Dear Joel,

I was playing a friendly game with a regular opponent. He played the French. Well, I don't like the locked pawn center of the main variations, so I usually exchange. Our game went:
1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. exd5 exd5 4. Nf3 Nf6.



And now my opponent made an unexpected request. "I want to make another move," he said. "I want to play Ne4 now." Well. Two moves in a row? Who ever heard of such a thing? Of course I said no.

The next time I had white, my opponent played a main-line Petroff:
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nxe5 d6 4. Nf3 Nxe4 5. d4 d5



And now my opponent piped up again: "Can I play Nf6 before you do anything else?" This was annoying. Why did he keep wanting to break the rules? "Of course not," I snapped. "But that's inconsistent," he said. "Last game I wanted to play Ne4. Well, here we are in just the same position as if I had, yes? Well, since you didn't want me to play it then, you must think it's better for you for the knight to be on f6. So you should let me move it there now."

I was confused. It was hard to argue with this logic, but something just seemed wrong. What should I have done?

David Goldfarb