Want further proof that technology renders us helpless
at simple tasks that used to be performed without a hitch by hand? Look no
further than the annual Unit 116 picnic and game on Saturday, Aug. 29.
No hitches in the picnic part of the day. The food – roast
chicken, potatoes, salads and the fabulous sweet corn picked that very morning from the
fields at Paul Zittel's farm – was very much up to the standards set in
previous years.
No, the breakdown didn't come until the game started,
after some initial confusion about who was sitting where in a setup that spread
18 tables through all four playrooms at the Buffalo Bridge Center. The
confusion over table assignments soon turned into confusion on the BridgeMates,
the electronic scoring devices. After director Art Morth wasn't able to set
them straight, he gave each table pick-up slips, little scoring cards for each
round.
I hadn't seen a pick-up slip since before the
pandemic, when director Bill Finkelstein favored them at the Airport
Bridge Club. Since I was sitting East, I didn't have to deal with them. That
challenge fell upon the players sitting North, since they’re in charge of
scorekeeping, and many of them had forgotten how to fill the damn things out.
At one table, I coached North from start to finish on
which figures went where. Several others also weren't sure what information went on
which line. And forget about finding out how well or how badly you did when the
game was over. There were no results right away.
There wasn't the usual email from the ACBL with
results on Saturday night, either. There still wasn't one Sunday afternoon. It
took until 9:52 p.m. Sunday for that familiar Live for Clubs message to show
up. That was followed 15 minutes later by another email, this one from
help@thecommongame.com. It read:
Dear Dale & Judy (sic),
Your reported score below looks highly unusual. Please
do NOT reply to this email. IF this was scored on the wrong side or in error,
please report this to your club director ASAP. ... While this might not impact
your standing or masterpoint awards, it could affect someone else's.
Board #13
Score -600
Opponent #18
Your direction EW
The information for the Contract was blank, but the
score suggests either a successful North-South bid of 3 No Trump vulnerable or
us going down six vulnerable. According to the hand record that accompanied the
email message, neither of those things was likely to happen. I dug out my
personal tally of the hands and, sure enough, we didn't get minus 600 on Board
13. We got minus 200. How come?
I had snatched the bid from North-South, Pat Haynes
and Agi Maisel, keeping them from playing it at 2 Spades. I went to 3 Diamonds –
my opening bid was a Diamond, since I had four of them and no five-card major –
and felt confident because my partner Judie Bailey had raised Diamonds. This
was going to be a sacrifice. I fully expected to fall one trick short for a
score of minus 100. On the other hand, if Pat and Agi made 2 Spades, and I
reckoned they would, our score would be minus 110. This is why they say down one
is good bridge.
When the dummy appeared, though, my heart sank. I
saw only three Diamonds in Judie's hand. Didn't her bid promise four of them?
Shouldn't she have mentioned her five-card Heart suit? In Hearts, according to
the hand record, we win eight tricks. As the Diamonds stand, we're good for
only seven. Draw all the Diamonds and play it like it's No Trump? Still good
for only seven.
East (me)
Spades: J-10-5; Hearts: A-J-6; Diamonds: Q-6-5-2;
Clubs: K-5-4.
South (Agi)
Spades: A-9-4; Hearts: Q-10-9-3; Diamonds: 8-7; Clubs:
9-8-7-3.
West (Judie)
Spades: 8-6; Hearts: K-8-7-5-2; Diamonds: K-J-10;
Clubs: A-J-6.
North (Pat)
Spades: K-Q-7-3-2; Hearts: 4; Diamonds: A-9-4-3;
Clubs: Q-10-2.
Minus 600 was an absolute bottom board. Minus 200 tied
us for bottom with two other East-Wests and gave us about 1.25 more match
points. Our final score went up from 44-something percent to 45.44%. I hoped it
would at least take us from 14th place to 13th among the East-Wests, but
no-o-o-o. Marilyn Wortzman and Jim Easton still were in front of us. By 0.06%.
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