Monthly Archives: August 2012

Russ Redux

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I met up with my old bridge partner again. Continue reading →

I attended the sectional bridge tournament in Great Barrington, MA, over the weekend. The highlight occurred before the first hand of the first event. You could have knocked me over with a feather when I saw Russ Elmore walking over to get some snacks before the first event started. When I took up bridge again a few years ago (after a hiatus of over thirty years), Russ was the very first person who ever asked me to play with him. We both customarily attended the Simsbury Bridge Club on Wednesday evenings, and we both came without partners. Russ evidently liked playing with me better than playing with the other people who came without partners. So, we played together for a year or so as I struggled to understand how to succeed at competitive bridge.

Playing with Russ was a uniquely educational experience for me. Usually when one plays with a new partner, an exchange takes place in which the two players negotiate what conventions they will play. Not with Russ. He carried with him a one-page typed 8½ x 11″ sheet that detailed how he played. That is what he played. Period. So, for a while, that is what I played, too. On my own I bought a book and learned other conventions, too, but when I played with Russ, we always played Standard Elmore.

Russ was very good at playing the cards. Perhaps my memory is playing tricks on me, but I recall that on two different occasions he managed to bring in all thirteen tricks on a 7NT contract while the opponents held two aces. For that to happen, the opponent on his right would have to hold both aces, and the opponent on his left would for some reason need to lead the wrong suit. Then Russ would need to be able to take twelve tricks in the two suits in which he held the aces. Then, and this is the really difficult part, he would have to trick the opponent with the aces into discarding the wrong one on the twelfth trick.
 
Russ and I did pretty well together, but I am sure that it was mostly his doing. He told me that he had once finished first in Simsbury five weeks in a row with five different partners. His wife asked him how he did it. He said that he chose his partners very carefully, and so did his partners.

I wonder if Russ is still playing Standard Elmore. I did not get to play against him in Great Barrington, which was a fairly large tournament, and I do not know how well he did there. I sincerely hope that he still has several more decades of bridge in front of him and that he continues to choose his partners carefully.

“The Pope”

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Why are popes so often anonymous? Continue reading →

I have been reading Margaret Armstrong’s romanticized biography of Edward John Trelawny, a controversial figure associated with the English poets Byron and Shelley. I came across the following pair of sentences that set me off:

[Teresa Guiccioli’s husband] thought that she had been away from home long enough. So did the Pope — from the first, the Pope had taken a benevolent interest in the Byron-Guiccioli triangle.

“The Pope?” I immediately wondered which pope had so little on his plate that he involved himself in one of Lord Byron’s trysts. This common technique of neglecting to disclose the pope’s name is a pet peeve of mine. I cannot list how many times authors have talked about the pope without identifying the man in question.

Does it matter? I think that it matters a great deal. In this case I deduced from the book’s index that the pontiff in question was, in fact, Pius VII, who ruled the Church from 1800 to 1823. If you are interested in the details of his long and arduous pontificate, you can read about them here.

IMHO Pius VII was one of the most interesting of all the popes. He assumed the papacy at a critical period in Church history. His predecessor, Pius VI, had been apprehended by Napoleon’s men and transported to France, where, in fact, he died. Because Rome was considered too dangerous, Pius VII was elected and crowned (with a papier-mâché tiara!) in Venice, which was then controlled by the Austrian Emperor.

David’s Le Sacre de Napoléon

A few years later Pope Pius was persuaded by Napoleon to come to Paris as his guest and to crown him as emperor. Not only did Napoleon switch signals at the last minute and crown himself in front of an astonished pontiff (a moment captured not once but twice by Jacques-Louis David), he refused to allow the pope to return to Rome. Until Napoleon was overthrown and imprisoned, Pius VII, along with thirteen of his cardinals, was held captive in France for several years.

The primary title of the pope, remember, is the Bishop of Rome. When Pius was finally able to return to the Holy See, he faced the monumental task of reestablishing order there. At the time the pope was not just the unquestioned ruler of the Church. He was also the king of the Papal States, a territory that stretched across the center of the Italian peninsula. Napoleon had seized these lands, but they were returned to the pope in the Congress of Vienna in 1815.

Pope Pius VII

And there’s the rub. The pope was probably not interested in Byron or Teresa as much as he was in her husband, Count Guiccioli. During the pope’s exile the count had backed Napoleon, and he had made a fortune doing so at a time when most of Italy suffered. After Napoleon had been deposed, Guiccioli somehow managed to retain much of the property that he had acquired in the Romagna, which was part of the Papal States. He was also closely associated with both the Freemasons and the Carbonari, two secret organizations that were thorns in the papacy’s side in the nineteenth century.

From the pope’s perspective, Count Guiccioli had stolen from the Church by aligning himself with a monster who had both humiliated and imprisoned the Vicar of Christ and then joined up with the heretics trying to undermine the papacy itself. So, when Teresa’s father (!) petitioned Pope Pius VII to approve a separation of his daughter from Count Guiccioli, the pontiff probably did not give Byron a moment’s thought. Guiccioli, on the other hand, was already on his enemies list. In short, knowing who the pope was puts a much different twist on the story.

The inability of most authors to distinguish one pope from another seems not to apply to the last two popes. At any given time most people can remember who the previous pope was and how he differed from the current one. So, most people today know that Benedict XVI is as different from John Paul II as Germany is from Poland. But what about the previous popes? I wager that even most Catholics would have a hard time naming JP II’s predecessors (one only lasted a month) and identifying what they stood for. Almost no one can identify any pope who was dead before he/she was born.

I think that that is a shame. The popes are interesting (to me).

A Leatherstocking Tale

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A weekend trip to Cooperstown. Continue reading →

Glimmerglass from above the parking lot.

Cooperstown, NY, boasts, in addition to the Baseball Hall of Fame, a lovely opera house that has been able to attract some of the best performers in the world. For two summers in a row, for example, Deborah Voigt, who recently sang Brünhilde in the Ring cycle at the Met, appeared in shows at Cooperstown’s Alice Busch Theater, popularly known as Glimmerglass. The theater seats nine hundred people, large enough to hold one-half the permanent population of Cooperstown.

Sue and I customarily make the trip to Cooperstown in mid-August to see an opera or two. The company performs nearly every day during the summer. Traditionally they have presented three or four different operas, two or three traditional “warhorses” and one a little more avant-garde. This year they deviated slightly from the norm and scheduled, in addition to a couple of operas, an unamplified version of Meredith Wilson’s famous musical The Music Man. It featured two singers who have performed at the Met. We both enjoyed the show, and the house was packed.

For the tourist there is considerably more to the Cooperstown area than the Hall of Fame and the opera house. The village lies at the southern end of Otsego Lake, which is not famous for its beaches, but which does offer opportunities to boating enthusiasts. It is the home town of James Fenimore Cooper, the creator of Natty Bumppo’s Leatherstocking Tales. I was surprised to learn that the town was not named after the author; his father purchased the area in 1785 and named it after himself. Plenty of establishments in the area, however, were named after the son, including a rather important art gallery. The village has been quite successful at drawing baseball teams from far and wide to play in tournaments in Doubleday Field or in one of the other nearby stadiums. The golf courses also get a good deal of play in the summer. There is a Farmer’s Museum and a few mansions from the area’s halcyon days in which one can spend a few pleasant hours. Some boutique breweries have recently sprung up, and a trail has been designated for a pub crawl.

We always take Route 20 to Cooperstown. Along the way is the famous Tepee, the best place in the area for purchasing worthless nicknacks. In the surrounding area are several other attractions, including a place in Herkimer that allows tourists to look for diamonds for only $10. Howe’s Caverns and a few competitors are nearby.

Even though the area boasts a good number of hotels and bed-and-breakfasts, one cannot expect to stay cheaply in or around Cooperstown, at least not in the summer. In the winter I assume that you can just about name your price, but in the summer you must either stay forty or fifty miles away from the village or put up with being gouged. Hedge fund managers and their ilk stay in the luxury hotels and cough up $400 or more per night. The frugal travelers stay at one of the many ma and pa motels or at a bed and breakfast, but they still shell out $200 or close to it.

We stayed at one of the small motels. It was a throwback to the seventies or earlier. The pillows were flimsy, and the beds were a little uncomfortable. The bathroom fixtures all worked, but neither Sue nor I could remember the last time that we had seen a shower in which the hot and cold water could be adjusted separately. The television was small and definitely not HD. There was a small refrigerator, but no WiFi, no ironing board, no coffee maker, and no hair drier. We had a view of the lake, but trees obscured all but a tiny corner. In short, it was nothing to write home about.

Maggie Daley, gave generously to help open the Maggie Daley Center for Women’s Cancer Care at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. During the summer “No Vacancy” signs abound. If an induction ceremony for the Hall of Fame is scheduled, it is advisable just to pick another time. At any time during the summer there are far more cars in the village than there are parking spaces. People who are on day trips are advised to park in one of the free lots on either end of the village and take the trolley. This is somewhat time-consuming, but searching for a parking spot in Cooperstown is usually frustrating and often futile.

One thing that puzzles me about Cooperstown is the dearth of restaurants. The tourist guide book describes only a handful of restaurants, but it includes dozens of places to stay. How can this be? Do tourists not eat? Do they all depend on room service? Maybe they bring barbecue grills.

We could not find a single place that was open for breakfast at 8 a.m. on Sunday morning. We ended up driving a few miles south to the village of Milford. There we discovered that the VFW was sponsoring an all-you-can-eat breakfast. It was tempting, but we chose a dive named Jackie’s that was located a few blocks away from the VFW. The atmosphere, about which I ordinarily care very little, was a notch below even my standards. On the other hand, the food was not bad, and the service was quite good.

There is a McDonald’s south of town, but that is the only nationwide chain that I saw. A number of temporary sheds that sell fast food can be seen on the side of the highway. We did not sample any of their offerings.

The drive to Cooperstown is always something of an adventure. It defies credulity that such a famous place is so inaccessible. If you draw a triangle that connects Syracuse, Albany, and Binghamton, Cooperstown lies just about in the middle. In this year’s trip my navigating skills failed us twice. Sue got a little annoyed at me, but we did find the hotel in time to check in before the owner turned in for the night.

The last thing that I said before we departed our hotel room the following morning was, “Well, I always leave something behind. I wonder what it will be this time.” At that moment I was standing within twelve inches of my laptop’s power supply, which was plugged into the wall when it should have been in my computer case. By my count, this is the third power supply that I have left in a hotel room. Sue called the owner, and he said that he would mail it to us.

Another Flannery Fiasco

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More adventures with the Flannery convention. Continue reading →

My least favorite convention is Flannery 2♦. This bid can be used in any seat to show five hearts, four spades, and 11-15 HCP. This hand occurs fairly often, and it can cause rebidding problems when partner responds with 1NT or 2 of a minor. The hand is too weak for a reverse, and usually no good rebid is available. Another advantage is that players who use Flannery can assume that a 1♠ response to a 1♥ opener shows at least five spades. This makes it much easier to find a 5-3 fit.

On the other hand, Flannery users forgo the weak 2♦ bid, which also occurs pretty often. That means that preempts in diamonds can only be done at the three (or higher) level. A Flannery opener can also lead to some perverse auctions, which is what happened to my partner and me in Saturday’s pairs game.

With both sides vulnerable, my partner dealt and opened 2♦. I was caught with this mess:

♠J3 ♥Q ♦T8643 ♣QT976
This is close to the worst hand imaginable for responding to Flannery. In the first place, the opponents probably have most of the points, so the objective was just to avoid a disastrous partial. I also knew that the opponents held the majority of cards in both major suits, which meant that, if we had to declare, we should play in a minor. My clubs were better than my diamonds, but we were already past 2♣. My only viable choice was to pass, which is what I did. The left hand opponent, who held ♦AK72 also passed.

Here was my partner’s hand:

♠AQT2 ♥AJ9762 ♦J ♣J5
Yes, he had six hearts, not five. Since he had a safe rebid of 2♥, I am not sure why he did not bid 1♥. Maybe he was worried about missing a 4-4 spade fit.

So, we ended up playing in a 5-1 fit after all. My partner played it very well and only got set by one trick. Our result was below average but not catastrophic. If we had used standard techniques, my partner would have bid 1♥, and I would have passed or bid 1NT. If I did the former, we would have probably played 2♥, which goes down one against the best defense. If I passed, the opponents, who were a good team, might have found their best strain, which was no trump, and achieved a better result than they did by passing.

This was by no means my worst experience with Flannery. That came at a sectional tournament. On that occasion both sides were vulnerable, and as dealer I was the one who opened 2♦ with this maximum Flannery hand:

♠Q875 ♥AQ983 ♦T ♣AK7
Needless to say, my partner alerted my bid and even explained it to the left hand opponent. She bid 3♦, obviously a preempt. My partner had to concoct a bid from this hand:

♠K432 ♥JT74 ♦6 ♣QJ94
He figured that we had game in either major if and only if I had a maximum, which, of course, I did. He bid 3♥ to show heart support and invite to game. Unfortunately, neither of us had a plan that took into account the other opponent’s bid, which was 4♠!

Well, I (correctly) did not think that we could make 5♥, and I was not confident that we could set 4♠. For all that I knew, the spade bidder could be looking at nine of them. I left it up to my partner, who knew exactly what my trump holding was, to decide what action, if any, to take. I passed.

What a dilemma he faced! He knew that the opponents held exactly five spades. He also knew that we had the majority of the points. He was therefore certain that they could never make 4♠. However, if he doubled, LHO would almost certainly pull it to 5♦, and it was possible that they could actually make that. So he just passed.

Evidently RHO had thought that LHO was bidding Michaels. He held three hearts in his own hand, I had five, as my partner had explained, and my partner had supported my suit, which certainly showed another three, at least. So RHO must have somehow believed that his partner also had five. His reasoning required a deck with at least 16 hearts!

So, we set them three or four tricks; there was some dispute, but it did not matter. We could have set them a lot more if we had just drawn trumps. According to Deep Finesse, we could have made four hearts, which is what I was ready to bid, or four spades! Five diamonds played by LHO would have been down three. If we doubled and set them three, we would have received 800 points, which would have been even better than making a game.

Had we not been playing Flannery, the bidding would have gone 1♥ – 3♦ – 3♥. I don’t know what RHO would have bid, but it would not have been 4♠.

Wielding the Axe

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Doubling for pleasure. Continue reading →

One thing was indelibly impressed on me at the NABC in Philadelphia. My partner and I bid too aggressively, and we doubled too little. On two consecutive hands I had to write down 1100 and 800 in the wrong column. It was painful.

In Saturday’s club game my partner and I had twenty-one positive scores in twenty-seven hands. I imagined that that would have been good enough for first place, but although we were only 1.5 points behind the winners, we only tied for second out of ten. We had only doubled one contract that the opponents bid. I decided to look at the other hands on which the opponents got the bid to determine whether we missed any potential doubles.

Hand # Contract Result Comment Double +/-
17 2♠ Made 3 Anything that we tried would have been dangerous, although nobody whacked any of the three pairs sitting our way who stole the bid. Doubling for us would have been extremely stupid. -2.5
18 1NT Down 1 My partner and I only had 18 points between us. +2.5
19 4♦ Down 1 This was a fluke. One of the opponents had his hand sorted incorrectly. We should have gotten the bid for 3♠. +2
20 3♠ Down 2 I was afraid that they would run to another suit. I should have doubled anyway. If they ran to hearts, it would have been worse. +4.5
22 4♦ Down 1 +1
24 4♥ Made 4 -1
28 3NT Down 1 +2
30 2NT Made 3 Doubling was not a consideration. -4
1 3NT Made 3 -2.5
3 4♣ Down 1 +1
4 4♠ Made 5 Doubling would have been inane. -4.5
5 3♠ Down 1 +.5

What an astounding result!

If we had doubled all twelve contracts that the opponents won — even the ones in which they clearly underbid — our results would not have changed. If we had doubled all except the three contracts on which the opponents made an overtrick, twelve matchpoints would have been added to our score. That would have netted us an improvement of over five percentage points and a comfortable victory.

This result was probably anomalous. I will try to check some other recent results.

Incidentally, my partner and I got the bid fourteen times, were never doubled, and made every contract except one. If our opponents had doubled us every time, we would have had a phenomenal score. On the other hand, if we had been doubled on the hand on which we were set, our absolute top would have turned into a bottom.