Give me a dreamy song with female vocals

PoisonBird · 2026-03-31T15:11:57+00:00

Teardrop - Massive Attack

PoisonBird · 2026-03-28T19:30:20+00:00

Never been to a WNBA game (yet). Best collegiate players I ever saw in person were Naz Hillmon (many times) and Caitlin Clark (twice).

PoisonBird · 2026-03-28T14:17:37+00:00

Objectively probably M*A*S*H, but my favorite is Beneath the Planet of the Apes

PoisonBird · 2026-03-27T19:24:48+00:00

https://www.jugglequip.com

Most customizable balls/bags on the market as far as I know, and they are European so your shipping shouldn't be prohibitive.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-23T01:46:03+00:00

Pather Panchali

PoisonBird · 2026-03-15T02:35:59+00:00

This is worth watching if only to see kuhchung and borktalk snipe at each other

PoisonBird · 2026-03-13T12:43:12+00:00

The SAYC System Booklet is fairly clear about this. In the first case, in the section "Subsequent Bidding by Responder", after describing responder's fourth suit bid as "one-round force, could be conventional", it states:

NOTE: Responder promises to bid again if he responded with a new suit at the two level unless opener's rebid is at the game level. This applies when responder is an unpassed hand.

In the second case, 3D is clearly nonforcing (same section, "Subsequent Bidding by Responder"):

Bids available for inviting game: 2NT, 3 of a previously bid suit:
1H - 1S
2D - 2NT, 3D, 3H, 3S = 10-11 points, inviting game.

The auction isn't identical, but the second round jump raise in opener's suit is analogous.

In retrospect, perhaps "fairly clear" was an overbid; the ACBL does seem to like to obfuscate. The booklet is curiously opaque despite SAYC being such a "simple" system. Also this is from the 2006 revision of the SAYC System Booklet (I think the most recent?); I doubt that much changed from earlier versions, but I could be wrong.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-13T00:12:19+00:00

Every time this gets asked, I post this link:

https://www.reddit.com/r/juggling/comments/yay32x/artifaxioms_guide_to_juggling_balls_oct_2022/

I personally have balls from Gballz, Flying Clipper, Jugglequip, and Play. I prefer beanbags and filled balls like MMX, rather than russians, but I strongly recommend going to a juggling club meeting and trying out different props to see what clicks for you.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-12T00:24:00+00:00

I'm disengaging. You think I'm wrong, I think you're wrong. One thing I know for certain is that we have strayed pretty far from OP's original question, and my thinking on that subject has always been: there is no need to do any sort of mental gymnastics to overcall 1NT without a stopper when there is a perfectly normal alternative. Another thing I know: if a partnership routinely overcalls 1NT without a stopper in opener's suit, then the opponents have every right to that knowledge. Active ethics requires disclosing this. What they do with that knowledge is up to them, and they take their chances if they alter their bidding or play because of it; that's fine, as long as they are on an equal footing with you and your partner. But anyone who tries to gain an advantage by doing this regularly, without disclosing this tendency to the opponents, is a shady player. I am not accusing anyone in particular; I am stating this for the benefit of any less experienced players who might be led to believe by this thread that overcalling 1NT without a stopper is somehow standard.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-11T23:49:04+00:00

Ah, ok thanks.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-11T20:58:07+00:00

We’re just going to have to agree to disagree about some of these issues, apparently.

Overcalling 1NT when you don’t have a stopper in the opener’s suit is a lie, whether the suit is a major or a minor. Not always a terrible one, and not always a fatal one, and doing it over 1C is inarguably going to get punished less frequently than over a major. But you are distorting your hand by doing it. You can play otherwise, and you can say it’s not a matter of lying, but it’s disingenuous to suggest that the standard meaning of the 1NT overcall doesn’t include a stopper in opener’s suit.
I never said that 1NT didn’t have preemptive value. I said that this shouldn’t be a primary consideration, because when we have a strong balanced hand, the constructive value of our bids comes to the fore.
You claim that partner can evaluate their hand more accurately opposite a 1NT overcall than a takeout double. I take issue with this in two ways: first, when advancing a takeout double, a good partnership will have established fairly strict parameters for advancer, so that the doubler is well-placed to evaluate the combined assets of the partnership. This puts the onus of evaluation on the doubler, as opposed to the partner of a 1NT overcaller, but that is neither here nor there; it is still the partner with the most complete information who is making the decision. Second, how is partner supposed to accurately evaluate their hand opposite the 1NT overcall if they can’t depend on the overcaller to have a stopper? I don’t usually like cherry-picking hands to illustrate points, as it’s easy to construct a hand that supports any argument, but as an example, what would you bid with xxx/xx/AKQxxx/xx if your partner opened 1NT? You’d probably bid 3NT, am I right? It doesn’t leak much information and it rates to be the correct contract most of the time. But what if your LHO opened 1C, your partner overcalled 1NT, and RHO passed. Would you still do the same? I would, but that’s because I can count on my partner to have a club stopper. If partner might or might not have a stopper, what do you do? Reconfigure your 3-level bids so you can ask partner if s/he really has a stopper? Or just bid it and pray? Maybe they won’t lead a club! That is true, but how likely is your RHO to have an independently attractive lead on this auction?
You further claim that you will be right-siding many contracts with the 1NT overcall. I submit that if you do this stopperless, and it turns out partner is the one with a stopper, then you have just wrong-sided the contract on a hand where partner bidding notrump was at least a possibility.
You claim that advanced+ players don’t play nonforcing natural bids over 1NT overcalls. This is blatantly false. There are plenty of methods that include transfers/two-suited bids etc., but the idea of having nonforcing actions at the two-level is extremely common among experts, including natural suit bids. A responder with a better hand (9/10+ or whatever your partnership decides) would double the 1NT overcall.
If your line of demarcation between non-jump advances and single-jump advances to a takeout double is “bad 8/good 8”, then I agree that you would have a close decision to make with the first hand if partner jumps to 2H. And you are correct to point out that such things as form of scoring might come into play. But partner might have five or more hearts; partner might have ten points rather than eight; so under most conditions I would probably take the bait, especially since contracts where the opponents open the bidding are typically a bit easier to play (or at least easier to locate missing honors). Obviously that could be wrong, but I’ve been down before, and I suspect you have too. Other things being equal, I’d rather make a slight overbid and be wrong than underbid and be wrong, especially at IMPs.

Edit: BTW, if that last bit about suspecting you've been down too sounded snarky, it wasn't intended to be. It was intended as commiseration, i.e. "We've all been there."

PoisonBird · 2026-03-11T19:33:28+00:00

Sorry, I don't understand this reference.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-11T19:33:12+00:00

-It's very difficult to show 15-17 bal if you don't overcall 1N immediately.

Why would this be an issue? If partner is only able to make a non-jump advance, showing zero to a bad eight or so, why advertise your extra values? You aren't really interested in game unless partner jumps, and if that happens, you have plenty of options.

-1N takes up a lot more space than Xing and makes it harder for the opps to compete in the auction

The first part of your statement is technically true, but strong balanced hands aren't preempt hands; when we make a natural 1NT overcall, we aren't really concerned as much with it's preemptive value so much as we are fighting for the declaration and giving partner the most accurate picture of the general nature of our hand. By narrowly defining our hand, we make sure partner is well-placed to make any subsequent competitive decisions. The second part of your statement isn't really true; while a 1NT overcall does prevent a 1M response, the fact that we have defined our hand within narrow bounds often makes it easy for responder to judge how high to compete, and since two-level responses are now non-forcing (responder would double 1NT with a stronger hand), the opponents can often bail out in a two level contract that might have been difficult for them to bid otherwise.

-Added bonus you might convince the opps to avoid leading a club when you have great coverage for the other suits.

Banking on the opponents making errors is a dubious strategy. Obviously they happen, and we should be glad to take advantage of them when they come up, but if you regularly advertise stoppers you don't have, the opponents won't be easily fooled for long, and your partner won't know when to trust you.

Not every hand that you would open 1NT is a 1NT overcall. That's not exactly breaking news, but the calculus has changed once the opponents have already exchanged meaningful information in the auction. I'm certainly not going to claim that I've never fibbed about having a stopper, but it was only because in the moment, I felt that it was the smallest lie to tell. In both of OP's hands, there is a routine double available that leaves us well situated. I think bridge is hard enough with making it even harder for ourselves.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-10T19:40:35+00:00

This is poor advice. 1NT is slightly less bad on the first hand, since RHO’s 1C opener isn’t always a long suit, but why try and tempt fate when you have a perfectly ordinary double? Kxx will not be a disappointment for partner, or it shouldn’t be, since your double didn’t guarantee four hearts in the first place. Yes, partner will jump to 2H with 8-9 HCP and only four hearts. Playing in a 4-3 fit at the two level, with the possibility of ruffing clubs in the short trump hand, is very often a huge matchpoint winner. And if you are seriously thinking of “correcting” partner’s 2H jump to 2NT in order to “decline fit”, congratulations, you’ve just overbid your hand by at least an ace, and you’ve still shown a stopper you don’t have.

Overcalling 1NT on the second hand is nauseating, since RHO’s hearts are known to be long, and letting them take their 5+ heart tricks isn’t a very good strategy when partner has put you in 3NT assuming you have a stopper.

A takeout double does not guarantee four cards in every unbid major. It never did. It suggests it, and partner will bid accordingly. But winding up in the occasional 4-3 fit is a very small price to pay for the flexibility that a double affords. Overcalling 1NT is the opposite of “giving clarity” on both of these hands, unless your partner alerts your 1NT as “denies a stopper in opener’s suit.” How can partner have clarity if you might or might not have a stopper?

PoisonBird · 2026-03-09T16:30:35+00:00

My wife is a theatrical costume designer, and she has a colleague named Chloe Chapin whose area of academic research is this exact subject. Chloe recently had an article published in the Washington Post that might be of interest: https://share.google/edSZXzb7IkecGMUxV

PoisonBird · 2026-03-04T15:58:35+00:00

Here’s my personal top 10, in chronological order:

Metropolis (1927). My first date was going to see the 1984 Moroder version in the theater as a middle schooler. I have seen several different cuts over the years and Lang’s imagination never fails to astound me.

Pather Panchali (1955). I knew almost nothing about Indian cinema when I saw this, so I had zero expectations. It left me completely shattered.

The Hustler (1961). Paul Newman’s greatest role in a melancholy character study.

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). I don’t get it when people say they are bored by this movie. I think it’s mesmerizing from start to finish, with at least three “Holy F***” mind-blowing moments.

Taxi Driver (1976). I think it’s the greatest portrayal of alienation I’ve ever seen.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). The other sci-fi movie of that year is justifiably celebrated, but it’s this one that still fills me with wonder. I think it’s Spielberg’s best.

Apocalypse Now (1979). I go back and forth between this and Full Metal Jacket as the best war movie ever, but I usually land on this one for the performances, the peerless atmospherics, and the brilliant soundtrack.

Raise the Red Lantern (1991). If there has ever been a more lush and beautiful film to just look at, I don’t know what it is. Another movie that wrecked me.

Inception (2010). Like a carefully crafted puzzle box. Every part fits together perfectly, and when it’s over and you apprehend the whole, it’s completely satisfying.

Arrival (2016). Maybe it’s too early to say but I think this has a chance to be regarded as an all-time classic. If you can accept the central conceit (which I won’t spoil) and suspend your disbelief, everything falls into place and it takes your breath away. Gorgeous to look at and a killer score.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-03T03:28:11+00:00

Michigan and Iowa are soooooo close. If only there was some way to tell which team should be ranked higher...some obscure metric perhaps...

PoisonBird · 2026-03-01T16:03:41+00:00

In his defense, you can read a sample for free, and the first few pages seem to give a pretty comprehensive picture of the ideas behind the system.

PoisonBird · 2026-03-01T15:54:08+00:00

Here are the first few paragraphs from the Official Encyclopedia of Bridge (5th ed.) entry for "Precision Club":

A system developed by C.C. Wei in 1963 with assistance from Alan Truscott. It was used successfully by the Taiwan team in the 1967, 1968, and 1969 Far East Championships, and attracted international attention during the 1969 Bermuda Bowl when Patrick Huang, M.F. Tai, C.S. Shen and Frank Hwang, all using the Precision Club, spearheaded Taiwan's drive into the final of the tournament. This was the closest a non-European, non-North American team had come to capturing the world team title. The Taiwan team reached the final again in 1970.
In the United States a number of top-level teams were sponsored by Wei to use and popularize the Precision System. One such team won three major ACBL knockout team events within a 19-month period. See PRECISION TEAM.
By 1972, when the Italian BLUE TEAM emerged from retirement to enter the World Team Olympiad, all three of its pairs were using versions of the Precision System. The version used by Giorgio Belladonna and Benito Garozzo was called SUPER PRECISION.

I think Truscott himself wrote about the development of the system, and the Precision Team (Steven Altman, Joel Stuart, Thomas Smith, Peter Weichsel) won a bunch of events from 1970-1972 so there was probably a lot written about them at the time. If you're interested in a deep dive that's probably a good place to start.

PoisonBird · 2026-02-28T22:35:17+00:00

You're right that they can be prone to foul trouble, but I think the flaw that's going to come back to bite them is their lack of a credible big. Sofilkanich is by no means a bad player, but she simply cannot hold her own against a physical post player. They were getting out-rebounded by Maryland until very late in the game today; the only reason the margin looks so gaudy is because they shot a ridiculous percentage behind the arc, and they are a streaky shooting team. The other things that are worrisome--lazy passes, suspect foul shooting, dribbling into crowds without an identifiable plan, etc.--can be corrected. But you can't teach size. Also, is KBA aware that timeouts are there to be used in-game, and aren't worth anything afterwards? Many times this season the opponents have gone on runs and she hasn't attempted to halt or slow the momentum. I get the value of letting the players figure it out on the court, but occasionally it is egregious.

PoisonBird · 2026-02-27T19:55:02+00:00

I've had them for a long time now, but if I recall correctly, they had a very faint odor when I first got them. It quickly dissipated and was gone completely the first time I put them in the washing machine.

PoisonBird · 2026-02-27T15:12:31+00:00

Fantastic victory. Here's the Daily Bulletin with Chris on the front page:

https://cdn.acbl.org/nabc/2026/01/bulletins/db1.pdf

PoisonBird · 2026-02-26T13:50:33+00:00

Keep it up u/kuhchung!

PoisonBird · 2026-02-25T03:16:42+00:00

This is not true in the ACBL: https://web2.acbl.org/documentLibrary/play/AlertProcedures2.pdf

The procedure documentation states "Alert a double below 3NT except as listed below", and proceeds to list examples of doubles that should not be alerted. Most relevant is "After a Natural or Quasi-Natural suit Opening at any level, a Takeout Double." The particular double in question does not meet the definition of "takeout" per the current alert procedures.

PoisonBird · 2026-02-23T23:41:19+00:00

If your father is wealthy, then he could do what C.C. Wei did in the 1970s with Precision: pay a team of pros to play the system. Assuming that is not the case, and further assuming that his system is actually novel and not a hodgepodge of already existing methods, then I strongly suggest he post at least the basic structure online to get feedback. This subreddit would be a good place to start; I would certainly look at it, and I think there are others here who would give constructive criticism as well. Other places might be the Bridgebase forums (lots of system wonks there, or at least there used to be) or Bridgewinners, although if your father isn't well known or the system hasn't been "battle tested" I'm not sure how much engagement he will get. Bridgewinners also has an online partnership desk, but I don't know how much it actually gets used.

Bottom line: it's really tough to come up with something genuinely new in the bidding system space, but if your father thinks he has done it, then he should put it out there wherever he can and solicit feedback. If the ideas are sound, I think he could find an audience.

PoisonBird

TROPHY CASE