jonottawa

♥K is highest variance lead, could work really well or be disastrous. I'm a 4th best from longest and strongest here. If ♣Q is small ♣, wow. If I can somehow randomly choose among the 4 suits without drawing suspicion to myself, I do that.

Ugh. Tough problem. I have no strong objection to any of the plans. I passed. If we make 3N we'll beat the folks in ♣. If we don't, we'll beat the folks in 3N. 3N at IMPs.

I'd like to see them abolish the DHS and beef up our intel-gathering (keep it constitutional, though) and black ops capabilities. I'm fine with 'profiling' (pretty sure the Canadians 'profile', I used to get hassled all the time when I was in my 20's and flew to Ottawa, especially when I had long hair) but only with respect to air travel (air travel is a privilege, not a right, so you check a few of your civil liberties at the door for the duration of your trip.) People should be encouraged to worry less about really really unlikely things. Flying is safe. If you want 'complete' safety, stay home. We (when I say we, I mean you) tried living in fear and basing many of our decisions on fear throughout most of the last decade and it didn't work out too well.

From the : "Richard 'Rick' Weiss is a contract bridge bidding system developer. He is credited with inventing the Weiss double, in which the double of a 2-level opening bid shows a strong balanced hand. He is also well known for originating the 'never trap pass with a strong hand' principle."

Well, it's December 31, 2009, so you all know what that means. Yes, it's the day before uber rich people (well, Americans) can die and leave their vast wealth to their spawn tax free. (If massive inherited wealth doesn't make you all warm and tingly, well you're just not patriotic enough.) Bet those life support machines are in short supply. I wonder if there will be a rash of murders/suicides (murders early in 2010 and suicides in December, presumably.)

Rented the Cove tonight. I prefer my sociopathic gleeful cartoonish slaughter to target non-humans.

Dude, how do you talk and do that at the same time? Why do I disagree? Because I've never heard of nor support the ''never trap Pass with a strong hand" principle'. I suspect that principle was developed by the same guy who developed the 'balance randomly' principle.

Inglourious Basterds looks appalling to me. Dehumanizing Germans is good but dehumanizing Jews is bad? Uh, no. Two wrongs don't make a right and making some sort of sociopathic gleeful cartoonish slaughter/torture of mid-20th century Germans 'fun' is really sick imo.

Double. Partner expects me to do this, so I oblige. It's slightly -EV if pard doesn't have a trap and mandatory if pard does, so I do. Partnership harmony and +800 are good things. This forum needs an optional 24-hr mask function where the stars (especially Fred) can make a post that shows up as a post but doesn't reveal itself for 24 hrs (or whatever an appropriate time frame might be.) These 'me too' posts make me throw up in my mouth a little.

Saw District 9 last night. Was rather disappointed. The special effects are good, but the plot is pretty awful. That's kinda what I'm expecting from Avatar. (Saw the South Park spoof of Avatar here.)

I'd probably be inclined to bet about 15k. I would expect the same result as shoving 90%+ of the time. Shoving looks weaker imo, although you both know you're both pot committed in either case. More important is the decision to announce the authorized information you had, that seems really dumb.

The combination of 3 bad hearts and the likely (albeit not guaranteed) prospect of no longer holding an opening hand got me to pass. I don't want a ♥ lead and I don't want to force pard into a pushy 4♥. Partner is 95% sure to bid again (even if we're not in a forcing auction he's short in ♠) and now when I correct his 3-level bid to 3♥ he'll know I have something like this. Did your friend get a top or a bottom?

I find the support x question more interesting than the 'main' question as presented. I strongly favor the support x. Rebidding 2♥ is gross (incredibly unilateral/handhoggish). Give me a suit that plays WELL opposite a small singleton and maybe you can pretend you had a ♠ in with your ♣. As to the 5/5 decision, I hate these. I don't like defending with a trump void, but I have no reason to believe that we have a big trump fit or that we can take 11 tricks on offense. Maybe opps got carried away because of the colors. I'd pass. It would surprise me if nobody bid on with these cards, though. I see it as clear for me, but not as clear enough to be unanimous in a poll. 'Bid one more for the road,' etc.

Didn't have Guy Lafleur, that kinda surprised me. Another cool little game to try: Machinarium

I predict a unanimous poll. Unless someone assigns some % of the blame to N for agreeing to play with S.

... Btw, if you respond 5NT do you have methods to distinguish between Kxxx(x), Kxxxxx, and Qxxxx(x), where you only want to be in 7 opposite one of them? I try not to play for pard to have the magic hand. I also try not to play for pard to have the hand from hell. If you want to give pard headaches, be my guest, that's not my style. If all I need from pard is a Q in the suit he bid to make slam playable, I'm allowed to play him for that. It drives me nuts when I think partners have a close decision and are asking me to weigh in when in reality all they're worried about is that I have some incredibly unlikely 'nightmare hand'. Somehow I'm supposed to guess which. I think B/I especially should be encouraged to keep their auctions simple. I think my auction fits the bill and gets you to the right spot the vast majority of the time. It's also fun/hot. If I had exclusion available and agreements on Q ask after exclusion, sure, that would be better, in that you could find the grand opposite the k6th.

Obviously your math should be expected IMPs, not points. But my math goes like this: I get dealt a hand that is cold for slam opposite most balanced yarbs 3 or 4 times in my life. I just got dealt one. I bid slam.

Not the best programming. It asked if my character was American and I said yes and then it later asked if my character was European. But it got Jesse Ventura in 17/18 guesses iirc. Later edit, it only took 20 guesses to guess God and it turns out he's not real! Glad that issue's resolved.

Now I wish I'd rightsided this puppy. :rolleyes: I guess you can cuebid 4♣ now and if you get no double and a 4♥ cue from pard you can bid slam or something. If you bid 4♦ now and pard bids 4♥ you're kinda hosed.

Justin's dad is Bob Hamman?

I thought this thread would get swamped so I got my answer in early. To answer Fred's actual questions: 1. My analysis went something like: 3-2 ♥ vs finesse ... oh, entry problem, less than half of 3-2 ♥ vs 4-1♥, finesse. 2. I think it's close enough that I have no idea what declarer at the other table will do, so yes. Even though playing on ♥ is just as unilateral as leading ♣, it feels more like you're delaying the decision until later, which bridge players like to think they're doing. 3. I think the odds of a ♣ to the King losing and a trump coming back are greater than any of the other mitigating possibilities (opp with 1-1 in the majors and never bid). I also think that I want to give my teammates credit for a ♣ lead if it was beating the hand. Try to win the match on another hand. Maybe if I'm playing a much stronger team or I'm down I play on ♥, but that goes without saying. My math, fwiw, ignoring any and all inferences or correlations between the 2 suits or misdefense or 1-1 M: Playing H wins 13.8% Playing C wins 16.1% Down you go regardless 36.2% You make regardless 33.9% http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=tT4...F7Q&output=html

I don't think 4♠ is gross in that 2♣ risks wrongsiding it. Edit: A little drunk, not high at all, dude, seriously.

I'm tempted to bid 6♦. If I bid 5♥ and then 6♦, it'll be hard for partner to pass when it's right. Screw it, I bid 6♦. Especially if my partner is a girl. :)

Sorry, the more I think about this the more I wish I hadn't posted it. It was just a frustrating hand and I was hoping I'd overlooked something glaringly obvious. I didn't really expect ducking the ♥ to gain, but I completely overlooked the possibility that I might be unblocking the suit for the opponents. It was a little ironic that I expected LHO to have 4 ♥, but by guarding against the somewhat remote possibility that he had 5 ♥, which he indeed have, I went down in a contract that makes easily if I win the first ♥. (And can still make double-dummy after ducking the first ♥, but good luck finding that line at the table.) [hv=d=n&v=b&n=sqjt5hk42da9764c3&w=s92hj8765dk8cqj85&e=sk7643hqtdjt32c42&s=sa8ha93dq5cakt976]399|300|Scoring: IMP P-P-1C-P 1S-P-2N-P 3N-Float[/hv] http://www.bridgebase.com/tools/handviewer...4325-1258449239

Seems like the risk of a 4-1 ♥ break is greater than the likelihood that ♥ are 3-2 AND ♠ 2-2. Hope the ♣A is onside. If not, we tell teammates they led a ♣.