As a fifth grader, he became the youngest person ever to win the northern California K – 12 championship according to chess.com. In November 2007, he was named the under 12 world chess champion.
He was awarded the title of international master in 2011 and earned his grandmaster title in 2013 at a tournament in Villa de Benasque, Spain. He was 17 and had yet to finish high school school.
Naroditsky graduated from Stanford University in 2019 with a bachelors degree in history. Though his parents wanted him to pursue a corporate career, he dedicated his life to chess…
Sad story, such a young man, so incredibly talented. But I found that bit about his parents wanting him to pursue a corporate career when he was a chess grand master at age 17 odd. You would think they would continue to encourage the game he plays, and who actually wants their child to pursue a corporate career? Isn’t a corporate career where you end up? Do kids dream about corporate careers? 
Obituary from the New York Times, published in the Minnesota Star Tribune, October 26, 2025
I found this in the paper today. A coach’s description of a new player in perfect sportsese. “He has the ability to make plays,” __ said. “He’s got good hands and can shoot the puck.” Nice.
February 28, 2025
Good people gotta get together. One great thing we can do that I’ve heard about is getting off social media and any media and spending no money anywhere on February 28, 2025. Especially online or large retailers. Money is one of the psychopaths’ two languages; this would send a very strong message that we are the ones with the real… Power is the other language they understand. Neanderthals. Let’s take it away for just one day. To start.
From Harper’s Index
Estimated amount of energy, in kilowatt-hours, that was used to discover a new prime number last year: 3,100,000
Estimated number of U.S. households this amount of energy could power for a year: 287,000.
The world is full of these things that just slip by.
I love this
From: “The Painted Protest: How politics destroyed contemporary art” by Dean Kissick in Harper’s December 2024. I love Harper’s. Can you tell?
SCIENCE!!
“In his 2022 book The Mind of a Bee, behavioral ecologist Lars Chittka chronicles his decades of work with honey bees, showing that bees can use sign language, recognize individual human faces, and remember and convey locations of far-flung flowers. They have good moods and bad, and they can be traumatized by near-death experiences such as being grabbed be an animatronic spider hidden in a flower. (Who wouldn’t be?)”
From “Minds Everywhere” by Rowan Jacobsen, in Scientific American February 2024; Illustrations by Natalya Balnova
(Do I need to cite an artist when I’m just pulling a quote?)
Kendrick Lamar and the Super Bowl Halftime Show
The Super Bowl Halftime Show is an extravaganza of outrageousness. But it can be really cool. I just watched Kendrick Lamar – I have one of his albums – “To Pimp a Butterfly” – and I dig it and see his genius throughout his career and know how talented he is. But the extravaganza of outrageousness calls for a can-be-somewhat outrageous artist, an artist that can match that huge stage, in the middle of a boring (or exciting) football game, like Prince. Prince owned that huge stage. And I think that is partly because the tempo of his music changed. He could start slow and build up for the audience and then blow the doors off the place. Which he did. Rap songs mostly stay with one tempo which makes it harder for the artist to do what a Prince or Bruno Mars or Madonna can do. That is my theory of Kendrick Lamar and the Super Bowl Halftime Show
Luke Digs Deep to Discover How Tempo Affects Mostly Wealthy Listeners Clutching 24 Ounce 75 Dollar Beers in a Dark Stadium During the Halftime Break of an Athletic Contest
I came across that phrase in a quasi-religious book just now and I chafed at it. As a young person I didn’t believe a thing about what they were talking about in our church, but for the be kind to your neighbor and that sort of thing. And I really didn’t like the pressure, the “see you next week!”, the forced camaraderie. I did, no do, like the little flour sprinkled buns with ham and cheese in the church basement though.
I also responded that way in sports. I played park board baseball and football, church basketball, ski raced and ran cross country and I never once felt good or bad about how I did. I tried! I really did. And I had fun. But I didn’t care. I couldn’t get my head around why I should care. “Here’s a made up scenario, now react emotionally to it.” Hey! That’s entertainment!
And to embrace the program fully, you must now react emotionally fully.
Fully doesn’t seem like a real word right now to me. You do that? Suddenly you see a word and think, huh? It could be four letters and you’ve seen it a bajillion times but suddenly it doesn’t look right. Is that how you spell boil?
I do have trouble reacting emotionally, like a lot of people and men in particular. And mine extends to the above. Oh, work, too. Similar inability to be a corporate guy. I once wrote an article about 3M employees who “bleed 3M red.” Super fans. Stans. Blew my mind.
I used to say, “I’m not a joiner,” and it is true. But I think I need to be more of a joiner. Like the church; I’ve attended a few AA meetings and enjoyed the people and the positive effects on my own sobriety. And sports; I could find a bar with a softball team. But then they’ll say, “we missed you last week” or “you’re playing again next year, right?” and I’ll freak out. I gotta get over that.
I often think that I could never organize a game of ultimate frisbee, because that’s way more nearby friends than I got.
Luke Soiseth 