Why Checkerboards and Chess?

My homegirls checkered socks and laces. What is it about those things? I'm reffering to the checks, silly!

I was taking calls on the set of Chess Now and a caller asked what came first for me, ska music or chess? Wow. I hadn't thought of why I like what I like but let me reflect. As a child I was a little on the obsessive compulsive side. When I like something I get way overboard with it. From trading cards to comic books to music, movies, anything. It makes me feel safe in a life of chaos. When I was in high school I started going to Rocky Horror and listening to WLIR the big New Wave station. In College I liked Ska but I didnt get od into until this girl I fooled around with turned me onto this comic called Pirate Corp$ by Evan Dorkin a funny comic about some futuristic universe where people hung with aliens partied fought laughed and cried to a cool ska soundtrack. It made me get my player weight up in the ska world listening to more 2 Tone and even reaching back to the roots. Mad Planet was a cool Zine by Action Girl, Sarah Dyer that helped. I met Evan and Sarah several times at ska shows and some comic cons. They were always were mad cool. They went on to do several cool comics, tv shows, website and more recently created a child! Great for them. They rule and deserve mad success. In any case between them and Hewlett & Martins "Tank Girl" they always rocked a Checkered theme. I like patterns. Black and White work perfect for me. On or Off, Zero or One, Yin and Yang, Good and Evil. At this time I started begging my freind Zack to teach me Chess. He would play chess every day all day against his computer not a million quick games either, ONE LONG GAME. the Chess computer would sit there blinking and blinking for hours then make a decision then Zack would sit there pensive pondering all possible strategies. He showed me a little but I was very intimidated and scared to play. Sal Piro from the Rocky Horror Picture Show was another great chess player who would play people every weekend at the 8th Street Playhouse. His main Opponent was this guy Solomon who never seemed too interested in the movie but the games were big draws. Upstairs people crowded round gawking, trying to figure out what was going to happen next. Sal used to play me without a Queen and ask me what square do I wish to be mated on. I think he grew bored of chess and left it for tournament Scrabble of which he is totally gangster. As for me chesswise I took my lumps and learnt more in the process eventually marrying Cinnamon who was a pretty good chess player herself. Actress and Chess expert, Eva Veronika Klein took a liking to us and was at our wedding and even brought me an autographed copy of her husbands book (FIDE Master, Asa Hoffman) "Chess Gladiator" I was sad to learn Eva passed away on her birthday Dec 3rd 2007. She was cool people. We met on the set of MTV Oddville while I was taking care of Suzanne Muldowney who was performing as Vlad the Impaler. Eva liked my Checkerboard Creepers. The conversation quickly turned to Chess. Cinni said she liked Nimzowitsch or Capablanca whilst I liked Paul Morphy. After that she challenged me and I admit I was way too P word to play her. I was intimidated. Ah well coulda shoulda woulda. In any case (boy I say that a lot) here is the episode of Chess Now enjoy. Rate it up and subscribe!