Bridge Club

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You’ve found
Authentic Business Adventures,

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the business program that brings you
the struggle stories and triumphant

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successes of business
owners across the land.

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We’re locally underwritten
by the Bank of Sun Prairie.

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Downloadable audio episodes can be found
at the podcast link found at drawincustomers.com.

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And today we’re welcoming/
preparing to learn from Glenna Shanahan.

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And this is interesting here,
world class bridge player,

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what it says here, and the owner
of the Bridge Club of Madison.

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And before Glenna gets talking here,
I just want to point out we are

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in a building that has a bunch of tables
for people to learn how to play bridge

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and to actually play bridge,
which I had no idea that existed.

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Really? I had no idea.

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No idea.

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When I had the address and I’m driving
up here, I didn’t know what to expect.

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It was just back room somewhere.

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But this is a building,
standalone only thing.

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So if you’re into bridge, great.

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If you’re not quite into bridge,
you will be soon.

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Glenna, how are you doing today?
Great, thank you.

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And you?
I’m doing very well.

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I’m excited for a couple of reasons.

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One, I’ve heard people talk about bridge,
but I guess I have never played bridge,

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so I’m probably one
of the people that do that.

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Well, come on in and prepare
to be a student here.

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I would like that.

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I like new students.
Yeah, right.

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How long have you had this?

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We’ve had it well,
three of us bought it 29 years ago.

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Okay.
29.

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It’ll be 30 in a couple of months.

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Wow.

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We ran it for 27 years,

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but one of the partners had cancer
and needed to get out of the business

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So I took it over, because
bridge is really my passion.

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All right.
How did you get into bridge?

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Well, that not a very interesting story,

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but I used to play tennis and golf
if I could, five days a week.

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But my third pregnancy was very toxic

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and I had to give that up and lamenting
how lonely and bored I was going to be.

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And a girlfriend said, oh, come to my
house and I’ll teach you to play bridge.

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And I said, a card game.

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She said, yeah, you might like it.

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I said, I don’t think so.

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She said, Just come try it.

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So we went over and sent her kitchen
and she taught us how to play bridge.

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And as soon as the baby was born,
I was back playing tennis and golf.

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But then a girl I really liked
and respected called me up and said,

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glenn, I’d really like you to learn to
play bridge and become my bridge partner.

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And I was so flattered that she would ask.

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I called up a bridge teacher and she said,

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well, if you can find me eight
people, I’ll teach a class.

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Well I found her 24.

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24 people.

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Holy cow.

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And it was really interesting.

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She said to me one day,
I kind of feel sorry for you,

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Glenna it because you’re going
to become addicted to the game.

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And I said, oh, no.
Never.

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And I did.
Here we are.

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Here we are.
Dang.

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All right, so toxic
pregnancy led to all this?

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Yes.

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You never know what’s
going to be good, right?

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Well, for many years I
did all three things.

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Wow.
All right, I was busy.

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Okay.
Never bored.

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Right.

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All right, so what do we
have on the table here?

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Well, I’d like to explain how this card
game is different than most others.

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Yeah.
Most other card games you’re playing

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with your friends and it’s three or
four people sitting around the table.

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I guess in some card games
there are seven or eight.

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Like we play hearts,
we have a whole crowd.

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But in bridge,

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there’s four people at a table and you
come to bridge with a partner.

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And it’s not by me, it’s all by compass.

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North, south are partners
and Eastwester partners, all right?

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And we have like 17 vocabulary words.

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We have four numbers, seven numbers
and four suits if you’re playing in a suit

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contract and if you’re
playing in no trumps.

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So I need to explain the difference
in those two, if you don’t mind.

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No, you spoke a different
language to me just there.

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Bridge is like a foreign language.

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That’s the first thing people should know.
Okay.

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All the games we played today basically
stemmed from China 2000 years ago.

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And they didn’t have cards,

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but they used coins and metal
and bones and sticks and whatever.

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And in the 9th century,

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they actually played a game
similar to what we played today.

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And in the 1350s, the Egyptian Vagabonds
took it to England.

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And that’s why the names of some
of these things are European names.

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So it really takes a few weeks
for people to get comfortable enough.

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And when I teach bridge,

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I tell them it’s like peeling
an onion to learn to play bridge.

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Your mind can only absorb so
many new things at a given time.

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So what I do is the first week introduce

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the game and all the mechanics of it,
bidding boxes, boards,

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table guide cards and explain
to them what these are used for.

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And then the next week we tackle no trump.

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And no trump means that if you’re playing,
the highest card played on the table wins

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the trick, and you win that trick,
you lead to the next trick.

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And so there’s no triumphant.

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Just sometimes the two
of clubs take a trick.

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And in social bridge,

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they’ll often have a prize
for whoever takes a trick that day

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to a club just gets the lowest
cardinate that contract, all right?

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In suit contracts when
you run out of a suit.

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And if you have trump,
you can win the trick by playing a trump.

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All right?

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So that’s the difference
between no trump and suits.

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Got you.

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We play boards.

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This is a duplicate board.

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And I teach with duplicate boards because

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all it is is a means for me
to carry hands around it.

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Different tables can play the same hands.

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So it’s a means of communication.
Got you.

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I suppose it’s easier to teach instead

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of just the students end up with random
cards and you have to right.

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For a two hour class.

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The first hour, I introduce the topic.

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We go through some
exercises so they see it.

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And in the last hour,

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we actually play four hands that deal
just with the topic that we learned.

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All right.
And so what I tell people,

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it’s kind of hard to ask them to trust me
at week one because they don’t know me.

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But learning to play bridge is like

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planning a European vacation because it
takes months to put it all together.

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That’s one aspect.

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The second aspect is the joy of it.

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And the third aspect is coming home
and enjoying it and rethinking about it.

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The bridge is sort of the same way.

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The first four weeks,

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you just have to take me at face value
and learn what I ask you to learn.

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And then at the end, we put it together.

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So there’s three aspects
to learning bridge.

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There’s the bidding, the play of the hand,
and then the defense of the hand.

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Oh, okay.
Defense.

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Okay.

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And they’re all simple.

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They are very simple to learn.

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But the problem becomes that you have
to have a partner and you and your partner

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have to have the same thought
process and the same skill level.

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Okay.

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And then you enter in with two opponents
and they’re trying to do you in.

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So putting it all together and dealing
with three other people, it’s difficult.

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All right.
So is there no tabletop?

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I have clean hands.
You can talk.

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But if you and I were playing rich and I

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wanted to open the bidding,
I would reach in the spinning box,

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put my thumb on what I want,
my fingers at the back,

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and I pull it out and I put it like
this so the whole table can see it.

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Got you.

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So there’s no asking.

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There’s no idea how many speeds you got.
Right.

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None of that.
All right.

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And so we do that and people say
that we’re too serious at bridge.

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They do.
All right.

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I have to tell you, there are days
that we laugh and have such a good time.

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I bet.

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But we are serious when
we’re playing the game.

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Sure.
Okay.

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But let’s say you have
three boards per round.

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You and your partner come here
and we play our three boards.

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And when that’s over,
we start chatting and we can talk about

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the hands we played or what you did last
night or what you’re going to go there.

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Yeah, whatever.
It’s very social.

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And then when the time is called,

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I have a timer in the corner that gives
people an idea of how much time they have

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left and if they need
to hurry up or slow down.

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It’s just something
that helps them keep going.

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As a test is a time game.
Oh, it is?

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Yes.
Okay.

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How long do you get for hand or board?

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Okay, well, hand,
we have to talk about it.

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All right.
Seven minutes.

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Seven minutes.

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Playing with three boards
at my table for 21 minutes.

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And when the time is up,
I take these boards to a different table

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and get new boards, and you go
to the next table and play those people.

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And the reason is the most popular port

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of a bridge is because you take
these boards in a whole room place.

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I’ll put out 27 boards,
and they play all of them well.

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When you have that many people playing

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the same hands, you’ve taken
out an element of luck.

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There’s still a little luck in the mouth,
but not like regular card games.

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All right.
Interesting.

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There’s some skills.

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So the people that are better
at the game will advance.

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Yes.
All right.

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Yes.
They win master points.

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And that’s what that word back
there says for LifeMasters.

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And then on the right side,
it says on the past.

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All right.

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These first columns are people who are

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LifeMasters in the years
they became LifeMasters.

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It takes 500 points today
to become a lifemaster.

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And then are those decades?

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Beg pardon?

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Those are decades.

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Do you have people from the 1960s?

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He started playing.

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He was a chemistry professor,
and he started playing.

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And his wife is down there,
just a few beneath him.

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They’ve been playing together
since 1967 or something.

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Wow.
And they have 14,000 of them.

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How do they keep track of it?

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Well, we have a home office.

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It’s called American Contract.
Richly.

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And it’s in Memphis.

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And we pay them as a club owner,

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I pay them half games, they’re sanctions,
and then I pay them so much per game.

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And then I pay them so much per table.
Wow.

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Okay.

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And in return for that, they keep track of
everyone’s master points in the picnic.

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To become a lifemaster, you have
to have certain colors of points.

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Colors of points.

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We have black points,
which you win at club games.

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We have red points, which you can
win at club games, are sectionals.

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You have silver points that you
win only at sectionals.

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You have gold points that you win
at nationals and at regionals,

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and then you have platinum points
that you can only win at the nationals.

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Well, we have four national
tournaments a year.

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No, it’s not right.
We have three street in the country.

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Wow.
Okay.

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For instance, we just had one last
month in Providence, Rhode Island.

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All right?
In November, it’ll be in Phoenix,

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and next March, it’ll be in New Orleans,
and in the summer, it will be in Chicago.

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So a different town every time.
All right.

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We had them in Canada at both
direct on Vancouver and Montreal.

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All right.
So do they just set up hundreds of tables

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and people play bridge until they
can’t hold cards anymore?

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Oh.

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When I was younger, we first started,
they would sometimes have three sessions

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a day, and we’d all play
three sessions a day.

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Wow.
All right.

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It is addictive.

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I have no idea.

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It’s so interesting how there’s
a national organization for anything.

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Anything.
Bridge, plastic plants, anything.

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Well, the thing about bridge is that
you can play it however you want.

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You could have three buddies over
and sit and have beers and play bridge.

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You could invite three other couples over

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and have dinner and then
have a bridge party.

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You could come here and play
competitive bridge.

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All right.
And the reason we get addicted

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to competitive bridge, I think,
is that first of all, it’s social

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because we’re here having a good time,
eating and drinking.

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There we are.
But it’s also problem solving.

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Each individual hand is like a puzzle,

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and you’re trying to figure out who has
the ace of diamonds, and if he has the ace

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of diamonds, he must have queen
of clubs, that kind of thing.

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And so after playing 27, 28 work,

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I am actually going to retire because
I’m keeping track of all those things.

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And thinking about things.
I bet.

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But our vocabulary can we talk about that?

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Yeah.

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This is called hand cards is my hand.

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And you have a hand.
All right.

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But what’s confusing at the end,

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we’ve played this and we say, oh,
on hand one, the whole board is a hand.

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So our vocabulary words are sometimes
like statemen and copy transfers.

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Those were named after the people
who first invented them.

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All right.
We have something called casino count,

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which was invented by a
Hungarian casino count.

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All right.

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It’s kind of interesting.

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Just learn all of this stuff.

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There’s a lot going on.

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It is very challenging, I think.

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So when people play bridge at home,

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are they using this plastic thing
or they’re just dealing cards?

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So this is just to help organize?

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It’s to organize, and it’s to allow us
to compare scores on the same hands.

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Right.
So let’s say you and I did to a game

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contract of four hearts,
and we don’t get a very good board.

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We can look at it after
the game is online.

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It’s posted.
It’s called Acbo Life.

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You see?

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Well, we have a dealing
machine, all right?

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We make Japan put them
on a dealing machine.

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They make the boards for us, we play them,
and then that hit record goes out online.

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And we played beforeheart, and we didn’t
get a very good score, but why not?

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Well, we can look at it.

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Unfortunately, we got the best
lead in the room for them.

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So other people made five
and we only made four.

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All right, so you are able it’s almost

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like self education,
because you can see what you might have

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done better or what you didn’t
think to do at the time.

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So I think I have people here who,

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in my opinion, have more fun going
home and going over the boards.

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And they actually do it plays really okay.

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They’re trying to figure
out how to get better.

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All right.

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Coaching themselves, kind of looking
at past plays, so to speak.

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All right.
Interesting.

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So the shuffle machine,
dealing machine loads these things.

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Yeah.
Wow.

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And that’s online.

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The results are online.
The results are online.

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Okay.
With a copy of a hand.

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It’s called a PBN file.
Okay.

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And we put that do you want
to see the dealing machine?

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I can sure.
Yeah.

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All right.

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This is the dealer machine.
Whoa.

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What is that?

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I put my flash drive right here.
All right.

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I turn it on.

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I click it on the dates
that I have prepared.

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I can’t really put all these in.

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I’ll put these in because these are
already made up for my game Friday.

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Okay, but you put in a deck of cards.

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Actually put the card at a time.

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All right.

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Right over here.

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Then another deck of cards.

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And you turn it on, and it opens,
and you insert it in here.

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Push the button, and the cards
are dealt with these boards.

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So this machine keeps track of what
cards are going in what pile.

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Wow.

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So then when you go online later,
you can see what Chan was, and.

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You see what everybody did.

[00:16:20.480]
How come we got a top board?

[00:16:22.160]
Well, we did three trump
instead of three clubs.

[00:16:25.040]
All right, so it’s really a nice way
to keep track of your of your experience.

[00:16:31.120]
Yeah.

[00:16:32.560]
So you tell the machine, hey, I’m
teaching these people, so I can do that.

[00:16:38.240]
Okay.

[00:16:38.480]
I bought another program
called the Old Master Pro.

[00:16:41.280]
All right?

[00:16:41.840]
And let’s say I wanted
to teach you no trucks.

[00:16:44.760]
I go into the Old Master Pro,

[00:16:46.520]
and I download eight hands,
and I print them out for you.

[00:16:51.520]
And I say, we’re going to play
these eight hands, and we do.

[00:16:54.640]
All right?

[00:16:55.000]
And then you have a record of them to say,
oh, that’s what she meant.

[00:16:59.680]
All right.

[00:17:01.360]
Because, see, everybody learns secretly.

[00:17:03.760]
We have visual words, audio words.

[00:17:06.680]
I can only learn something
if I write it down.

[00:17:09.200]
Okay.

[00:17:10.360]
So when I teach bridge, I try to

[00:17:14.200]
teach it in those three manners so
that no one is really left out.

[00:17:18.360]
Got it.
It’s covered all the bases.

[00:17:20.360]
I tried to.
All right.

[00:17:22.360]
That is crazy.

[00:17:23.800]
So the cards that you use with this

[00:17:25.960]
machine, are they
specific to this machine?

[00:17:28.320]
Proprietary?
No, I ordered them.

[00:17:30.880]
There’s a huge company called October,
but that’s Baron Rich Products.

[00:17:40.040]
They sell cards and machines
and all that international.

[00:17:43.240]
So these are cards
specifically for bridge?

[00:17:46.040]
Well, or you can use them you
can use them for other games.

[00:17:49.800]
I don’t play that many other games.
All right.

[00:17:52.520]
No other game.

[00:17:53.280]
You need to know,
but I bought something like 60 decks

[00:17:58.000]
of new cards when we came back from the
Pandemic, and we wanted to do cards.

[00:18:03.520]
That is cool.

[00:18:06.840]
It’s surreal because I see this
must be a little camera there.

[00:18:09.600]
So it’s reading the face of the.

[00:18:11.680]
Card, and sometimes

[00:18:13.640]
a card will get stuck and it’ll splash
up error and tell me what’s wrong.

[00:18:19.000]
Did it not read the card correctly?

[00:18:21.520]
And so you can push cancel and see the
hand and put the card in the right place.

[00:18:27.120]
Got it.

[00:18:29.040]
When I first started,
it took me like 40 minutes to make a dick,

[00:18:32.200]
I bet, because we make
28 words for each game.

[00:18:35.560]
Yeah.
But now I’m down to like 18 minutes.

[00:18:38.880]
All right.

[00:18:40.440]
So you get much faster getting these

[00:18:42.920]
things open and putting them
in and being ready to go.

[00:18:45.680]
Wow, that is slick.

[00:18:47.880]
That’s impressive.

[00:18:49.120]
It really is.

[00:18:50.840]
I think most of my people
are baby boomers.

[00:18:56.840]
It’s kind of interesting.

[00:18:58.080]
Not that many younger people play.

[00:19:00.080]
I have an 8th grader oh, really?

[00:19:02.640]
Whose mother drove him to Philadelphia so

[00:19:05.440]
that he could play in the youth
championship at the summer regional.

[00:19:09.360]
Wow.
National.

[00:19:10.600]
And then I had two young
men come here from Epic.

[00:19:16.120]
Well, now they bring for seven of them.

[00:19:19.640]
So it’s interesting how bridge grows.

[00:19:23.040]
I think floor by word of mouth than

[00:19:24.840]
anything somebody says,
oh, did you see that?

[00:19:27.760]
They have bridge there.

[00:19:29.600]
Some people didn’t want to and stop me.

[00:19:31.400]
I was pulling flowers in the garden.

[00:19:34.000]
She said, do you have to play euchre?
And I said no.

[00:19:36.720]
I’m sorry.

[00:19:40.560]
Funny.
That is cool.

[00:19:42.760]
So when you first got into bridge,
I guess when you first got with your

[00:19:48.040]
partners to start this, was there any
other business that was doing this?

[00:19:53.040]
Well, actually,

[00:19:53.960]
the first duplicate in Madison was held
out at the airport in the World War II.

[00:20:00.960]
The officer’s wives were lonely and born,
so some of them knew how to play bridge.

[00:20:06.760]
And they started a bridge game
airport for the officers wives.

[00:20:11.600]
And then it wasn’t big enough for them,

[00:20:14.600]
so they started inviting other
people that they might meet.

[00:20:17.680]
All right.

[00:20:18.320]
And so Ridge has been going
on here since the 1940s.

[00:20:22.160]
Holy hell.

[00:20:26.560]
Was actually Ridge Overall.
Heyday.

[00:20:29.920]
Was during the Depression because people

[00:20:31.720]
didn’t work, didn’t have jobs,
they were going crazy.

[00:20:36.320]
A lot of people learned to play bridge.

[00:20:39.240]
Interesting.

[00:20:40.720]
So when you went to well,
let me back up a step here.

[00:20:44.560]
You get your business partners.

[00:20:45.840]
How did you figure out what business
partners you were going to have?

[00:20:48.400]
Oh, that’s easy.

[00:20:50.560]
I was not a bridge, and one of them was a
lifemaster already and very experienced.

[00:20:56.520]
And I think the other one was also

[00:20:57.920]
a lifemaster, but probably
not as experienced.

[00:21:00.640]
We just had fun together.
All right.

[00:21:02.800]
And about twelve of us would go out after

[00:21:05.920]
a rich game at night to have a drink,
and our minds could recall all the hens.

[00:21:12.600]
Wow.

[00:21:13.120]
And we would sit around
and we would say, oh, I’m 47.

[00:21:16.080]
What did they lead against you?
Did they lead?

[00:21:18.400]
And we would talk bridge.

[00:21:22.200]
All right.
Ford cell phones.

[00:21:23.800]
Did you know about 30 phone numbers?
No.

[00:21:27.000]
Wait, yeah, before cell phones.

[00:21:29.880]
And now

[00:21:31.720]
I just speed that on my kids because I
can’t even remember their phone numbers.

[00:21:35.480]
Yeah, it’s the same with bridge.

[00:21:37.360]
If you didn’t have hand records and all

[00:21:39.200]
this computer stuff,
you would just remember the hands.

[00:21:41.800]
Anyway, the three of us
enjoyed each other.

[00:21:44.920]
One of them was in charge of being
some program at the UWS.

[00:21:51.960]
He was a department chair.

[00:21:53.760]
The other one was just a handyman.

[00:21:56.200]
And then I kind of like making
things nice and red colors.

[00:22:02.040]
And so we were kicked out of this
building, and we found a place to rent.

[00:22:06.760]
And so the guy said to me,
you pick out the paint and the carpeting.

[00:22:10.240]
We’ll do the work.

[00:22:11.800]
And we worked well together.

[00:22:13.720]
So the next time we got kicked out

[00:22:15.720]
of the building, I said to them, let’s
find a small building and just buy it.

[00:22:21.480]
And they said, oh, how would we do that?

[00:22:23.960]
And I said, I don’t know, borrow money.

[00:22:27.240]
So they said, all right, find this one.

[00:22:29.280]
So I got in the car and I drove around
Madison for two weeks, I think.

[00:22:32.920]
And we used to live in Arbor Hills.

[00:22:35.440]
And I drove by there one day,

[00:22:36.800]
and it was for sale,
and we had to repair the back wall.

[00:22:41.560]
It was a store that cleaned

[00:22:44.480]
motors and engines, so the whole place
was just filled with oil and grease.

[00:22:49.200]
Oh, sure.

[00:22:49.920]
I had to have someone come
in and clean all the vents.

[00:22:52.800]
We scraped everything down.

[00:22:54.320]
We repaired that wall and made it whole,

[00:22:56.640]
and we bought it in the first
two or three years we owned it.

[00:22:59.680]
We had to pay taxes out of.

[00:23:01.040]
Our own pockets because not
enough of them coming in.

[00:23:04.640]
All right.

[00:23:06.160]
Even though it’s been 30 years, almost
sure it was still pricey back then,

[00:23:11.240]
because we used to charge
$3 to put bridge.

[00:23:13.640]
All right.
It’s never been a big money.

[00:23:15.960]
You did all right.

[00:23:17.280]
But anyway, that’s how we moved
in here and got it started.

[00:23:22.040]
And then when we knew that we were tired
of being hit out,

[00:23:26.560]
the three of us went together and bought
pay taxes out of our own pocket.

[00:23:30.400]
All three ran rich games here.
Wow.

[00:23:33.560]
So were the three of you
working in other day jobs?

[00:23:37.080]
Well, I wasn’t, but they both okay.

[00:23:39.160]
All right.
Got you.

[00:23:40.840]
Just to be able to sustain
this or keep it going.

[00:23:43.880]
All right.
And then we hired other directors.

[00:23:47.560]
We had one guy who directed
on Wednesday night for, like, 15 years.

[00:23:52.120]
Wow, that’s impressive.

[00:23:53.520]
He was here rain or shine,
he never missed.

[00:23:56.720]
People are really loyal to bridge.

[00:23:58.840]
All right, that’s cool.
It is.

[00:24:01.280]
That’s really cool.

[00:24:02.360]
I call it the community?

[00:24:04.360]
I would think so.

[00:24:05.800]
Yeah, definitely.

[00:24:07.360]
And that teamwork makes the dream work.

[00:24:10.240]
It’s perfect for me because I could not
possibly run this club and all the games

[00:24:16.880]
and all the teaching and all
the things that people do here.

[00:24:20.640]
So everybody, I think, should always
thank the director when they leave.

[00:24:25.200]
The director sits at that desk.

[00:24:27.240]
He’s made the boards,
he brings streets, he runs the game.

[00:24:30.160]
He makes rulings at the table,

[00:24:31.600]
and there’s an infraction
and he sits there and works.

[00:24:35.320]
He doesn’t have any fun.

[00:24:36.560]
We’d all ever be directing.
All right.

[00:24:39.840]
But I have people who do things for me.

[00:24:44.920]
If I buy a trunk full of sodas,
leave the trunk.

[00:24:48.880]
I’ve got three guys who are
out there bringing it soda.

[00:24:51.480]
Oh, really?
Before I get the car.

[00:24:53.440]
Oh, nice.
Yeah, it’s little things like that.

[00:24:56.600]
It’s a cool room.
It is.

[00:24:58.280]
So do you have employees?

[00:25:01.520]
Well, I don’t call them employees.
Okay.

[00:25:04.480]
But the directors beyond just you?
Yes.

[00:25:07.320]
Okay.

[00:25:08.120]
I have games here six days a week
and still three games online.

[00:25:13.040]
So I can’t like how that is.

[00:25:15.920]
A lot of bridge.
It is.

[00:25:19.600]
Wow.

[00:25:20.640]
So have you found, I guess,
what is the ideal time for a bridge?

[00:25:25.520]
Any time, anytime.

[00:25:28.040]
Stupid question, James.
Thanks.

[00:25:30.320]
Come on, Jim.
Bridge.

[00:25:31.840]
Oh, it’s funny.

[00:25:32.680]
We have to get you into bridge because
you would be such a nice asset to that.

[00:25:38.800]
I played cards before, and I’m not
the greatest, but you know what?

[00:25:42.320]
I’m not a great card player.

[00:25:43.800]
My friend invited me to poker
just to take my money.

[00:25:47.840]
I don’t know.

[00:25:48.640]
Well, I’ll invite you
to bridge like a jack.

[00:25:52.280]
That’s totally fair.

[00:25:53.680]
So how do you get the word out?

[00:25:55.520]
Because you said
I guess this word of mouth is best.

[00:25:59.160]
Let’s go start somewhere.

[00:26:00.360]
I have to tell you, my team,
I call us the bridge club of Madison’s.

[00:26:06.880]
Better bridge team.

[00:26:08.480]
And I call us that because people

[00:26:11.240]
with expertise in certain
fields have contacted me.

[00:26:14.960]
So about five years ago, this woman said,

[00:26:17.600]
glenn, I’m retired, and I think
you need to have a website.

[00:26:22.360]
So she did the website five years ago.

[00:26:25.680]
Five or six years ago that’s the.

[00:26:27.240]
Internet has been around for a while.

[00:26:30.520]
But I didn’t need it.

[00:26:32.760]
Well, I didn’t even know about it.

[00:26:34.120]
I didn’t think about it.

[00:26:35.200]
All right, if you’re not into techy
things, not techie at all.

[00:26:39.400]
I just wouldn’t know we were here.

[00:26:41.480]
We had to sign up front.

[00:26:43.320]
But anyway, she called
and offered to do this.

[00:26:46.240]
So she got together the website.

[00:26:49.600]
Then she collected I used to make

[00:26:51.520]
individual little telephone books
with people’s name and phone numbers

[00:26:54.840]
and addresses so that when it’s your
birthday, I can send you a card.

[00:26:57.880]
All right, well, she said,
let’s do that online.

[00:27:01.000]
That way when somebody moves,

[00:27:02.720]
instead of the book being out
of date is the day it’s printed.

[00:27:05.920]
We can keep it up to date.
All right.

[00:27:07.520]
So she put all of us online.

[00:27:10.280]
There’s a place that you
can go on our website.

[00:27:12.400]
Just like, if you wanted a game with me,

[00:27:14.360]
you can go with my phone
number up and calls on call.

[00:27:16.760]
Right.
And she’s kept that up to date.

[00:27:19.360]
Wow.
And then about three or four months ago,

[00:27:23.640]
a woman contacted me and said,
I really like to do something nice

[00:27:28.840]
for the bridge club because
I’m so enjoying playing there.

[00:27:32.240]
And she said, Could I
help with the website?

[00:27:34.320]
And I said, well, thank you.

[00:27:35.960]
It’s very nice of you, but Mary does that,
and I wouldn’t want to step on her toes.

[00:27:40.000]
And she said, Well, I’ll call Mary.

[00:27:42.320]
So she called me back and she said,
we’ve worked it out.

[00:27:44.640]
I’m going to help Mary, but I’m going
to start a Facebook page for you.

[00:27:48.160]
You really need a Facebook page?

[00:27:49.920]
It’s okay.

[00:27:54.000]
Wow.

[00:27:55.200]
So it’s things like that.

[00:27:58.720]
We realize that it takes a whole village.

[00:28:01.320]
The team is getting going.
That is cool.

[00:28:04.280]
That’s what makes us functional.

[00:28:06.360]
All right, so tell me about the equipment,
because I see a sink as a calculator.

[00:28:12.480]
No.

[00:28:13.720]
This is called the bridge made.
All right?

[00:28:16.160]
And if we were having a game,
I would set the game up on the computer.

[00:28:21.240]
I would start these, and then I put one
on each table, and I put it by north.

[00:28:26.880]
And it’s North’s responsibility
to make sure that all the names are

[00:28:31.000]
entered, because once your name is
entered, each time you go to a table,

[00:28:34.520]
it shows that you’re there
until the airponents know who’s coming.

[00:28:41.240]
When the hand has been placed,
like we’ve played hand one,

[00:28:44.920]
I would go here and go to board one,
and I would say what the contract was, in,

[00:28:49.920]
which direction played it,
and then if they’re successful or not.

[00:28:54.520]
And that goes to the computer.
All right.

[00:28:57.000]
So those communicate to some big database
somewhere in the net, and then I.

[00:29:02.680]
Can turn on this screen
near the end of the game.

[00:29:06.080]
And when most of the boards have been
posted, I can flash the results up

[00:29:10.440]
on the screen and they can
see where they’ve come in.

[00:29:13.120]
And I always say, there’s a late player,

[00:29:15.480]
there’s two boards
scored I’m going to fix.

[00:29:18.560]
And they’ll usually wait for me to correct

[00:29:20.480]
it, because even though they’ll have
the results in a computer,

[00:29:23.600]
by the time they get home,
they still like to know what they’re here

[00:29:28.040]
so they can say to their
partner, that was fun.

[00:29:30.640]
Wow.
We did better than I thought we did.

[00:29:32.920]
That kind of thing.
Very cool.

[00:29:34.720]
It’s camaraderie.
Yeah.

[00:29:37.040]
We can get people together.

[00:29:38.400]
That was very cool.
Tell me about it.

[00:29:40.760]
So, 29 years, almost 30 years.

[00:29:43.160]
We had a pandemic recently.

[00:29:45.000]
How does that change the nature of the
game or the nature of just the business?

[00:29:49.000]
Well, we closed.
Closed up shop.

[00:29:51.040]
Yarn.
We were closed for a year and a half.

[00:29:53.240]
I.
Think what happened.

[00:29:56.160]
It hit in late February or early March,

[00:30:00.480]
and the first thing I did was I had
to buy a new first air conditioner.

[00:30:05.800]
Anyway, I made sure that I got a really

[00:30:07.840]
super duper filter system on it,
and I thought people would come back,

[00:30:12.480]
but they didn’t want
to come back for a while.

[00:30:15.320]
And even teaching I had to teach on Zoom.

[00:30:18.480]
Oh, that’d be tough.

[00:30:20.160]
Well, some classes you can teach on Zoom
and kind of get away with it,

[00:30:24.360]
but you cannot teach, like,
brand new people something on Zoo.

[00:30:27.480]
They have to have cards in their hands,
and we have to have that.

[00:30:31.160]
So I thought the thing about teaching

[00:30:33.720]
on Zoo was I had 21 people
from Vancouver in one class.

[00:30:38.640]
Oh, wow.
All right.

[00:30:40.400]
And then I had to do that locally.

[00:30:42.480]
Here I taught at three different
countries closer to California.

[00:30:46.840]
I used to live in California six
months a year in the winter.

[00:30:49.320]
Oh, really?

[00:30:50.000]
And I taught at three
country clubs out there.

[00:30:52.720]
Some of those people took
Zoom classes from me.

[00:30:55.400]
All right.

[00:30:55.880]
And then I had a few Madison
classes that I did on Zoom.

[00:30:59.960]
All right, so do you still do those?

[00:31:02.480]
Well, I let my zoom expire because
I teach for Madison College.

[00:31:07.680]
Madison School for Recreation.

[00:31:10.000]
And here I don’t need to teach unsunit.
All right.

[00:31:14.440]
Do you teach four medicine college?

[00:31:16.880]
Like, medicine college is a class on.

[00:31:18.760]
Bridge where classes I
just have one a semester.

[00:31:22.840]
Okay.

[00:31:23.720]
When we finished today,
I’m stopping there because my fall class

[00:31:27.160]
is starting soon, and I need
to know how many students I have.

[00:31:30.080]
That’s funny.

[00:31:31.200]
So is that extra class, or is it
adult enriching adult enrichment.

[00:31:36.040]
Okay.

[00:31:36.480]
I was just going to ask, are they
going for a diploma in bridge or no.

[00:31:41.120]
Okay.
That is pretty cool.

[00:31:43.040]
But I suppose that teaching a class,

[00:31:45.080]
that’s also a feature
for the business here, right?

[00:31:47.920]
Well, it is.

[00:31:49.360]
I just taught my class ended Thursday
at Madison Public Schools,

[00:31:54.040]
and we have a bridge workshop here
on Friday morning for people.

[00:31:58.960]
I think five of them from that class came.
That’s cool.

[00:32:04.080]
And this morning I got an email
from somebody who knew one of those people

[00:32:07.880]
and wanted to know if he could
come to the class Friday.

[00:32:10.440]
So that’s why I think word of mouth
is a big part of this business.

[00:32:14.480]
Man.
That’s cool.

[00:32:15.680]
So the people that come here that are ten,

[00:32:17.720]
are they typically coming once a week,
or are they coming more.

[00:32:20.360]
Than very few people only come once.

[00:32:22.960]
A week or they come in more than half.
Yeah.

[00:32:25.240]
All right.

[00:32:26.120]
We’re talking two or
three times or holy cow.

[00:32:29.920]
I have a man who’s here yesterday,
not healthy at all, but he was telling me

[00:32:36.160]
in his heyday, he played
here six days a week.

[00:32:38.840]
Six days a week?

[00:32:40.240]
Well, that’s a healthy
addiction that works in brain.

[00:32:43.600]
Well, it is a good brain yeah.
That is cool.

[00:32:46.600]
Yeah.
You’re telling me just before we start

[00:32:48.320]
recording that I like to play chess, and
the chess and bridge are pretty similar.

[00:32:54.680]
The mental in, the mental stimulation.

[00:32:58.880]
And I think the fact that I really do

[00:33:02.240]
believe that we never know everything
there is to know about bridge.

[00:33:06.480]
Yeah.
That is interesting.

[00:33:08.640]
Well, because bridge
has changed in itself.

[00:33:13.720]
People have changed.

[00:33:15.760]
And you’re keeping up, you’re constantly
changing, so you just can’t ever right.

[00:33:21.680]
So you tell me the rules of the game
over the course of time.

[00:33:26.280]
I don’t know when bridge
officially started.

[00:33:28.320]
Was it hundreds of years ago or well,
thousands, I guess, depending on how.

[00:33:31.960]
Far the 50s they called the of west.
Okay.

[00:33:35.680]
And then it became the Westbridge.

[00:33:37.920]
Now, today we have the game
of west and we have bridge.

[00:33:41.840]
Two separate games.
They’re two separate games.

[00:33:43.880]
So I used to teach a lot on cruise ships,
and so one day I had twelve tables,

[00:33:49.160]
and the people who had been there
the day before weren’t there.

[00:33:52.680]
And I asked their friends where they were,

[00:33:54.680]
and she said, oh, they decided they
better support the west game thing.

[00:33:58.720]
So I left the room and went down
to the Whist game, 22 things.

[00:34:03.880]
Oh, all right.

[00:34:08.600]
I’ve never played War, but I’ve
heard Whist is compared to war.

[00:34:12.840]
Okay, but you’re trying to take
the tricks with a partner.

[00:34:16.480]
All right, but it’s similar.

[00:34:19.320]
Well, in the 1930s, Vanderbilt, I mean,

[00:34:23.600]
the rich royalty of if you want to call
them the royalty of United States had

[00:34:30.520]
a lot of spare time, so they
were very much into bridge.

[00:34:34.280]
And Vanderbilt said at that time,
it was auction bridge.

[00:34:37.120]
You just played bridge and did
whatever Vanderbilt said.

[00:34:40.840]
Let’s make bridge more interesting.

[00:34:42.640]
Let’s have contract bridge.

[00:34:45.360]
So what contract bridge is that we are

[00:34:48.440]
partners and we lived together, and we
reach a contract of three no trump.

[00:34:54.800]
Well, three no trump.

[00:34:56.040]
First you have to have
a book of six, right?

[00:35:00.040]
Then if we had three no trump,
we have to take the book of six,

[00:35:04.080]
and then we have to take
the three additional tricks.

[00:35:06.200]
That’s nine tricks and no trump.

[00:35:08.320]
If we’re successful,

[00:35:10.280]
we normally get the score for that,
but we get a bonus for being accurate.

[00:35:14.480]
All right, but the next time we vince
I go down, we don’t get a bonus for that.

[00:35:22.080]
Our opponents get the bonus.

[00:35:23.760]
Oh, all right.

[00:35:25.200]
So at the end of the day,
you’re comparing all these scores and you

[00:35:29.480]
come up with who is first
or second or third.

[00:35:32.800]
All right, so let me think.

[00:35:36.120]
Each person has 13 cards.

[00:35:38.360]
So does that mean there’s
13 plays in each 13?

[00:35:42.000]
Actually, they’re called tricks.
Tricks.

[00:35:43.920]
Okay.

[00:35:44.520]
So when four cards are played,
that’s one trick.

[00:35:47.840]
Got it?
Okay.

[00:35:49.320]
And the person who won the trick
leads to the next trick, and it’s.

[00:35:53.080]
Essentially the highest
card based on okay.

[00:35:56.920]
And I’ll show you this.

[00:35:58.840]
You and I are playing bridge, and if we
win the trick, we put it down this way.

[00:36:04.240]
If they win the trick, it goes that way.

[00:36:06.680]
If they win that trick,
then we win this trick.

[00:36:08.920]
And then we win that trick.

[00:36:10.960]
At the end of 13 cards, you can look
down and say, oh, you made four.

[00:36:16.040]
All right.

[00:36:16.640]
Oh, you’re down to because
it’s right here.

[00:36:19.400]
In front of you, all right?

[00:36:20.600]
And then if we disagree,

[00:36:22.080]
somebody will say, oh, go back
to trick seven and see what was done.

[00:36:26.760]
And so you’ll go back and you’ll see

[00:36:28.200]
that somebody had accidentally turned
their card in the wrong direction or

[00:36:31.000]
something because they’re curious
about why it’s not the trick.

[00:36:34.360]
All right, how fast is a trick?
Are we talking?

[00:36:40.320]
Seconds.
People lay their cards down.

[00:36:42.840]
Let’s say I lead and you’re the declare.

[00:36:46.480]
So the person to the left is declare,
makes the opening lead.

[00:36:49.440]
Let’s say I leave this card
and you’re in a contract.

[00:36:52.960]
When you see this lead,
you’ve already looked at your dummy.

[00:36:56.840]
The hand that goes down is called

[00:36:58.920]
the dummy, but your partner
also becomes the dummy.

[00:37:01.880]
Another double meaning.

[00:37:04.400]
You will take a few minutes to analyze
the bidding and the opening lead,

[00:37:09.680]
and you’ll compare your hand
with that hand and see how they fit

[00:37:12.720]
together and where the strengths
and weaknesses lie.

[00:37:16.240]
And then you’ll call a card from dummy.

[00:37:18.960]
Dummy cannot touch a card until you
request it, and then that person falls,

[00:37:23.720]
and then you decide to win it or not,
either in dummy or in your handy.

[00:37:28.040]
So each trick could take minutes.
Oh, yeah.

[00:37:30.720]
Oh, really?
Okay.

[00:37:32.200]
I’m used to playing with
fast, fast older people that they’re

[00:37:37.560]
trying to teach me and they’re just like a
high card and they throw a card so fast.

[00:37:42.440]
But I don’t know what just happened.

[00:37:44.240]
I know I lost, but that’s fine.

[00:37:48.960]
As I said to you, part of the pleasure
to bridge is that it’s problem solving.

[00:37:54.200]
All right?
So your brain won’t go that fast.

[00:37:57.920]
You have to think through things.

[00:37:59.720]
Okay, like, why would I leave this card?

[00:38:02.240]
I wouldn’t just pick
a card up and leave it.

[00:38:05.360]
I have to have a reason for it.

[00:38:07.120]
All right,
and so you’re trying to figure out

[00:38:10.440]
my thought process, which good luck with
that my partner is trying to figure out.

[00:38:16.320]
All right, that’s funny.

[00:38:18.800]
That is cool.

[00:38:20.080]
So how has the business itself changed

[00:38:22.280]
over the past almost 30
years in the same building?

[00:38:26.600]
Same building are not games.

[00:38:30.840]
We used to have games on Monday
and Wednesday nights and on Saturday

[00:38:35.880]
nights and Sunday afternoons because
people who worked needed those games.

[00:38:42.360]
Now our population has aged and we’d have
maybe ten people besides the young guys

[00:38:48.640]
from Epic, maybe ten
people who still work.

[00:38:51.000]
Okay, so it’s changed our night games

[00:38:53.680]
that I’ve put them online because nobody
wants to get in their car and drive out

[00:38:58.280]
in the rain or the snow
or the freezing cold.

[00:39:01.320]
And last night we had only five tables,
but sometimes we’ll have six or seven

[00:39:07.560]
tables, and sometimes we’ll
have only three tables.

[00:39:10.400]
All right.

[00:39:10.880]
I just never know who’s
going to show up to play.

[00:39:13.400]
When you say six or seven tables,
you mean four people at a table?

[00:39:16.560]
Yes.
So it’s still a healthy amount of people.

[00:39:18.720]
Oh, it is.
All right.

[00:39:20.280]
Five tables, you get 20.

[00:39:21.680]
It’s still not as big,
though, as it used to be.

[00:39:23.720]
Sure.
Okay.

[00:39:24.680]
And virtual games weren’t
popular back then.

[00:39:28.200]
Right.
I mean, it’s called Bridge Base Online,

[00:39:33.960]
and they started it in, I think,
2004 because I remember

[00:39:39.800]
but during a pandemic, this sounds
impossible, but it’s worldwide.

[00:39:46.520]
You would click on because
you wanted to go play.

[00:39:49.120]
And it would say, 52,000 people
are now playing bridge online.

[00:39:53.320]
Holy cow.

[00:39:55.400]
Wow.

[00:39:56.840]
At that moment,

[00:39:58.400]
at that time,
and at one point in the morning,

[00:40:01.680]
they have games that there aren’t
that many people in there.

[00:40:03.960]
I’ve never been on it.

[00:40:08.240]
But I just loved it.

[00:40:10.760]
People said they hated it because

[00:40:12.440]
there was cheating that was
going on and online.

[00:40:16.040]
Oh, people cheat.

[00:40:17.400]
How do you cheat online?

[00:40:18.560]
Because you’re essentially fighting
against the computer with a computer.

[00:40:22.160]
But if you’re married,
your spouse is in the other room.

[00:40:26.000]
Got you.
Okay.

[00:40:27.360]
All right.

[00:40:28.440]
So there was cheating, and they
said it wasn’t social enough.

[00:40:32.080]
But what I found is that I loved playing

[00:40:35.920]
against people from India, Egypt, lots
of people playing from England, Bermuda.

[00:40:41.600]
One day I was playing and I don’t even

[00:40:44.080]
know how it happened, but for some reason,
the name just hit me is like a bell.

[00:40:51.080]
And I asked the young man where he
was from, and he said, as it was on.

[00:40:55.280]
And I said, oh, I was there eleven
months ago, and I loved your country.

[00:41:00.000]
Oh my gosh.

[00:41:00.920]
He started writing me
all these stupid chat.

[00:41:04.320]
He said, what is your ethnic background?
Where do you live?

[00:41:07.440]
What do you do?

[00:41:09.360]
So we became friends sort of online.

[00:41:12.320]
And who would ever think
that could happen?

[00:41:14.480]
Yeah, that’s cool.

[00:41:15.600]
So now in our online games,
we have people who played from Milwaukee.

[00:41:20.040]
We have two guys who play
every week from lacrosse.

[00:41:23.800]
Wow.
We have people who live in Florida

[00:41:26.400]
in the winter, and some of them
have stayed down there.

[00:41:29.320]
They join us sometimes.
All right.

[00:41:31.160]
I have a father who lives in Dam.

[00:41:36.680]
His son is a physician in California.

[00:41:39.160]
They get together online to play.

[00:41:42.720]
These are things you wouldn’t
be able to do in the past.

[00:41:45.560]
That’s cool.

[00:41:46.240]
So I guess even bad things
have good things come out.

[00:41:50.000]
Typically, that’s how they work.

[00:41:51.520]
Yeah.

[00:41:52.800]
I think Warren Buffett’s a big bridge guy.

[00:41:57.000]
Have you really?

[00:41:58.200]
How did you do a big one?

[00:42:01.520]
Okay.

[00:42:02.600]
Well, when they started,
they were not very good.

[00:42:04.760]
Okay.
They had hired a coach.

[00:42:06.560]
And it takes time, too.

[00:42:09.600]
Yeah, it sounds like it.

[00:42:10.880]
But I have to tell you what
was interesting about it.

[00:42:13.360]
I just saw two guys sitting there,
and I didn’t even think that.

[00:42:16.120]
I don’t even look at them.

[00:42:17.160]
I just say hi when I sit
down and check my cards.

[00:42:19.480]
Let’s go to work.

[00:42:20.600]
But right.

[00:42:22.160]
Maybe 7ft away from us were these two men
who had arms like this,

[00:42:28.720]
and they were standing in the doorway
doing this, and they had on white shirts,

[00:42:33.120]
very crisp and black pants,
and they just kept looking at our table.

[00:42:37.800]
And so I started paying
more attention to it.

[00:42:41.520]
And I looked at these guys, and I
didn’t recognize Warren Buffett at all.

[00:42:45.960]
But Bill Ginks was online.

[00:42:48.000]
Oh, funny.

[00:42:49.120]
I’ve seen them enough on TV,

[00:42:51.000]
and I knew who it was, but their
bodyguards are watching them.

[00:42:54.760]
That’s funny.
I probably couldn’t beat him today, but.

[00:42:56.920]
I did years ago, back then.

[00:42:59.120]
Yeah, that’s funny.

[00:43:03.360]
A bridge.

[00:43:06.280]
It was so obvious.

[00:43:08.080]
You’re going to hire
bodyguards when you have them.

[00:43:10.680]
Not be quite so obvious, I suppose.
Yeah.

[00:43:13.600]
Arguments either way, right.

[00:43:15.880]
I don’t need a bodyguard,

[00:43:17.360]
but I have to tell you, oh, probably 25
or 30 years ago, I don’t even remember.

[00:43:23.160]
We went to a tournament,
and long rows, maybe 15 tables long.

[00:43:29.480]
I could see down at the end of this row,

[00:43:32.680]
people are sitting there watching,
and they’re called Pipppezers.

[00:43:35.920]
And there must have been eight or
ten chairs surrounding this table.

[00:43:40.080]
Pivoting.

[00:43:41.240]
And I thought, who on earth
could be that important?

[00:43:45.120]
I got down there.

[00:43:46.560]
It was Omar Sharif.

[00:43:48.960]
And when he looked up at me and smiled,
my heart just melted.

[00:43:52.920]
I mean, he was a heart throbbing of the
moon, but here he was, plain bridge.

[00:43:59.000]
And he had so much Groovement.

[00:44:00.680]
It was incredible.
Nice.

[00:44:02.800]
And then I don’t know if you’ve
ever heard of Barry Crane.

[00:44:05.920]
Yes.
You’re probably too young,

[00:44:07.920]
but he had three or four TV shows,
and the most popular one was Get Smart.

[00:44:12.320]
Okay.

[00:44:13.240]
He produced those, and he was
fletching to death by anxiel over.

[00:44:19.200]
But I did play against him.

[00:44:21.360]
Oh, really?

[00:44:22.720]
He’s been around.

[00:44:24.360]
Well.

[00:44:27.880]
Playing bridge for a connected
like that, that’s pretty cool.

[00:44:31.000]
Well, I told somebody, I don’t know who,

[00:44:34.800]
but I really think bridge is almost
an international language, all right?

[00:44:40.040]
Because I’ve played bridge in so many
different countries,

[00:44:44.080]
and friends, they were nice,
they were kind, they were helpful.

[00:44:49.360]
And I hope that when they come
to this country, we’re the same.

[00:44:53.080]
Yeah.

[00:44:54.000]
So is bridge as big in other
places around the world?

[00:44:58.120]
Oh, it’s bigger in China
than it is in the States.

[00:45:00.560]
In China?

[00:45:01.840]
Well, everything they do is big,
but all right, we have three nationals.

[00:45:07.200]
Yeah.

[00:45:08.000]
And the last time it was in Chicago,
I was in charge of one of the programs.

[00:45:13.360]
I was amazed.

[00:45:15.080]
China and I don’t remember the number

[00:45:17.760]
of the plane, but those the big planes
that have hole 500 people or something,

[00:45:24.200]
they sent a plane load of Chinese children
to Chicago for five days to plain bridge.

[00:45:31.000]
Wow.
How young have children?

[00:45:33.520]
The youngest life master
Everest, I think eight.

[00:45:37.040]
But no, most of those kids were
like junior high schoolers.

[00:45:40.320]
They’re still young.

[00:45:42.000]
Well, China wants to win
everything, all right?

[00:45:45.680]
So they’re preparing them
to become British champion.

[00:45:48.600]
Wow.

[00:45:49.840]
But that’s the only country I know

[00:45:51.840]
of that’s ever harder to play
just to transport kids there.

[00:45:56.120]
That’s pretty interesting.

[00:45:57.320]
That’s pretty bold.

[00:45:59.040]
The

[00:46:01.240]
organization that you’re talking about
in Memphis,

[00:46:03.720]
does that keep track of worldwide or is
that just keeping track of national?

[00:46:07.800]
There’s a different organization
called the World Bridge Federation.

[00:46:12.240]
All right, of course.

[00:46:14.520]
And they make rules that all countries

[00:46:19.920]
they make rules that all
countries should follow.

[00:46:22.440]
Okay?

[00:46:22.960]
Now, the United States is the only
country, though,

[00:46:26.000]
in the World Rich Federation that allows
us at one time, like we’re playing four

[00:46:31.040]
hearts, and you show
out on the third heart.

[00:46:33.480]
I can see you.
You have no more heart, partner.

[00:46:36.720]
And that saves revoke.

[00:46:38.400]
So revoke is when you have a card you
should have played, and you didn’t.

[00:46:41.320]
There’s still weeks for that.

[00:46:43.000]
So the World Reach Federation,

[00:46:45.280]
I’ve been played in one in Montreal,
25 years ago, a friend asked me to go

[00:46:50.320]
play, and the first day,
they cut the fields in half.

[00:46:56.520]
The next day, they cut
the fields in half again.

[00:46:59.680]
And finally, he and I made it to the
finals of the World Bridge competition.

[00:47:04.680]
Impressive.

[00:47:05.360]
All right, well,
I’ve never played the screens before,

[00:47:08.480]
and screens are maybe two and a half,
3ft wide and probably 4ft tall.

[00:47:17.080]
And the screen goes across
the table this way.

[00:47:20.160]
Okay, so I can’t see my partner and you
can’t see your partner,

[00:47:23.600]
but you take your bids out of the bidding
box and you put them under the screen.

[00:47:27.880]
All right?

[00:47:29.520]
And then you can ask me what his bid meant
because you didn’t ask out loud,

[00:47:36.800]
because you don’t want your partner to
know that you have a question about it.

[00:47:39.920]
All right?
So anyway, playing with screens

[00:47:42.360]
in highlevel competition
is a very common thing.

[00:47:45.280]
Oh, interesting, because most people
have little signals or whatever they do.

[00:47:55.040]
Two people just recently

[00:47:58.200]
admitted to cheating, and she has
a past president, Basy Bailey.

[00:48:04.440]
She’s beautiful, wealthy, a fantastic
bridge player, and Gordon Cook.

[00:48:10.680]
All right.

[00:48:11.640]
And she was being inductive,
and she admitted she cheated, for one.

[00:48:17.960]
She just lost everything.

[00:48:19.360]
Oh, no.

[00:48:20.440]
Well, I mean, it’s a big deal.
Yeah.

[00:48:23.960]
So were they just blinking or
moving their hands on the table?

[00:48:27.360]
I don’t know.
Husband and wife and he wasn’t good enough

[00:48:30.280]
for her, so they started
cheating so they could win more.

[00:48:32.920]
Got you.

[00:48:33.440]
Okay, no, I don’t think
this room is cheating.

[00:48:37.720]
This is a game.
Right?

[00:48:39.440]
And you want to win
the game on your skills.

[00:48:42.320]
So hold on a second.

[00:48:44.720]
When you’re playing bridge,

[00:48:46.960]
I guess I always assumed it was just an
individual, and you got put on the table.

[00:48:50.680]
A few other people like it’s.

[00:48:51.720]
You and a partner and you
and that partner.

[00:48:55.080]
Oh, okay.

[00:48:57.080]
So if you sign up to play rich with me,

[00:48:59.000]
it’s for three and a half hours,
and it’s 27 boards, usually.

[00:49:02.080]
All right?
So you and me were hitting the table.

[00:49:05.000]
All right?
Got it.

[00:49:06.920]
Okay, so it’s not so much individual.

[00:49:08.680]
So I imagine at one point you just

[00:49:11.560]
subconsciously pick up on nuances
of your bridge partner.

[00:49:17.120]
I think married couples do that more
probably than single people because they

[00:49:22.040]
know each other so well,
they should help but pick up on things.

[00:49:26.120]
But one of the rules at Bridge is when I

[00:49:29.000]
make a bid, I’m not supposed
to be looking at you.

[00:49:35.360]
Sometimes personally put down a bit,

[00:49:37.480]
and their partner goes,
all right, I’ve done it myself,

[00:49:43.120]
because you just think, oh,
my gosh, what’s going on?

[00:49:46.480]
You’re not really supposed
to show any of those.

[00:49:49.360]
You’re supposed to be just poker face.

[00:49:51.480]
All right, look away.

[00:49:53.720]
Interesting.

[00:49:54.760]
And you’re not supposed
to stare at the opponent.

[00:49:57.240]
You’re sitting here looking at your hand,
and I’m not supposed to sit here.

[00:50:00.320]
At you just intimidate them
into sitting low or something.

[00:50:03.760]
Okay.
Interesting.

[00:50:06.240]
It’s the same sort of a gentleman’s
game as golf or tennis rules.

[00:50:12.920]
We’re expected to follow them.
All right.

[00:50:15.880]
Makes sense.

[00:50:17.200]
So with bridge, I guess,
and all the people,

[00:50:21.080]
where do you see bridge going
in the next 10, 20, 30 years?

[00:50:24.960]
Do you think it’ll get bigger or
do you think it’ll just maintain?

[00:50:30.760]
Well, it’s kind of a two sided question

[00:50:33.520]
because more and more young
people are not playing.

[00:50:39.160]
All right,
throw School offered me to come in and do

[00:50:44.000]
a lunar threat class for 8th grade math
students or 7th grade students for bridge.

[00:50:50.640]
And the reason I told her that I would do

[00:50:53.520]
it is because for children,
it teaches them concentration skills,

[00:50:58.880]
it teaches them hangup doesn’t do that,
and it teaches them that negative

[00:51:04.640]
inferences sometimes are
more powerful than positive.

[00:51:07.840]
So she doesn’t look at both sides.

[00:51:10.160]
So I told her that it would
greatly improve that.

[00:51:13.600]
Well, she promoted it.

[00:51:15.480]
She talked it up, and only three
students signed up, so she canceled it.

[00:51:20.720]
But what we decided was if you had

[00:51:23.720]
somebody in your family,
a grandparent or an aunt or somebody

[00:51:26.800]
who played, you might be
interested in learning.

[00:51:29.480]
But if you’ve never heard of Rich,

[00:51:31.400]
who wants to take a Rich
with a class in a card game?

[00:51:35.880]
So I think that as we continue to grow,

[00:51:39.240]
it’s always going to be more
senior citizen type people.

[00:51:42.560]
Are the newly retired?
Okay.

[00:51:44.560]
I had a class of newly retired,
and they were hilarious.

[00:51:48.200]
I don’t mean talk about having
worked too hard with her whole life.

[00:51:51.840]
She was taking art lessons in the morning,
and then she was coming here for a class,

[00:51:55.960]
and then she was going to one of the golf
courses for a putting lesson.

[00:51:59.800]
It was like that was her day, every day.

[00:52:02.400]
She just was doing everything she could.

[00:52:04.680]
Pick that never bored.

[00:52:05.920]
All right, well, I think when she works,

[00:52:08.800]
she must have thought,
someday I’m going to do this and that she

[00:52:11.920]
was trying everything out
to see what she wanted to do.

[00:52:14.640]
All right.

[00:52:16.800]
I just don’t know what the future holds.
Okay.

[00:52:20.160]
What are the plans for you
with the business?

[00:52:23.640]
Well, I’m going to continue
running it as long as I can.

[00:52:27.920]
Obviously, as I age,
I need more and more help.

[00:52:31.000]
Sure.

[00:52:31.440]
Because I can’t do some of the physical
things I used to be able to do.

[00:52:34.960]
Okay.

[00:52:36.000]
But I’m going to keep it
until there is no more meeting.

[00:52:41.040]
I love it here.

[00:52:42.720]
I wake up in the morning and I’m making

[00:52:45.600]
treats to bring if I’m directing or this
morning I answered four or five emails.

[00:52:50.480]
People wanting to know more about Bridge.

[00:52:53.480]
It gives me I mean,

[00:52:55.320]
I love my children and my family dearly,
but I used to have golf and tennis.

[00:53:01.000]
Now I have my grandchildren in Bridge.

[00:53:03.760]
That’s awesome.

[00:53:05.080]
I’m still garden old.

[00:53:07.000]
You used to have a newspaper
called tell me about that.

[00:53:10.880]
Oh, I wish I could think of the man scene.

[00:53:13.760]
He was the person who wrote about

[00:53:16.680]
the operas and the plays, and someday
I’ll have to I may have it every month.

[00:53:23.720]
Anyway, he called me up one day and he

[00:53:25.840]
said, Blanc, this is so and so, and I hear
that you’re a very good, rich player.

[00:53:31.200]
I was wondering if I could
interest you in writing a column.

[00:53:34.080]
I said, writing a column.

[00:53:35.520]
I mean, I’m not a writer.

[00:53:37.600]
And I told him that and he said,
well, come in and talk with me.

[00:53:40.480]
So I went over there and I
agreed I would try it.

[00:53:44.240]
And so I did it for a year.
All right.

[00:53:46.800]
Every day or week?
Every week.

[00:53:49.400]
Once a week.

[00:53:50.480]
But we have three children in a dizzy life
and all the other things I was doing,

[00:53:56.040]
and I’m a big volunteer at England
School for all my kids.

[00:54:02.200]
I just didn’t have time.

[00:54:05.400]
I use too many words for everything I do.

[00:54:08.800]
So I would write the column and let it sit

[00:54:11.680]
there, and then I’d go back and rewrite
it practically, but take out 30 words.

[00:54:15.400]
And then the next day or two, I’d reread
it and take out twelve more words.

[00:54:19.280]
And it’s very time consuming to write one

[00:54:21.920]
article this big
to spend that much time on it.

[00:54:25.760]
So I enjoyed it.

[00:54:27.120]
And I had people writing
me and calling me.

[00:54:29.440]
They were interested in bridge.
Oh, fun.

[00:54:31.760]
But you need somebody who likes it.

[00:54:34.680]
Right there’s, that yeah, that’s fair.

[00:54:38.800]
So I know that I talk too much.

[00:54:44.960]
We had a podcast, so that’s ideal.
Well, I don’t know.

[00:54:48.880]
It seems like I do something often.

[00:54:51.840]
Imagine when it’s something
social like this.

[00:54:54.400]
I can’t imagine an introverted
person running a show like this.

[00:54:58.320]
Oh, really?
No, because I would think that a big

[00:55:03.160]
portion of the reason people come here is
to meet, likeminded people that are

[00:55:08.800]
there has to be a certain level of
intellect to play the game alone at all.

[00:55:13.640]
So right there you’re like, okay,

[00:55:15.000]
everyone that’s in this room
is at least this smart.

[00:55:18.080]
Whether it’s paper to justify it
or prove it or not doesn’t matter.

[00:55:23.000]
They have the ability and that alone,

[00:55:25.520]
you’re like, okay, well,
these are cool people because of that.

[00:55:27.800]
That’s true.
And then you play the game.

[00:55:30.040]
It’s fun.
But yeah, there’s got to be camaraderie.

[00:55:32.920]
I would imagine that the person running

[00:55:34.520]
that has to have something to,
I suppose, help extract at other people

[00:55:40.520]
because there’s probably some
introverts that walk through the door.

[00:55:42.800]
Oh, yes.

[00:55:44.040]
And then after a few hands,
maybe they open up a little bit.

[00:55:47.120]
They do.

[00:55:48.840]
I have to say I am genuinely happy
to see people walking that door.

[00:55:53.920]
I bet.

[00:55:54.440]
And I think when you’re genuinely happy,
they realize that.

[00:55:58.880]
So I have people who walk in this club and
walk up to me and hug me or something.

[00:56:03.800]
They do.
They walk out and they say thank you.

[00:56:07.240]
They’ll bring treats and say, here,
I want to share this with you.

[00:56:10.680]
Well, that’s awesome.

[00:56:12.480]
It’s really a family or community and I

[00:56:16.160]
hope everybody who comes
here feels that way.

[00:56:19.200]
Yeah, I think that I don’t know,

[00:56:22.360]
I see stuff like this and the reason
that I got into Chest is because I needed

[00:56:26.280]
to exercise my brain in different
ways than I do with a typical job.

[00:56:31.160]
You just want to I feel like your brain

[00:56:33.680]
and your body is it use
it as a kind of thing.

[00:56:35.960]
Oh.

[00:56:36.440]
But most people don’t realize
that about their brain.

[00:56:39.440]
I am just fascinated with people.

[00:56:42.600]
I have a lady who comes here
and she’s always bored.

[00:56:47.360]
She never had anything plus and are happy

[00:56:49.880]
to say she’s just very down and I really
have worked on her trying to get her

[00:56:55.480]
to come around and she actually
paid me a compliment last week.

[00:56:59.320]
She didn’t mean to accident.

[00:57:02.040]
I didn’t mean to say that.

[00:57:05.480]
But I think we’re all going through life

[00:57:08.400]
the very best we can and it takes
nothing to be kind, so why not try it?

[00:57:14.000]
Right.
Yeah.

[00:57:15.000]
There’s no instruction
manual or anything, but no.

[00:57:17.560]
Interesting.

[00:57:18.560]
But she’s still playing bridge and is she
having a good time with your partner?

[00:57:23.200]
No.

[00:57:25.200]
Maybe it might be worth their partner.

[00:57:29.640]
No worries.

[00:57:31.600]
I imagine that there’s definitely a social

[00:57:34.880]
dynamic with any gamers sitting at a
table, especially for people like that.

[00:57:39.480]
Well, we play against
them three times a week.

[00:57:41.960]
You kind of know where they’re going
on vacation and how great her grandkids

[00:57:45.560]
are and her daughter just had twins
and I mean, you just know fun stuff.

[00:57:49.720]
Yeah, that is cool.

[00:57:51.320]
And I have to even take it a step farther.

[00:57:53.600]
I’m sure you live in some parry won’t know

[00:57:56.360]
this, but this is not
a desirable neighborhood.

[00:57:58.760]
It used to be.

[00:58:00.480]
I was going to ask you about that because

[00:58:02.480]
30 years that building wasn’t there,
these huge power lines weren’t there.

[00:58:07.960]
It’s a different world.

[00:58:09.160]
Well, when we first moved to Madison,

[00:58:11.000]
we lived in our hills and it was a nice
neighborhood and I think it still lives,

[00:58:15.960]
but all of this area back
here is no longer nice.

[00:58:18.800]
You have four families living in one

[00:58:21.520]
apartment building over there
in the corner, and lots of drug deals.

[00:58:26.720]
I would be here during the pandemic
to come over and run water and do things,

[00:58:30.600]
and you could see the drug deals
going on over at the Laundromat.

[00:58:34.360]
Oh, no.
I would have a furnace guy say they were

[00:58:37.960]
selling drugs at 630 this morning,
that kind of thing.

[00:58:41.640]
So I was very sad

[00:58:45.240]
when I came here one day,
and there was like a dozen eggs broken

[00:58:48.400]
on the parking lot and a
dozen bottles of beer.

[00:58:51.400]
I came over here Sunday to work,

[00:58:52.760]
and there were two beer bottles out
on the parking lot I had to clean up.

[00:58:56.400]
So what I’ve done, and I’m out there
pulling weeds, and people walk by.

[00:59:03.080]
I talk to them and I say hi to them.

[00:59:06.360]
And I’ve got about four people
now who really like this club.

[00:59:12.240]
They come over, I’ve told them all they

[00:59:14.520]
have my permission to cut
all the flowers they want.

[00:59:17.200]
And a lady stopped, and they told me she
lost her son two months ago at age 27.

[00:59:23.040]
And she said, I come up here
and just look at these flowers.

[00:59:26.200]
And I said, well, please cut some.

[00:59:27.680]
And she said, I’ll buy a customer.

[00:59:33.400]
I don’t know.

[00:59:34.440]
I’m not going to sell this building.

[00:59:36.480]
It’s too close to the belt line.

[00:59:38.800]
Yeah, you are.
Right there.

[00:59:40.600]
I have people who drive here
every week from Sun Prairie.

[00:59:44.160]
All right.
Okay.

[00:59:45.920]
I have people who come in from Verona,
from Mount Horb.

[00:59:50.240]
I have a guy who started coming
from Plantedville, also.

[00:59:54.600]
Hike, are you?
Yeah.

[00:59:55.960]
But you’re coming?

[00:59:58.000]
Yeah, that’s the name again.

[00:59:59.680]
And if you can feel

[01:00:02.400]
I don’t know what word to use maybe, but
you feel like you’re having a positive.

[01:00:06.520]
Influence, make the world
a little bit better place.

[01:00:11.080]
Yeah, that is cool.

[01:00:12.600]
That’s why we keep it.

[01:00:13.840]
All right.

[01:00:14.960]
Yeah.

[01:00:16.080]
It’s interesting because I guess when I
was in the parking lot,

[01:00:18.560]
you look down there and it’s completely
opposite of looking north, I suppose.

[01:00:27.320]
Interesting.
Yeah.

[01:00:28.960]
Good or bad, I mean, cities evolve
or neighborhoods evolve, I guess.

[01:00:33.880]
Well, and I complained of three people.

[01:00:37.680]
Were they talking?

[01:00:38.720]
This guy, and he finally told me
he’s a plain closed policeman.

[01:00:43.760]
Okay.

[01:00:45.000]
He said, there’s so many drug
deals going on around my place.

[01:00:48.560]
What do I do about that as
a private citizen?

[01:00:50.800]
He said, I’ll take care of it.

[01:00:52.840]
So I occasionally will drive by or come
over here, and there’s an unmarked car

[01:00:57.480]
just parked in my parking lot,
and they’re watching my neighborhood.

[01:01:01.280]
All right.

[01:01:03.160]
That’s a big job.
It is.

[01:01:05.160]
But I figure they probably have a pretty

[01:01:07.600]
good handle on what’s going
on in the neighborhood now.

[01:01:10.000]
Yeah, I imagine you hope so.

[01:01:11.520]
Anyways, it gives me
a little piece of mind.

[01:01:14.200]
Right.

[01:01:15.240]
Everybody’s got their routine
so even to our dealers.

[01:01:19.600]
True.
Yeah.

[01:01:20.800]
Interesting.

[01:01:21.840]
So you have a cool place here.

[01:01:23.960]
I’m impressed.

[01:01:25.280]
And I feel like you’re making the world a
better place, which is cool with bridge.

[01:01:30.040]
And anytime I hear about

[01:01:31.400]
the Warren Buffett’s or the Bill Gates of
the world, I remember Warren Buffett’s.

[01:01:36.320]
I don’t know if it was
biography or autobiography.

[01:01:39.400]
Bridge sticks out because it was

[01:01:40.920]
mentioned, I want to say, almost as
much as stock picking in that approach.

[01:01:46.920]
I told you it’s addicting.

[01:01:48.880]
People don’t realize that.

[01:01:50.440]
They say, oh, it’s a game, but people
are addicted to gambling, food.

[01:01:55.040]
Oh, yeah.

[01:01:56.960]
They keep putting them up.
Yeah.

[01:01:59.280]
That’s cool.

[01:02:00.440]
And I think the thing about
bridges is the same way with golf.

[01:02:04.400]
You have a bad shot or a bad little golf,

[01:02:06.720]
you think, well, tomorrow when
I play, I’ll do better here.

[01:02:10.160]
Well, it’s the same thing with Rich.
Yeah.

[01:02:12.240]
Oh, today I was average,

[01:02:13.680]
but if we’d just done two boards
better, we could have won.

[01:02:16.520]
That kind of thing.
And you get into that.

[01:02:18.840]
What did you learn?
What did you learn?

[01:02:21.240]
Always be improving.
That’s cool.

[01:02:23.800]
Is your name on the board there?
Yes.

[01:02:25.960]
Yes.
Okay.

[01:02:27.560]
Where are you at?

[01:02:29.120]
Well, I became a lot Master in the 80s.

[01:02:33.480]
That’s awesome.

[01:02:35.000]
Oh, yeah, I’m up there.
That’s awesome.

[01:02:37.400]
I have 7000 master points.

[01:02:40.000]
Is that relatively speaking?

[01:02:41.480]
That seems like a lot to me.

[01:02:43.240]
Okay.
That’s cool.

[01:02:46.320]
Do you play bridge every
day when you’re here?

[01:02:49.000]
No.
Some days I direct.

[01:02:50.680]
Okay.
All right.

[01:02:52.320]
And if someone comes without a partner,
I will play with them if I need to.

[01:02:57.280]
All right.

[01:02:58.320]
But most people come with partners, but ever since the Pandemic
there’s been, like, three or four.

[01:03:03.320]
Like, the guy who came in from
Benjaminville came by himself.

[01:03:06.800]
He said, I used to play
bridge, and I’m retired.

[01:03:09.880]
And we welcomed him with open arm.

[01:03:13.000]
Nice.

[01:03:14.040]
I feel like I would want to come here
alone just so you can be my partner.

[01:03:24.480]
Wrong.

[01:03:27.760]
Didn’t work out so hot.

[01:03:30.240]
Somebody else came out of partner.

[01:03:31.720]
Oh, got you.

[01:03:36.400]
But I have to be honest.

[01:03:38.880]
I have maybe three partners
I play with the most often.

[01:03:42.800]
Okay.

[01:03:43.320]
And then those are the people
I go to tournaments with.

[01:03:46.320]
You see, there’s club games,
then there’s sectionals, which are like,

[01:03:50.600]
we’re having a sectional here in December
in this building.

[01:03:54.400]
Oh, wow.
Yeah.

[01:03:55.320]
Nice.
Congrats.

[01:03:56.240]
And then there’s regionals,
which are a step higher,

[01:04:00.400]
and then the nationals, so
you can do any of those things.

[01:04:05.360]
But when you go to tournaments and compete

[01:04:07.400]
and pay $36 for the day to play bridge,
you want to play with somebody who you’re

[01:04:11.960]
in tune with and can be good
competition for the field.

[01:04:16.400]
So somebody who has not very many points
asked me to go with him to play and attend

[01:04:20.960]
it, and I let them down
as nicely as I could.

[01:04:24.920]
I said it would be a waste of your
money because you would have to play.

[01:04:28.480]
in flight A.

[01:04:29.000]
With me, you have three flights A, B,
and C, and you play in those flights

[01:04:32.800]
according to how many
Master points you have.

[01:04:34.840]
Got you.

[01:04:35.440]
So he has 30 Master points, and he’d
have to play with me in flight A.

[01:04:39.160]
Right.
And in flight A,

[01:04:40.360]
you have Bridge Pros in there and people
who are a lot better than I am.

[01:04:44.440]
Seriously?

[01:04:45.560]
And so I tried to explain that to him,
and he just sort of shook his head yes.

[01:04:50.440]
I don’t think he believed me. All right.

[01:04:52.200]
But I was being honest with him.
Got you.

[01:04:55.080]
People with 50 Masterpoints think,
oh, boy, I’m winning at bridge.

[01:04:59.280]
I’m pretty good.
No, because the world is figured out.

[01:05:02.000]
But then when they get to about 300, they
realize they still don’t know it all.

[01:05:06.840]
So there’s that learning curve.
All right.

[01:05:09.160]
You have to have a certain
amount of self confidence.

[01:05:14.400]
You wouldn’t come here and expose yourself
to likely be coming in last place.

[01:05:19.040]
All right.

[01:05:20.120]
I suppose you don’t want to let go of your

[01:05:21.640]
partner, especially the person that you
maybe just met that night or day, right?

[01:05:26.280]
No.

[01:05:27.320]
It’s competitive, and you want to feel
like you have a chance to win.

[01:05:32.480]
I like it.
Cool.

[01:05:34.400]
Well, Glenna, thank you so much.

[01:05:37.360]
I can hardly wait to see
what you do with this.

[01:05:39.800]
hodgepod.

[01:05:44.360]
You gave me a lot to work with here at
the school place, so this is impressive.

[01:05:48.440]
I had no idea what to expect.

[01:05:50.960]
It’s interesting.

[01:05:53.120]
It’s cool because this is bridge facility.

[01:05:56.000]
Bridge only.

[01:05:57.200]
You don’t see that with chess.

[01:05:59.200]
You don’t see that with poker.

[01:06:02.040]
Think of all the card games,
board games, everything.

[01:06:05.400]
You don’t see individual
buildings with those.

[01:06:07.880]
We have them with a bridge here,
so I think that alone speaks volumes.