The Complete Idiot's Guide to Chess

Did I mention that I borrowed it from the library? Good book. After learning that I have been studying the wrong stuff for my level I am going back to the basics. Next I'm going to go over Seirawan's "Play Winning Chess" then on to "Unbeatable Chess Lessons for Juniors".

Saturday, one hour of tactics then one hour with Idiot's Guide. Sunday, one hour of tactics then one hour with Idiot's Guide (notice a pattern here? guess what I am going to do today.) Also, the Idiot's Guide had a chapter on lone Queen vs King and lone Rook vs King. I know this may sound funny to some of you but I have never learned how to checkmate a King with a lone Queen before reading this book. I just assumed that the advantage was so great that it would be no problem. Well now I can do both situations blindfolded AND I taught my girlfriend's cousin how to do it too. I also drilled the Lucena (or was it the Phillidor?) and some pawn endings, including lone pawn vs lone Queen (this one was VERY instructive). Tonight I plan to go through some drawn endgames. Man, I can't wait for my Chess Mentor. Maybe I should have dropped the extra $10 for priority mail instead of media mail.