[WellSpyder]

pescetom, on 2018-April-21, 15:24, said:

Chess turned out to be quite simple with no arguments possible

Ha! I remember the look on my cousin's face when I castled against him when we tried out a friendly game more years ago than I like to think. (Reasonably enough he went off to his father to check that this was allowed.) And then in the next game he made a double pawn move in a position where I could take it en passant - I don't think I had the nerve to make another move that looked like I was making up the rules as I went along.....

While on the subject of confusing bridge language, I also remember lending my mother a basic bridge book when she started playing an occasional social game again after a decades-long break. (She had only played at a very basic level in her youth, as will be apparent from what follows.) Unfortunately she got stuck on chapter 1 on card play- "what does it mean when it talks about ducking?"

[barmar]

WellSpyder, on 2018-April-24, 03:30, said:

While on the subject of confusing bridge language, I also remember lending my mother a basic bridge book when she started playing an occasional social game again after a decades-long break. (She had only played at a very basic level in her youth, as will be apparent from what follows.) Unfortunately she got stuck on chapter 1 on card play- "what does it mean when it talks about ducking?"

There's a novice player who frequently joins us when we go to a restaurant to post mortem after our weekly club game. Hardly a week goes by that we don't have to explain a bit of bridge jargon: "run", "in the slot", "tight", etc.

[kenberg]

I have yet to explain to my wife just what a strip squeeze is. I think she figures that as long as I don't expect her to do it, she doesn't care.

One of my favorites was when I had a pick-up partner at a Regional. On one hand my LHO, the declarer, claimed the rest of the tricks, saying that she would run the clubs. My partner called the director and explained that she had not said whether she would run the clubs from the top down or the bottom up, and if the latter he would win a trick. The director, I still remember it was the late Millard Nachtwey, calmly and without laughing, explained that having announced that she would "run the clubs" she would not even be allowed to run them from the bottom up if for some reason that would be advisable. I later made sure that Millard understood that this was a pick-up partner.

[barmar]

I miss Millard I only knew him from nationals, but he was great.

We taught our novice another new phrase last night: "4 by 3" (for a flat hand). And last week we taught him "tank"; it's surprising he didn't know it, since he's the slowest player at the club.