@MP33... Thanks for the advice but, and I hessitate to say this cos I am abit scared of jinxing myself, I am up over £120 on the week so far. I am not aware of playing any differently, I just seem to be hitting the river cards that others were hitting last week. Gotta love that v-word.
@Tikay... once I start writing about cars, I can't stop!
1 £11 Timed Tournie – another loss but as only 7 out of 23 got to the end maybe I shouldn’t be so surprised to get knocked out of so many
Current Balance = £255.01
So, as I mentioned when I posted the video of Anglesey in the middle of the week, things started well and I got all the way up to £370+ but then early on Friday evening I had a really bad run - I did jinx myself replying to MP33! - after which I ended up back where I started!
With not having much in the way of writing commitments I was able to put in lots more volume than usual enabling me to get £12.75 in rakeback tomorrow… a number which always makes me think of the Mini 1275GT – the “hot” model used for racing with the square bonnet from the (original) Clubman.
Been quite an undramatic week… well aside from the poker up and downswings. Went out to lunch with my mate Steve who I met through work in 1990. I drove him to three country pubs but all had been closed down when we got there which is not a good sign for the rural economy. The fourth was open so we didn’t starve to death but it was a close run thing as there was a huge queue with people heading to Wales for the Bank Holiday. As we drove for an hour it was all good practice for me to be behind the tiller.
I went to the final game of the season at Chester. Another defeat… we finished two places about the relegation zone and, having been on such a bad run not having won at home for 8 games, it is a good job the season wasn’t a few weeks longer.
I have not had too lucky a weekend! ...but things could be worse
Last week £255.01 This week, after about 30 TDYMs, it is £297.76 My poker week ended last Wednesday afternoon when my pc died. Been shuttling back and forth to my mate's on The Wirral trying to get it fixed. Being a new driver, I found driving at motorway speeds daunting but at least having spent so much time on the M53 (The Wirral's motorway) I now feel more comfortable. My friend thought it was just the power cable that had blown on my computer and he had a spare in the loft but he never had a monitor connected when he tested it. When I got home, although it powered up, the Windows unlock screen never appeared. Been abit of saga. It may just have blown the graphics card in which case my mate can fit a replacement, if not a new pc will be required. He was meant to collect it on his way home from work on Friday but he forgot (rolls eyes to the heavens) and then we were both busy over the weekend. I dropped it off at his work this morning and... just as I typed "work" he pinged me... looks like he has got it going. It worked straight away too so perhaps my mum didn't put all the plugs in that were required. I really hope he has got it going as I have had to use my 10 inch tablet which is great when I go out as I use it to type "chat" to be people via Notepad but using it for the internet drains the battery and I have had to use it sparingly especially as the Formula Ford 1600s were at Oulton Park on Saturday. I had lots of media work and didn't have any battery life spare to play poker with. Not sure when I will be pokering again as I have a big report to write for the Formula Fords. I am bringing in some journalism students to give me a hand later in the season so should have more time in a month or two. I just wanted to touch base with my poker friends in case they worried I had gone bustio!
There was a feature on our local news about "Team Brit" at Oulton Park, aimed at getting injured armed services personnel and also promoting motorsport for people of all disabilities. http://www.teambrit.co.uk/
Now you are used to motorway speeds, maybe there could be a racing career ahead for you?
My footie team (or one of them - I am a 3 team tart) Maidstone United also survived a season in the National League. I will look out for the Chester fixture next season.
Yes, I heard about that car when I was at Oulton on Saturday. I should have asked for a drive! Although they have hand controls rather than foot controls.
There is an annual long distance Mazda MX5 race for injured ex-servicemen at Anglesey every Remembrance Sunday. Everyone pulls into the pits at quarter to 11 for a Remembrance Service then off they go racing again.
Motorsport has become an important activity in rehabilitating many injured soldiers. It gives them back a purpose in life and also provides an adrenalin rush without getting shot at! Some even do the Dakar Rally (which now held in South America as there were too many gunmen lurking in Africa) in an adapted Land Rover.
The computer was returned today. It's great to be back on a 24 inch monitor rather than the 10 inch tablet. It seems huge.
No time for poker at the moment though. Just dropped in to see how everyone is doing. Great to read Dohhhhhhh's latest post... and then you got me talking about motor racing!
Yes, I know I said I wouldn’t be playing poker for a month due to my writing commitments but the lure was too strong and I had 5 games on Friday night… and won them all. So, of course, I then had to play 5 – or 6 – more tonight to ensure I got my £2.30 Tournie Token but I only won 3 of the 6. Nice to be up on the week though.
Also, took a break from the writing on Wednesday to go to Delamere Forest as the weather was glorious, if a tad cool in the shade. I had a trundle around the mere. The colony of screaming seagulls on the islands in the middle was deafening. Not sure what they were doing there – it’s not on the coast and no one was eating chips. They may have been loud but they didn’t worry me as they were “mere gulls”… ho ho ho. I’ll get my coat.
I have been to the forest with my cousins but this was the first time I had been on my own. When I first got my outdoor wheelchair I wondered about going on the train as there is a station right in the middle of the forest but with my speech being not too clear I would have needed a note in my seat belt saying “I wanna go to Delamere” but how would I have got back home?
I suppose if I had planned ahead, I could have got my mum to ring the station and booked everything in advance but on Wednesday I made a spur of the moment decision to go… and got in my van and went. No need to rely on any third parties understanding my needs. I took myself down on the tail lift after I parked up and off I trundled.
I was back at Oulton Park on Saturday albeit on a busman’s holiday with no writing duties. It was a meeting run by the Aston Martin Owner’s Club so there were plenty of mouth-watering cars including one that I had never heard of – a Ginetta G10. I did some Googling when I got home. Only 2 or 3 were made and this is believed to be the only surviving example. It had actually won the only contemporary race it contested at Brands Hatch in 1965 before the company moved on to other projects.
That day it’s 4.7 litre Ford V8 engine was just too powerful for the E-type Jaguars it was competing against. History repeated itself at Oulton this weekend when the Ginetta growled its way to victory down the straights as the drivers of the E-types valiantly took the corners right on the limit trying to keep up. It was a fabulous sight to see the beautiful Jags being driven on the throttle. For those who are not petrol heads, that means the guys were deliberately skidding the rear wheels to turn the car through the corners rather than using the steering wheel.
Another quiet week on the tables, just enough action to get the £2.30 token. Should have more time for poker in the weeks ahead.
A while back I mentioned that one of my goals now that I am mobile was to visit the viewing area at Manchester Airport, that was something I accomplished last Tuesday.
It took a little bit of forward planning as the car park has a barrier system operated by tokens and push buttons that I am unable to operate. I emailed in advanced so that the guys in the gatehouse were expecting me. They couldn't have been more helpful. I received some wonderful, welcoming smiles when I arrived. I imagine they don’t see a tiller steered VW Transporter every day!
I really enjoyed my afternoon. It had been raining in the morning so each ‘plane that landed threw up a curtain of spray that was very spectacular.
Of course, what I really wanted to see was the A380. That was amazing… so big that it made all the other aircraft look like toys. Then as it took off you could see the wing span was simple huge. Amazing!
It was nice to see Concorde tucked away in its hanger too.
Most importantly, the M56 on a weekday was the busiest road I had driven on but I felt very at home in the middle lane passing all the trucks. Not so long ago every time I overtook, I feared I was going to veer to the left and hit a lorry!
I worked in the Aerospace industry for 20 years and was lucky enough to witness the maiden (UK) flight of the Eurofighter Typhoon. Years earlier I had seen its prototype the EAP at the Farnborough airshow, along with its French rival the Rafaele.
I remember being most impressed though by the sight of Concorde doing a touch and go and Lightning doing a near vertical climb straight after takeoff. Incredible that the best technology of the day didnt have the impact of some 1960s technology.
I managed to sit in a Concorde cockpit as well, an operational one, in a maintenance hangar at Heathrow.
You have got me started now.
Anyway glad your confidence on the roads is building and you are ticking these items off of your wish list.
I saw a Typhoon do a preliminary display before the start of a touring car meeting at Oulton Park a few years ago. It seemed to defy physics. Unfortunately, all the locals phoned the circuit to complain about the noise so the main display later in the day got cancelled. Buying a house near a race circuit and then complaining about the noise... I don't get that. I'd be happy to swap.
An airshow is on my to do list. Possibly Southport in September.
When I was a kid my Dad carried me up the steps into the prototype Concorde they have at Duxford. Couldn't believe how tiny it was inside. Also, the first time I went to Australia on a Jumbo back in 1992 a big burly Ozzie steward carried me up into the cockpit just as the pilot began his final approach into Heathrow. That wouldn't happen today with all the security fears. How times change!
51 £11 TDYMs + Super Sunday freeroll. Finished 90th
Current Balance = £332.66
More time for poker this week, enough for a fiver of rakeback. Some games I won, some I didn’t and I ended up breaking even.
I have been charting my driving firsts via this blog and this week was the first time I got lost!
People say to me “Why don’t you get a satnav?” but I have always enjoyed navigating. When mum was younger we used to holiday in the UK. I would study the map with it spread out on table beforehand then guide her all over the country from memory as I couldn’t get the map out when we were in the car.
Nowadays there is Google StreetView which I think is the best invention – ever! I get it to plot my route in advance and then “virtually drive” through each junction noting all the landmarks so that I know where I am when I get there in real life.
When I went ‘plane spotting the other week, this approach saved me from accidentally leaving the country as when I requested the route to “Manchester Airport Visitor’s Centre” it took me to Terminal 2! Had my mum programmed that into a satnav before I left, I would have been stuck as I couldn’t have reprogrammed it but at home on my toe controlled computer, I got the postcode for the viewing area and replotted a route to there.
This week I picked up a friend and took her out to lunch. I had visited her house once before about 12 years ago, I had no idea how we got there as she drove through the rabbit warren that is the residential district of Ellesmere Port so I went through the route on StreetView before I left on Wednesday.
I expected to come through a T-junction on a minor road and turn right then left at a roundabout after 200 yards but I never came to the expected intersection and kept going down a busy through route. Google had given me a straight road to the T junction from a retail park so I expected all the traffic to turn off at some point and things to become quiet. That never happened! I got to the other side of Ellesmere Port and realised I was lost.
I reckoned I needed to be somewhere to my right so I made a couple of right turns and… there I was heading back into Ellesmere Port on the same busy road. I thought about giving up and going home but decided to head to the retail park and try again.
I was certain I hadn’t missed the T-junction – I’d have crashed into someone’s front room if I had – so thinking back to the map, I reckoned I needed to turn right before I got to the centre of Ellesmere Port. I did that and mysteriously came to the roundabout that I needed to turn left at.
How did I do that? Coming back down that route to head to the restaurant, there was a junction on to a minor road just before we came to the through route. Looking on Google when I got home, that minor road runs parallel to the main road up to that point, there is only a high hedge between them. When I clicked the map I hadn’t zoomed in enough to see there were two roads and StreetView had brought up the wrong one.
So I made it to pick up my friend and go for our meal. In the mid-noughties, she was due to marry my best friend from my schooldays but tragically he died very suddenly 5 weeks before the big day. We have kept in touch and meet up to go out fairly regularly. This was the first time in the 14 years we’ve known one another that I have collected her rather than the other way round.
I have just seen the news about the SPT in Manchester. That’s certainly in range, I may pop along to say “Hi!”
I had little writing work to do this week and so I decided to see if I could grind my way to £50 of rakeback… I aimed to play 4 hours a day and played 4 tables instead of my usual 3.
But first I had my fear of the number 13 to deal with. When the cashback was added to my account on Monday I had £xxx.76p and 7 + 6 = 13. I know it's a stupid thing to worry about however, rather than have it on the back of my mind all week, I decide to play a £16.50 TDYM to spend 50p. I should’ve gone to a 50p TDYM as I got knocked out on a coin flip.
Aside from that, I ran good, got used to 4 tabling after the first day and made it all the way up to £445.26. I won more of my share of pots and felt things were going to turn bad, which they did over the weekend. By Sunday tea-time I had £360.26 and 1995 points.
My tea was almost ready and, as I was in two minds as to watch the concert from Manchester or grind some more on Sunday evening while listening to it, I decided to have a quick HU game just to get to 2000 points/£40 cashback. Only £21 hyper or speed games had someone waiting to play so I selected the speed and… lost. I chose a rematch trying to break even but lost again. So, bang went my plan to withdraw the £40 cashback as I feel I am only just breaking even on the £11 TDYMs and don't want any less of a cushion for downswings than I have now.
Really annoyed with myself for going back to chucking away money on high stakes HU SNGs especially as I had time for a couple of £11 TDYMs (won one, lost one) after watching the amazingly moving concert.
Next week is looking busy with writing so doesn’t look like there’ll be much time for poker.
It wouldn’t be my blog without mentioning cars or planes. I went to the Classic Car Show at Tatton Park on Saturday. So many Fords and Triumphs from the seventies it took me back to my childhood when my Dad had his garage… and as Tatton Park is under the flight path for Manchester airport I did plenty of ‘plane spotting too. I didn’t know whether to look at the cars next to me or up to the sky!
So just enough time this week to earn a fiver of rakeback. One more win and I would’ve broken even – although as I earned £40 of rakeback the previous week, the figures don’t look so good! I did the right thing not withdrawing it.
A busy week writing including an article about marshalling. They have been running Taster Days at Oulton Park for motor racing fans that are interested in becoming marshals – they are given a tour of the circuit trackside during a race meeting with someone explaining how things are run. The problem is people usually attend a few meetings then drift away.
The thought is that those first few meetings are abit like attending a new school where there is a sea of unfamiliar faces and no one to guide newbies through all the procedures so a team of marshals have got together to be a point of contact for new marshals and to buddy up with them through their first few days on duty.
It is quite amazing. The marshals are all volunteers and yet here they are working pro-actively to ensure there is enough safety cover to enable amateur racing drivers to have fun. If marshals were paid, the entry fees for drivers would have to increase so much that many couldn’t afford them and so motorsport would die out.
I have less writing next week so will aim for £40 of cashback again. Also plan to have some driving adventures.
Had to abandon my grind to £40 cashback on Wednesday with £104.xx in my account. Probably should have stopped earlier but was expecting my luck to turn as (bad?) poker players do…
It all went wrong. Whenever I raised, I was reraised. When I called/shoved it was against a stronger hand. When I sat tight and waited for a hand I ran out of chips. Was shoving UTG with a raggy King as the Blinds were about to leave me with something like 100 chips. Never seemed to get good cards when I needed them.
A higher proportion of games seemed to be going to Level 9 – fewer recs around perhaps. I yearned for the days when TDYMs were all about sitting back and waiting for everyone else to knock each other out. I dropped all the way down to £1.10 TDYMs wondering if I could beat them and grind my way to £40 a week like that.
When I switched to those, I realised I felt less anxious than when I had been on my bad run at £11 level – I guess the mental aspect of the game was affecting me more than I realised – but they too were far from being the shove fests I was hoping for and were lasting almost as long as the higher stake games. Four tabling I managed 15 games in an hour, finishing £3 up. Extrapolating that up (I used to be a mainframe capacity planner…), at that success rate playing 200 games (the equivalent of grinding enough to get £40 cashback at £11 TDYMs) would give me a profit of exactly £40!
That is probably not what Sky Poker want to hear… They may shut my blog down!
Just 15 games is a very small sample however and I may not maintain that hit rate. I had no time to play further after last Wednesday – a writing commitment I thought I had offloaded came back to me. Looks like I have lots of writing and website admin to do over the next fortnight too.
Meanwhile… I love the sun! Sitting in the sun I feel so at ease and contented. When I was a kid, sunbathing was healthy! Nowadays the World is full of people telling me I am going to die of skin cancer. I heeded their warnings for a while but I came to realise for me sitting in the sun is a reason to live and it was something I didn’t want to stop even if there was a risk it could shortened my life a little. I Googled the probability and the chance of that happening in any single year was the same as the likelihood of winning the half-time draw at one match at Chester FC and, even with two tickets, I have not won in 5 seasons!
I do use plenty of sun cream to avoid getting burnt – the blurb says that’s what causes the cancer although I know people who hate the sun and avoid it at all cost but they still ended up getting skin cancer. I guess much of it is genetic. I’d hate to deny myself and still end up with it.
Having given up the day job, I was looking forward to a Summer of sun. But… why does there always have to be a but? These past few days I have been badly affected by grass pollen. It was really bad at Oulton Park on Saturday and driving home with running eyes was not a good experience. Yesterday I “walked” (wheelchaired) into Chester and sat by the River. There is always a lovely happy atmosphere down there on hot days. My nose was fine but in the evening I sat in the garden with a wee dram and it all flared up again. Makes me nervous to go out, especially in the car, which is frustrating.
So, I have not been running too well but compared to all the terrible things that have been happening in the World, life is still good!
Eek - hope your TDYM luck turns, Quickfeet. Do you have a revised plan? £107 seems a little precarious for grinding £11 ones, although I am bankroll anti-nit and would just assume I would win seven out of the next ten and bludgeon on.
That river in Chester sounds idyllic. I don't spend anywhere near enough time by rivers.
Comments
8,000 words - with your toes. It beggars belief.
QF is the GOAT.
I am not aware of playing any differently, I just seem to be hitting the river cards that others were hitting last week.
Gotta love that v-word.
@Tikay... once I start writing about cars, I can't stop!
Last week’s balance £254.71
This week’s games
101 £11 TDYMs
1 £11 Timed Tournie – another loss but as only 7 out of 23 got to the end maybe I shouldn’t be so surprised to get knocked out of so many
Current Balance = £255.01
So, as I mentioned when I posted the video of Anglesey in the middle of the week, things started well and I got all the way up to £370+ but then early on Friday evening I had a really bad run - I did jinx myself replying to MP33! - after which I ended up back where I started!
With not having much in the way of writing commitments I was able to put in lots more volume than usual enabling me to get £12.75 in rakeback tomorrow… a number which always makes me think of the Mini 1275GT – the “hot” model used for racing with the square bonnet from the (original) Clubman.
Been quite an undramatic week… well aside from the poker up and downswings. Went out to lunch with my mate Steve who I met through work in 1990. I drove him to three country pubs but all had been closed down when we got there which is not a good sign for the rural economy. The fourth was open so we didn’t starve to death but it was a close run thing as there was a huge queue with people heading to Wales for the Bank Holiday. As we drove for an hour it was all good practice for me to be behind the tiller.
I went to the final game of the season at Chester. Another defeat… we finished two places about the relegation zone and, having been on such a bad run not having won at home for 8 games, it is a good job the season wasn’t a few weeks longer.
I have not had too lucky a weekend! ...but things could be worse
This week, after about 30 TDYMs, it is £297.76
My poker week ended last Wednesday afternoon when my pc died. Been shuttling back and forth to my mate's on The Wirral trying to get it fixed. Being a new driver, I found driving at motorway speeds daunting but at least having spent so much time on the M53 (The Wirral's motorway) I now feel more comfortable.
My friend thought it was just the power cable that had blown on my computer and he had a spare in the loft but he never had a monitor connected when he tested it. When I got home, although it powered up, the Windows unlock screen never appeared.
Been abit of saga. It may just have blown the graphics card in which case my mate can fit a replacement, if not a new pc will be required. He was meant to collect it on his way home from work on Friday but he forgot (rolls eyes to the heavens) and then we were both busy over the weekend. I dropped it off at his work this morning and... just as I typed "work" he pinged me... looks like he has got it going. It worked straight away too so perhaps my mum didn't put all the plugs in that were required.
I really hope he has got it going as I have had to use my 10 inch tablet which is great when I go out as I use it to type "chat" to be people via Notepad but using it for the internet drains the battery and I have had to use it sparingly especially as the Formula Ford 1600s were at Oulton Park on Saturday. I had lots of media work and didn't have any battery life spare to play poker with.
Not sure when I will be pokering again as I have a big report to write for the Formula Fords. I am bringing in some journalism students to give me a hand later in the season so should have more time in a month or two.
I just wanted to touch base with my poker friends in case they worried I had gone bustio!
Hopefully your computing problems will now be resolved
Yes, I heard about that car when I was at Oulton on Saturday. I should have asked for a drive! Although they have hand controls rather than foot controls.
There is an annual long distance Mazda MX5 race for injured ex-servicemen at Anglesey every Remembrance Sunday. Everyone pulls into the pits at quarter to 11 for a Remembrance Service then off they go racing again.
Motorsport has become an important activity in rehabilitating many injured soldiers. It gives them back a purpose in life and also provides an adrenalin rush without getting shot at! Some even do the Dakar Rally (which now held in South America as there were too many gunmen lurking in Africa) in an adapted Land Rover.
The computer was returned today. It's great to be back on a 24 inch monitor rather than the 10 inch tablet. It seems huge.
No time for poker at the moment though. Just dropped in to see how everyone is doing. Great to read Dohhhhhhh's latest post... and then you got me talking about motor racing!
Last week’s balance £297.76
This week’s games
11 £11 TDYMs
Current Balance = £339.06
Yes, I know I said I wouldn’t be playing poker for a month due to my writing commitments but the lure was too strong and I had 5 games on Friday night… and won them all. So, of course, I then had to play 5 – or 6 – more tonight to ensure I got my £2.30 Tournie Token but I only won 3 of the 6. Nice to be up on the week though.
Also, took a break from the writing on Wednesday to go to Delamere Forest as the weather was glorious, if a tad cool in the shade. I had a trundle around the mere. The colony of screaming seagulls on the islands in the middle was deafening. Not sure what they were doing there – it’s not on the coast and no one was eating chips. They may have been loud but they didn’t worry me as they were “mere gulls”… ho ho ho. I’ll get my coat.
I have been to the forest with my cousins but this was the first time I had been on my own. When I first got my outdoor wheelchair I wondered about going on the train as there is a station right in the middle of the forest but with my speech being not too clear I would have needed a note in my seat belt saying “I wanna go to Delamere” but how would I have got back home?
I suppose if I had planned ahead, I could have got my mum to ring the station and booked everything in advance but on Wednesday I made a spur of the moment decision to go… and got in my van and went. No need to rely on any third parties understanding my needs. I took myself down on the tail lift after I parked up and off I trundled.
I was back at Oulton Park on Saturday albeit on a busman’s holiday with no writing duties. It was a meeting run by the Aston Martin Owner’s Club so there were plenty of mouth-watering cars including one that I had never heard of – a Ginetta G10. I did some Googling when I got home. Only 2 or 3 were made and this is believed to be the only surviving example. It had actually won the only contemporary race it contested at Brands Hatch in 1965 before the company moved on to other projects.
That day it’s 4.7 litre Ford V8 engine was just too powerful for the E-type Jaguars it was competing against. History repeated itself at Oulton this weekend when the Ginetta growled its way to victory down the straights as the drivers of the E-types valiantly took the corners right on the limit trying to keep up. It was a fabulous sight to see the beautiful Jags being driven on the throttle. For those who are not petrol heads, that means the guys were deliberately skidding the rear wheels to turn the car through the corners rather than using the steering wheel.
Last week’s balance £339.06
This week’s games
10 £11 TDYMs
Current Balance = £331.36
Another quiet week on the tables, just enough action to get the £2.30 token. Should have more time for poker in the weeks ahead.
A while back I mentioned that one of my goals now that I am mobile was to visit the viewing area at Manchester Airport, that was something I accomplished last Tuesday.
It took a little bit of forward planning as the car park has a barrier system operated by tokens and push buttons that I am unable to operate. I emailed in advanced so that the guys in the gatehouse were expecting me. They couldn't have been more helpful. I received some wonderful, welcoming smiles when I arrived. I imagine they don’t see a tiller steered VW Transporter every day!
I really enjoyed my afternoon. It had been raining in the morning so each ‘plane that landed threw up a curtain of spray that was very spectacular.
Of course, what I really wanted to see was the A380. That was amazing… so big that it made all the other aircraft look like toys. Then as it took off you could see the wing span was simple huge. Amazing!
It was nice to see Concorde tucked away in its hanger too.
Most importantly, the M56 on a weekday was the busiest road I had driven on but I felt very at home in the middle lane passing all the trucks. Not so long ago every time I overtook, I feared I was going to veer to the left and hit a lorry!
I saw a Typhoon do a preliminary display before the start of a touring car meeting at Oulton Park a few years ago. It seemed to defy physics. Unfortunately, all the locals phoned the circuit to complain about the noise so the main display later in the day got cancelled. Buying a house near a race circuit and then complaining about the noise... I don't get that. I'd be happy to swap.
An airshow is on my to do list. Possibly Southport in September.
When I was a kid my Dad carried me up the steps into the prototype Concorde they have at Duxford. Couldn't believe how tiny it was inside. Also, the first time I went to Australia on a Jumbo back in 1992 a big burly Ozzie steward carried me up into the cockpit just as the pilot began his final approach into Heathrow. That wouldn't happen today with all the security fears. How times change!
Last week’s balance £331.36
This week’s games
51 £11 TDYMs + Super Sunday freeroll. Finished 90th
Current Balance = £332.66
More time for poker this week, enough for a fiver of rakeback. Some games I won, some I didn’t and I ended up breaking even.
I have been charting my driving firsts via this blog and this week was the first time I got lost!
People say to me “Why don’t you get a satnav?” but I have always enjoyed navigating. When mum was younger we used to holiday in the UK. I would study the map with it spread out on table beforehand then guide her all over the country from memory as I couldn’t get the map out when we were in the car.
Nowadays there is Google StreetView which I think is the best invention – ever! I get it to plot my route in advance and then “virtually drive” through each junction noting all the landmarks so that I know where I am when I get there in real life.
When I went ‘plane spotting the other week, this approach saved me from accidentally leaving the country as when I requested the route to “Manchester Airport Visitor’s Centre” it took me to Terminal 2! Had my mum programmed that into a satnav before I left, I would have been stuck as I couldn’t have reprogrammed it but at home on my toe controlled computer, I got the postcode for the viewing area and replotted a route to there.
This week I picked up a friend and took her out to lunch. I had visited her house once before about 12 years ago, I had no idea how we got there as she drove through the rabbit warren that is the residential district of Ellesmere Port so I went through the route on StreetView before I left on Wednesday.
I expected to come through a T-junction on a minor road and turn right then left at a roundabout after 200 yards but I never came to the expected intersection and kept going down a busy through route. Google had given me a straight road to the T junction from a retail park so I expected all the traffic to turn off at some point and things to become quiet. That never happened! I got to the other side of Ellesmere Port and realised I was lost.
I reckoned I needed to be somewhere to my right so I made a couple of right turns and… there I was heading back into Ellesmere Port on the same busy road. I thought about giving up and going home but decided to head to the retail park and try again.
I was certain I hadn’t missed the T-junction – I’d have crashed into someone’s front room if I had – so thinking back to the map, I reckoned I needed to turn right before I got to the centre of Ellesmere Port. I did that and mysteriously came to the roundabout that I needed to turn left at.
How did I do that? Coming back down that route to head to the restaurant, there was a junction on to a minor road just before we came to the through route. Looking on Google when I got home, that minor road runs parallel to the main road up to that point, there is only a high hedge between them. When I clicked the map I hadn’t zoomed in enough to see there were two roads and StreetView had brought up the wrong one.
So I made it to pick up my friend and go for our meal. In the mid-noughties, she was due to marry my best friend from my schooldays but tragically he died very suddenly 5 weeks before the big day. We have kept in touch and meet up to go out fairly regularly. This was the first time in the 14 years we’ve known one another that I have collected her rather than the other way round.
I have just seen the news about the SPT in Manchester. That’s certainly in range, I may pop along to say “Hi!”
Last week’s balance £332.66
This week’s games
Nearly 200 £11 TDYMs
1 £16.50 TDYM
2 £21 Speed HU
Current Balance = £319.26
I had little writing work to do this week and so I decided to see if I could grind my way to £50 of rakeback… I aimed to play 4 hours a day and played 4 tables instead of my usual 3.
But first I had my fear of the number 13 to deal with. When the cashback was added to my account on Monday I had £xxx.76p and 7 + 6 = 13. I know it's a stupid thing to worry about however, rather than have it on the back of my mind all week, I decide to play a £16.50 TDYM to spend 50p. I should’ve gone to a 50p TDYM as I got knocked out on a coin flip.
Aside from that, I ran good, got used to 4 tabling after the first day and made it all the way up to £445.26. I won more of my share of pots and felt things were going to turn bad, which they did over the weekend. By Sunday tea-time I had £360.26 and 1995 points.
My tea was almost ready and, as I was in two minds as to watch the concert from Manchester or grind some more on Sunday evening while listening to it, I decided to have a quick HU game just to get to 2000 points/£40 cashback. Only £21 hyper or speed games had someone waiting to play so I selected the speed and… lost. I chose a rematch trying to break even but lost again. So, bang went my plan to withdraw the £40 cashback as I feel I am only just breaking even on the £11 TDYMs and don't want any less of a cushion for downswings than I have now.
Really annoyed with myself for going back to chucking away money on high stakes HU SNGs especially as I had time for a couple of £11 TDYMs (won one, lost one) after watching the amazingly moving concert.
Next week is looking busy with writing so doesn’t look like there’ll be much time for poker.
It wouldn’t be my blog without mentioning cars or planes. I went to the Classic Car Show at Tatton Park on Saturday. So many Fords and Triumphs from the seventies it took me back to my childhood when my Dad had his garage… and as Tatton Park is under the flight path for Manchester airport I did plenty of ‘plane spotting too. I didn’t know whether to look at the cars next to me or up to the sky!
So you ended up minus £13 for the week. Do you think that had anything to do with the fact you were worrying about the number 13
There you go - the dreaded number 13 got me in the end!
Last week’s balance £319.26
This week’s games
51 £11 TDYMs
Current Balance = £298.96
So just enough time this week to earn a fiver of rakeback. One more win and I would’ve broken even – although as I earned £40 of rakeback the previous week, the figures don’t look so good! I did the right thing not withdrawing it.
A busy week writing including an article about marshalling. They have been running Taster Days at Oulton Park for motor racing fans that are interested in becoming marshals – they are given a tour of the circuit trackside during a race meeting with someone explaining how things are run. The problem is people usually attend a few meetings then drift away.
The thought is that those first few meetings are abit like attending a new school where there is a sea of unfamiliar faces and no one to guide newbies through all the procedures so a team of marshals have got together to be a point of contact for new marshals and to buddy up with them through their first few days on duty.
It is quite amazing. The marshals are all volunteers and yet here they are working pro-actively to ensure there is enough safety cover to enable amateur racing drivers to have fun. If marshals were paid, the entry fees for drivers would have to increase so much that many couldn’t afford them and so motorsport would die out.
I have less writing next week so will aim for £40 of cashback again. Also plan to have some driving adventures.
Last week’s balance £298.96
This week’s games
80 £11 TDYMs
15 £1.10 TDYMs
Current Balance = £107.56
That didn’t go well at all, did it?
Had to abandon my grind to £40 cashback on Wednesday with £104.xx in my account. Probably should have stopped earlier but was expecting my luck to turn as (bad?) poker players do…
It all went wrong. Whenever I raised, I was reraised. When I called/shoved it was against a stronger hand. When I sat tight and waited for a hand I ran out of chips. Was shoving UTG with a raggy King as the Blinds were about to leave me with something like 100 chips. Never seemed to get good cards when I needed them.
A higher proportion of games seemed to be going to Level 9 – fewer recs around perhaps. I yearned for the days when TDYMs were all about sitting back and waiting for everyone else to knock each other out. I dropped all the way down to £1.10 TDYMs wondering if I could beat them and grind my way to £40 a week like that.
When I switched to those, I realised I felt less anxious than when I had been on my bad run at £11 level – I guess the mental aspect of the game was affecting me more than I realised – but they too were far from being the shove fests I was hoping for and were lasting almost as long as the higher stake games. Four tabling I managed 15 games in an hour, finishing £3 up. Extrapolating that up (I used to be a mainframe capacity planner…), at that success rate playing 200 games (the equivalent of grinding enough to get £40 cashback at £11 TDYMs) would give me a profit of exactly £40!
That is probably not what Sky Poker want to hear… They may shut my blog down!
Just 15 games is a very small sample however and I may not maintain that hit rate. I had no time to play further after last Wednesday – a writing commitment I thought I had offloaded came back to me. Looks like I have lots of writing and website admin to do over the next fortnight too.
Meanwhile… I love the sun! Sitting in the sun I feel so at ease and contented. When I was a kid, sunbathing was healthy! Nowadays the World is full of people telling me I am going to die of skin cancer. I heeded their warnings for a while but I came to realise for me sitting in the sun is a reason to live and it was something I didn’t want to stop even if there was a risk it could shortened my life a little. I Googled the probability and the chance of that happening in any single year was the same as the likelihood of winning the half-time draw at one match at Chester FC and, even with two tickets, I have not won in 5 seasons!
I do use plenty of sun cream to avoid getting burnt – the blurb says that’s what causes the cancer although I know people who hate the sun and avoid it at all cost but they still ended up getting skin cancer. I guess much of it is genetic. I’d hate to deny myself and still end up with it.
Having given up the day job, I was looking forward to a Summer of sun. But… why does there always have to be a but? These past few days I have been badly affected by grass pollen. It was really bad at Oulton Park on Saturday and driving home with running eyes was not a good experience. Yesterday I “walked” (wheelchaired) into Chester and sat by the River. There is always a lovely happy atmosphere down there on hot days. My nose was fine but in the evening I sat in the garden with a wee dram and it all flared up again. Makes me nervous to go out, especially in the car, which is frustrating.
So, I have not been running too well but compared to all the terrible things that have been happening in the World, life is still good!