Leaderboard

Apparently, in the UK, duty was levied on playing cards right up until 1960. That is the reason why the A♠ is still larger and more elaborately decorated than the other Aces, on British cards: it used to carry the duty stamp. And I remember reading somewhere, that back in the 19th century a man was hanged for forging the A♠ on packs of cards, in order to evade duty.... So it could have been worse.... :blink:

Not trying to start anything at all here, just got this email and wanted to share it. An atheist was walking through the woods. 'What majestic trees! 'What powerful rivers!a 'What beautiful animals! He said to himself. Suddenly, he heard a rustling in the bushes behind him. He turned to look .... . . and saw a 7-foot grizzly bear charge towards him. He ran as fast as he could along the path. He looked over his shoulder & saw that the bear was closing on him .... He looked over his shoulder again, and the bear was even closer .... and then ..... He tripped and fell. Rolling over to pick himself up, he found the bear was right on top of him ......... reaching towards him with its left paw ..... and raising the right paw to strike ... At that instant the Atheist cried out, 'Oh my God!' Time Stopped ... The bear froze ...... The forest was silent .... A bright light shone upon the man, and a voice came out of the sky ... "You deny my existence for all these years, you teach others I don't exist and even credit creation to cosmic accident ........ Do you expect me to help you out of this predicament?" "Am I to count you as a believer?" The atheist looked directly into the light .... "It would be hypocritical of me to suddenly ask you to treat me as a Christian now ... but perhaps you could make the BEAR a Christian?" ... a pause ... "Very well," said the voice ... The light went out. The sounds of the forest resumed .... the bear dropped his right arm ... brought both paws together ... bowed his head & spoke... "Lord, bless this food, which I am about to receive. Amen."

I don't play systems where I don't have some known anchor suit. I really can't give much practical advice over your 1♦ opening. Sorry

The only reason is if it goes 1nt float too often when partner should balance but if you start coming in on hands like this, they will continue to not balance and will stop raising your overcalls too.

As jallerton (that's Jeffrey Allerton, an English international player btw) already mentioned, not showing the minor when it is unnecessary is one of the advantages of opening 1NT. Most of the time, a strong 6322 hand is going to be showing its minor at the 3 level so we are not really saving bidding space by opening 1m - the information leakage on the other hand is another issue. Your reference to NT defences rather confuses me as I cannot see the relevance to this topic. I would not say that a large number of world class players use DONT (not Don't, it is an acronym for Distub Opponents' NT) or Brozel. DONT tends to be most popular amongst club players, particularly in the USA. Multi Landy, to name but one, is far more popular amongst world class players. In the UK, where I grew up, almost noone plays either DONT or Brozel. Lionel is a perfectly decent NT defence and also has its adherents in the UK. It is not my choice though and I am not overly convinced by your argument of it being "more useful". If you are interested in discussing this, I would suggest starting a new topic though, rather than risk threadjacking Fluffy's discussion.