Rotten bridge and milk
Aug. 13th, 2007 01:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jianantonicThis morning, I purchased a pint of milk at the country store by my office, as I often do, and I took a sip, as is the custom after buying milk, and realized that it tasted like juice, not milk. Was it juice? No. Definitely looked like milk. And actually it wasn't juicy so much as it was just far more flavorful than milk should be. After about 5 seconds of processing wtf was going on, I realized that for the first time in my life, I had ingested rotten milk. It was pretty disgusting. But it didn't smell particularly rotten, and the carton was stamped "Sell by Aug 25." Um, yeah. It's only the 13th. Not cool.
I spent a few minutes halfheartedly searching the internet for a way to complain to the dairy (it's not the store's fault that the milk was bad - it's not even close to the sell by date yet), but I couldn't find any info and kinda gave up on it, but now that it's been six hours and I still have the taste of rotten milk in my throat, I may renew my efforts later today.
Z and I went to Silver Spring for the weekend - 2 pairs sessions on Saturday and A/X swiss on Sunday. I've never had much of a problem competing with the A players in Charlottesville, but DC has a much stronger pool of competition. The A players in my area got to be A players by taking turns beating each other over the course of fifty years. Anyone who plays bridge long enough will eventually make Silver Life Master. This does not mean they are good players. Masterpoints are nice and all, but they're not actually a very good measure of how good a player is. More on that in a moment.
So, because Z has 2600 of those near-meaningless measures, we had to play in the A/X pairs, which is an event just for experts and people who think they are experts. I know better. I am not an expert.
I got a little nervous and had quite a few bad boards as a result of nerves, but I settled down and mostly held my own. Unfortunately, Z wasn't really on top of his game, either, and we ended up just barely sub-50%, which I figured was sorta respectable considering the field. We played again in the evening and I was much less nervous with one session under my belt. I played what I felt was some of my best bridge, though admittedly still made more errors than most, and we did much better then - 55%, good enough to scratch and really boost my confidence for the next day.
We'd been lined up with a pair given the following words of encouragement about one of the two: "He's a good player - he carries his 3500 masterpoints well." Remember what I said about masterpoints.
We checked the scores from Saturday to see if our teammates had played. Uh, 44% and 36%. Not a happy sign. And with their 3500 masterpoints, we'd be A's, not X's...yeah...
So let's just say it did not go well.
After two rounds of really embarrassing results (we thought we'd won the first round - nope, got blitzed, cause our teammates forgot to bid and/or make their five cold games), I knew we'd have to stretch to make something happen, so when I held
Axxxx Ax Txx Q8x in first seat all white, I took it to 3N on this auction (the opps were quiet throughout):
P - 1D
1S - 2D
2N - 3H
3N
Z had limited his hand and I knew we'd be fucked in clubs when he showed a heart suit, so when a club lead came out, I knew I was toast. Here's the dummy:
Qx QT9x AKJxxx x
Are there 9 tricks there? Definitely not. After they run their 5 clubs, I'll be lucky to take the last 8 - diamonds have to break. Well, for some ridiculous reason, the opps chose to switch to spades after two rounds of clubs (I'm left with a stiff worthless 8 at this point). I put up the Q on the dummy, which was covered, so I won the A in my hand and went after diamonds, which broke mercifully - stiff Q on my left, so there's no guesswork. Again, mercifully, as I'm running the diamonds, righty is pitching clubs while lefty pitches all the way up to the heart jack, allowing me to try a heart finesse, which doesn't get covered...but I only get one round since I'm stuck in my hand with the A on the next trick - but it matters not - I've got my 9 tricks on an absolute miracle. The opps could've run five clubs off the top, but for some reason chose not to. And if lefty hadn't pitched hearts (why she held onto clubs after deciding she couldn't return them in the first place makes no sense), I'd have been fucked on the finesse, too. So this really was a gift. I don't see how the defense could've been any worse, really...which is why I'm still scratching my head over how our teammates let them make 4NT at the other table. WTF?! So one teammate starts getting a little testy with me over not playing it well enough, at which point I state calmly that I was lucky to make it at all on the club lead. He said that he, too, led a club, but it was cold, as my hand ALWAYS has a club stopper. Umm...no I don't! The only way my Q is actually a stopper is if both AK are in the same hand, which they weren't. I got up and left the table when he tried to continue arguing with me. So, um, it wasn't a fun day for me.
The upside is that I played the hell out of my hands - Z said I played really well for 45 out of the 49 boards, which I'll take - combine nervousness and frustration with my inexperience, and 92% decent play is totally respectable. So I think that we won't be doing any more blind teaming. We'll just work on making a reputation as good pairs players, and then we should be able to get good teammates whenever we want.
I did have fun, though, and our teammates were nice guys. After the first three rounds, I resigned myself to the "well, it can't get any worse" philosophy and just focused on learning a lot from McKenzie, which I think I did. We'll see how much I remember tonight at the club.
Side note - had a really unethical opponent in round one, which made it even more infuriating that we didn't beat them (Z and I played well enough to win that match, I think) - when he wasn't busy staring down my dress, he was bending every rule in existence and generally being a total dick. So, you know, I'm not a violent person at all, but if anyone else feels like doing my bidding, let's just say I'd love to shake the hand of the person who sterilizes that guy with a swift kick in the nuts. Just sayin'.
In addition to all the bridge we played, Z and I had a wonderful time visiting with my cousin Laura and JohnLinn, who I am very sad that I didn't see in my whole time at FRFF even though we were apparently very close at times. Oh well.
So yeah. That's all.
Peace.
I spent a few minutes halfheartedly searching the internet for a way to complain to the dairy (it's not the store's fault that the milk was bad - it's not even close to the sell by date yet), but I couldn't find any info and kinda gave up on it, but now that it's been six hours and I still have the taste of rotten milk in my throat, I may renew my efforts later today.
Z and I went to Silver Spring for the weekend - 2 pairs sessions on Saturday and A/X swiss on Sunday. I've never had much of a problem competing with the A players in Charlottesville, but DC has a much stronger pool of competition. The A players in my area got to be A players by taking turns beating each other over the course of fifty years. Anyone who plays bridge long enough will eventually make Silver Life Master. This does not mean they are good players. Masterpoints are nice and all, but they're not actually a very good measure of how good a player is. More on that in a moment.
So, because Z has 2600 of those near-meaningless measures, we had to play in the A/X pairs, which is an event just for experts and people who think they are experts. I know better. I am not an expert.
I got a little nervous and had quite a few bad boards as a result of nerves, but I settled down and mostly held my own. Unfortunately, Z wasn't really on top of his game, either, and we ended up just barely sub-50%, which I figured was sorta respectable considering the field. We played again in the evening and I was much less nervous with one session under my belt. I played what I felt was some of my best bridge, though admittedly still made more errors than most, and we did much better then - 55%, good enough to scratch and really boost my confidence for the next day.
We'd been lined up with a pair given the following words of encouragement about one of the two: "He's a good player - he carries his 3500 masterpoints well." Remember what I said about masterpoints.
We checked the scores from Saturday to see if our teammates had played. Uh, 44% and 36%. Not a happy sign. And with their 3500 masterpoints, we'd be A's, not X's...yeah...
So let's just say it did not go well.
After two rounds of really embarrassing results (we thought we'd won the first round - nope, got blitzed, cause our teammates forgot to bid and/or make their five cold games), I knew we'd have to stretch to make something happen, so when I held
Axxxx Ax Txx Q8x in first seat all white, I took it to 3N on this auction (the opps were quiet throughout):
P - 1D
1S - 2D
2N - 3H
3N
Z had limited his hand and I knew we'd be fucked in clubs when he showed a heart suit, so when a club lead came out, I knew I was toast. Here's the dummy:
Qx QT9x AKJxxx x
Are there 9 tricks there? Definitely not. After they run their 5 clubs, I'll be lucky to take the last 8 - diamonds have to break. Well, for some ridiculous reason, the opps chose to switch to spades after two rounds of clubs (I'm left with a stiff worthless 8 at this point). I put up the Q on the dummy, which was covered, so I won the A in my hand and went after diamonds, which broke mercifully - stiff Q on my left, so there's no guesswork. Again, mercifully, as I'm running the diamonds, righty is pitching clubs while lefty pitches all the way up to the heart jack, allowing me to try a heart finesse, which doesn't get covered...but I only get one round since I'm stuck in my hand with the A on the next trick - but it matters not - I've got my 9 tricks on an absolute miracle. The opps could've run five clubs off the top, but for some reason chose not to. And if lefty hadn't pitched hearts (why she held onto clubs after deciding she couldn't return them in the first place makes no sense), I'd have been fucked on the finesse, too. So this really was a gift. I don't see how the defense could've been any worse, really...which is why I'm still scratching my head over how our teammates let them make 4NT at the other table. WTF?! So one teammate starts getting a little testy with me over not playing it well enough, at which point I state calmly that I was lucky to make it at all on the club lead. He said that he, too, led a club, but it was cold, as my hand ALWAYS has a club stopper. Umm...no I don't! The only way my Q is actually a stopper is if both AK are in the same hand, which they weren't. I got up and left the table when he tried to continue arguing with me. So, um, it wasn't a fun day for me.
The upside is that I played the hell out of my hands - Z said I played really well for 45 out of the 49 boards, which I'll take - combine nervousness and frustration with my inexperience, and 92% decent play is totally respectable. So I think that we won't be doing any more blind teaming. We'll just work on making a reputation as good pairs players, and then we should be able to get good teammates whenever we want.
I did have fun, though, and our teammates were nice guys. After the first three rounds, I resigned myself to the "well, it can't get any worse" philosophy and just focused on learning a lot from McKenzie, which I think I did. We'll see how much I remember tonight at the club.
Side note - had a really unethical opponent in round one, which made it even more infuriating that we didn't beat them (Z and I played well enough to win that match, I think) - when he wasn't busy staring down my dress, he was bending every rule in existence and generally being a total dick. So, you know, I'm not a violent person at all, but if anyone else feels like doing my bidding, let's just say I'd love to shake the hand of the person who sterilizes that guy with a swift kick in the nuts. Just sayin'.
In addition to all the bridge we played, Z and I had a wonderful time visiting with my cousin Laura and JohnLinn, who I am very sad that I didn't see in my whole time at FRFF even though we were apparently very close at times. Oh well.
So yeah. That's all.
Peace.
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no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 06:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 06:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 06:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 06:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 07:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-13 07:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-14 01:38 am (UTC)ewwwwwwwwwwwwwww!
Date: 2007-08-16 06:08 am (UTC)but...um...it gave us each our weekly dose of penicillin???? ;P
Re: ewwwwwwwwwwwwwww!
Date: 2007-08-16 12:17 pm (UTC)It was yucky, and I'm still trying to erase that taste from my memory.