Here's wishing you grand slams aplenty in 2021! You deserve all good things, just for surviving this oh-so-challenging year. And hopefully, you will get to do your bidding face-to-face before many months have passed.

District 4 Officers  

Traditions are foundationally important in strengthening family and community, in reinforcing values, in celebrating life’s events, and in creating lasting memories. The routine of traditions results in a closeness that creates comfort and stability in our lives. During this challenging year, “pressing pause” on traditions of the past was difficult, and creating new traditions – maybe temporary or maybe permanent – became the norm. Now, I don’t think it’s a bad thing to begin new traditions, but the changes required in 2020 came at us like drinking water from a firehose! While I love some of my family holiday traditions – like playing cards and board games after a huge feast, there are two “new-in-2020” events I’d like to make permanent traditions. First, after 40 years of cooking Thanksgiving dinner, I loved having it catered!  And, second, the cookie exchange in my Condo building was loads of fun… with another bag or two of cookies arriving outside our door day after day.

I have recently also been reflecting on the traditions of bridge, whether at club games or tournaments. Bridge certainly has been a big part of the rhythm of my life, providing a sense of community and belonging. In 2020, our new tradition is virtual, online bridge. Over the past few weeks, the multitude of holiday wishes shared by both old and new friends in the virtual table chat warmed my heart and brought back memories of our club holiday parties of years past. Even if virtual bridge is temporary, I hope that you’re participating in it as a way to remain involved with your bridge family to keep the bridge community ties strong.

My New Year’s wish for each of you is good health and safety, love and laughter, all mixed with a smattering of new traditions.

Let’s all toast to that!

I welcome your comments or suggestions (jeannegehret@comcast.net)

The Competitions and Conventions Committee has introduced a new alert procedure system that will become effective January 1, 2021. Here is the full text of the new Alert Procedure. Changes include that instead of announcing "transfer," we will announce the suit shown, e.g. "hearts." Support doubles and redoubles are no longer alerted since they have become so commonly used.

Because of COVID-19 related uncertainties about when tournaments can safely resume, please check the ACBL calendar listings.

For a full year D4 calendar, click here.

For the D4 virtual club calendar, click here

For a 2021online event schedule, click here

An understanding of scoring is important to developing your bridge strategy. Larry Cohen reviews the basics that may help you determine when to double, when to bid on, when to sacrifice, whether you are playing with regular partners or with robots. Bridge scoring explained provides an overview in three easy lessons.

How do you explore for slam after partner's weak two opener -- or should you just settle for game? The decision may partially rest on how disciplined your partnership is with weak two bids in the first position, non vul against vul. After you choose your bid, see what the experts say!

Then visit the MSC website to read next month's problem and submit your answers online: http://d4msc.straguzzi.org

Whether you are an established professional or new to teaching, check out the new Education and Bridge Lessons Tab on the District website. There are links to resources for teachers who want to start teaching online. Any teachers in the district who would like their contact information included, please send it to Joann Glasson at joannglasson@msn.com

News from Around the Units 

www.acblunit112.org 

Junior Masters                                    

Club Masters                                                    

Sectional Masters                                                    

Regional Masters                                                      

Advanced NABC Masters                                                              

  www.unit120.org 

The ancient Babylonians are said to have been the first people to make New Year’s resolutions some 4,000 years ago. They were also the first to hold recorded celebrations in honor of the new year—though for them the year began not in January but in mid-March when the crops were planted. During a massive 12-day religious festival known as Akitu, the Babylonians crowned a new king or reaffirmed their loyalty to the reigning king. They also made promises to the gods to pay their debts and return any objects they had borrowed. These promises could be considered the forerunners of our New Year’s resolutions. If the Babylonians kept to their word, their (pagan) gods would bestow favor on them for the coming year. If not, they would fall out of the gods’ favor—a place no one wanted to be.

A similar practice occurred in ancient Rome after the reform-minded emperor Julius Caesar tinkered with the calendar and established January 1 as the beginning of the new year circa 46 B.C. Named for Janus, the two-faced god whose spirit inhabited doorways and arches, January had special significance for the Romans. Believing that Janus symbolically looked backwards into the previous year and ahead into the future, the Romans offered sacrifices to the deity and made promises of good conduct for the coming year.

Despite the tradition’s religious roots, New Year’s resolutions today are a mostly secular practice. Instead of making promises to the gods, most people make resolutions only to themselves and focus purely on self-improvement (which may explain why such resolutions seem so hard to keep). According to recent research, while as many as 45 percent of Americans say they usually make New Year’s resolutions, only 8 percent are successful in achieving their goals. But that dismal record probably won’t stop people from making resolutions anytime soon—after all, we’ve had about 4,000 years of practice!

Check back next month for unit news. In the meantime, stay well!

Unit 133: Lehigh Valley 

Happy New Year to All! Not to damn with faint praise, but I hope that everyone has a better 2021 than they did 2020. It looks like we are on pace to be able to see each other in person in 2021, and hopefully even have face-to-face bridge. There will probably even be a Nationals or two.

I am saddened to report the passing of long-time Unit 141 Board Member Joan Weinrott in December. She was instrumental in the running of Unit 141 tournaments for a long time. I can certainly attest to the fact that that’s a thankless job. Joan didn’t play in tournaments the last few years, but there are still plenty of folks who are going to miss her.

It was a slow work day today, so I had the vugraph of the inaugural event of the World Bridge Tour event on in the background. (They don’t call me King of the Vugraph for nothing.) The event was an invitational event with 16 top pairs from around the world. There were actually more than 16 pairs, technically, since Bob Hamman would up playing with Peter Weichsel for one day and Bart Bramley for two. Hindered by this, Mr. Hamman, a mere lad of 82, only won the event by 42 some-odd IMP’S, with a score almost twice as high as the second place pair. While of course none of is Bob Hamman, the fact that he can continue to win should be an inspiration to us all.

There are no new Life Masters this month, but there are people with other masterpoint achievements. 

New Diamond Life Master (5,000 points) – Frances Abramson

New Ruby Life Master (1,500 points) – Daniel Jacobson

New Silver Life Masters (1,000 point) - Joan Bernstein, Frank Feng, Ellen Kelley, Margot Lebovitz and T E Molnar

New Bronze Life Master (750 points) – Dianne Meyer

New NABC Masters (200 points) - Maureen Luke, Bill Schwarzman, and Harriet Stuart

New Regional Master (100 points) – Leslie Wildstein

New Sectional Masters (50 points) – Deborah Barberio, David Endy, Lori Flynn, Richard Greenberg, John Neefe, Sharon Neill, and Shelley Schwartz

New Club Masters (20 points) – Stephen Hughes, Maude Kent, Paul Lotke, Anne McAlaine, Mark Nath, and Phyllis Suckow

New Junior Masters (5 points) – Mary Beth Bright, Ann Higgins, and Virginia Pappas

Check back next month for news about Unit 168. In the meantime, stay healthy!

Unit 190: Delaware 

With the bridge community facing a long wait before the return to face-to-face bridge, Unit 190 has decided to help those players who have not yet made the jump to BBO. In the South, there is a team headed by Trina S. Williams, along with the friendly assistance of Dini Romito, Peter Harris, Paula Varrassi and Kim Holm. (Check out the Shuffles game on Thursdays on BBO at 9:30.) In the North, Carole Everitt is assisting and guiding those players who are not yet playing online. For further details, please see the November issue of The Dummy.

BRONZE LIFE MASTER: Mary K. Reilly

SILVER LIFE MASTER: Colin C. Mackay

SAPPHIRE LIFE MASTER: Anne C. Taylor

To read about the Winter Delaware State Championship Tournament, or how the Delaware Unit is working to get the old gang together, or to learn other news while you are staying home, check out the Unit 190 website and click on the link below to the November Dummy:

Unit 217: Susquehanna 

4Spot | January 2021 | Editor: Janet Johnson | janet.johnson210@gmail.com