I don't know what I did wrong in another life but it's come back to haunt me. Somewhere along the line I felt sorry for the Nymph of Darkness and agreed to do some coaching with her. To be fair, she's become quite a respectable player and after the coaching sessions on Friday evening we play in the IMPs room on BCL! against "the usual suspects". Now and then, however, she produces a play that leaves me breathless, astonished and usually curled up on the floor weeping. It's not a problem, I fine her in Essex girl life-support items, and have a warehouse full of lime green thigh-length PVC boots, mascara, glitter, handbags, skinny t-shirts etc that she's had to pay me over the years. Indeed to set the matter straight she had a decent session with her dad in a recent sim and I let her have some items back, thankfully. The storage charges were crippling me.

I set the scene. We're playing against a seriously strong pair, in this case a husband and wife from Oslo, at about one in the morning and the Nymph picks up 8 3 7 6 3 2 A J 10 8 6 4 2 and hears a 1 opener on her right. Being at favourable she bids 4, knowing that I won't mind this and then she hears 6 on her left. I think for a moment and bid 7, looking at 1400 against 1430 and a certain amount of gloating rights. I know she'll have seven clubs since she's lost two complete beach outfits to me recently when she didn't have her pre-empt. My hand is J 6 5 8 5 3 2 7 6 K Q 9 7, and I know that the 6 bidder will have about AKQ to 8 and at most we might have one club trick. The double can be heard across the North Sea. As is usually the case, there's a gallery including Geraint.

The defence is merciless, they cash two spade winners, two diamond winners and then two heart winners, ending on the Nymph's right. A small heart comes back. Now, she can ruff with even the 4, but our Nymph is up for this one. She ruffs with the 2, gets over-ruffed with the singleton 3 and the table collapses when I jump onto it shouting "CLUELESS!". The post mortem was entertaining too:

6 bidder: "I've never made a singleton 3 before on the first round"
Text Book (from the gallery): "Priceless!"
Nymph: Hands over complete make up bag

I've booked the whole of the local storage facility for this one.