Mark your calendar now for our popular pot-luck holiday party on Sunday, December 15, at 5 p.m. Unit members can sign up for this dinner and unit game at the club. We’ll be renting a big room at the Campbell Community Center, as usual.

Our unit is also holding a special game during STAC week on Saturday night, December 21 at 7 p.m. Come out that week and play often for silver points at the club.

11 tables showed up in October to enjoy our wine and cheese unit game. Lynn Yokel selected much of the wine and cheese and baked a birthday cake for Stu Goodgold. Ray & Maxine Lubow came in first overall, Teddi & Derek Fiero were second, Michael Migdol & Stephen Tu were third. I regret that work had me out of town.

Our unit members have been distinguishing themselves again at local sectionals. In Santa Cruz, these people were first in their stratifications in pair games: in the afternoon, Frank Lowenthal and Tania Moalem; in the evening, Diane Shannon and Ray & Maxine Lubow (who were also first in their direction in all strats). I usually focus on strat firsts, but it’s notable that right behind Diane were Will Watson & Robert Ritz and Neal Webb & Ray Yuenger. Right behind the Lubows was Tania. So our unit took all the top spots. The first place Swiss team included Tania Moalem, Richard Sarsfield, and Dana Brown. Tied for first in their strat were the teams of Thomas Coleman, Shih Wei Lu, Alexander Tampilang, & Gary Kao and Richard Jacobs, Malcolm Stewart, Eric Yang, & Ben Chen.

From what I can tell, not many members made the trip to the Santa Rosa sectional. Tania’s Swiss team was second in their strat. In the Sonora sectional, Tania had a different Swiss team and again finished second. Michael Abrams and June McCullough were second in their strat in pairs.

The BER sectional belonged to Stephen Tu. He was first place with Will Watson on Saturday afternoon, second place with Will Saturday evening, and Stephen’s Swiss team, including Steve Chen and Michael Migdol, took first. First in their strat in pairs were Shih-Ming Shih and Mindy Foos. First in the evening were Gary & Jan Soules. Strat firsts also went to Chingling Jim Tseng, Leon Lee & Eric Yang.

Our unit went to Palo Alto in October for a single-session team challenge match. Facing off were five teams classified by masterpoints: open, under 2000, 750, 300, and 100. Our teams won every match. Congratulations to all 20 team members, whose names are too numerous for my limited space. It was a fun event. I hope it will be repeated.

If you want me to report more, let me know what to say. Corrections, comments and news are welcome at (408)379-7717 and rayyuenger@starband.net. Old columns appear under “old stuff” at www.sjbridge.org.