Whoops

Playing in the finals of a national pair event, things are not going well. Our minor errors cost heavily, and the opponents' errors all gain for them. On this hand, my RHO is arguably the best woman card player in the world. Her husband opens a strong notrump, and before long we are defending 4

	Q7 AK4 A762 Q1092
A64 7 QJ9854 843

Dummy	CHO	Declarer	Me
1NT	3	4	All Pass

I lead my stiff heart, of course. Dummy wins the ace. Partner contributes the 2 and declarer the 5. I assume partner's card is suit preference in case I have led a singleton, so I win the trump continuation. I plan to shift to a club. Which club? There's obviously room in my hand for the

K, and I need to make sure that partner doesn't insert the

J from

AJx, so I shift to the

8. Declarer covers, wins partner's

J with her ace, and starts running winners.

I suddenly realize that my Trick 2 signal is going to cost a trick. Partner shows out on the second trump. After trumps are drawn, declarer cashes the K, crosses to the A, ruffs a diamond, and gets to the business of squeezing my partner in clubs and hearts. I carefully hold onto my clubs; maybe declarer won't realize her 5 is high, but no, she triumphantly cashes it for her twelfth trick. The hand was

	Q7 AK4 A762 Q1092
A64 7 QJ9854 843		8 QJ98732 10 KJ76
	KJ109532 105 K3 A5

Whoops. Sorry, partner. This zero is typical of the session. The opponents play very well and everything goes wrong for us, so despite a good final session, we end up 41st. Blech. May I have my

8 back, please?