My wife Carolyn was diagnosed with ALS a year ago. The disease has progressed to the point where she can no longer speak or walk and her hands and arms are very weak. Taking care of her is more than a full-time job, and that leaves me with little time to write or even to play bridge so...this will be my last article.

Writing these articles has been an interesting experience. The two formats: The Okbridge Spectator, an email magazine, and the online format at www.okbridge.com turned out to be quite different than the typical newspaper bridge column. Most newspaper columns (with exceptions like the New York Times) have to fit in a certain spot in the newspaper, something like above the crossword puzzle and to the left of the Dilbert, Fox Trot, and Zits cartoon strips. This fairly specific piece of real estate has to be filled uh...fairly specifically. The column can't be too small or too large. Too small usually isn't the problem, but many hands from the real world with a lot of maybes and might-bes and several decision points would be too large. So the hands end up with one and only one problem that has a binary right and wrong solution. Often there are two characters, a Bozo who does it wrong followed by a Godlike Superstar who then explains what he should have done, often in terms along the lines of, "Why am I afflicted with such idiot partners?"

Repetitive and boring! Also a bit insulting since most of the readers identify with the Bozo rather than the Superstar.