Stats and Bring a Torch!

My date on Sat night ended up being a waste of time.She was nice enough, but after an hour of small talk the conversation died and when she mentioned she was probably going to head up the road I was happy to reel off the standard "Well it was nice to have met you,I'd better go and get my bus" speech.After my experience with my neighbour and other dates over the last few months I was beginning to wonder if it was my own social skills that were lacking.On reflection though if I don't feel any spark with someone then I'm not going feign interest and pretend otherwise and I guess women on dates feel exactly the same.

The other girl I was texting reckoned the first pub I'd suggested for a meal wasn't up to much and then wanted to speak on the phone first before meeting.On Mon night she'd said was going out with her brother for a couple of hours and would text and then call me later.After she didn't call I pretty much decided to forget the whole dating thing and enjoy my upcoming two weeks off work.

She did text me the next morning to say she'd fallen asleep on the couch when she got in but that did make me a little wary.We eventually spoke on the phone at lunchtime and met up for dinner last night.My initial instinct had been to ignore her morning text and move on, but I'm glad I didn't as she was lovely and we hit it off quite well.She was far better looking than her profile pic,was easy to chat to and we come from similar backgrounds too.

We've been texting each other last night and today and as her wee girl is away staying with her Dad until Sunday I'm hoping we can arrange another date for the weekend.
I'll take things easy with this new girl and see how it goes.If it doesn't work out there are still thousands of awesome girls out there.Here a few choice quotes from "profiles" I was looking at the other night…

For environmentally friendly blokes there's the girl who is "100% recycled Awesome".Another girl who has obviously watched too much reality tv declared "I'm a fan of awesomeness".Hey,aren't we all?!

It's amazing anyone on the site is single as everyone is easy going,honest and loves to laugh.Either that or they're just "totally crazy" or as one girl wrote "zippy and zonkers".The girl who wrote the quote below looked like Noddy Holder.I did like her profile statement although I'm not sure where the "darkside" comes into things...."I'm not over the hill or under it,I'm dancing and laughing around it.Come to the darkside.Bring a torch."

I've added my monthly poker stats for June and have decided to keep the $524 I cashed out on pokers Black Friday in my bank account.

Pokerstars $1989 ( + $395 for June)

Party $803 ( -$74 for June)

Total $2792

Total profit of $321 for June

Back soon....

Orly!

I'm back in the habit of not playing any poker during the week.This can be a bit of a problem when trying to come up with poker related stuff for my blog,especially as beyond dreaming of playing in the main event one day,I really don't have much interest in which young hotshot has taken down the latest tourney at the WSOP in Vegas.

I will be hitting the tables tonight though before heading into Glasgow for another internet date tomorrow evening.I've been texting two women this week and felt a bit guilty telling Woman 1 that I was visiting the Big Chap in Ledhills ( a place miles away with no mobile reception!) on Sat night.I was thinking about asking W1 out tonight, but she said she's visiting a friend for a couple of hours which is probably her way of avoiding having to tell me she's going out on a date!

Ahh well its' a ruthless game and if she is still free and it doesn't work out with Woman 2 on Sat night then maybe I'll take her out next weekend.

I've never been the most stylish of blokes and although I don't think I have any issues with confidence/self-esteem,I don't delude myself that I'm particularly special either.( special needs maybe!) My philosophy on life tends to be that nobody else is that special either and that as the Pink Floyd put it, we're "all just bricks in the wall". I'm not at all religious and John Grays "Straw Dogs" book which ( in simple terms) says us humans are not separate from animals and are simply driven by the same instincts and urges made a lot of sense to me.

Having said that if I don't want to be single forever I suppose I need to learn to play the game a bit better and try and sell myself a bit more pro-actively.All of this is just a roundabout way of saying I splashed out nearly £50 this week on a couple of new Bench shirts! I did have a look in the Diesel shop today though and nearly fainted when I saw they were selling t-shirts for £70 and jeans at £130.The much used internet forum "Orly Owl" pic below sprung to mind at those prices!



I'm probably just being an out of touch old slob!

Before I hit the publish button on this post I turned on the tv and there was a kids quiz show on.They played a bit of music and the kids had to guess it's name.I loved one kid asking if it was the "National Theme Song" and the presenter enquiring further and discovering the kid meant the national anthem! It would be great if they took a lead from that kid at next years Olympics and asked the crowds to "Please be upstanding for the National Theme song of the United Kingdom"....Made me smile anyway!

Back soon...

But How Much Did You Lose?

Football will always be my favourite sport, but I like big sporting occasions in general and having read the hype about the Stanley Cup final last week, I discovered I actually have ESPN America and recorded the game on Wed night to watch later.Unlike football over here I thought it would be easy to avoid the score, until I switched on the BBC News the next morning and saw coverage of the riots which followed the big game! I still watched it on Friday night, however making a 60 minute match into a 3 hour programme to accommodate adverts and classic moment clips every few minutes drove me nuts.Just play some uninterrupted hockey ffs!

I went to the Alea Casino yesterday for the £22 turbo tourney and sadly didn't cash.I came around 15th from 81 starters and having played a few live games recently I think I'm starting to pick up on a few basic tells.The guy wincing at the flop and then going all in obviously had a monster ( the old weak means strong tell) and a couple of players always seemed to use more chips of a lower value when betting with a weak hand.

I was annoyed at my exit because I'd just paid the big blind ( 3k/6k) and was moved into the bb again at my new table,leaving me with a tiny stack.After another card dead orbit,I shoved K4 when it folded to me on the button,both blinds folded and the dealer was pushing me the chips when our side of the table realised someone had already shoved all in.My K4 didn't improve v his A8 and that was that.

Away from the poker, my neighbour downstairs has a new boyfriend and the good news is that I genuinely don't care.As I posted before I think it was just a bit of a crush and the reality just didn't live up to the fantasy I had in my head of how it would be if we got together.Not long after I'd asked her out she sent me a text and came up to mine late on a Sat night after she'd had a few drinks and we ended up in my bedroom.Sure the bedroom part was fun, but she came across as a bit of a chav/ned type when she was drunk and I can look back now and just feel glad to have got it out of my system and to have moved on.

I've got a date lined up for next Saturday night and another girl asking to swap numbers now too so I'll see how that goes.Although I still feel a bit of a player chatting to two girls ,online dating is very much a numbers game and the chances are that neither date will come to anything anyway.Like money,chemistry and sparks don't just grow on trees!

I had mentioned I may be playing some live poker to Saturday date girl and got the response,"Are you going to your poker game tomorrow? Do you play quite a lot? Don't you lose quite a lot of money?!". In the world of dating, being passionate about hobbies and interests is meant to be good, but when it comes to poker it's hard to explain that I'm not some gambling degen and that yeah I do actually make a profit from my play.

So next weeks plan is to catch up with Step A ( and offer and her friends a run into town for the Framing Hanley gig on Wed night),go and see my wee nephew and folks again on Thus and to be out on hot dates on Sat and maybe Fri night.

Thanks for reading.Back soon...

On a Draw....

I consider myself quite a loyal guy and when I got an email from Full Tilt saying they wouldn't be able to pay for the advert they have on my blog I didn't remove it.It's been there a few years and being able to cashout a few $$ every now and then has been very handy.They also paid for a trip to London a few years back when Bullmeister and I won a great package to see the Million Dollar cash game being played live.

The ad and blogger sponsored tourneys were a two way street of course, but I didn't feel like pulling the ad when I got the initial "we can't pay you" email.Theres a lot of speculation about Full Tilts future at the moment and I've taken it down now,mainly because they still haven't paid the withdrawl cashouts to US players and I'd hate to point any new players in the direction of a company where they may lose their hard earned deposits/winnings.

Last night,despite downloading the new Black Ops map pack,I hit the poker tables and watched more of The Shield.After going 0/4 in my first set of $15's, things picked up a bit and I managed to make a small profit.I decided to roll one more before bed and bought into a $100 6 max cash table for $50.The table reminded me of the good old days at Ladbrokes on Fri/Sat nights when drunken fish used to line up to spew off their bankrolls.I ended up winning $124 at that table and went to bed with a smile on my face.I was going to post three of the key hands but although this is essentially a poker blog I doubt anyone really cares that I turned a better two pair v a flopped two pair in one hand or made a fine turn bluff bet with a flush draw to take down another pot.

No dates lined up for this weekend.I'm wondering if I'm maybe taking the wrong approach to it and should be going down the more artistic route like this guy.( I'd love to have read the responses to his work!)

Thanks for reading.Back soon...

Fear

As well as leading an exciting life playing poker and video games I also like to read books.At the moment I've got the latest Carl Hiassen book, "Star Island" and Christopher Brookmyres "Where the bodies are buried" waiting to be read on my Kindle.For now though I'm just finishing Yann Martel's "The Life of Pi" and I'd rate it as the most stunning ,beautiful book I've ever read.( and not an "Airport" book as ex girlfriend once called Brookmyres writing!) With google around I'm not going to bother reviewing it here, but I'd highly recommend checking it out and I've copied my favourite chapter below.Enjoy....


I must say a word about fear. It is life's only true opponent. Only fear can defeat life. It is a clever, treacherous adversary, how well I know. It has no decency, respects no law or convention, shows no mercy. It goes for your weakest spot, which it finds with unerring ease. It begins in your mind, always. One moment you are feeling calm, self-possessed, happy. Then fear, disguised in the garb of mild-mannered doubt, slips into your mind like a spy. Doubt meets disbelief and disbelief tries to push it out. But disbelief is a poorly armed foot soldier. Doubt does away with it with little trouble. You become anxious. Reason comes to do battle for you. You are reassured. Reason is fully equipped with the latest weapons technology. But, to your amazement, despite superior tactics and a number of undeniable victories, reason is laid low. You feel yourself weakening, wavering. Your anxiety becomes dread.

Fear next turns fully to your body, which is already aware that something terribly wrong is going on. Already your lungs have flown away like a bird and your guts have slithered away like a snake. Now your tongue drops dead like an opossum, while your jaw begins to gallop on the spot. Your ears go deaf. Your muscles begin to shiver as if they had malaria and your knees to shake as though they were dancing. Your heart strains too hard, while your sphincter relaxes too much. And so with the rest of your body. Every part of you, in the manner most suited to it, falls apart. Only your eyes work well. They always pay proper attention to fear.

Quickly you make rash decisions. You dismiss your last allies: hope and trust. There, you've defeated yourself. Fear, which is but an impression, has triumphed over you.

The matter is difficult to put into words. For fear, real fear, such as shakes you to your foundation, such as you feel when you are brought face to face with your mortal end, nestles in your memory like a gangrene: it seeks to rot everything, even the words with which to speak of it. So you must fight hard to express it. You must fight hard to shine the light of words upon it. Because if you don't, if your fear becomes a wordless darkness that you avoid, perhaps even manage to forget, you open yourself to further attacks of fear because you never truly fought the opponent who defeated you.

Monthly Stats

Pokerstars $1594 ( + $524 in bank) = $2118 ( + $1001 for May)
Party $877 ( - $136 for May)

Total Roll $2995 (+ $865 for May)

Obviously pleased to have made a decent profit last month mainly thanks to a couple of decent Mtt runs.I haven't played any Mtt's since those cashes, but hopefully I'll get few under my belt this weekend.

On Friday night I was out with Hot Side Profile Chick.I've added the side profile bit to her previous Hot Chick moniker because she had a gap between her front teeth big enough to park a bus.Now it's great when a women is hanging on my every word, but her habit of repeating and slightly slurring the last few words of my sentences gave me the impression she was probably on drugs and after an hour of polite stilted chat, I gave her some excuse about my dog being left alone and made like a shepherd.( got the flock out of there!)

Perhaps haunted by the strung out chick I didn't sleep much on Friday night despite a good smoke and feeling very tired.Just as I was dropping off it suddenly felt like an explosion had gone off in my head and although there was no pain I was bricking it,thinking I was about to have a stroke or something.For once the internet was quite reassuring and apparently "exploding head syndrome" is not uncommon and is harmless.I'd love to phone in sick to my work and give it as a reason though.....

My lack of sleep on Friday night left me too tired to go and play live poker and not up to focusing on Mtt's.I ended up watching Jackass 3 and playing sit and go's.Yesterday afternoon my Dad came over and we struggled to get the hang of L.A Noire on my PS3.Last night I hit the tables again and watched another few episodes of The Shield.( series 1)

I also spoke to Step A who is down in England staying with her Mum at the moment.It was good to catch up with her and I'm looking forward to taking her for our usual Mcds' and Call of Duty session when she gets back around the 18th.


Back soon...

Six Years and Counting....

I'm not going to write too much about passing my six year blogging anniversary as I mentioned it in a previous post.I will say that if anyone is to blame for inspiring the mince I've spouted here over the years it's Waffles as the first two blogs I ever read were the now defunct Poker Chronicles ( great blog header that says "Proving that if you put a million monkeys in front of a million computers eventually 65,000 of them will log on to Party") and Waffles incredible lessons on roller coaster bankroll management. Thanks also to the Low Limit Grinder,Jordan at High on Poker and Tripjax for linking me up when I started out and helping ensure I wasn't just talking to myself here!

On the dating front the plan is to go out for a few drinks tomorrow night with a hot looking chick I've exchanged a few short messages with.No real expectations.Just going to see how it goes.

Assuming I'm not hungover, I'll maybe try and get to the casino again on Sat afternoon for the £22 turbo tourney.This time I'll try and leave my donkey ears at home…

I bought the new detective game LA Noire for the PS3 the other day and my Dad is coming over on Sunday to see if we can solve a few cases.I left home at 16 due to family crap caused by him and it took a good few years to rebuild a decent relationship.I see my folks once a week or so and love them to bits but my Dad and I have never really done the going for a pint or sharing a hobby type thing.In fact when I went over to teach him to play poker it was my Mum who caught the bug and now has thousands of low stakes sng's on Stars under her belt!

I'll be back to work on Monday and I'm enjoying it less and less since a new management team started recently.I get allocated four multi-faceted complaints per day to deal with and the only calls our teams take are customers calling back re those complaints.Despite that, our new managers come from a call centre environment and seem determined to implement the same sort of crap they got away with in their previous jobs.Taking away our flexi-time citing non-existent "business needs" and reducing the amount of people that can be on leave at one time just seem to be the start.Can't wait for the "performance management" stuff to start…..

Thanks for reading.Back soon...