December is here and that means Christmas is just around the corner! It is hard for me to believe that so much time has gone by! *Campfire Chess* will celebrate its 2-year anniversary in May and we’ve averaged around 50 visitors a day since August of this year! If the internet could be imagined as a city then *Campfire Chess* is like a novelty comic book shop in a strip mall. Even Best Buy and some of the most successful businesses in the world started out small, so we are on our way! November was a lot of fun for me because my chess activities were up-and-down as usual but ended on a *very* high note. I closed out the month of November 2015 with a win that gave me my highest online ELO ever: 1073! I am very excited with the level of improvement I have gained in the last 2 years of tracking my chess studies. My online ELO was around 650 in May 2014 when I opened *Campfire Chess* as *Off My Chess*. 1073 represents almost a 100% improvement which is not too shabby for a guy who is going to university full time, raising two kids, working full time, and supporting a family. In addition, my chess studies and improvement are without the assistance of an OTB coach although I am utilizing the [Tactics Trainer](http://www.chess.com/tactics/) and [Chess Mentor](http://www.chess.com/chessmentor/) over at [Chess.com](http://www.chess.com).
In reflecting on this milestone I would like to share two of my favorite annotated games from November. The first game is an 9 move game that could be described as an assasination…
I am attending a school in Philly, so the next game was annotated on an American Airlines 737 from Dallas to Philadelphia earlier this week. This game was a lot of fun and had me on the edge of my seat several times throughout.
I anticipate completing my Masters of Divinity in March so I hope to devote more attention to the rest of the blog. I recently began reworking the [reading list]() this week and plan to add the *movie list* which has been in production since July 2014. Chess is growing around the world and 2016 looks to be even better than this year! Stay tuned!