Hello, I suppose this thread is as good as any for my first post here. My name is [Edited]. I was born in China but emigrated to Southeast England aged 5; so culturally I am very much British. Now 20 years old, I am a second year Economics undergraduate with a little too much time on his hands. On BBO, my moniker is "Lemm1ng", originating from my like for lemmings :) I stumbled upon bridge during break times in Sixth Form (high school equivalent) when I would play with friends. None of us were any good and we knew nothing about bidding systems; it was merely a casual game where people rarely bid beyond the 3 level and nobody bothered to keep score. This all changed after I left for university. I began to read bridge columns (Andrew Robson's in the Times is a particular favourite) and learned everything I know about bidding from Karen Walker's excellent bridge library; http://www.prairienet.org/bridge/ Essentially I am entirely self taught, learning to run before I could walk by reading about elaborate declarer play and defense. This is perhaps why I am occasional fallible to the most rookie errors! SAYC is my bidding system of choice and I play all sorts of gadgets. I am a willing student of the game and would love the opportunity to improve my skills, but this is difficult because nobody else my age seems to play bridge (at least nobody near me). Age is important I think because I need to be able to relate, to build a rapport. My inability to find a partner has hurt my interest in the game, and I seem to use BBO less and less nowadays. As a person, I am very talkative with a less than conventional perspective to everything, and full of random trivia. I work part time as a teaching assistant at the local Sixth Form College. I love British sitcoms, namely Blackadder and the Office, and personally I have a dry sense of humour. Chopin and Liszt make up my music of choice, though I also enjoy British rock (n roll). Cooking and following cricket make up my other main hobbies :) Good job if you read all that.
