jjbrr

Figure skating is for pervs. Curling is for those of us with fine taste in athletic competition.

Curling, eh? I'll share my opinions of curling. I hear it's big in Russia. http://img716.imageshack.us/img716/7761/olympic2010russia0026.jpg http://img30.imageshack.us/img30/3905/therussiancurlingteamis.jpg And Madeline likes it, too. Spoiler (Hidden): http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/516/tuespic1maddy.jpg And this one is obvious. http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/5507/7tvxw.jpg

We have plenty of cardboard already in America, thank you very much.

especially food porn poetry.

A truly American invention if I've ever seen one.

overcall structure. where NT is t/o and double shows some goodish hand, usually balanced.

I actually think hands where you have to arrange a ruff in a 4333 dummy to make the contract are pretty cool.

I feel like the most likely explanation is that Eric opened 2♦ with the given hand, as I believe meckwell played a weak-only 2♦ multi years ago. Maybe the point was someone psyched 2♠ and they still got to 4♠ and then the play was cool because the opps misdefended or the ♣A was onside or RHO didn't have a ♥ honor or something.

5431 is so overrated

I, also, am glad you're a cat.

I'm down with 6430 to be honest. Particularly if the 6 is ♠.

concur

There is an easy solution, you know. http://img163.imageshack.us/img163/5848/baconcheeseburgerpizza.jpg "Bacon Cheese Pizza Burger Giant burger between two large meat pizzas, eggs, bacon, colby and pepper jack cheese. " My preference would be to have it cooked a little more in the middle, though I'm sure it's fine as it is. The eggs seem kind of out of place though lol

Something about this story does not make sense. Meck passed a 16 count with Axx in support of partner? Eric then bid THREE SPADES?

Obv when they preempt you have less room to be precise, so your doubles have to be more flexible and can contain a wide range of hands, some of which aren't described perfectly by the double. The fact that double is overloaded with all sorts of different hand types should be a good indication that it would be very hard to describe your hand to partner if you didn't have double available at all if you play them as penalty. Of course if you have a penalty double of their preempt and you have a hand with which to penalize, you put yourself in a good position, but on the other hands you put yourself in a much worse position. The latter hand type is much more common.

please don't bid 2♠ or 2 anything else for that matter with this hand.

I think pass and double are both losing bridge with a hand like this.

What was west trying to accomplish with his 3♠ bid? Was he merely confirming that he had his 1♠ bid? This hand is a perfect example of why it's right to bid 3♥ with Hx. And the x this time is the 9, which is about as good as an x can be!

you need to do some calculations if you think AKJTxxxx is substanially inferior to AKQxxxx How about... if partner has a stiff then AKJTxxxx is about 15 % less likely to run than AKQxxxx? That is quite significant and not that unlikely of a scenario. it is not really about if one is significantly better than the other. My calculations show AKJTxxxx will produce 8 tricks 75% of the time. What you need to decide is, is that good enough to bid gambling 3NT? My personal style is that it is not.

1♥ all day

This is a classic meme on a different forum, but it's probably appropriate in this thread. csaba, if things aren't going your way with the girls, try hitting them. girls love the dominant, alpha male. Spoiler (hidden):

Takeout. Sometimes you have classic t/o shape but aren't strong enough to double directly over 1♥.

I'd probably splinter with the S hand after a 1♦ opener. You get to describe the key features of your hand in one bid and partner can judge what to do. After a 3♠ cuebid, a 4♦ bid will suggest good trumps, since S can't have many points in the majors and couldn't cue ♣. Seems like good trumps, short ♥, not much in ♣ is enough for N to make some move.

yep