champion, Dr John Patty, two-time South Dakota Champion James K Williamson (I drew a match 3-3 against him in 1980 or '81), Lee Corbin, 1958 California State Champion and a master coach (Christiansen was one of his students), FM Dan Durham (Who I was 2-0 against), the late NM Coach Bill Richards, who owned the third-largest club on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/club/nm-coach-bills-free-video-lessons USCF Master Jim Diamond...too many to mention!  Note: Christiansen once crushed World Champion Anatoly Karpov in 12 moves!  I peaked at USCF 1963 twice in the early 1980s.  Then I started my job at the USPS graveyard shift for the next decade.  Trying to make all my moves before 10 pm so that I could make it to work on time ruined my game and my rating quickly plummeted to the low 1800s.  I had to quit the game I loved, at least for awhile.  Retired from the Post Office and started playing at coffee houses because by then our club had folded due to a State Proposition that cut tax payer funding.  Started playing online and quickly rose to master but it was at a website with inflated ratings and not USCF sanctioned.  Then I found chess.com and found out that old age does indeed affect your chess abilities.  I'm now lucky to be 1500.  I checked on some of my old club members here and we have all dropped 400 to 500 points. Growing old sucks.

I love and miss my late wife Angela. 

We met online at a dog lovers' site in September 2007.  I lived in California; she lived in Iowa.  I was 53; she was 37.  I was never married and she was in the midst of a divorce.   She had commented at the site that the authorities were threatening to take her dad's dog.    She wanted to take and protect the dog but her husband said no.  Everyone at the dog site told her to listen to her husband - except me.  We started talking and became MySpace friends.  Remember MySpace?  My MySpace name was 14 Dog Knight.  Unlike other women I met online who thought I was weird because I had 14 dogs, she was intrigued and thought I was a good person.  We planned to move in together and since I had so many dogs and she had only two,  we decided it would be easier for her to come out here.  After three long days of driving an over-filled U-Haul truck, she finally arrived on February 7, 2008.  We got married exactly four years later on February 7, 2012 at my father's gravesite in the Riverside National Cemetary.  My dad was my Best Man.  Her best friend who she met at UC Riverside, was her Maid of Honor.  Her friend's husband was a pastor and he performed the ceremony.  No one else was there.  My wife passed away in Iowa on September 2, 2018, while visiting her family at the young age of 48.  Her dad had passed away from the complications of Diabetes, which also killed my wife.  I never got to say goodbye to the love of my life.  I moved into my new home on August 2, 2020.  I brought my 17 dogs with me.  I somehow fit them all in my Honda Fit and made the 3 1/2 hour trip to our new home.  I've lost two dogs since moving out here, but I rescued three more.  One was a little dog  named Charley who was owned by the sister of the guy who sold me the house.  She lived a couple of miles away and he would roam back and forth between our homes. After about six months, he chose to make our home his.  There were also two dogs who were tied up in the extreme heat 24/7 next door at a homeless encampment.  I offered to take them in and they said okay but never brought them over.  I found out later that they were heroin addicts.  I went over and  and picked up Mastiff mix (his name was Buddha) because he had earlier suffered a heat stroke.  He was very aggressive to everyone but trusted me because I was feeding them daily.  Buddha now sleeps curled up next to my chest every night.  The young homeless couple decided  to go to rehab and had their friend bring me over their other dog named Teddy.  He was very shy and wouldn't  come to me.  I had been so afraid he would wander onto the I-10 Freeway and get killed.  The freeway was just about 50 feet away and its fence was full of holes.  My home is just a hundred yards from the freeway on and off ramps. So that's my story of how I wound up with my current 18 dogs.  since 1999 I've always had many dogs. The others were strays,  brought to me from people who didn't want them anymore, from the shelter, from abusive and neglectful neighbors, and paid for by me to rescue them.  All of my dogs are fixed except my three newest ones from my new neighborhood and they are male.  They've all had their shots.  I chose my home because it is in an unincorporated area where there is no limit on the number of pets you can have, plus it has a HUGE, securely-fenced yard.  My dogs are all very happy and playful.  They all love each other and get along great.  When you have a home, when you're never tethered, when you can come inside anytime you want to get relief from the elements, when you know you're loved, when you're never hungry, when your human plays with you and always buys you new toys, when you're never stressed...you are are always in a good mood and never aggressive towards each other.  The only negative thing they feel is occasional jealousy for my attention and sadness when I go to the store or doctor's appointments, etc.

I love my dogs.  I love your dogs.  I love all dogs.

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I also love all animals and enjoy astronomy, computers, video games, and watching sports: Track & Field, Summer Olympics, MMA, Boxing, Baseball (Go Dodgers!), College football, and basketball (Go USC! Go UCLA!).  

I believe in Democracy.

I believe in Science.

I believe in DOG.