I would like to thank all the wonderful bridge players that have made my achieving Life Master possible. First and foremost, to my Aunt Mary, who 2 years ago encour­aged me to join BBO so we could play bridge together on line. I had not played a hand of bridge in 35 years. Perhaps a month later while playing on BBO, Joan Waite saw a message I sent and initiated a dialog with me that ultimately inspired me to visit our local bridge club. As most or you know, that started a lovely partnership where Joannie became my teacher, mentor, and regular Thursday evening partner.

On my first visit to play live duplicate, I arrived at the Oak Hill Hospital annex unattached. Lois Fortunato, the director, provided a warm welcome and graciously offered to be my partner. At the time, she must have thought how did this 49-er appear, boy, does he need help with his bridge. Nonetheless, she encouraged me to return and provided a list of players I could contact for games. And so it began where over the next year and one half, in excess of 40 different members were kind enough to give me a games. I wish space and time allowed to acknowledge all of you individually.

Special thanks to my regular partners: to Michael Miller who introduced me to Precision and helped me acquire the vast majority of my gold points, to Richard Wan who is a wonderful card player and became my regular Friday partner when Tony Cruden returned to England, to teammates at the Orlando NABC and Clearwater regional - Jerry Lebo, Pat Clark, Bob Mooney, David Marks, again Richard and Michael, to other teachers that gave me great tips and advice - Jim Logan, Carol Hargrave, Bev Tillberry (GO BUCKS), Marion Ellingsen, and Jim Somma, and to all the directors that were helpful in teaching the rules and proper etiquette. Finally, a very special thanks to Doctor, Professor Emeritus, Argyrious Vourkas, but he prefers to be called Rudy, who along with Richard and Rose-Marie Bullis teamed with me at the most recent St Petersburg Sectional to secure the last five silver points necessary to complete the Life Master requirements. Rudy, unquestionably, is the most knowledgeable bridge player and teacher I have ever had the good fortune to know and am most pleased he has expressed an interest in individually mentoring me to help me advance to the next level of bridge excellence.

Once again, thanks to all my friends at NCBC, both partners and opponents, for the great games, good times, and fond memories. Happy bridge playing.

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