January was an interesting month for Unit 503. We had our annual transition of Board Members and officers. The new team hit the ground running to address the Covid spike and its impact to face-to-face games at the Palo Alto Bridge Center (PABC). As a result, we had three meetings of the Board this month: one regularly scheduled and two special meetings which resulted in the suspension of play at the PABC through at least February 14. Our next board meeting is on February 14 at 4:00PM, please contact me (merenbach@yahoo.com) if you would like to attend so I can send you the Zoom link. All our meetings are open to our membership.
As mentioned in several emails already the PABC online schedule until further notice is:
— 10:15 AM – Limited Sections: Monday – Saturday
— 10:20 AM – Open Sections: Everyday but Sunday
— 1:00 PM – Every Day: Monday – Sunday
— 7:00 PM – Monday, Wednesday and Friday, Evenings
Unit activities in January included a Silver Linings week featuring Double Silver Points for all games. During that week the Unit had great participation. We had 338 tables in total, 187 of which were in online PABC games. To put that in perspective, that is an average of more than 1.7 games played by every member of the unit.
Another highlight in January was the Celebrity Lecture Series that 93 people “attended” on January 29th. The lecture on overcalls featured Gavin Wolpert who was joined by his mom while Adam Parrish manned the chat channel. The lecture was funny, fast-paced, and fantastically informative. Part two is scheduled for February 12. At just $25, it is a bargain and a great way to support the unit. You can attend part two without having taken part one… sign up here. Thanks again to Kathy Wheeler for organizing this series.
Stay tuned for updates on the Non-Life-Master Sectional scheduled for February 19-20. The current plan is to hold the event and a final call will be made at our board meeting. This is a great opportunity to earn silver points and there is a special section for players with less than 5 master points on Saturday morning.
On Sunday, February 6 we have a unit pairs game scheduled and on Sunday, February 27 we have a unit swiss game, both at 1:00 PM. Unit games are fun and provide direct financial support to the Unit, so I encourage your participation in these games.
Most of us are probably still working to improve our games. In addition to our celebrity lecture series we have on-going free lectures featuring teachers from our unit. Recordings of previous lectures are posted on our website: lecture series. We would love a volunteer to run this series going forward! Additionally, ACBL’s website features videos and classes: https://www.acbl.org/learn/#know.
Finally, I would also like to thank you continuing to support our community. We miss the camaraderie of face-to-face bridge, but we are excited by the continued engagement with our classes, and the on-going participation in the online games held by Unit clubs.
Stay safe & I will see you online until we can see each other at the table in person.
David Merenbach