| 🧨️ Happy Mah Jongg Monday!️ | AROUND THE TABLE by Dottie | Hal put his golf clubs in the garage two weeks ago. He’s done until spring.
Since then he’s been in his chair every morning, playing The Winning Hand app against the bots on his phone. He has opinions about them now. At dinner on Tuesday he said, “Mahj Stewart hoards her flowers.” He said it the way you’d talk about a neighbor.
He wants to beat every one of them, all sixty-some. He keeps a legal pad beside him with their names down the side and two columns, one for Casual and one for Challenging. The Casual column is filling up nicely.
I asked how the Challenging column was coming along.
He went and got coffee.
That settled it. A man with opinions about Mahj Stewart needs real people across the table. So on Friday I took him to the senior center. Helen looked up and said, “First time, honey?” Patty already had the sign-in sheet and wrote him down.
He came home and added a third column to the legal pad. It says Friday.
Pour the coffee. Let’s go.
— Dottie | | Here’s a quick preview of today’s issue. Scroll down to read each section in full. | ⬇️ The More You Play — Join the Association.
💡 Table Wisdom — Why your tidy rack is fooling you.
🦻🏻 Hear Every Tile Called: A hearing tip worth knowing about.
🖐🏻 A Hand to Play — Which hand are they building?
🛒 Winning Picks — Cozy picks for soup weather.
🪧 From Our Sponsor — A candle made for game night.
🎥 Max’s Minute — Called a tile, then changed your mind?
🥠 Ask Auntie — When losing makes you snap.
📸 Spotlight — A Halloween party, dressed as tiles.
🎂 Birthdays — This week’s AMJA members.
🙋🏻♀️ A Free Strategy Session — See if we called your name.
🏁 Milestones — Progress inside The Winning Hand app.
… and more! | | | | | | | ⬇️ The More You Play, the Better You Get ⬇️ | Association membership now includes bot play in the Winning Hand app, with 60+ computer bots to sit down against whenever you want, on your own.
Set them to Casual and they build toward a hand and make sensible calls, so you win more games just by playing more of them.
Turn them up to Challenging and they read your discards and exposures, weigh several hands at once, and defend the moment they know they can’t win.
Beat a Challenging bot and you’ll be a better player when you sit down at your next weekly game.
Over 16,385 members are already playing against bots like Elvis Pungsley, Mahj Stewart, and Lucille Bam.
$39 a year. About $3 a month.
Try it, and if it’s not for you, just tell us and we’ll refund you. | |
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| | | | | | | | Try Sorting by Number, Not by Suit | Ever finish the Charleston holding a gorgeous row of one Suit and nothing to do with it? That row was never a hand. It was just tidy. | Suit sorting tells you what color you were dealt, and color is the least useful thing to know before the first pass. The Card asks bigger questions. How many evens? How many odds? Any number showing up three or four times across Suits? Those answers are scattered all over a Suit-sorted rack. | So on your next game day, try to set it up this way: Flowers on the left, then every number from 1 to 9 in order, Suits mixed together, then Dragons, Winds, and Jokers. Same tiles. Suddenly your 3s are sitting next to each other and your evens are lined up in a row. | Use it to steer your passes. When you’ve chosen the Section of the Card you’re headed for, arrange the rack however feels natural. | Key Takeaway
Count by number before you pass. The Suit can wait. |
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| | | | | | | | Last Week’s 🖐🏻 Hand to Play Results:
7,994 Insiders played, 62% chose right.
👉 See the correct answer & explanation here. | Once an opponent has two or more exposures on the table, you have enough to start narrowing down which hand they’re building, and that keeps you from throwing the tile that wins it for them. | Your opponent has made the exposures shown below. Which of the hands listed are they playing? | Check the exposures against the Card and decide which hand fits. | Cast your vote and see how your read compares with other players. 👇 | | What hand are they playing? | |
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| | | | | | | | Soup Weather | Sweaters are out, the soup pot is back on the stove, and the game goes to whoever has the warmest kitchen. | 🀄 Mah Jongg Throw Blanket Soft flannel with a Mah Jongg design, for your lap at the table or the couch after everyone heads home. Your group will want one too. Curl up → | 🧴 Eight Hour Cream One tube handles chapped lips, rough cuticles, and dry knuckles, which is exactly what late October does to hands that handle tiles all week. Women have kept one in their purse for generations. Keep one close → | ☕ Mah Jongg Lover Mug Room for a proper cup of tea or cocoa, with tiles on the side so everyone knows whose it is. Pour one before the first deal. Fill it up → | 🍲 Soup Bowls with Handles Big bowls with handles you can actually hold, plus lids and spoons, so one pot of soup turns into supper for the whole table. They go from microwave to dishwasher without any fuss. Ladle it up → | 📖 Soup Cookbook More than 325 soups and stews from Taste of Home, the kind of recipes you make on a Tuesday and serve to company on Saturday. Find tonight’s soup → | A warm kitchen and a good game make the whole week. | (As an Amazon Associate, The Mah Jongg Insider earns from qualifying purchases.) |
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| | | | | | | | | A Thoughtful Holiday Gift for Mahjong Lovers | Literie’s Calling for Mahjong candle is for the players who never miss a Charleston. With notes of white peach and sauvignon blanc, it’s a bright, fruity scent that will be the talk of your next Mahjong night. | Female-founded and made in the USA, Literie crafts clean, story-filled candles for every kind of moment. | Discount code for 15% off entire order: MJG15 | |
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| | | | | | | | Max takes two questions from Insiders and answers both in a quick 60-second video. | 🕔 This week’s questions:
1️⃣ Can you change your mind after calling a tile for an exposure?
2️⃣ When can you do a blind pass and why should you ever do one?
➡️ Watch this week’s video here |  | Click to watch the video |
| Have a question for Max?
🎤 [Click to leave a voicemail] |
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| | | | | | | | ⬅️ Last Week’s Questions
1. We have a group of between 12 and 20. Some players, when exchanging a tile for an exposed Joker, say “Give me your Joker” instead of asking for it. How should this be handled?
- Carol C. 2. Someone in our group licks her fingers while eating snacks and keeps playing without washing her hands. This is not only poor manners, but unsanitary and disgusting. We don’t like sitting at her table. How do we get her to stop?
- Vicki D. 3. What do we do about one player who consistently holds up the flow of the game? We’ve tried telling her nicely, but nothing has helped. She seems almost oblivious that she’s ruining most games for the other players at her table.
- Ronnie M. |
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| 🥠 Auntie’s Advice 🥠 1. My friend, say “May I have your Joker?” yourself, every time, a little louder than necessary. Your table will pick it up faster than you’d think. 2. Keep a stack of wet wipes and a bottle of hand sanitizer on the side tables, and pass the wipes around after snacks like it’s the candy dish. That way nobody gets singled out. 3. Some women are slow the way some women are tall. Sit with the quick players when you can, and when you can’t, top up your coffee. 🗳️ 82% of you said the finger-licker would bother you most. |
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| | ➡️ This Week’s Question
I love my group, but when I’m losing I get short with people. Last week I snapped at a new player over a slow discard and watched her face fall. I’m not a mean person. Why do I turn into one at the table?
- Annoymous |
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| 🤗 Want to share your advice?
🤔 Have a Mah Jongg manners or table moment dilemma? | 📩 Send it to Auntie: auntie@themahjongginsider.com |
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| | | | | | | | | We gathered to celebrate our hero, Dolly Parton, and her dedication to children’s literacy, cancer research, and spreading kindness. | To mark the occasion, we wore pink, played with Dolly-themed Mah Jongg cards, dined from Lenox Butterfly Meadow china, and enjoyed her music throughout the evening. We had a great time discussing our favorite Dolly songs and her various acting roles. She was truly one of a kind!
- Dr. Leah Keith | | | Our friend Zelda, a member of our Seattle Mah Jongg group, turned 70 last Halloween. We went to her Halloween birthday celebration dressed up as Mah Jongg tiles.
- Carol Ingram | | 📸 Share your Mah Jongg moments!
Send us a photo and a quick note — big wins, themed nights, or fun group shots — for a chance to be featured. | 📩 Email: hello@themahjongginsider.com |
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| | | | | | | | The American Mah Jongg Association would like to wish these members a very Happy Birthday! | October 26
Annette G. (FL), Lynn K. (MN), Tara D. (GA) | October 27
Claire A. (TX), Connie H. (NC), Elaine L. (CT), Martha G. (NC), Mary G. (IL), Stephen J. (MA), Joy N. (FL), Deborah H. (SC) | October 28
Anna B. (FL), Brian P. (KS), Christi U. (CO), Donna K. (AZ), Juliet B. (GA), Monique H. (UT), Sue H. (CA) | October 29
Kayce B. (AL), Teresa L. (NE), Maura C. (PA) | October 30
Charmaine L. (CA), Marcene A. (ID), Terry K. (AZ) | October 31
Karen W. (FL), Suzanne M. (OR), Kim S. (SC) | November 1
Rachelle M. (AL), Debi C. (GA) |
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| | | | | | | If your name is Krista, enjoy a FREE Strategy Session 🙋🏻♀️ on us!* | *Just reply to this email by this Friday at midnight, your email name must match! |
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| | | | | | | | These milestones come from players using The Winning Hand, the app included with membership in the American Mah Jongg Association. [Join Here] | 16,385+ members use it in different ways: To warm up. To stay sharp. Or simply to spend more time with the game you already love. | 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥 500 games played
Amy Podhurst 🔥🔥🔥🔥 400 games played
MJ Smith 🔥🔥🔥 300 games played
Charlotte Irish 🔥🔥 200 games played
Maureen Hinkelman 🔥 100 games played
Camille Childers
Jo Poole
Sarah S 👏 The more you play, the better your game gets. |
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| 🎥 New to The Winning Hand app?
Short videos walk through each game mode:
🤖 Bot Play
➕ Hand Builder | ☑️ Finish the Hand | 🔃 Scrambled Hand | 💃🏻 Charleston |
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| | | | | | | | Share the Insider with your Mah Jongg friends 👇 | 3 → Winning Mah Jongg Strategies PDF 5 → AMJA Sticker 10 → 30-Day Practice Plan PDF 15 → Free Strategy Session w/ Max or Phyllis 25 → Large 2026 NMJL Card 50 → Virtual Bootcamp Access 100 → Mahj Insiders Club Membership 1000 → Self-Shuffling Table
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