Sunday, December 31, 2006

Friday 29th December: The Sleep of Reason Brings Forth Monsters.

I headed into town on the tram this afternoon with my head stuck in a book I received for Christmas, The Retreat of Reason, by Anthony Browne, published by Civitas. It is a critique of "political correctness and the corruption of public debate in modern Britain" and on its cover there is a reproduction of Goya's El Sueno de la Razon Produce Monstruos.

I was struck by how the fellow looked as if he was slumped at a mahjong table at the end of a particularly harrowing all night session. The poor fellow languishes there tormented by the monstrous products of his sleeping reason which have come back to haunt him in a variety of bat and cat-like forms, all bearing the mocking likenesses of the ghastly visages of his various opponents...

Is not that creature that spreads its wings upon high a bat-eared version of Noda, exalting himself in the height of his nocturnal glory? Does not that self-satisfied looking cat lounging behind him and looking on with indifference bear a prowling Tomcat-like resemblance to the Human Computer, sitting pretty in second place - the only gaijin cat to get his paws in the cream? Is not that dark one gaining ascendency from behind none other than Jaime? Flying in the lower middle regions over on the left comes Ray, while Tim sits to the Sleeper's right and chats away while waving a chicken wing at him. There, hovering over the slumped figure is this year's new-comer, Hide, a sort of pale version of Noda, his spreads his lesser wings over the sleeper.

The version of the etching that is in the Prado offers this salutary advice to the mahjong player:
La fantasia abandonada de la razon, produce monstruos imposibles: unida con ella, es madre de las artes y origen de sus marabillas.
Ah yes, how often is the mahjong player - er, or rather, how often am I when playing mahjong - busy concocting fantastic monstrosities devoid of reason... And yet, on a good day, Imagination and Reason work together to fashion the mother of all arts, one mahjong marvel after another!

Anyway, Jaime, Kenyon and I had told the Mama-san at Koyo Jansou that we'd probably play there this week if the parlour was open and she'd told us it would be, so that is where we spent ten hours of the last Friday night and Saturday morning of 2006. A very enjoyable time we had too, whether winning or losing.

The exertions of the holidays showed, however, as there have never been so many
Chombo in one session and nor has there ever been such a hamfisted session in all the hamfisted sessions that we have played. Tiles were constantly slipping from fingers and crashing into mahjong walls. On numerous occasions people took tiles from the wrong part of the wall and that was how the most memorable Chombo of the evening was committed as Kenyon, who had declared Riichi, passed over the wall of tiles in front of his nose to take a tile from the end of Jaime's wall. He instantly revealed it and declared

"Ron!"


only for both Jaime and David to cry


"Chombo!!"


Kenyon owned up to another Chombo and committed a third, the details of which I now forget. Jaime added to the Chombo tally by going out on a 7-Bamboo that Kenyon, playing safely, discarded - the 7-Bamboo happened to be in Jaime's discard pile.

Meanwhile, The Poor Little Cypriot reverted to his old foible of losing a tile and having to play out a couple of hands with only twelve tiles. He got away with one hand not being noticed - Kenyon did express puzzlement at the discards, however, but the PLC kept
stumm.

As this was the last game of the year it was unlikely to alter much at the top of the table but there was a chance that a win by David and loss by Jaime could change the order at the bottom. However, Jaime's early lead, although largely at the expense of Kenyon, put paid to that option. Even though by the end of the evening Jaime had shed most of that early lead, the points had gone back to Kenyon and David was equally generous, ending the year with yet another big loss of over 100 points...

We were the only customers all night - or at least from 6:30pm until 3:30am. The Mama-san was friendly throughout. It turns out that she and her hubby live above the jansou. The Jansou is on the first floor (Japanese and American second floor) and they live above the parlour, a very convenient arrangement for them and they took advantage of it to disappear upstairs for long periods of the evening. When she was at the counter, Mama-san spent much of the time chuckling away at the figure skating oblivious to the cries of a thirsty table for more beer! Apart from the squid, most of the snacks she served were suitable for Johnny Foreigner - peanuts, chocolates and sweets, cheese and so forth. All in all it is a very pleasant environment in which to play.

By the last hand, however, David's evening long hopes of recovery, which appeared more and more like Adolf's hopes of a change of fortune on the Russian Front after Stalingrad, had evaporated. Just one positive hand at the end would keep his 10th game in the black... It was a
Ryanshi hand with Jaime as Oya. Kenyon was going for Coins and David had to discard a 2-Coins in order to go Riichi for his second Yaku - it was obviously dangerous but the hope was that either he would get away with it and go out and so finish the last game in the black, or Kenyon would go Ron and at least the game would end... please either one of those scenarios just get me into a taxi and on my way to my bed...

"Ron!"

Inevitably, it was the latter of the two options. Kenyon claimed David's tile and David was left feeling tired and frustrated and haunted by his monstrous sleep of reason...

Kenyon -70, +53,* -17, +28,* +29, -2, +67, -17,* +34, -15, +26, -13 = +120
Jaime +75, +9, -17,* -37, +19, -61, +32, -21, -19, -15, +37 = +2
===
David -5, -62, -11, +8, -17, -6, -15, -13, +34, -11, -24 = -122

The final results for the year and the "Prizes" are as follows:

Noda +835 - 2006 Cockseye Club Three-Player Mahjong Champion
===
Kenyon +464 - Best Johnny Foreigner
Hide +197 - Best Newcomer, Best Batting Average
===
Tim -105 - Worst Batting Average
Ray -106 - Best Paddy
Eri -242 - Best Lady
Jaime -397 - Best Recovering Player
===
David -646 - Best Loser, Worst Johnny Foreigner, Worst (1/8th) Paddy


As Kenyon protested that he ought to get a prize as well as Noda the Central Committee decided that it would be unfair to discriminate and so ALL players have been awarded prizes as listed above. However, ONLY NODA'S will be AWARDED at the NEW YEAR COCKSEYE CLUB DINNER which will take place at a location to be announced shortly, as soon as Noda confirms his safe return from the golf courses of New Zealand...

In the meantime, the year's BATTING AVERAGE has been calculated (to one decimal place, without rounding up or down) by dividing the number of points scored by the number of games each player has played and the results are quite interesting, at least for David, as it gets his arse off the bottom:

Hide 5.7
Noda 5.3
Kenyon 2.8
===
Ray -1.7
Jaime 1.9
David -3
===
Eri -40.3
Tim -105

It is worth noting that the actual difference in form between the regular players is quite small - but just as with genetic difference between man and the higher beasts - that SMALL difference is ALL...

Happy New Year!

David Hurley
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St John Evangelist Day Revelation!

On December 27th, the Feast of St John the Evangelist, I found myself back at the Doc's for a festive afternoon of mahjong.

The "revelation" I received was this - Doctor M junior was right! When we first began to play mahjong he prophesied that I might suffer at the four-player mahjong table as a result of my habitual playing of the three-player variation, or, on the other hand, progress in the four-player game could well be to the detriment of my three-player game.

And lo, even as he said, so it has been!


Thus, when I finished top in today's game, as for every game in the fourth quarter of the year, it was a result that spake unto me with something of a convenient revelatory power! So that's why I am doing so badly in the three-player league! I have my excuse! Nothing to do with crap play or the standard fallback excuses of being knackered after a gruelling week of toil, or of being too drunk/not drunk enough/sober - it is because progress at the four-player game has thrown a spanner in the works!!

Mind you, it looked as if The Poor Little Cypriot would have to pay out at the Mogamis' as well as at the Friday night three-player sessions as the first two games went to the senior Mogamis while I was down on -13 in both games and had accumulated five Batsu, XXXX, X as well as recording my first Chombo at the Doc's - indeed, it was the first Chombo that any of us has ever made in these sessions. It was a classic case of loss of concentration while changing the configuration of the hand. I had a set of melded open White Dragons and a hand that would be ready to finish (I thought) if I switched things around so that either the 6-Bamboo Dora or the 9-Bamboo would complete my hand. But I had forgotten that I had opened my hand, so when I claimed the 6-Bamboo I also committed a Chombo!

That was the low point of the afternoon for my game. The table also had a low point of its own during this part of the afternoon and it seemed about as reluctant to work as an English language teacher with a hangover. The table was opened up a couple of times and on the second occasion we found that a tile had got jammed in the feeder mechanism.

After two games we changed places, or rather, Doctor M jr and I changed places and after a promising start to the third game Dr M jr spent much of the afternoon struggling in the unlucky seat.

In the third game I was able to string together some nice hands and complete several of then - enough to make me the only winner on a nice healthy total and to wipe out the
five Batsu, XXXX, X with six Maru, 000000 to go one Maru into the black on top of the now positive-looking score.

When things are going well in Mahjong you get the feeling of being in control of events and the sense that the risks you take are always reasonable and likely to succeed. An example of that was my last-tile discard in a game where nobody had declared Riichi. The tile I needed to throw was the North, which was also a Dora - a very nasty piece of work as no North tiles had been discarded. I just felt confident that the other North tiles were not together in a hand that was ready to go out and so I threw it to retain a Tenpai hand. There were gasps and exclamations of "Eehhh!" and "Waaah!" all around at my audacity, but it worked - and as I was the only player with a Tenpai hand I made 3,000 points out of it. Another time, of course, that is exactly the sort of play that would get you hammered! That is usually what happens when you are the player who finds himself unable to complete a hand and who is getting frustrated!

The winner of the fourth game was Dr M sr, who came second-and-in-the-black in the evening with yours truly in poll position and the junior doc having to pay out and Mrs M having her losses covered by Dr M sr's winnings...

It was an entertaining afternoon with the usual endless supply of snacks, sandwiches, beer and soft drinks. At the end of the session I was asked if I liked Ebisu beer as I usually request Kirin. Yes, I like Ebisu, I replied, and it transpired that one of the patients recently did the decent thing and presented the clinic with a large supply of Ebisu in gratitude for his miraculous recovery so it looks as if I will be forced to drink beer while playing mahjong at the Doc's throughout 2007 (DV).

Happy New Byeeearr!

David Hurley
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Wednesday, December 27, 2006

Friday 22nd December - Back to Koyo Jansou

With Noda absent tonight the foreign contingent elected to head back to Koyo Jansou, the cosy place in Tatemachi with the cheerful Mama-san and the old play-worn tiles.

Tonight's result didn't bring a change in the rankings. Kenyon progressed, Jaime's recovery stalled and David managed to change direction from down to, er well hardly up, but at least to not-down tonight.

It ought to be added, however, that David came perilously close to committing a Chombo on three or four occasions - once almost missing a Tsumo, once declaring Ron on 7-Bamboo and retracting it and recovering his tiles as they were about to be revealed - only to go out on Ron on Jaime's next post-Riichi discard, 8-Bamboo!

Kenyon +38, +16, -29, +31 = +56
David +11, -11, +24, -9 = +15
===
Jaime -49, -5, +5, -22 -71


David Hurley
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Tuesday, December 19, 2006

ut omnes comprehendant

It has come to my attention that a message which I sent out by electronic mail to a list of worthy recipients was received with some perturbation of spirit. Murmerings arose among my intended readership to the effect that the said electronic message was "unreadable". I admit and freely confess that I, infected with the malady of the age, id est, "attentioniondeficititis", had omitted three words from the epistle. I made up for that oversight, however, by sending the three words in two subsequent supplementary mailings and although I would be the last to presume anything of anyone nowadays, I did assume that the effort of plugging the words into the missive would not prove beyond the wit of any of my aquaintance.

The nub of the gist was an invitation to a house party. It was the details appertaining thereto that taxed my readership's comprehension.

The first reply I received was an irritable one from a Japanese lady who enquired whether or not it was strictly necessary to send a message THREE times. On putting the lady right on that matter I received a gracious message of acceptance and no further complaint.

The second reply was from a young American who unabashedly admitted that he could not understand anything at all of the epistle.

The third reply was from a middle aged Englishman who claimed something similar.

I therefore feel beholden to lay the matter out with due candour to the general public that it might have its say. Here then it is, with the three words that were omitted omitted:
Dear All,
be holding a CHRISTMAS PARTY at our place on THURSDAY 28th DECEMBER
which
you are invited along with vostri ostaggi della fortuna and
your paramours or mistresses or your intendeds or I wot not.


Behindhand though Mrs H is like to be in attending upon you withal,
the
rest of the household will be ready to entertain from the
beginning,
videlicet from whensoever the first guest arrives, and we
shall continue
so to be until the end, id est, when the last one
leaves, if he does,
unless we fall asleep aforehand.

For the rest, I remain,

Your ever mobile sometime never servant,

etc.

The three inadvertently omitted words were, "We," "shall," and "to."

Now, I will freely acknowledge that the matter could have been summed up in a few plain words and that the plain style is currently fashionable among our most distinguished gentlemen of affairs and that simple words are best medicine for dull blocks. Nor do I deprecate the employment of good honest Anglo Saxon. It is a good thing to write and speak in plain words of true English stock. Avoid Latinisms.
Non scrivere in una lingua straniera. Non essere né presuntoso né esuberante. Non essere copioso.

Forasmuch as I would have that which I have written by all men comprehended, it therefore seemeth incumbent upon me to offer not only this apology but also to fashion a crib so that every swaddled infant and every university graduate might read and understand:









[We shall] be holding a CHRISTMAS PARTY at our place on THURSDAY 28th DECEMBER [to] which you are invited along with vostri ostaggi della fortuna and your paramours or mistresses or your intendeds or I wot not.
"vostri ostaggi della fortuna" = "your hostages to fortune" = "your wives and children". Source: Francis Bacon, Essays.

paramour = "a lover, especially one in an adulterous relationship."

intended [arch.] = "fianc
é" - the person one intends to marry.

wot not [arch.] = "don't know"

Behindhand though Mrs H is like to be in attending upon you withal, the rest of the household will be ready to entertain from the beginning, videlicet from whensoever the first guest arrives, and we shall continue so to be until the end, id est, when the last one leaves, if he does, unless we fall asleep aforehand.
Mrs H may be late but the rest of the family shall entertain from the beginning of the party.

The party starts whenever the first guest arrives.

We shall continue to party until the last guest leaves, if he leaves, or we fall asleep.



There. Unnecessarily copious, I daresay, but it can hardly be said to be in the same league as the novels of Thomas Pynchon which some do persever in their aversion to and aver to be "unreadable."

David Hurley
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Sunday, December 17, 2006

Friday 15th December: The Noda Wait

I was attending a birthday party tonight so did not play mahjong. Tonight's "zero" score was a marked improvement on my recent form. I leave it to Jaime to file the report:

"When I first started playing mahjong in 2000 I cobbled together a strategy of how to simplify the winning process. The pretence was that if you were only waiting for 1 tile, then there could be no confusion over what was required. It was also a nice way to confuse the other players and more importantly it seemed to work much more than the percentage would account for.

"There were also two more decisive reasons behind this 1 tile strategy; alcohol and football. This was due to many games being played at Allan’s old apartment on a late Saturday night / early Sunday morning. We used to congregate there to watch Manchester United win the English Premiership and to play mahjong. Of course the football would lead to many distractions, (there were other such as feline women, but that is another story) and so the knock on affect was quite a few chombos. By reducing the number of tiles one was waiting for, it allowed one to concentrate on the football, the beer and stories of loose women handing out refunds. It also generated a name for this strategy, 'The Jaime Wait'. I quite liked it.

"Sadly 'The Jaime Wait' is no more, it has become the 'The Noda Wait' in honour of Noda san who has now adopted the theory that he once sneered at with incredulity. Yet on Friday night, he went for this form of victory five times in succession and nine times in total. I went for it once (and got it).

"In all Friday night was a sedate one, with only three players, Ray having emerged from his countryside hideaway like a 1970s Bond villain (anyone spring to mind?) to compete with Noda and Jaime. In total only 4 games were played, but each game averaged an hour and a quarter and so we finished just past the witching hour.

Noda continued to bemoan his 'end of year luck' and finished bottom of the pile on a deficit of -38. Ray also finished the night down, but only on a paltry -25, whilst Jaime emerged with a handy +63 victory to edge him closer to the -200s on the Grand Accumulated Points Table.

"Noda flirted with empty tray in a couple of hands and Ray had one of his 'Last Oya Charges', but it was remarkable how even the night was for most of the play. There was one Yakuman hand for Noda whilst Jaime was oya, but that aside most of the victorious hands were in the mangan / haneman vicinity.

"Ray came close with some potentially huge hands whilst oya in the 2nd game, but crafty play from Jaime (blind luck & a few hunches!) averted some Titanic size holes in his tenbo pile.

"The evening finished as below and Ray potentially finishes the year 1pt behind Tim in the Grand Accumulated Points Table, but as some games will be played over the festive period, you never know what might happen…."

Jaime +23, +38, -24, +26 = +63
===
Ray -14, -2, -9, 0 = -25
Noda -9, -36, +33, -26 = -38

Jaime
13blue.blogspot.com


David Hurley
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Monday, December 11, 2006

Sunday 10th December: 10 Men... 9 Men... "B" Division... "C" Division...

I arrived at Yano stati
on at about a quarter to ten this morning, half an hour behind schedule as I had missed the 9:03 from Hiroshima.

Jaime was already at Yano when I got there and we took a taxi up to the football pitches a few miles into the countryside. It was a cold day, but bright, lovely conditions for football and no need for any undershirts during the game! We were greeted by the unwelcome news that there were only ten players - including us. I had been looking forward to a second half twenty-minute stroll up and down a small patch of the pitch but instead had to prepare myself for a full game...

Actually, if there was to be a day when I would have to do this sort of thing today was the ideal day indeed. I am two weeks into the booze-fast (my personal Advent fast kicked in a few days before the start of Advent this year) and so was not suffering from a hangover. Yesterday I had made good use of my one-hour break between classes at DEH Nakamachi by whipping across the road and into a very pleasant hotel bath-house for a good soak and a long sauna and had had a good night's sleep; the fatigue of Friday evening was long gone.

The captain (standing in for Yuusuke who was not able to play today) shunted me out to left back, an ideal position for someone not really intending to run around too much...

We had never lost to the team we were up against. They were another Hirodai team and Jaime knew one or two of the players. However, I think we must always have had a full team when we played them before.

Today's game started brightly enough and I didn't feel myself to be under much pressure - actually it was one of the easier first halves to play in for me and I was able to pace it pretty well. On the other hand it was not my best performance although I stopped a couple of crosses and took the ball off the geezer I was marking for a corner. We soaked up most of their attacks and saw them off until about 15 or 20 minutes in when the ball came off our post and was picked up by one of their strikers who powered it into the back of the net - a rocket of a shot.

Apart from that our goalkeeper stopped everything else. His biggest problem was goal kicks which were consistently low and consistently dropping to one of the other team's strikers. The goalkeeper spent the half-time interval practising his goalkicks - kicking ball after ball at the fence.

One other problem we had was our throw ins - the old problem of too many foul throws.

At the other end nothing came of any of our attacks but at half time the talk was of how if we could score a goal... - the feeling was that we were still definitely in the game.

In the second half I thought I had added to our throw-in woes by actually failing to throw the ball in at all! I certainly threw it up the line but the ball simply never crossed the line. However, it turned out that the ref had not been ready so I got a second chance and this time managed to throw the ball in and to one of our players!

The other team sent attack after attack down their right which had me chasing around, but nothing came of their attacks although it must be admitted that they were putting in the shots. If anything got through then our goalkeeper was either there to pick it up with immense calm, or equally cooly sharp in judging when let it go.

The ball heads up the other end and Jaime and their goalkeeper are chasing a 50-50 ball and both arrive at the same time and Jaime goes over the goalie and crashes to the ground. He fell heavily onto his shoulder and didn't get up. But we all know Jaime's sense of melodrama... One of the other team's attackers opined that he was not hurt and I assumed he'd be right as rain in a few minutes. Our captain was asking him if he was "really" hurt and was attempting to move his arm just to make sure!

Jaime was helped off the pitch and didn't come back on so we were now reduced to nine men.

The amazing thing was that it seemed to spark something in the team and the Japanese played their hearts out and even the old codger raised his game too! Attack after attack came in again, and every one was dealt with somehow or other. I found myself contantly having to run back as the ball whizzed over my noddle to one of the guys on the right. The effort of running meant that any time I won the ball there was little I could do with it - I mean less than usual... - but most of the time I was just chasing those attackers around.

They had several corners and none came to anything though we were certainly lucky that another searing shot from their nippy attacker went just wide.

Then we had a five minute spell of attacking their goal - amazing! But there was little clear space to be seen to shoot at and so the game ended 1-0 to the other Hirodai team and it looks ever more likely that we will be playing in "C" Division next season. Well, provided we can get a full team out, the games ought to be easier, oughtn't they??

After the match Jaime went to the hospital in Funairi which confirmed that he had "done something" to his "AC joint". I had no idea what "AC" stood for and checked it out online:

What is the AC Joint in the shoulder?
The top of the wing bone or scapula is the acromion. (It is called the acromioclavicular joint.) The joint formed where the acromion connects to the collar bone or clavicle is the AC joint. Usually there is a protuberance or bump in this area, which can be quite large in some people normally. This joint, like most joints in the body, has a cartilage disk or meniscus inside and the ends of the bones are covered with cartilage. The joint is held together by a capsule, and the clavicle is held in the proper position by two heavy ligaments called coracoclavicular ligaments.

How is the AC Joint usually injured?
The AC joint is injured most often when one falls directly on the point of the shoulder. {Ah yes! It was a heavy fall, not an athletic roll!}

The trauma will separate the acromion away from the clavicle, causing a sprain or a true AC joint dislocation. In a mild injury, the ligaments which support the AC joint are simply stretched, but with more severe injury, the ligaments can partially or completely tear.
Source: http://www.scoi.com/acjoint.htm

David Hurley
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Sunday, December 10, 2006

Friday 8th December: David Hits Bottom!

It happened. David's 4th quarter loss of form has seen him plunge from "third and in the black" (30th September) right down through the ranks to bottom in December! The very first hand of the first game provided a foretaste of his fortunes for the evening. Noda declared Riichi and David, with no "safe" tiles, spotted the 9&6-Coins in Noda's discard row and so threw the 3-Coins.

"
Ron!"

Of course, it was one of Noda's
Chitoi traps; a Seven Pair hand with a cunning wait.

Kenyon slotted into the vacant seat for the third game and promptly went on a two game winning spree during which he was chided by Jaime for vaunting on completing a hand!

We changed seats for the fourth game - David and Kenyon swapped places and their respective fortunes followed them.


  • A three-tile wait covering two suits for David - not a sausage.
  • David declares Riichi waiting for 3&6-Coins.
  • With just a few tiles remaining Kenyon declares Okkake Riichi and goes out on Ippatsu Tsumo and it turns out he was waiting for just one tile - 6-Coins!!

That's mahjong...

A player may be called "lucky", but luck is also made - and so is misfortune!
Faber est suae quisque fortunae

David went through much of the evening half asleep and inattentive of basic procedures such as checking the
Dora Pai before discarding a tile - Kenyon cashed in on that lapse at least twice (West Wind... 1-Characters). Several times David simply forgot what he was doing - once discarding a Chun which gave Kenyon Kokushimusou which halted David's modest revival during the fifth game (aided by a Japanese version of a Fox's Glacier Mint as David is currently off the booze) and set Kenyon up for his second winning run of the evening.

On another occasion, when Kenyon had racked up four
Hyaku Tenbo as Oya and was clearly making a bamboo hand David simply forgot and elected to through 8-Bamboo despite having told himself that he was under no circumstances to throw any bamboo out...

"
Ron!"

In the meantime Jaime, who had had mixed fortunes through the first part of the evening, was getting frustrated by the seemingly wilfull malevolence of the gods of the table as he managed to draw tiles that would have fitted well with tiles he had just discarded. At one point he treated us to one of his performances as he lunged out of his chair and headed towards the window. Any attempt to hurl himself out of the window would have been frustrated by the fact that the window looks out onto the adjacent building which stands just six inches away...

Still, the good news for Jaime was that his slide was much slower than David's - David overtook him on the way down!

Yet for some reason, despite really really wanting to go home for much of the evening, it was David who proposed another game each time... Hope is a good breakfast but a poor dinner and David was dining on hope alone.

By the eighth game David was slumped in his chair suffering from an excruciating awareness of how slowly the seconds pass when a chap wants to quit but when other players hum and ha over what to do with their hands. Kenyon, once again
Ryanshi Oya, had three open Pon, two of which were Dragons. David drew a Chun and adopting a world weary insouciance he declared that he really no longer cared whether Kenyon needed it or not (which at least suggested that he was aware that Kenyon MIGHT need it) and chucked it...

Nothing happened!

Nevertheless, the hand eventually had to be dismantled and, inevitably, Kenyon went out!

Finally Jaime declared
Riichi and David persisted with his policy in the hope that either he would get away with it and complete a hand or he would give away yet more points but also bring the game to a close and get himself into a taxi! Of course, it was the latter which occurred.

Here are the results:

Kenyon --, --, +46, +78, -32, +46, +25, +87 = +250
===
Noda +50, -6, +4, -51, --, --, --, -- = -3
Jaime -23, +23, -19, 0, +2, -7, +5, -27 = -46
David -27, -17, -31, -27, +30, -39, -30, -60 = -201

David now holds the record "lowest score" for the year. Kenyon moves above Hide into second place and stands a very good chance of finishing the year in the black.

The size of tonight's results prompted me to check back through the year's results to see if any other records had been broken - Was +250 the best result for a single session? Was
-201 the worst? It so happens that neither result is a record-breaker. Jaime holds the record for the best result of a single session so far this year with +252 and Kenyon holds the record for the worst result of the year on -227. I have added the stats to the results page (see "Best/Worst Result").


David Hurley
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