Month: November 2008

Hi all

Last Thursday I enjoyed my first Thanksgiving ever. Discard soberness, the task at hand was to indulge in enormous amounts of food. I’m not exaggerating here, there was not just one 16-pound-turkey prepared for us (some twenty people), no, there were two of those beasts waiting for us. 

I have some nice memories from the day before as well. I was a mercenary for Leerdam in the ICL. This game I had a trick up my sleeve, and when the opponent didn’t pay attention for a moment, I got away with murder.

 

pass

pass

1

double

31

4

4

1. Weak, 4+

I thought I had an easy save against their vulnerable game, but look what happened:

West started with a trump for the Ace in dummy. I finessed in directly and West fired back his Queen of trumps for my King. When I played the Ace of I noticed East had dropped two pretty valuable cards. So far I’ve only lost one trick, but there are still a and two to lose. If only I could dispose of three  in dummy.

Ingredients: an evil and greedy mind + sleepy West

I innocently played the 6 of from hand and West followed with the 5. Bingo! Next I was able to discard two more  from dummy and claim +590.

Hi all

Thursday, November 20th. Browsing around on the internet looking for events and nice places in the neighbourhood I found out there’s a Belgian beer bar in Oakland. Some twenty minutes later Sanne and I arrived at The Trappist where they were celebrating the 25th anniversary of Chimay in the US. Too bad all the Chimay was gone already, but I think I have found my sanctuary. The Brother Thelonious I had brought a very bright smile to my face and spread familiar warmth throughout my body.

A game. I was watching Leerdam (old colleagues from Transfer Solutions) in the Intercity League and what I saw wasn’t very good. After eight boards they had to close a 50 imp gap. But in the second half of the match they blitzed their opponents ending the match 71-56 in their favour. Not bad for only sixteen boards *cough*.

 

1

1

1

4

pass

pass

4

5

5

double

a.p.

West led the Jack of and now Geert-Jan (ggoulash on BBO) could shine, for this was the deal:

He ruffed the lead, drew one round of trumps noticing the 0-3 split. Ace of and another one and the opponents tested him with more love. Next he negotiated two ruffs in dummy with the Queen and Jack. The play was virtually over, Geert-Jan had a complete count on East. This is the five card ending:

When Geert-Jan played a small from dummy East could have made life a bit more difficult by ducking, but when he rose with the King of , Geert-Jan simply drew the last trump and finessed against West’s Queen of  for 11 tricks. Nice!