Standard Gerber
So, during our Quixotic attempt at playing Bridge, I've noticed that Dawn and I are the only two folks who play Albuarran, Brozel, and, our favorite, Gerber. We play Gerber so much, any and every time we throw down those 4 Clubs cards, we start the Ace asking, even if it's unintentional. Doesn't matter if we've bid Clubs before or we're not in a No Trump contract, if we can pull out the Gerber, then by God, we're going to pull out Gerber. I believe we're going to change our approach from Standard American to Standard Gerber.
Example hand from last night:
North: Pass
Dawn: 2 Clubs
South: Pass
Biz: 2 No Trump (No Aces)
North: Pass
Dawn: 3 Clubs (here's our suit)
South: Pass
Biz: 4 Clubs ("Dawn, I've got 5 clubs for support")
North: Pass
Dawn: 4 No Trump (thinking Biz threw down the Gerber and tells Biz that he's holding three Aces)
South: Pass
Biz: 5 Clubs (thinking Dawn was pulling out Royal Keycard, responding I have no Kings)
All Pass
Bid and made, but I think we should been in No Trump here, Dawn?
Another classic in terms of fucked up bidding:
Dawn: 2 No Trump
South: Pass
Biz: 4 Clubs (misreading the 2 No Trump card as 2 Clubs hence trying to tell Dawn about his Ace of Clubs)
North: Pass
Dawn: 4 Spades (misreading Biz's WTF? bid as Gerber)
All Pass
Bid and made.
The later was flat as everyone bid and made 4 Spadacinnis.
Hey, if opening 2 diamonds is the "in" thing to do with 15+ pts and 5/4 or better in the majors ("Mexican 2 Diamonds"??), then why not the Standard Gerber in which you lose a much less useful bid with 4 clubs? It lets you stop in a game in the majors while investigating slam, earlier than 4NT. Yes, there was some confusion with BQ's 4 club over my 3 club, but honestly I was going to bid 4NT anyway, as I had 3 aces.
So screw the splinter 4 club (which BQ and I don't play anyway) -- if you jump shift to 4 clubs, it's fucking Gerber, got it?
I love it.
Gerber, Blackwood, RKC, 1423, etc, are all conventions used to _avoid_ bidding into slam. Albarran, on the other hand, is used to get to slam.
By getting too excited about bidding ace asking conventions, or worse yet, king asking, you lose the opportunity to cue bid for controls, and splinter bid. We should be spending more time learning about those conventions, as opposed to getting too vested in one mediocre convention.