Bridge Blog 741: Rear-view mirror

Games, blogs, life itself, all came to a screeching standstill over the weekend, thanks to a nasty cold that left me unable to do anything for more than five minutes without conking out. The cold is still with me, but the conk-out factor is much improved so, full of decongestants, I'm back at the bridge table but taking Tuesday night off sick.

First of all, a wrap-up of the St. Catharines Sectional, where Buffalo players weren't as much of a factor as they sometimes are.  

Leading Unit 116 representatives were the partnership of Bert Hargeshimer and Christy Kellogg, who tied for tenth with 16.89 points, 8.61 for tying for third in the Sunday Swiss teams competition and 7.44 for tying for second in the Friday afternoon pairs.

Other Buffalonians of note included Saleh Fetouh (13.07, tied for 22nd), Bud Seidenberg (11 even, 26th), Kathy Pollock (7.85, 38th), Linda Burroughsford (6.62, 52nd), Madhav and Beena Deshmukh (6.17, tied for 54th), Wufeng Luo, Ten-Pao Lee and Chongmin Zhang (5.83, tied for 59th), and Chris Urbanek (5.42, tied for 63rd).

My point total for the tournament turned out to be more than I calculated – 1.79 (194th). That fourth-place finish in the B strat Friday afternoon (Blog 739) turned out to be worth 1.47 points.  

So, having missed four games on the ailing list (including a much-anticipated Saturday evening session at the St. Catharines club), is there any hope for a decent point count for February?

Let’s ignore things like the 37.04% game with Barbara Sadkin on Monday afternoon and just review the good stuff, like Tuesday’s 59.52% game, again with Barbara, who played most of the hands in our direction. That was second overall, good for 0.63 of a point.

Other successes – 55% with Bill Boardman back on Feb. 1, good for 1.07 point; 54.86% with Barb Sadkin on Feb. 10 for 0.45 of a point; and 49.40% with Dianne Bloom on Feb. 13 for 0.22 of a point. That’s it. Club total – 2.37. Tournament total – 1.79. Not even halfway to double digits.