Tuesday 25 May 2010

Looking beyond the World Wide ..

The World Wide Simultaneous Pairs is nearly on us. The EBU simultaneous pairs is soon to be finalised. And I am looking forward – to November and the Children in Need pairs ! Yes already. Our lovely commentators – Liz McGowan, Sally Brock, Mark Horton, Julian Pottage and – a newcomer to the “commentator bank”, Mike Swanson of Diamond Bridge (http://www.diamondbridge.co.uk/) who have all done their stuff and all of them have done it free of charge so that we can keep the expenses down. Aren’t they lovely ? And now I am typesetting the booklets ... not the most inspiring jobs in the world, but Chris Evans on i-player through my headphones helps!

 

Of course, there are the EBU and BGB sims before that, but they are all done, dusted and ready for printing believe it or not. I HATE fire fighting so do try very hard to keep ahead of the game !

 

I have recently heard that a friend of mine, Barnet Shenkin who now lives in America (used to live in Scotland) has launched a new website ... a free club to join free bridge tips, stories and articles, hands that you can play out on the site and members have a number of free online lectures – so it’s all happening there. Check it out at : http://www.shenkinbridge.com/

 

Well, that’s about enough for today – time to stop and go shopping for supper J

 

anna

Friday 21 May 2010

Yet another Senior Moment

When I did the results for the BGB Simultaneous Pairs, I looked at the letter from last year, and thought – ah. I am not sending master points for the English Clubs – they are being direct registered. So I duly re-wrote the letter and cover sheet to say that, for the English Clubs, no master points were included as they were being registered directly. Only the envelopes for the other NBOs (Home Unions) would have points included.

 

Then with great care I printed last year’s letter by mistake. Which said that points were included. Which they aren’t of course.

 

And until I got the first email querying it a couple of days later I didn’t realise. So – sorry to have caused confusion. BUT, rest assured, all you English Clubs, I have sent off the file to the EBU and I am sure they will be registered them all direct for you.

 

I am going to make my horrid summer cold my excuse – my head feels as if it is stuffed with cotton wool, and that is stopping my two brain cells from working properly. And I am coughing like an idiot and feeling VERY sorry for me L ... but I am sure it will get better and the weekend is nearly here with our first BBQ party to look forward to – this year we are determined to steer away from the inevitable burgers and sausages so I am marinading a butterflied leg of lamb and we will slow cook that on the barbie and Steve next door does a wicked marinade for chicken, so he will be doing that. And hopefully one of his famous potato salads !

 

Have a great weekend my friends

 

xxx

Tuesday 18 May 2010

printing and packing

My daughter has come over to help me get the results from the BGB Spring Pairs into envelopes and off to the post ... I am frantically printing them between sneezes and snuffles, as some dear soul has kindly given me his or her cold, so am grateful to have the door open as the smell of toner gets a bit much otherwise !

 

The file with the Master Points for the English clubs has been sent to the EBU for direct registration of course, but we are still printing master point cards for the Scottish, Welsh and Irish clubs of course. And all clubs will get their ranking list, the heat winner prizes and, for the top 20 pairs on the overall ranking, cheques. Which I hope will be spent on something frivolous – we have a rule in this household, which states that winnings are strictly for FUN !

 

Anyway they should all be in the post this afternoon with a bit of luck and a following wind as they say, so you will have them soon.

 

And now I need to get a few more parcels packed with material for the World Wide Contest at the beginning of June !! And send off the documents to the printer for the July pairs – all part of the cycle J

 

A few more systems have trickled in for the European Championships and I will sort those out as soon as I can – so I had better get on with it !

More later ... xxx

Thursday 13 May 2010

phew

Well, that’s the BGB April event finalised – the final ranking list with the master points is up on the site for you to peruse at leisure. I will be starting to print the results and the “paper” points for the non-EBU clubs tomorrow, as well as writing all the prize cheques for the top 20 pairs overall in each event, then it will all get posted next week – probably on Tuesday.

 

I have sent the XML file off to the EBU for them to register the master points – I don’t know how quick a job that is for them, so I can’t tell you when you should start checking to see if they have appeared in your “account”. And it does, of course, rely on your EBU number having been submitted with the results, but I can’t give you any way to check that because we are not allowed to publish EBU numbers I am afraid (data protection and all that ...). So I think the only way is via your EBU master point record. I will be sending the club ranking lists out as normal, so you can check how many points you should have – oh and it is on the website too of course – click here to go to the page where you download the full list for whichever day you played.

 

Now to pack up some more sets for the World Wide Contest in June to say nothing of keeping a weather-eye on the EBU Sims running at the moment ... it is never ending, this Sims Lark!

 

Speaking of weather-eyes – the forecast for the weekend is a bit warmer. Perhaps I might even get some gardening done ... my poor early potatoes have a touch of frost-bite though and the chickens are sulking big time with the cold and declining to lay me any eggs L. Have a great weekend whatever you are doing won’t you ?

 

anna xx

Tuesday 11 May 2010

hmmmm ...

The Spring Pairs are no closer to being finalised I am afraid – I am still waiting for at least 2 clubs to send in results with their EBU numbers included and until I get those and approval from the EBU for the file format my hands are tied I am afraid. So I am sorry but the words “please be patient” are all I can really say!

 

I am sure we will get all the results flowing smoothly in future – the new systems in England were bound to cause something of a hiccup in the early stages, there are various wrinkles to be ironed out, but it will all work in due course so please bear with us!

 

I had a great weekend away – went off to Megalithomania in Glastonbury !! A series of lectures on our dim and distant past. It turned out to be a bit “hippy” but was still great fun and made a very real change from bridge I can tell you!

 

The EBU pairs is on this week of course – so do go along to a club near you (lists are on the website) and play if you can.

 

Watch this space and I will keep you updated on the BGB Sims ...

 

Tuesday 4 May 2010

BGB Spring Pairs

I am deliberately not finalising this today (I had hoped to ...) because I am waiting for a couple of English clubs to get some membership numbers to include in the files. It means that these events won’t be finalised now until next week – sorry and all that but I have a lot of other things to do and also have to be out of the office quite a bit for meetings ... plus I have had Friday booked as a day off for ages! I am also waiting for confirmation from the EBU that the file with the master points that I sent them for the Warwickshire Charity Pairs is in the format they need – no point in trying to generate one for the BGB event if they need changes.

 

So please bear with me. I will do it as soon as I can next week and get the results onto the website and the Master Points out to the clubs in Scotland and Wales – the English club’s points will all be direct credited this time.

 

Reason for my frantic week ? Well, I am waiting for all the systems that need registering for the European Teams championships (If you are reading this and haven’t sent me yours, then please do so QUICKLY); they all have to be converted to PDF, logged and uploaded and that takes TIME! Lots of it!

 

On a personal note, I had a WONDERFUL weekend – my older daughter and my granddaughter were both dancing in their annual show – classic ballet, contemporary ballet and tap and they were both totally amazing. And to add to the joy my younger daughter came up from Bristol for the weekend to join us and we just had such a great time all together. A very very special weekend. How lucky am I ?

 

Now back to the systems !