Article help-come join us as we form the "Solitaire Leagues of the MFCA"

[Silverhorse 228]

All Coaches,

Currently we are working on the Spring issue of The Tweak. The theme is going to be focused on Solitaire leagues and how to form your own at home. Right now I am in the process of trying to form a separate organization within the MFCA to be called the "Solitaire Leagues of the MFCA". This would be mostly to help new comers to the hobby...as a mentor program to aid in getting started, which usually begins with solitaire play.

Also, I would like to have a list of ALL solitaire coaches in the country and if you have a logo, then I would like to add it to a banner that Wolf will print off for us.

Finally, for the article...I would love to have a 2-3 paragraph summary of what solitaire play means to you and perhaps some tips for play. Everyone plays solitaire different...it would be great to have a library of how guys play the same game.

You can pm me or send it to me at mmmculp@comcast.net

Thanks

Matthew Culp
Editor and Publishing Director of The Tweak

[mark robin]

my solitaire play began in my youth. i was 10 years old in the summer of '74. i went across the street to a friends "garage sale". i was instantly awestruck at what was for sale on the window seal. it was EF men, of course, i didnt know what they were, the boys of the family explained it to me. in 2 seperate beggings to my mom, i got 1.50, twice in 2 hours. that bought me 7 original hogleg teams, and 1 (now known as) a haiti prototype dolphin team(plastic was /is almost translucent). and one brand new handpinted team, the newly uniformed RAMS, who had just that year added yello to their uni's.

anyway, i began solitaire cause i just HAD to play it everyday, and there was no way in hades i was gonna let my little brother play...lol. so, me and a few buddies started playing nearly daily that summer and all through football season, until the next april9baseball restarted). in the meantime, at night, or whenever none of my friends could play, i began playing by myself, and YEAH, more often than not, my TEAM would win.

time flew, i put it up for a few years(around '80) and maybe played 20 minutes the next 11 yrs. then in '91 i broke it out to show some of my karate students at a get together for the karate students. that brought back memories, so i began to play more games, now as an adult. i had all my stats and gamesheets for a looooooooooong time, but lost most of them through time. anyway, back to the early 90's, me being the competitor i am, i would play my RAMS or COWBOYS against the other teams i had. at that point i had already become somewhat of a collector, i think i had 42 teams. SO, by playing all this soitaire it became my version of a "combine">the word hadnt been invented at that time to my knowledge, but it was what i was doing, drafting and trading superstar bases to make my favorite teams. through the 90's i may have played opponents about 10 times, only lost twice, so that inspired me more, cause i had gotten a miggle SB board with a newsletter that said leagues were on the flourish all over the country. soon, nearly at miggles beginning of their message board, i joined and became friends with several guys. with the internets help, and my years of combining and collecting, i had ammassed a 25 man team of RAMS with ALL UNTWEAKED bases, and i soon had to challenge myself to play someone that was very good in the hobby. i soon made plans to meet up with RAIDERMAN in austin Texas, and we had (to me anyway) a GREAT game. he had tweaked bases, and honestly, at that time , i really had no clue what a tweaked base was. all i ever did was rub the base on my jeans a few times and it was good enough. anyway, i lost the game, but was still proud to have played an experianced coach, who had been in leagues and played other adults often, to a great game. he won, but , even though the final score didnt reflect it, the game was way more closer than he liked, i actually had a chance to win until near the end of the game. it was awesome. since then, ive played in 2 leagues, i think about 30 games, and i only lost 2 times, both losses were to those pesty Klingbiels, mark and his son marky. dadgummit. since then i have returned to solitaire, but not to often, ive only played a handful of games in the last year.

for years, ive used Tudor rules, then miggle rules for my solitaire, now i use a hybrid of tudor/miggle/buzzball and whatever is popular to me at the time.




i have a logo, but dont know how to attatch it here.

[mark robin]

sorry matt, i didnt see instructions to send it to you. my bad.

[Silverhorse 228]

Thanks Mark...I am starting an "archive" for the formation of the Solitaire Leagues of the MFCA and you have been added. I have seen a ton of responses from coaches...much bigger group out there than I anticpated. I will post the list soon, with the help of Raven Al...

[the french guy]

WHat is the deadline date for article submission ?

I want to share a big modelling article (not sure of the theme for now, but I've got plenty of ideas), BUT actually I'm working...pretty tuff work, so I don't know when I'll be able to make that article.

Waiting for that, I posted several articles on MFCA.org. (I added one today, BTW).


THanks


dimitri

[Silverhorse 228]

Dimitri,

First off...I will take any article I can get. Second...this issue is filling up, so I can't promise it would be in this issue, but I can promise the summer issue, which has a deadline of July 1st. Third, you have been added to the "Solitaire List"...

I am thinking about sending out a structured questionaire to all the solitaire coaches, so as to also make a "list" page to go into the magazine...

What is the name of your solitaire league? And has Lynn made you a logo?

Matt

[the french guy]

I didn't started to play solitaire, in fact.

OK for the deadline date, I'll send you something in may (normally my contract ends on may).

[Norbert Revels]

Hey Matt, I will be sending you a nice article on my complete plans for this league the end of april.

Norbert Revels
The Pro Prospects League

[Silverhorse 228]

Thanks Norbert...look forward to looking at it....

[Coach K-LO]

Does it matter if it is "active" at the time of the article??

I have to start it over again. I still have my guidelines that I used to make it a little more "guessing" because I used play cards back in the day.

Now, I can only use the teams I have with are only 10 teams that are detailed which adds more favor to it for sure.

but always working on others to get to 34 Pro teams (NFL, Oilers and Purple Knights of NHFL