Out-of-town partners. Continue reading
Through 2023 I have mainly played bridge with people from the Northeast in the Hartford Bridge Club (HBC) and the Simsbury Bridge Club (SBC) in Connecticut and at tournaments. There were two sets of exceptions: the two bridge cruises that Sue and I took and a few occasions in which I picked up a partner at a club game when I was on the road for business or some other purpose. Only eight out of my 144 partners through 2023 fit in these categories.
Club games: I have included one game in Northampton, MA. The other two locations were in Charlotte, NC, and the Tampa Bay area.
Dave Wroblewski was the father of Denise Podavini (introduced here). He lived in Charlotte, NC, which was the location of the headquarters of Belk stores, one of TSI’s most important users of the AdDept and AxN systems throughout the twenty-first century. Denise was TSI’s primary contact at Belk from her arrival in 2008 until the dissolution of TSI in 2014 (described here).
I learned from Denise that her family was from Massachusetts and that her father was an avid bridge player. Denise was not even slightly interested in the game, but her father was attempting to teach her daughter1 how to play. When he heart that I had become a Life Master he invited me (through Denise) to play with him at the Charlotte Bridge Club one evening when I was in town consulting and gathering specs. This probably occurred in 2010, but it may have been a little later.
Dave and I had a nondescript game together. I am sure that I made a few mistakes. In those days my assessment of my abilities was somewhat inflated.
David was still a member of the ACBL at the end of 2023. He did not receive any masterpoints in 2023, which struck me as peculiar. He needed less than 27 masterpoints to reach the Diamond Life Master level of 5,000. I had to wonder if something happened to him to prevent him from playing.
It occurred to me while writing this section that my wife Sue has played with Ann Wroblewski, who lived in South Deerfield, MA. I had to wonder if her husband John was related to Dave. The name is not that common.
A year or two before the pandemic my friend Judy Hyde was trying to promote the novice game in the Northampton Bridge Club.3 She invited me to come up and play in the Pro-Am game at a room at the Methodist Church in NoHo. It was a long drive, and Wednesday was the worst possible day for me The time of the game (1pm) conflicted with the morning game at the HBC. It did not directly conflict with the evening game in Simsbury, but working out how best to get from Noho to Eno Hall and to eat supper by 6:30 would not be easy.
On the other hand, I wanted to help Judy get the game established, and so I agreed to play with Susan Lantz
It appears that playing one round with me did not inspire her much. She stopped paying dues to the ACBL in 2022, at which point she had only 26.71 masterpoints.
My wife Sue’s parents moved to Clearwater, FL, in 1982. In the subsequent years Sue and I went down to visit with them on several occasions. Occasionally Sue and I visited one of the local bridge clubs for a game. They found appropriate partners for both of us.
The Clearwater Bridge Club4 played on the second floor of the Regions Bank building. They still were playing there at the end of 2023. Occasionally local residents Eric Rodwell and his wife have been known to attend games. The one time that I played there I was paired up with Dr. Mark Goldschmidt, a retired pediatrician who was a very good player.
My recollection is that we had a pretty good session, but we did not win. In 2023 Mark was still active in bridge. He had about 1,700 masterpoints.
The other club near Clearwater is the St. Petersburg Bridge Club, which is actually in a shopping center in Panellas Park, FL. I can only remember going to this club once, but my list of partners lists two from this club, Marvin Kistler of Kenneth City, FL, and Chris Person from Tampa. Both of them were still members of the ACBL in 2023, but Marvin had earned no masterpoints all year.
I have one fairly vivid memory of playing at this club. I think that I was playing with Chris, but I could be mistaken. On a hand in one of the very first rounds we were playing against one of my partners from Connecticut, Michael Varhalamas (introduced here). Chris opened 1♣, and the opponent to my right passed. I had a very weak hand with shortness in clubs. I passed, and so did Michael. Chris had to play in 1♣ with less than half the points and less than half the trumps. We received a very bad score.
I asked Michael if he would have bid with my hand. He said that he would have because opener could have as few as three clubs. He said that if he had opened any other suit. I have remembered that advice, but I am not sure that it is the right choice in all circumstances.
Sue has much more vivid memories of this club than I do. She was there when someone drove their car through the flimsy wall and stopped just short of where Sue was sitting. Mark Smith was directing that day. He ran up to Sue and helped her out of the “death seat”. He claims that he saved her life, but Sue remembers it a little differently.
The St. Pete club is still operational in the same building in 2023. Its website is here.
Sue and I took two bridge cruises together. Both of them featured Larry Cohen. The first one was in 2012, right after Sue and I got married. I have recorded the details here. We have often referred to it as the “Honeymoon for One. ” The sordid tale has been posted here.
One of the tournament staff was assigned the job of assuring that everyone had a reasonably appropriate partner. I was originally assigned to play with a lady, but she dumped me before the first hand. Instead my partner for the entire cruise was Frank Evangelista from Boca Raton, FL.
I really liked Frank, and I communicated with him a few times in the years following the cruise. Frank stopped paying dues to the ACBL in 2021. I could not find an obituary or any other clear reference to him on the Internet.
The other cruise was two years later. It was longer and had a much better offering of excursions. My journal of the trip has been posted here. My partner for this one was Marty Singer, who had houses in both New Jersey and West Palm Beach, FL. We intended to play together at an event that was proximate to both of us, but it never happened. He is still playing regularly at national and regional events.
On December 24, 2014, Marty was not available to play. I was paired up with Jacques Sopkin of Newport Beach,CA. The journal page for that experience is here. Jacques died at the age of 91. His obituary is here. His LinkedIn page is still available here. For “experience” only “007” is listed.
1. I never met her, but I think that this must be Katie Podavini, who was still an ACBL member at the end of 2023. She only had 37.71 masterpoints and none in 2083. It is incredible to me that so many people were still paying dues in 2023 but not playing at all.
2. The Charlotte Bridge Club appears to have survived the pandemic. Its home page is here. On the day that I wrote this entry (12/16/23) the club was holding a “Christmas/Holiday” party.
3. The Northampton Bridge Club was struggling in 2023. Their Tuesday night game was taken online during the Pandemic, and it never returned to face-to-face play. Judy’s Wednesday game persisted in 2023, and they sometimes had special games at Amherst. The club’s website can be found here.
4. The Clearwater Bridge Club was running seven in-house games per week and two Swiss events per month at the end of 2023. They were still playing in the bank. The website is here.