Happy Old Years

Happy New Year! I know that's a bit belated. But I haven't gotten into 2013 yet. I'm still stuck in the past.

My mother's was the first bridge party I ever attended. The gatherings started when I was in second grade and once a month she had her bridge group over. A card table was set up in the middle of the living room and in the dining room were lots of goodies, but best of all were brownies cut up in small bites with powdered sugar on top.

She was never good at bridge but she liked her bridge group. She once told me, "You should learn to play bridge because when you get older you'll always have something to do." Then one day it was over. After decades of bridge group, they were finally all gone, except my mom.

In her mid eighties she attempted to play again, taking lessons with me at the Bridge Center. It was a new kind of bridge and she never caught on. She would go over to Marquette Manor, a senior living facility, once in awhile and sub for a group there who played the old fashioned way.

One day they needed two subs and she called me. We were to be partners and play with her friends Keith and Alice. At a nursing home. I didn't want to go, but I did.

The room was hot and cramped and mom and I didn't bid the same way so we couldn't get to the right games. My partner and my opponents all had hearing issues so no one could hear anyone else (no bidding cards). Every hand I had to repeat what each person said. Keith served extra salty nuts and the only water was warm from the tap. It was torture.

Alice and Keith are gone and now my mother is at Marquette Manor. But she's not playing bridge. She's a hospice patient and I would give anything to be back in that hot room, eating extra salty nuts and playing bad bridge with her again.  

Winter Solace

It was a good news/bad news kind of day today at the Bridge Center. Well, I take that back...it was actually a good news/bad news/bad news day.

The good news is the Maya were wrong - the world didn't end as their calendar had predicted. It turns out the reason the Mayan calendar ended on December 21 is simply because they ran out of paper. Naturally the global population made much more of it than was warranted, as they usually do.

The bad news is a different story. Bad news #1 - my bridge partner and I came in last today and it mostly had to do with a math skill I do not possess called subtraction. What is it about 13 minus 8 that is so complicated? Twice I miscounted trump.

Bad news #2 is a little sadder. Having missed a bit of bridge lately, I wasn't exactly sure what the Christmas party schedule was this year. But it being four days before Christmas, I assumed there would be some gaiety and good cheer today.

So driving over to the Bridge Center on this cold and blustery winter's day - the roads thick with ice and the winds rattling my car - I dreamed of the food table filled with cake and pie and maybe ham. I danced and sang my way through the door and what did I see when I entered? Only an empty deviled egg container. No feast. No merrymaking. Just tupperware. I guess the party was held on Monday.

So I missed the Christmas party - the cake, the pie, the ham - and we were dead last in the game. But at least there will be a tomorrow.

2 over 1 - cliff hanger resolution

When spring was in full bloom, the fearless four walked out of class ready to dominate the bridge table with one more tool in the old toolbox - 2 over 1. I almost looked with disdain upon those less equipped as the flurry of games began again and classes were now behind us.

We got back into the routine of playing at the usual places - the Bridge Center, Woodstock and friend's houses - and Cindy and I would say before each game, and I mean EACH game, "Ok, remember to play 2 over 1." Ok! 

Weeks went by. Spring turned to summer and summer fall - 2 over 1 never showed itself. Fall was on the verge of winter and... still...nothing. We were Vladimir and Estragon waiting for Godot. 

Then one day, when the frost was on the pumpkin, we played a hand that made 6 hearts and we only bid 2,  Cindy said, "I bid 2 diamonds over your heart opening." I answered dully, "So." "That was 2 over 1!!" She said excitedly. I was dumbfounded. I'd not only forgotten about the convention, I didn't even recognize it when it was right in front of me.

Then the following week, Cindy opened a spade and I responded 2 diamonds, my heart racing but my exterior cool and calm. She passed. We made 4. It was Cindy's turn for dumbfoundedness. It went on like this for weeks until I had had enough. 

Now what I'm about to tell you is not only shameful, but inexcusable. And it is all true:

We are at Woodstock. I take my hand out of the tray. I count my points - 13. Cindy opens a spade and I have five hearts. My interior dialog: "OMG! Here it is. We are NOT going to miss this." I reach into the bidding box and with a flourish so dramatic I could have been on stage at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, I lay down the 2 hearts bidding card. She doesn't pass! She rebids her spades! We get to slam! SHE GOT IT! WE DID IT.  It was amazing. It was spectacular. It was... so illegal.

Would Cindy have figured it out without my attention drawing gesture? Maybe. Did I think I this was inappropriate? Not at the time, but was I at a point so desperate I would have tried anything? Apparently, but as I said earlier, it was inexcusable.

So 2 over 1 and I are not friends. It reduced me to the lowest common denominator (see, I was right - fractions were involved) and made me ashamed of myself. And I regret the day we met.

2 over 1 - is not fun

Late last year with the new year ahead of us and visions of many winning bridge games dancing in our heads, Cindy, Joan, Barb and I took a class called 2 over 1. At first I thought is had something to do with fractions and wanted no part of it. Then I was told, "Oh no - it's a very important game forcing bid. It will really help you get to the best game contract and explore slam possibilities." Well, I thought, who doesn't want to explore slam possibilities once in awhile??

So for eight intense weeks we went to class, took notes and studied. We learned: when 2/1 applies (not very often) and when it doesn't (more times than when it does); the advantages of 2/1 (not very many); 1 no trump forcing (messes up all you ever knew about a 1 no trump response); opener's rebid (too many to remember); responder's rebid (ditto); control showing bids (now it's definitely time to get out the gin bottle); the principal of fast arrival (sounds like some sort of sexual problem to me).

We duly completed the class and were sent out into the world. We were told we were ready- that everyone is playing this way, that more and more people convert every day and it would vastly improve our game.

Were they right? Were we ready to go out into that jungle and perhaps explore slam possibilities? Were we going to show them all what we were made of and take our game to the next level???

You'll never believe it when I tell you what happened...

To be continued...

If Only...

If only I didn't love dachshunds. If I didn't love dachshunds, I wouldn't have one and I wouldn't have taken her to the vet last Monday. And if I hadn't taken her to the vet last Monday, I could have gone to "Loaded Baked Potato Day" at the Bridge Center. It was a roaring success, I'm told.

It was the NLM's day to shine. Many times the Life Masters have invited us to share in their bounty (except when they didn't) and it was high time we hosted a luncheon for a change. So Monday was the day all were invited by the NLM group to "get loaded at the Bridge Center" (the potatoes...get the potatoes loaded).

Four kindly volunteers roasted eight dozen spuds and still others brought toppings, both traditional and the not-so-much. Cheeses, chives, bacon and butter; salsa, broccoli, cauliflower and lettuce; chili, barbecue and...tuna fish? Complete with dessert and salad, not a person went hungry. 

But what about the beverage, you ask? Served with the taters was "Rebecca's Bourbon Slush" a most delightful drink that I had the pleasure of trying a few years ago at the Center. Recipe follows, but let me just say it was a big hit. People loved it. In fact, one of my sources said that some people loved it too much. Apparently several partnerships weren't playing up to their usual high level after a few glasses of slush, said my source, so I can only conclude that the potatoes weren't the only things getting loaded at the Bridge Center last Monday. 

Rebecca's Bourbon Slush

2 cups hot tea

1/2 cup sugar

6 ounce frozen orange juice

6 ounce frozen limeade

12 ounce frozen lemonade

6 cups water

2 cups bourbon (or 1 1/2 cups and 1/2 cup amaretto)

Dissolve sugar in hot tea. Mix all ingredients together and freeze. Stir every 6 to 8 hours for two days before serving.

Talk About the Dangerous Hand!!

As mentioned in the last post, one of the culprits who changed polite, manicured-nails, martini bridge to serious, conventioned-laden, headache bridge was Ely Culbertson. Following Harold Vanderbilt's bright idea in 1925 to change auction bridge to contract bridge by tweaking the score and making the game riskier, Culbertson took it upon himself to promote it.

One of the tools he used was his magazine Bridge World. According to Maggie Simony's book The Bridge Table, by the November 1929 edition, the magazine was reporting that a murder had taken place over the game.

It was seasonably balmy in Kansas City that night when four friends gathered to play bridge at the Bennett's apartment. The men had played golf earlier in the day and the women had been busy preparing a sumptuous supper.

Late in the evening Myrtle was dummy to John's (her partner and husband) 4 spades contracts. He went down two tricks; she complained; he slapped her; she got a gun and shot him twice in the back while he tried to run. Shocking!

Even more shocking - she got away with it. Evidence and witnesses notwithstanding, it was a smooth-talking defense attorney and a beautiful, weeping defendant that claimed victory.

But many think it was an additional fact that was discovered which also helped poor, sobbing Myrtle not only get acquitted but collect insurance as well - in an earlier hand, John had trumped her ace.

After that was revealed, bridge players across the country agreed -this was indeed justifiable homicide.

The Good Old Days

Bridge in the olden days sounded so lovely. I didn't start playing until the 21st century and therefore never knew olden day bridge, but I yearn for it nevertheless. 

From the beginning, I learned contract bridge and its myriad conventions and I have the copious books, notes, crib sheets and headaches to prove it. But there was a time, I am told, when bridge was pleasant and lovely and much easier and there were no books telling you how to bid, play or defend. 

In those days all you needed was a manicure, three other players and a pitcher of martinis chilling in the "electric refrigerator" to sip on between playing and chatting. If I sipped martinis and chatted while playing today's bridge, well, I was going to say I wouldn't be able to tell a heart from a spade but that can happen to me sober and quiet.

Ladies would start with luncheon at noon, play throughout the afternoon, stop at 4 o'clock for coffee or a fresh batch of 'tinis, then play until 6 o'clock clearing out before the man of the house returned. Then the Mrs. would set up the vacuum so the afternoon appeared constructive.

It turns out I have two people to blame for this change in bridge from pleasant to petrifying - Harold Vanderbilt who invented contract bridge and Ely Culbertson who mercilessly promoted it.
After these two scoundrels got involved, social bridge turned into serious bridge and that...led...to...MURDER!

To be continued....