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It was overcast here on the night of the total lunar eclipse, but there were occasional gaps in the clouds, and it was a very pleasant night to be out. I walked over to Shepherd’s Hill Recreation Park to wait for a photo opportunity from the top of the hill.

Here is the blurry result. I don’t have proper equipment for night-time photography, so this is the best I could do.

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Near the beginning of 2011, I signed up as a volunteer for Austalk, a nation-wide study of how Australians speak. In December, I finally heard that recordings were about to take place.

At first I was told I couldn’t take part because the rules require one’s entire education to have taken place in Australia (I had six months in Scotland in 1983). But a day or two after telling me this, they contacted me again to inform me that a more thorough examination of their own rules permits me to participate after all.

We agreed that my first of three recording sessions would be on Tuesday 20th December. But the person making a record of this accidentally wrote me down for Monday instead, as I discovered from an answering message that evening after work. We re-scheduled for Thursday 22nd, which worked out fine, but here’s the kicker: I was originally planning to go home to my parents’ place on Wednesday 21, but this had been re-scheduled for Thursday because on Wednesday my parents had a funeral to attend. So it’s only because of the funeral that I was able to get the Austalk session done!

One is assigned a code name so that one can access data about one’s own recordings (not yet available). My code name is kind of cool, but I probably shouldn’t mention it in public.

As I write this, my 2nd session was only yesterday (Friday 20th January) and my 3rd is provisionally scheduled for February 2nd.

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The Adelaide Fringe Festival is coming up in March, I’ve already booked tickets for some events, and have others on a shortlist.

The ones I’ve already booked are those for which I’ve persuaded a friend to come with me: Faraday’s Candle by Re-Science and Eidolon by Nervous Doll Dancing.

I’d like to go to a couple of magic shows, including Time Travelling Magicians by Morgan and West (whom I’ve seen on TV), and Seven Stories (because magic performed to a narrative is a classic form, but all too rare these days). I’m also intrigued by some stage performances including The Origin of Species (comedy about Charles Darwin), A Donkey and a Parrot (based on one family’s historical escape from France to England), Fleeto (about knife gangs in Glasgow), and The Monkey King (Chinese puppet play).

The Art, Pattern and Complexity display has the advantage of being free, so I might go and have a look at that sometime, too.

I can’t go to all of the above. Negotiations are ongoing. Tell me in the comments, if you like, which ones you would go to and why.

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For the first time since 1983, Mum and Dad got themselves a Christmas tree without either me or my sister helping to choose it. I believe some local children helped.

I decorated it, though, and here is a photo from Christmas lunch, with my sister and her husband in the foreground.

As part of a Christmas present from Mum, I got tickets to some upcoming events. So I’ll be going to this (which should be great) and this (which should be great) and this (not as exciting, but still a free night out). I also got a novelty electric fly swat (which wasn’t very good) and quite a lot of chocolate.

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I had a red, inflamed eye for a few days around Christmas. Antibiotic eyedrops from the chemist did the trick, though.

Absolutely hated the TV adaptation of Going Postal by Terry Pratchett, which screened in Australia recently. The phrase “character assassination” summarises most of my complaints. I also thought the scene where Moist forces Adora to dance was socially irresponsible.

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I blogged separately the photos from our Christmas Day beach walk, as well as our Boxing Day adventures at St Kilda.

At St Kilda we gave out mini Christmas puddings we’d made, according to the following recipe (which we’ve used before). We didn’t eat any of them ourselves this year; we gave them all away to relatives.

I’ve published one of the photos from the St Kilda mangrove walk as a Zazzle jigsaw puzzle, which you’re welcome to buy.

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Going for a casual walk one day, I found this bird’s skull (probably magpie) lying on the ground. I’ve still got it.

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Near the end of December we went for another beach walk at Tippara Rocks. Photos:

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For a few days in the new year, my cousin Robert and his family (wife Katrina, three children) came over. It was great to see them, and especially to see how the kids are growing up.

It was the first time I’ve seen Joshua, the youngest at three years, since he’s started talking. I played hide-and-seek with him one day. January 2 was the middle child, Leah’s, eighth birthday. She’d already had a proper party another time, but she got a smaller one with us, in Dad’s office at morning tea time, organised by Katrina. As for the oldest, Kate, it was something of a shock to realise that in my earliest memories of my cousin’s sister, she was the same age as Kate is now (she’s eleven).

Here’s a photo of the three kids eating New Year’s Day lunch by the inflatable pool we set up for them. (The pool has an attached ramp not shown in the picture.)

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The very worst news from my Christmas break is that several cows died of dehydration on my parents’ farm.

A few years ago, my family struck a deal with the local council so that in return for letting them use some of our land for the new town dam, we got free access to the town’s water supply, which is pumped through underground pipes for the benefit of the animals. However, this January the system failed and the water stopped flowing. Such a problem has never occurred before, but once they realised what was going on my parents did everything they could. Altogether we lost about five, I believe.

(In the old days we got enough water in our own dams, but then the local roads were resurfaced and the runoff no longer flowed in the right direction.)

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I wrote separately about our plans to visit Canberra, and have updates to add to that post when I get around to it.

Here I will add that I bought the tickets online, which is the first time I’ve ever personally bought aeroplane tickets. Also, the reason Dad isn’t coming with us is that he’s signed up for an ambulance-driving course, as a new way of contributing to the community as he nears semi-retirement (where “semi-retirement” means cutting down to a mere fifty hours of work a week).

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We did a couple of jigsaw puzzles between Christmas and the time I went back to Adelaide on January 10.

The first was a 3D puzzle: an antique-style globe of the world. And when that was finished, we started on a puzzle that I’d bought my parents three years previously (when we visited my cousin Rosemary in Warrnambool), but which they’d shelved as being too hard and never attempted until now.

Here is a picture of the train jigsaw in progress, followed by one of both jigsaws completed.

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I had some lovely discussions with friends on Skype.

I’ve had a Skype account on my laptop since before we went to Europe last year, but can only make use of it when I have access to a wireless network. I don’t have wireless at home, but there’s one in Dad’s office which I made use of while I was there.

The last thing I did in my holidays was to upgrade my desktop computer, from a decade-old machine running XP, to a brand new Windows 7 computer. I’ve gone for a nice emerald green colour scheme. Here’s a screenshot showing my current desktop icons, start menu contents, and system information.

I’ve Skype installed on my desktop too, now (but no video capability, and no microphone other than the expensive one I keep in the cupboard, so, text chats only). My username is flesheatingdragon, should you be interested in keeping in touch that way.

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Mum’s mulberry-and-apricot fruit slab is very nice. I took some home but haven’t finished it yet.

That’s all for now; I’ll save more recent stuff for another post. Please comment on anything that strikes you.

I was about thirteen the last time I was in Canberra, and that was en route from Sydney (where I’d attended the original 1990 Whovention). So we didn’t do much.

My draft list of interesting places follows. I’ve divided it into two sections: one for places in located central Canberra and one for everything else.

Central Canberra

First, here is a Google Map showing all of the places listed in this section.

• [A] Australian National Botanic Gardens (official site). Botanic gardens are always good to visit, and each has its own character. Behind the gardens is Black Mountain, which has walking trails and a lookout tower.
• [B] National Bonsai and Penjing Collection of Australia (official site). A small exhibition of small trees, but who isn’t fascinated by bonsai? The current location in Commonwealth Park is temporary, but for now I’ll assume it won’t have moved before we visit.
• [C] Old Parliament House, containing the Museum of Australian Democracy (official site) and Old Parliament House Gardens. Even if one’s interest in (or patience for) politics is strictly limited, one can hardly spend several days in Canberra without going here.
• [D] National War Memorial (official site). Although I’ve been told this is outstanding and worth three days to itself, it doesn’t really sound my thing. But Mum’s keen to go (particularly in order to find the names of relatives) and I’m happy to go along.
• [E] Changi Chapel (speaking of war memorials). This testament to history interests me primarily because I enjoyed the TV series. It’s on the grounds of the Royal Military College Duntroon, between Lavarack Harrison Road and Miles Road (this took some google-fu to discover, as most maps put it some distance out).
• [F] Mount Pleasant Lookout. I’ve done a little research to determine the best lookout from which to take a photograph of Canberra, and am leaning towards Mount Pleasant as the one to choose.

Non-Central

• Gold Creek Village (map) in northern Canberra is a hub containing several attractions, including the National Dinosaur Museum, Canberra Walk-in Avery, Australian Reptile Centre, Aboriginal Dreamings Gallery, Aarwun Gallery, and most intriguing to me, Cockington Green Gardens (official site). This features model buildings in a garden setting. Let us note in passing that Gold Creek Village attractions tend to have substantial entrance fees.
• Scope Mount Stromlo (official site) where the famous Mount Stromlo Observatory was destroyed by bushfires in 2003, has been undergoing a rebuild since 2004. It features a cafe with a view and I’d love to have lunch (or coffee) there one day. (Also, a walk around.)

Here is a Google Map showing the relative locations of Gold Creek Village, the Australian National Botanic Gardens (which I’ve included to represent central Canberra) and Scope Mount Stromlo.

That’s what I’ve got at the moment. It’s probably enough for four days, but I want to give people a chance to recommend their own favourites.

On Boxing Day, we went to St Kilda to meet up with relatives over from Melbourne. I haven’t been to St Kilda for many years, and am pleased to report that the adventure playground and mangrove swamp are both still there.

This slideshow includes eleven images from the mangrove walk plus one image from the playground.

As with the previous post, there is a gallery of images below the fold.

I will fill in more details about my Christmas break activities in a future blog post. The pair published today are all about the photographs.

The beach, Balgowan, is one I’ve been to many, many times, but rarely in such perfect weather. It was an ideal day for a walk, and for taking photographs. Enjoy the slideshow (22 images).

Below the fold: a gallery of images in the slideshow, to make it easier to click on the photograph you want to see.

A recent highlight around here was the visit of some friends from England (the Dessons, who I caught up with when I was over there in September). They arrived via Perth on 25 November, and we’d planned to have tea at my place, but the flight was delayed (apparently the wing defroster malfunctioned) so there wasn’t time for more than a quick chat at the airport. My parents and I had tea at Glenelg while waiting for the re-scheduled flight. At the end of the evening, my parents drove the Dessons home to their place, while I went home in a taxi.

The Dessons visited my place on 6 December, on their way to exploring other parts of the country. I served a simple lunch (which nevertheless included combinations that were new to them), went for a walk, came back for coffee, and showed them my calendar collection. Had a really great time.

Now for the links, of which there are quite a few.

• Prior to my previous link collection, there was the disgraceful pepper spray incident in America (more here). which I didn’t link to at the time because I don’t generally do politics, but I was as outraged as everyone else. Later I read an interesting article about the memification of the incident, which I think definitely merits a link.
• Winners of the National Punctuation Day competition have been announced (there’s no permalink, unfortunately). My entry — which I shared here — did not win, but I believe it’s alluded to where the announcement says: “We also had a 140-character tweet, but it had three sentences, so it qualified for a prize (it didn’t win).“
• The Mars Science Lab, aka Curiosity, is on its way to Mars. There are any number of links with further details I could point you to, but I’ll let you find them if you’re interested. There are plans to photograph it when it arrives.
• Very long article about the history (and other aspects) of mice in scientific experiments. Confession: I’ve only read the first 1/3.
• Fossil of not-quite-avian dinosaur eating fully-avian dinosaur. Reminded me of this, which was one of the sources for my science history trivia quiz. Only this time we have the culprit.
• Fossil evidence that teeth evolved from scales.
• A look back at how we learned some of what we know about Venus.
• Developing moral system of babies, illuminated with stuffed toys.
• Why cells are probably more complicated than you thought.
• Naming elements under pressure is harder than it sounds.
• On the evolution of dogs.
• What to look forward to, and hope for, regarding the Higgs Boson.
• Superstitions about corpses in 19th Century England.
• Things you probably didn’t know about laughing chimps, mathematical parrots, and cunning dingoes.
• Why beehives behave a bit like brains.
• Empathy wins over hunger if you’re a rat.
• Linguistic analysis of lolcats.
• Finally, having browsed the finalists for Open Lab 2012, my personal favourites are #1 (on pirates) and #12 (on fluids).

The rest of my news:

I started reading Babel’s Dawn (the book by Edmund Blair Bolles, whose blog of the same name I’ve been following for some time), but got distracted on other things and haven’t finished. I have to say my feelings are mixed. One of my biggest criticisms is that Bolles misrepresents what biologists mean by levels of natural selection, but I don’t want to go into details before I’ve finished the book.

I made an offering to the fairies, which they accepted after about a week. You’ll have to beg if you want to know what I mean by that, though.

I bought some new tinsel for my parents’ Christmas tree. I could take a photograph, but perhaps better to show it on the tree.

• Skulls carved out of fruit and vegetables.
• Lots of photographs of rare cloud formations.
• Ancestors of whales. Includes an overview of the fossil discoveries as well as a captivating drawing.
• Mathematics of tree branches.
• Why using genetic engineering to combat mosquitos is not easy.
• Archaeological remains of a man who had been crucified.
• Short article by Paul Willis on pushing back the date of America’s earliest inhabitants.
• I liked the November 18 edition of 365 Days of Astronomy, which discusses constellations recognised by Aboriginal Australians. I especially like the way it includes examples from different parts of the country.
• Lovely video from space, with city lights, aurorae, and more.
• Under Europa’s ice, not just the deep ocean but shallow lakes as well.
• The  star I once informally adopted as my fictional homeworld can be found at pixel coordinates (2206, 526) on this recent Astronomy Picture of the Day image. On the ultra-high resolution version available here, the coordinates are (1337, 4413). It also happens to be a lovely image in its own right.
• A video on extremism and anti-extremism. Meanwhile, I’m somewhat intrigued by this book on Islamic history. I won’t add it to my wishlist just yet, but it merits consideration.

The most memorable event in the last fortnight was the evening of November 14, when my parents came for tea. We had Indian takeaway food and afterwards played with Ganjifa cards. The games were simple and familiar card ones like Fish, the idea being to get familiar with the cards without complicating things by learning new rules as well. Later in the evening we went to the movies, but the time spent around the table was more enjoyable.

Another evening of note was November 11, when I went to the pub to meet Paul Willis, Australian palaeontologist and science communicator. I’d been meaning for some time to go along to one of the pub gatherings hosted by the Royal Institute Australia (of which Paul is the director), but until now it hasn’t worked out for me. He showed us a lovely fossil crocodile jawbone, which looked at first like a stick (poetically appropriate given how live crocodiles look like logs) until you turn it around and see the tooth sockets. I gave him a copy of the Q/A sheets from my science history trivia quiz, but there wasn’t enough time that night to discuss it.

I’ve done some maintenence on my Zazzle store and added some new products after learning about this page (contains ‘create’ links for new product types not yet integrated with the main site).

My copy of Babel’s Dawn (the book about the evolution of speech) arrived on the morning of the day I write this. I look forward to reading it.

The housework is done, at least for now, so this place is clean for the first time since I got back from Europe in September. Hopefully this means I’ll have time to write some blog posts I’ve been meaning to get to.

With the new one, I now have seven calendars in my collection, which I’ve been keeping since 2006. I add one calendar to it each year, always the same one that I hang on my office wall. The “one per year” rule distinguishes it from the type of collection where people accumulate as many items as possible, and the fact that I use the calendars distinguishes it from the type of collection where people keep items in pristine condition. The idea is to choose a different theme every year, one that I’ve never had since I started the collection. There are so many calendar themes available that I can probably keep going forever without running out of interesting ones.

In this post I’ll show you my entire collection to date, including photographs of the front and back covers. I’ll also remind you of the calendar I created myself, which is available to buy on Zazzle should you think it worthy. In the comments, I invite you to share your favourite calendar themes.

OK, here’s what I’ve got.

2006. Theme: Antique maps. Style: Actual maps drawn by history’s cartographers.

2007. Theme: Outback Australia landscapes. Style: Photographs by David Messent & other contributors.

2008. Theme: Camouflaged animals. Style: Photographs by Art Wolfe.

2009. Theme: Australian birds. Style: Lifelike drawings by Shirley Barber.

2010. Theme: Fairytalesque cottages, floral gardens, etc. Style: Imaginative paintings by Thomas Kinkade.

2011. Theme: Natural forces such as storms, volcanoes, etc. Style: Photographs by various contributors.

2012. Theme: Depictions of people reading. Style: Paintings by famous dead artists, mostly 19th century.

That’s it. By 2018 I’ll have enough for a calendar calendar, i.e. one calendar for each month of the year!

I’d also like to remind readers that the 2012 edition of my Silk Route calendar is available on Zazzle. It’s an improved version of the calendar I originally published for 2011, featuring photographs from my parents’ package tour from Beijing to St Petersburg in 2010.

Below is a photograph of the cover, followed by one of my favourite pages. I hope that, with its great photographs, informative captions and coherent theme, you’ll consider buying a copy to hang on your wall in the year to come. Here’s the purchasing link again.

A few links:

• Stan Carey wrote a silly poem about octopuses, inspired indirectly by the word’s plurality of available plurals (octopi, octopodes, octopuses). In the comments, I set it to music.
  

• Scientific American bloggers wrote some Halloween specials, of which my favourite was this one from Primate Diaries.
• Walking through a doorway triggers forgetfulness. I’ve noticed this effect in myself, which makes it more interesting. I’d always attributed it to a displacement effect caused by the inflow of new sensory information you get when you walk into a new space. Another thing that triggers an event boundary, in my experience, is when I click the Start button in Windows and the computer groans for a few seconds. Very easy to forget which program I intended to open. Worth pondering what implications this has for software design.
• In astronomy, the Mars500 simulated mission has finished, and indicates that it’s possible for humans to go to Mars without going mad. Meanwhile, the next robotic explorer, Curiosity, is all packed up and awaiting its trip to Mars, much as a box under the tree awaits Christmas day.

Halloween fell on a work day this year. I wore my costume as I walked through the door to my workplace, and also wore it on my walk home. Other than that, I did nothing I wouldn’t normally do on a Monday.

Let’s talk about books. I’ve read the selected dialogues of Lucian that I bought in England, but need to read it again with an eye for detail. One thing I learned was that the phrase “Socrates himself” is not original to Python, but seems to be something of a motif even in Ancient Greek. I believe Lucian would have been a better writer had someone had the foresight to introduce him to Terry Pratchett, and speaking of Pratchett, I bought a copy of his latest book (Snuff) on a recent trip to a local shopping centre. (First impression: good, but not one of his masterpieces; the pacing strikes me as a weak point with too much happening at the last minute.)

As for books I will read in the near future, I have ordered a copy of the Babel’s Dawn book, about the evolution of speech, and look forward to that. (It’s by the author of the Babel’s Dawn blog, which I’ve been following for some time.)

I’ve chosen, and have ordered, the calendar I want on my wall in 2012. I’ll have more to say about calendar themes in a blog post I’ll publish after it arrives.

My latest product on Zazzle is a binder featuring one of my Monbachtal photographs. This is the second product I’ve made using pictures from this year’s holiday to Europe, the other being the Arundel Castle keychain.

• Overconfidence in one’s ability to read facial expressions can have tragic consequences.
• Nice overview article on slime moulds (though I don’t get the bit about relative vs absolute values).
• Once in a while I update my old blog post about sun-bearing exo-constellations. Most recently I was prompted to do so my Mark Rosenfelder’s article on the nearest stars.
• Effects of alcohol are largely in your head.
• Stars reionised the universe in only 200 million years.
• Remember this cartoon? Turns out it’s actually true. (Contains disturbing content, but makes you think.)
• Photograph of a planet in the process of formation.
• How to build a moonbase. (Bet it won’t happen any time soon & would cost more than forecast if it did.)
• Mineral could reveal exactly when Mars was wet.

We had a small earthquake here in Adelaide in the early hours of the 19th, which I felt.

On the 15th, Dad was rushed to hospital with an allergic reaction. The trigger is unknown, but hypothesised to be an ingredient in a medication he was taking. An upcoming appointment with the allergist will hopefully settle the matter.

I spent today with my parents, who were in town. Among other things we spent some time at the reception gathering for the World Solar Challenge in Victoria Square.

On Twitter, I’m now following people directly instead of via my “wouldfollow” list (now deleted). Twitter has changed enough since I created the list that I felt it was time to re-evaluate my policy.

In this sequel, I’ll describe a game I’ve invented especially for Ganjifa. For the international deck of cards we’re all familiar with, there are hundreds of games of many different types, each type radically different from the next. But the traditional playing cards of India have never proliferated in the same way, and far fewer games are played with them (even those few are difficult to find information on). This need not be the case. I propose we enrich the potential of Ganjifa cards by inventing new games, taking inspiration from games that use the familiar deck of hearts, diamonds, spades and clubs, and changing them to take advantage of a deck with twice as many suits and cards that are circular instead of rectangular. They are surely worthy of the attention. Also, let us build on each other’s inventions to create families of related games.

The game described below is inspired by the Eights family of games, though it lacks the wild cards that give that family its name. It’s a game that could never have been invented with rectangular cards, because the layout of six cards in a ring with a seventh in the centre depends upon a symmetry you only get with circular cards. Being simple, it’s suitable for players who are new to Ganjifa and still learning to distinguish the often visually confusing cards.

One thing I’ve not been able to invent is a good name for the game. It really wants to be called Bridge, but someone else has already invented a card game with that name! I welcome suggestions. Also, I’ve not yet had a change to test it by playing with other people, but that doesn’t matter. If I need to change or clarify anything, I can always update this post, and sharing the rules now lets people around the world take part in the testing process. I realise not many people have access to a deck of Ganjifa cards, but I hope this post will reach some people who do, and perhaps inspire others to get hold of some. Please tell me if you have any comments, for example if anything in these rules is unclear.

My Ganjifa game, as yet untitled

Preliminaries and Deal

The game is suitable for 3-6 players. I’ll assume that play proceeds in a clockwise direction.

Throughout the game, cards are played to seven distinct positions on the table. Six of these positions form a ring (we’ll call them Positions 1 to 6, proceeding clockwise), and the seventh is in the centre of that ring (we’ll call this Position 7).

Six cards are dealt to each player, and another card is dealt face-up to Position 7. The remaining cards form the stock.

Normal Play

The first player, if able, selects from their hand a card with either the same suit or the same rank as the card on Position 7, and places that card face-up on Position 1. If not able to do so, the player picks up a card from the stock, and the opportunity to play to Position 1 moves to the next player.

In the normal course of the game, each player seeks to play a card with either the same suit or the same rank as the most recently played card, and does so by placing it on the next position around from that previous card. So if the previous card was played on Position 1, you play on Position 2. If the previous card was played on Position 2, you play on Position 3. Position 7 is not ordinarily played to, so if the previous card was played on Position 6, you play on Position 1, and round it goes.

A player must play if able. Because an infraction of this rule is virtually impossible to detect, the game relies upon players’ honesty.

A player who is unable to play picks up a card from the stock. But because a very large hand is not much fun, I suggest an optional rule: that if a player already has nine cards in their hand, they don’t pick up, but simply pass. In a footnote, I will address the question of what to do if all players end up with nine-card hands.

Special Play

So far, I have addressed only what happens in the normal course of the game, but it is the extra-ordinary moments that are really what it’s all about. We must now discuss some special moves that are available to players when the opportunity arises.

First I must make it clear that when I refer to two cards as directly opposite each other, I refer simply to the layout of the six outer positions. The card currently sitting on top of Position 1 is directly opposite the card on Position 4, and vice versa. The card on Position 2 is directly opposite the card on Position 5, and vice versa. The card on Position 3 is directly opposite the card on Position 6, and vice versa.

A player may play a card to Position 7 if that card not only shares its suit or its rank with the most recently played card, but also shares its suit or its rank with the card directly opposite the most recently played card. Such a move I will refer to as building a bridge, because it connects two opposing positions, metaphorically speaking.

Moreover, a player may play two cards in a row if the second one builds a bridge, the first having been played in the usual way. Be sure to plan both moves before performing the first, as failure to do so is at least a breach of courtesy.

After a bridge is built, all cards played so far are gathered up and taken out of the game. The player who built the bridge begins a new phase by playing any card to Position 7, and if able, playing another card with the same suit or rank to Position 1. (The first card to be layed down is deemed to be the one at Position 7.) Normal play resumes with the next player’s turn.

Winning

A player wins by getting rid of all cards in their hand. Specific ways to win include:

• Using up your last card during normal play.
• Using your last card to build a bridge.
• Building a bridge with one card remaining (as this would be used to start the next phase).
• Building a bridge with two cards remaining that share a rank or suit (as these would be used to start the next phase).

Tips

This is not a game of deep strategy, but there is some scope for thoughtful play.

• If the previous player’s card matched the rank of the card before, you might want to match the suit, and vice versa. If four cards of equal suit or rank are played in a row, the ends of this series will be directly opposite each other and then any other card of the same type will be able to build a bridge. You probably want to prevent this, because the player who stands to take advantage of it probably won’t be you.
• Pay attention to which cards have already been played, so that you know which suits and ranks are still mostly out there. Sometimes you’ll want to play a card that an opponent is likely to be able to follow, and sometimes not, so it’s good to be able to predict which is which.
• It’s useful to have a few cards in your hand that could be played one after the other, largely in case you have a chance to build a bridge as well as to increase that chance, but also because it happens sometimes that your opponents won’t be able to play. On the other hand, it’s also useful to have cards from as many suits and ranks as possible, so there’s a trade-off.

Footnotes

If you’re using the rule that players don’t pick up if they already have nine cards, and all players end up with nine-card hands but are still unable to play, here’s what I suggest you do.

The player who most recently acquired their ninth card takes another card from the stock and places it face-up on the table, repeating this until a card is turned up that’s suitable to be played. Cards that are turned up but not suitable take no further part in the game.

Once a playable card is found, the player uses it to continue the game as though it were a card from their hand. (As usual, they may then build a bridge if able to do so immediately thereafter.)