Books ...

Just to let you know that the 2009 World championship book is now available and can be bought through ECatsBridge – just go to www.ecatsbridge.com and click on the shop and it is listed under New Products (and in the Championship books section). A good addition to a collection !

 

We had a great weekend away last weekend –a spur of the moment decision to go and stay in Kings Lynn, so I found a lovely little hotel (The Stuart House) where we had the very posh room with the four poster and were very comfortable for a couple of nights. Lots of walking on the bird reserves and a really relaxing time. Just what was needed before getting stuck into packing up the material for the World Wide Bridge contest for the overseas clubs, ready for the couriers to collect and wing on its way –now the volcanic cloud has cleared a bit of course !

 

Let me know asap if you are a club needing material for the World Wide though – then I can get the pack off to you and out of my hall way !

 

anna

Oh what a day !

I had all sorts of things planned today, but then we discovered that the Web Site had decided to hold on to the emails sent to us, instead of forwarding them to me – I guess it thought they were private ! Anyway, my lovely Mark realised what was happening and fixed it for me, but that resulted in a welter of emails … so if you have sent me an email via the website in the last two weeks and haven’t had a reply please send it again. Sorry about that.

Then I discovered that I have been backing up the wrong bits of my computer (fortunately the right bits as well …) but it meant that everything was duplicated – twice ! So I had to do a lot of deleting of files and then re-set the backups so they back up the right bits! Very silly of me, and very time consuming.

Now I need to get on with sorting out results from the Sim Pairs – Oh, and for those of you who are interested, the EBU has sent me the final list of Master Points for the Portland, and it is up on the site, so do have a look if you are interested.

And as it is nearly 5, and I am going to be finishing soon, I had better get back to work !

xx

PS here is a nice picture of Emale, our very special ECatsCat, posing with our logo …  just because I thought you might find it amusing :-)

Its Friiiiiiiiiday !

I was beginning to wonder if it would ever come. AND it’s a lovely day and the forecast for the weekend is good, so I have lots of plans for planting potatoes, sowing some peas, carrots, lettuce and things like that and doing lots of weeding ! the trouble with living in an old Railway Station is that the garden is very big and takes a lot of time, but it is fun to do and I am looking forward to it.

 

Not been the best of days as I found out this morning that I had a dyslexic moment when typesetting the travellers for last night’s sim pairs – the front says it is session 8894, which is WRONG ... the back is correct – it is 8994. ARGHHH. So I have had to change a lot of files. But thanks to many of you who spotted the error and got it despite my best efforts. Thanks also to Harvey who has helped me set up the database in such a way that I can generate the travellers automatically in future without re-typing the number!

 

Spent a lot of time as well untangling our advertising engine on the site ... it is amazing how something so simple can end up being so complicated. Anyway I think I have managed it now so they are appearing when and where we want them to.

 

Clubs wanting duplimate files for the EBU sims in May ... I will send them early next week if that’s OK. But don’t forget to email me if you want them.

 

Have a great weekend – hope the sun shines on you J

 

so much to do ...

... so little time ! I think I have (just about) sorted out the Conditions of Contest for Philly – I will put them up just as soon as I can, and will post in the blog that I have done it. It is such a marathon task with so many aspects to be thought about, and they have been winging their way between various members of the WBF Executive Council to try and make sure we haven’t missed anything out.

 

The first Simultaneous Pairs to be played under the new EBU P2P regulations is running this week – so there are a LOT of phone calls about that, though it doesn’t really affect the scoring as far as ECatsBridge is concerned – the important thing is that the EBU player numbers are in the files, but there isn’t much I can do to help on that one unfortunately – it has to be sorted locally. Still, it all seems to be working so far anyway. It’s funny really, but by the time it has got to the stage of the Sims actually running, I am off and working on the next one – or the one after that and hardly notice what is happening. It’s like being at a major Championship ... once it has started my job is more often working on the next one, not the one that is happening !

 

The packs for the May EBU Simultaneous Pairs were sent out yesterday, so clubs should be getting them quite soon. Now to start packing the World Wide stuff up ! Then maybe I can have my entrance hall back !

 

Had a quick visit from daughter Vickie yesterday, with my granddaughter Jasmine (15) ... she has got her first pair of contact lenses and is very excited about them. She has worn glasses since she was 18 months old and it was lovely to see her without them – she looks incredible !

 

Right – back to my database. Time to sort out some systems for the European Championships I guess J

 

 

Did you have a fun Easter Holiday?

I certainly did – we had some days out, some days in and had a lovely relaxing time. We got into our roof space and had a massive clearout of rubbish but also found masses of old photographs which I am now going to get scanned so I can make slide shows and bore the family to death !

Now it is back to work of course – all the material for the EBU Spring Simultaneous Pairs has arrived and is packed and in the hall waiting for the Post Office to pick them up (my local Sorting Office is the best in the world I am sure ...). The World Wide material awaits packing, boxes and boxes of it, so that’s a marathon task awaiting my attention.

I have been asked to let you know that Thailand is hosting the forthcoming Asean Bridge Club Championships, in Bangkok from 20 – 24 November, and they have said that they we would like to invite all the Non-Asean Clubs to join them to make the event bigger – the email I have says “please inform all bridge players around the world to come visiting Thailand and join this short and friendly atmosphere event” … you can download the brochure by clicking here. So if you fancy a trip to Thailand to play in a fun bridge event do check it out !

It has been an interesting couple of days – the new boiler is safely installed in the office (at vast expense) but a new problem has reared its head as we have discovered that somewhere there is a leak in the pipes. And it isn’t in the ones that can be seen. So it is under the concrete floor somewhere, deep joy! I foresee some chaos in the near future as we dig it up to find it – oh well !

Lunch time now, then back to the office to get on with things !

More soon ...

 

 

Time to relax

There isn’t really much bridge news today – it has all gone very quiet (dare I say thank goodness ...) and I am doing some catching up with things which is always good. Also planning a bit of a tidy up on the website, to check on any broken links and try and get some more interesting documents up for you all to enjoy.

 

Anway – Happy Easter to you all! ... I hope you get some time off and time to relax – which is certainly my plan. In England we have Bank Holidays on Friday and Monday which is great, and I am going to be naughty and take Tuesday off as well. We have lots of things to do round the house and I am hoping for good weather so I can do some gardening, but although bright today it is quite chilly !