Archives for March 2013

An unusual Grand Slam: Down 6 doubled, but a great bid

Grand Slam bids are pretty rare in bridge. Bidding a Grand Slam with only 1 high-card point in your hand is even rarer -- and few if any bridge players would even dream of doing such a thing. But yours truly, otherwise known as the "bridge burglar," did exactly that on Thursday night in a Swiss … [Read more...]

Optimists don’t fare well in Reston

RESTON, Va - I should have known better than to try and squeeze in a late-night bridge game after the annual visit to my tax accountant, which is always a pretty exhausting exercise. But since I still use the same accountant who has served me well since the days I lived in the DC area in the ‘80s … [Read more...]

Stealing bids, parking spaces at the Black-Eyed Susan

PIKESVILLE, MD - The Black-Eyed Susan Spring Sectional duplicate bridge tournament this past weekend (March 22-24, 2013) in the Baltimore, Maryland, suburb of Pikesville turned out to be dangerous place for bridge burglars like me – but not necessarily at the bridge table. First of all, it was … [Read more...]

No fit, no points, but we still stole bid

ARLINGTON, VA - While playing reporter at a Payroll conference in Washington, DC, my head was spinning from the W-2s, W-4s, FICA, FUTA and all the other alphabet soup that goes with that territory, so I took a break to look for a bridge game Monday night (3-11-2013) and I found a very congenial one … [Read more...]

Mining gold in coal country

WILKES-BARRE, PA - In between work assignments at the end of one week in northern Pennsylvania and in Washington, DC, at the beginning of the next, I decided to drop in for the final days of the Wilkes-Barre, PA, Winter Regional duplicate bridge tournament (March 8-10, 2013) that annually attracts … [Read more...]

Lost in San Diego, but stolen bid saved the day

SAN DIEGO - Local bridge clubs want to keep the rent low to keep card fees low and they’re often located in out-of-the-way places, making them hard to find for strangers. So my partner Christine Matus and I got horribly lost this weekend (3/1/2013 to 3/3/2013) trying to find San Diego’s Adventures … [Read more...]

Could have made slam, but didn’t even make 3 diamonds

WEST CHESTER, PA - Although we had a decent 54% game, my partner Christine Matus and I had our string of victories (or ties for tops) broken this week at the Monday night (2-15-2013) game at Hershey’s Mill, a nice game with a lot of nice people that we want to continue to support – it’s a $5 game … [Read more...]