"chessed out"

I spent the day today at a 7 hour long chess tournament. At first, I was thinking, "Oh My Gosh...7 hours of chess". Then, I came to the realization that I would be there ALONE without a 20 month old climbing all over me or the structures in the building. I love my Elliott to bits and pieces, but it was nice to give Owen a little one on one without having to run after a toddler.

We arrived at 9:30 ish. We left at 8:30. It only should have taken 15 minutes to get to downtown. Where did that other 45 minutes go? Let me tell you. Being the nice mom that I thought I was being, I decided to take Owen and his friend through the Tim Hortons Drive thru for a good luck donut. The stupid good luck donut started my day off opposite of that. You see, my Owen asks for a different donut every time we go to the donut shop, only he means the same donut. Let me give you our conversation this morning "mom, I want a chocolate cake donut...the kind without frosting'. So, I ordered a chocolate cake donut. After getting the donut, I hear WAILING in the back seat and look back to see a river of tears flooding the floor. "I didn't want this kind, this is the most horribilist day of my life". Ok. After getting flustered, I whipped around the corner, and told him to get out because I needed him to POINT out the donut. I wasn't going to be the source of his most horribilist day ever. After getting in the store, he pointed out a raised glazed with chocolate frosting. Ok. This is the one that I THOUGHT he wanted and even double questioned his original choice. I just couldn't bear it, so as a punishment, I made him order the donut all by himself. lol.

We got to the tournament and there were about 140 Rookie chess players. These were kids that this was their "first" tournament. Owen and Ayden represented their school and were the youngest players there. Owen played 3 fifth graders and 1 forth grader. He won 3 matches/games of the 4. Now, this is where it gets good. The kid he lost to was a 5th grader. He also competed 3 times in the same rookie tournament. After finding out that he took 2nd at the table, Owen started to get a little attitude about the fact the kid really wasn't supposed to be there (according to the rules, but I think his school didn't offer a school wide chess tournament). Of course, they had trophies for the first placers. If you have been reading my blog for for sometime, you would know that trophies are as good as gold to my boys. I tried to explain to him the different options of why the kid may have had to be there. I mean, he was chummy with the kid the entire time...until he found out that the kid was the champion of the table. My Owen is so competitive. It is good in some ways, horrible in others.

Another funny comment from Owen was this "MOM, they (meaning the officials) keep saying that winning isn't everything. If that is really true, why do they have trophies for the kids that come in first? If it really doesn't matter, we should all get the same thing, right?".

Oh, I wanted to deck a mom (of a boy) at the tournament today. Her comment to her son (in front of his opponent) was "YOU GOT BEAT BY A GIRL!" Really MOM? There were so many issues with this, I probably shouldn't even go there.