Have you noticed the similarities between your bridge club and a day care center? Let me name a few:
1. Snacks must be provided. No one can get through a whole round of bridge without chips, dip, donuts, popcorn, leftover Halloween candy, leftover birthday cake and whatever other leftovers have been lying around the house which people say, "Oh, I'll just bring it to the bridge club and it will get eaten". True statement that.
2. As director, part of the job is calling for quiet between rounds. "Use your indoor voices" or "shhh" or "Quiet down people". With a large number of players with hearing aides which barely function, it isn't easy to keep scores or the play of the hand from being overheard by the next table.
3. Some players decide it's nap time. Directors find themselves using cattle prods to wake people up to bid, complete the round, or to move to the next table.
4. Everyone is supposed to play nice with everyone else.
5. Bridge has the equivalent of time outs for zero tolerance violations. Violators are fined match points or sent home without snacks.
6. Players must be reminded to clean up after themselves. Apparently, some of them never learned this in kindergarten.
7. Entertainment is a must. Hula hoop contests at the Luau, lottery wins, free games WITH FOOD, put on by the unit. To a bridge player, a free game with food provided is the best of all possible worlds.
8. Like holding hands in line, you must have a partner.
Maybe it is true that as we age, we regress. Playing bridge, for me, brings back memories of elementary school.
Friday, November 21, 2014
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
Pro or Schmo?
Here a guide for newbies who find themselves at a regional or national somewhere and want to know if the opponent is a pro bridge player with a client.
1. The pair play no known system but one usually devised by the pro so that he can play every hand. (I am using a generic "he" here since I have never come across a female bridge pro. I am sure there are some; I just haven't met any yet.)
2. The pro has a jacket over jeans or polyester slacks (depends on age).
3. If his partner does something wrong, the pro explains patiently what partner should have done instead. This is usually incomprehensible to the opponents.
4. The tricks the pro takes, instead of being lined up neatly in front of him, are carelessly tossed into an untidy pile as if to give you a message that there will be no question about the outcome since he can tell you every trick played from his infallible memory.
5. The other message the untidy trick pile sends is that he is absolutely unconcerned about the outcome of the hand.
6. If you watch the pro's forehead carefully, you can almost see the series of numbers running through his brain like the moving neon lights on a Times Square sign.
7. Unlike your neatly printed convention card in its holder, decorated with regional stickers, pros keep a written score on the back of a hastily scribbled card which was filled out 2 minutes before game time. They always use a golf pencil (if you are a pro, there is no need for an eraser since the outcome is foreordained) and said convention card is a crumpled up mess never to be used again. (Thanks to friend/partner, Rebecca, for noticing this one.)
8. Pro and partner come to the table discussing the last hands in no known earthly language and leave your table discussing in the same argot, no doubt communicating about how they could have sliced and diced you into yet smaller pieces.
Perhaps, some day, I'll go to a national disguised as a pro, doing all of the above. The problem is, after my first three no trump declarer play, I would be degradingly unmasked.
1. The pair play no known system but one usually devised by the pro so that he can play every hand. (I am using a generic "he" here since I have never come across a female bridge pro. I am sure there are some; I just haven't met any yet.)
2. The pro has a jacket over jeans or polyester slacks (depends on age).
3. If his partner does something wrong, the pro explains patiently what partner should have done instead. This is usually incomprehensible to the opponents.
4. The tricks the pro takes, instead of being lined up neatly in front of him, are carelessly tossed into an untidy pile as if to give you a message that there will be no question about the outcome since he can tell you every trick played from his infallible memory.
5. The other message the untidy trick pile sends is that he is absolutely unconcerned about the outcome of the hand.
6. If you watch the pro's forehead carefully, you can almost see the series of numbers running through his brain like the moving neon lights on a Times Square sign.
7. Unlike your neatly printed convention card in its holder, decorated with regional stickers, pros keep a written score on the back of a hastily scribbled card which was filled out 2 minutes before game time. They always use a golf pencil (if you are a pro, there is no need for an eraser since the outcome is foreordained) and said convention card is a crumpled up mess never to be used again. (Thanks to friend/partner, Rebecca, for noticing this one.)
8. Pro and partner come to the table discussing the last hands in no known earthly language and leave your table discussing in the same argot, no doubt communicating about how they could have sliced and diced you into yet smaller pieces.
Perhaps, some day, I'll go to a national disguised as a pro, doing all of the above. The problem is, after my first three no trump declarer play, I would be degradingly unmasked.
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