A Little Less Conversation A Little More Action

Moving On (Again!)

In the 2 weeks previous to the last blog, I had fallen into a pretty bad cycle, what I was doing was spending 12 hours of every day on the phone, on skype, on facebook etc telling everybody how busy I was, "Oh My God!" I was telling people, "you wouldn't BELIEVE how busy I am, you just wouldn't believe!" This was met, largely by a caring, affectionate disinterest, with a couple of people just plainly not caring. After 10 days of this I realized that for all my relentless complaining I'd somehow managed to be LESS productive than usual, so I decided that it was time...

First thing I did was make a list, listing all the things that needed doing, inform council tax I'm leaving, pay my final electricity bill (I swear to god i'll reach a point one day where no-one will supply me with electricity) start packing, move things to storage, organize $'s, re-direct my mail, buy some new clothes for Vegas, get my new drivers license, throw that fucking shower mat out before I break my spine, go through post I still have un-opened since February, and so on.  So this was about 10 days since I compiled my list, would anyone care do guess how many things have been done? Yup, you guessed it

I couldn't even bring myself to ring the council, hose number I have in my phone and say, "From June I won't be living in my flat X" prolly a three minute job! I do however an excuse, which no doubt you'll all see coming, "My GOD! You just wouldn't believe it, I've been....

SO here we, are stuck in a cycle of too many jobs and not enough direction to do any of them! Chances of getting everything done by the next blog? mmmm, If I were a gambling man, I think I'd take the unders on EVER ;) !

However, don't think my frantic and dramatically productive fortnight has stopped us getting up to a bit of mischief, I was recently offered a job, not a job I was all that interested in, but when asked how much I'd want per year I thought I'd hard-ball the negotiations and went in for £500,000 per year....(after tax, and a company Bentley) seems my technique was a little over-ambitious, as the talks broke down soon after my request and alas, I remain job-less! Oh well, at least the bar has been set, you want lil Dave, you gotta pay the premium ;)  Like my Mum always said to me, if you don't ask, you don't get!

I've also had some really fun meet-ups with a bunch of cool guys, not sure how much I am allowed to say about some of them (mmmm) but i will tell you all about a terrific afternoon I had in London, as I was in the vicinity Mr. Neil Channing of Blackbelt Poker invited me lunch, which was at Langan's Brasserie, a very popular and well known restaurant in Mayfair, however as has been proven time and time again wherever I've been in any country I am utterly useless at getting anywhere, so whilst Neil waits patiently for me in Langan's, 15 minutes after we are supposed to meet I am at the Langham Hotel wondering what the hell is going on! I wish I could half the time I'd spent being lost in my life back, could rattle that to-do list off about 30 times over. Anyways, as he picked up the lunch bill, here is a Blackbelt plug! www.blackbeltpoker.com/ on the iPoker network, if you're an aspiring player wanting to improve in a really fun community spirit, with help from some excellent and experienced pro players and get into some big buy-in live event, then Blackbelt is 100% something to look at! 

As for my poker form of late, been pretty hit and miss, having some great HU games online and doing well, but losing in the 6max games, I THINK I'm playing good, I am attributing the losing mostly to running and playing excellently at £1/£2 - $3/$6 and running badly and not playing my best at £3/£6 - $10/$20 so that's why, overall I'm winning small and I guess that's fine lol given that I am only a few hands at higher stakes away from being decent winner. Whatever really, online poker is pretty meh, I like it, it's fun, but in terms of being worried about it or getting upset with results ever I'm pretty much over it! I've had a few decent live poker sessions of late so we're keeping the wolves from the door, as they say !

Get away Wolf! GET AWWWAAAAAY!
They look really cute wolves, but don't be fooled - they are ridic aggro, I'd hate for anyone to have read my blog, seen  this picture and thought Wolves were friendly or approachable! Pretty sure they'd rip your head if you tilted them. Very loyal as well so if you have beef with one Wolf you got beef with several Wolves. Defo try steer clear.

Still slipping on my shower mat about 33% of the time I take a shower, getting to the point now where If I kill myself on it I'll literally have only myself to blame. This is two shower mats that cause me trouble, I guess maybe a fault with my bath? Can't figure it out, but as we area all aware I am just FAR FAR TOO BUSY to be sorting it out :D

Jake Cody, who recently made us all quite jealous by purchasing a house, has gone and done it again with the acquisition of a new hot-tub. You all thinking of one of those stnd 8 seater Jacuzzi's you see for sale, well, don't think of them, this is perhaps one of the sickest hot-tubs ever, with a TV screen, built in sound system and different massage options it's out of this world. The other night after everyone has chunked it off playing internet poker (Jake's IP started running horrifically of late, could spell problems for us all) we went for a chill in the hot-tub, as the beers started to flow plans for how to fully utilize the hot-tub were being formulated, if we pull them off I WOULD HIGHLY recommend reading the next blog!

In between buying hot-tub's Jake has been up to all sorts of calamity's and has even picked up some lil-Dave esque transport problems! (To be fair, when it comes to flights I actually have a great track record! although near on gtd to miss my flight to Vegas now I've said this :D) Read all about what he's been up to in his latest blog! http://www.jakecodypoker.com/?p=81

Similar to Jake I've decided to put my trip to LV back ~10days, the games are good online, I'm having so much fun in Leeds and with everything going on in England atm I don't quite feel "ready" for Vegas yet. I'll be there though, and it'll be awesome, and this mean I'll have someone to fly over with!!!

Going to have a small rant now.

Yes. Trains. I've always quite liked trains, good way to get about, nice and comfortable decently priced and all in all a good experience (not to mention convenient) however out of the last 15 train journeys I've taken, I'd say 13 of them have been horrific, I'll tell you about one journey....

Off to Manchester to play poker, I deliberately fade the 5.30-6pm trains so I jump on at 6.45pm first thing is it takes me 10minutes to even get on it's so busy, I've got a first class ticket so I'm happy to just wait and get on after, so I head to FC and they've de-classified it! So now I have to stand for the whole journey, completely cramped, barely 5inches from a person either side. I've never been good in tight spaces or crowded environments so I'm hating this so much. I made a, pretty valid, point that I did have a FC ticket. The conductor looked at me like I was a complete troublemaker and begrudgingly refunded me the difference between STND and FC. "So the fact I waited for everyone to get on thinking I had a seat in FC and that cost me sitting down for the whole trip is irrelevant?" I asked, 

"Well that's your fault, FC is always de-classified at these times." he tells me.

"Oh it is it? Well you didn't think NOT selling me a FC ticket was the way to go if there was no FC for me to buy a ticket in?"

"Well it's not my problem mate, I don't make the decisions."

So I left it at that and stood for the whole journey, this is exactly what is wrong with the world these days, everyone is happy in "Not my problem, ask the gaffer" roles, I think if a customer is unhappy with something it's EVERYONE's problem and anyone who doesn't actively try to ease the discomfort is not doing their job. Any business I've been involved in has always had the same ethos, Objective 1 = Customer leaves Happy, Objective = Money in the till. I guess there is no other train options for me so I have to suck up the shitty service. SHAME ON YOU FIRST EXPRESS. SHAME

I wasn't even bothered about the sitting, although it was joke tilting, I just wanted some GOOD SERVICE .

The other day, as I mentioned I was in London, on the way down at 2.30pm the train was so crowded again it was unbearably hot, on the return leg it was sposed to take 2hr.45m, It actually took near on 4hours because of three long stops, the most annoying was outside Leeds station "waiting for a space" at 3am - 3am! What the fuck is happening! Is this a time for bustling train activity? 3am ffs! If they are moving trains around that are dorment then it's WAY out of line because they KNEW that train was due in at that time. But then, what do they care - it's just a trainload of people who've made money to be transported from X to Y in a certain time, we can make them wait - WHY DO WE CARE? That's right, you don't do you. £165 train ticket - and why should you?

Taxi's.

This has happened a few times to me lately, but the most ridiculous case was recently. I was with my solicitor and I rang a local Taxi company I use a LOT, I got into the taxi and the guy asked where I was going (despite me having told the person on the phone, not that it matters) I told him - I live in a really stnd place - he didn't know, so he asked me for my post-code, fair enough I gave it to him. He cant enter the post-code properly, despite me giving it to him 3 or 4 times, so I say I live near the Etap which he knows. I then get a phone-call and un-able to direct him round every bend. He takes two obviously wrong turnings then has to interrupt me to ask where he should be going, I don't know where he's taken me so he has to try his satnav again and we end up driving round a pointless piece of Leeds for 5 minutes before we find somewhere I recognize. After all this a 5 minute journey has taken 15 and a £4-5 fare is now £8, I wanna say wtf but I cba arguing over £3 so give him £10, now he doesn't have any change. So he gives me it back and says he doesn't have change for a £10 note.

"And this is my problem why?"

"Well I just started, no £ coins"

"And again, my problem why? Your job is drive people places and take their money, you've taken 3x the time to take me to a place EVERYONE in Leeds knows, pretty impossible to be a taxi driver and not know it and now you're telling me you can't accept my money?!"

"Listen don't you have £3 and I give you a fiver?"

"No I don't. Because in my day to day life I don't need to provide people with change, if I did then i would almost certainly have some £ coins."

Then another taxi driver turns up and he changes my £10 for me, but seriously what is wrong with people - every taxi I book these days takes 15minutes longer than they say to turn up and half the drivers don't know where anything is. The other day I even got into a taxi at 5pm who insisted I paid upfront £10 for a £5 journey and he'd refund me the difference at the end - then it came to £4.60 and he just gave me a fiver back. Oh NO. Pretty sure I'm owed £5.40, and the fact that you've not got any 20p's is not my problem, he ended up having to give me a 50p! Justice. No-one care about their customers anymore. Very sad

Had a fun night out the other day, myself, Ben Martin, Dave Burn, Luke Fields and Dan Morgan went over to York to see Jenna our new best friend, started off with a really nice meal at a restaurant called the Biltimore Bar and Grill will give it a plug as it was great! http://www.thebiltmorebarandgrill.com/ Food was excellent, service great and a great cocktail list! This makes the team very happy :) after ballin on a budget in rev's ordering champagne for no good reason >>> LFMagic losing his mind! We then went to some completely empty bar (maybe 4 or 5 other people) we had this incredible idea that we should round everyone in the club up to same part to create a party atmosphere! However the charms of myself and Luke, nor the dance-aster Ben Martin was creating was enough to persuade the others to join in our plans :(  Shameeee !

Said "Dance-Aster" mid-creation.

Next leg of the journey took us to a Chinese restaurant/converted evening club called "The Willow" where we took to the dance-floor, several bottles of Desperado and mayhem duly followed! Exactly what the mayhem was no-one can quite remember, but we're all pretty sure we caused it :)


What we do have, courtesy of my new phone and enjoyment for photo-taking some fun pictures of the night! I've also gotten into this very professional habit of taking 3/4 shots of each picture, in case any of them are blurred!!

Luke, Dan and Dave posing for a picture with a guy they were calling "Shrillex" I don't know who or what that is! Dave Burn looking dashing albeit ever so slightly simple and my good self posing next to a sign in the Chinese place that at the time I found hilarious! I think it would make a great novel..."Theft at the Willow".... Has Occurred MANY times.

That is about all from me, apologies for the lack of degenerate Incidents! Anyone who read my last blog will have seen I romped home on the Snooker betting! Backed the two finalists pre-tourney and laid the guy who lost i the semi, that is how we DO IT! I was loving watching the snooker all day every day, when you have some decent bets on it becomes SUCH a good sweat! I promise next blog will have some adventures in it :D

IDK if anyone say this news story, the video footage is both frightening and hilarious,  2 complete lunatic Irish men are racing on horse and cart on a busy main road in cork! Swerving in and out of the police car trying to stop them! Mayhem....

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ireland/9259261/Illegal-horse-race-blocks-Irish-dual-carriage-way.html

Some people really are completely fucking mental, and most of the time these people seem to come from Ireland!! 

Going to leave you with this, which made me laugh!

Haha! Gl Everyone

lilD

Back to Blog!

It's All Been Going On!

Once again it's been a bit of time between blogs, I've quite genuinely been really, really busy, in the last two weeks I can't think of a single day (bar one particularly hungover day) where I wasn't up before 10.30am and still working on something at 11pm. It's been great! Felt really good, really productive and as far as getting stuff done is concerned I've been crushing :) !

First thing I've done is start Vegas preparation. If I've learnt anything about travelling away to play poker it's that preparation is key, especially when you're dealing with Vegas. Money needs to be organised, you need to be feeling healthy, in good shape, sleeping well and in a great frame of mind to play poker, if any of these things AREN'T in order, then what's going to happen is that you is Vegas is going to get you, in someway or another. So step one of my Vegas preparation is to sort my flat out, I've already begun packing stuff up and over the next two weeks I am planning on moving everything to various locations ready for when I get back, I don't want to be frantically rushing around the two days before I leave trying to organize all my stuff, as I plan to adjust my sleeping pattern a wee before I go - luckily this will work nicely with playing online, so with any luck will be able to get a decent chunk of online hours in those 2 weeks before I leave.

Second thing I've done for Vegas prep is to get into good shape, it's so easy to fall into bad habbits, eating badly and being generally unhealthy that I've decided to spend the whole month before with very few nights out, cooking my own, healthy meals and trying to a LITTLE bit of exercise (mostly just runs in the morning) don't get me wrong, still pretty anti-exercise for the most part, but have to say I'm feeling good, and seriously ready to out in a big summer :)

Here is some are the two of my favorite culinary creations over the past week !

Nice Salmon fillet in a lemon drizzle with a rocket salad with low fat french dressing and a small potato salad.
I re-did this today and added 2 scallops and a few bits of asparagus and it was delicious!

Grilled Chicken in a homemade tomato sauce on a bed of onions with roasted red peppers, asparagus, fine beans and tenderstem brocoli! Not as appealing to look at as the one above, but really tasty and aside from the Mayo in my homemade potato salad (delicious to eat with the broccoli btw) pretty much all completely good for you!  

I also decided to completely eliminate bread from the diet pre-vegas, despite my reservations over bread being bad for you, still seems like rubbish to me, I've decided to give it a go! I think it would be naive to think that I wouldn't be slipping back into eating kind of questionably in Vegas but if I set off feeling great, then hopefully I'll start off well and i'll be inspired to live somewhat better than I usually do out there. Having Ash with me will be amazing as he's turned into a complete health nutter so he'll be able to keep me on the straight and narrow! The eggs benedicts though, are going nowhere!

Finally my Vegas preparation has involved lots of boring poker work, I've decided that this year, as I decided last year as well, my focus is going to be on PLO games. Really happy with my live NL game right now, and have been playing great in 6max games online, but live PLO is a different animal so lots of work on 9handed plo has gone on, very boring and culminating in an article in this month's Poker Player! Availble at all good newsagents - do pick a copy up and hear my thoughts on 9handed PLO!

Snooker! Yes, the other thing has been taking my time up lately, and much to my delight, is the Snooker World Championship! Always been a great fan of the snooker, watching, and most particularly BETTING on it! Everyday there is 2 or 3 terrific snooker matches on so every afternoon is gtd to be fun.  My initial instinct was to bet on the being a 147 in the forst 3 days, available somewhere at 24-1, however we received some seemingly reliable information from none other than Steve Davis, claiming the coup of round one was backing Stuart Bingham vs Hendry at 10/11 (Hendry delayed en route back form china with virtually no snooker match-play experience) and Bingham in decent form, a 3-1 on shot at absolute worst. I was also advised that the clothes were not going to make for big scoring initially. So I lumped on Bingham and watched as Stephen Hendry made a phenomenal 147 to romp to a pretty straight forward victory :).  Just goes to show, never a sure thing in gambling, no matter has renowned and respected the tipstar may be.


Always been a big Hendry fan, delighted to see him back to great form at the crucible, I feel pretty damn certain he won't be winning the title, but seeing him playing great snooker again is terrific for a fan of the game!  I got some shrewd bets on, 13/2 on Ronnie early doors and Ali Carter @72/1 on betdaq and managed to top it up when he was 7-1 up in round one with some money still unmatched at 66/1.  Tempted to lay it off 5-3 up vs Trump, but my new gambling tag-line...Hedging is for Gardners :D


Also taken the liberty of laying a pretty large bet on Maguire when offered a decent vig to share exposure on someone elses bet, so will really be pulling for Hendry next round!!! Trump (as I expected) seems likely to beat Ali Carter 9-7 ahead but Carter more than capable of nicking it, and should he win, he's more than capable of winning the thing. Maguire I don't like and didn't look too great in either game, so right now, LOVING watching the snooker, and loving the bets I've made. Lets gogogogo, what a great championship it's looking to be!!

The main thing I've been up to is some real life work and with a sale of one of my shops almost imminent, looks like we'll have a nice lil cash flow boost pre-Vegas! Won't be taking business money out to Vegas to gamble with ofc, but it does mean the chances of me being genuinely homeless on my return is reduced dramatically! Producing some actual profit as a result of enterprise has been fantastic, I'd love to have kept it as I was proud of it, but the time is right so here we go!


So all in all, it's been a very busy couple of weeks, lots of work, lots of gambling and lots of poker. Poker has been going ok, I've played quite a lot of poker recently, a couple of live sessions in a friendly private game (I know some of the guys there have been reading so Hello to the team!) I can't even really remember how I'v done in that game either, I have so much fun gambling, joking and messing around that I forget I'm even playing for money half the time!  I hate poker when it's too serious, who can be bothered?  I like having a good think about the game, but I LOVE all the banter and (basically) pissing around that goes on in a friendly live game! So as far as results have gone I can't remember, I can still afford to go play so I guess I can't be losing too much!

As far as online is going, been pretty boring, the games been up and down and my results have been pretty mixed but ultimately somewhere near break-even and prolly small winner after rakeback.  I'm defo not at 100% of my game online, but certainly showing some periods of what I would consider my best.  It's really hard to stay objective with online poker because results affect your mood so drastically it's easy to just lose your perspective mid-session, but I've felt, throughout the times I have been playing, I've been playing somewhere between "Not-Bad" and "pretty good."  This obviously isn't quite good enough for the long term, but it's been getting me by and all-in-all the results I've had are prolly only just a little below where I "deserve" to be. So I can't complain, but certainly can improve.


I guess the good thing is, I'm enjoying playing right now, and I feel really good for vegas, roll on VEGAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSS





So this is the theme of the blog, and the theme of the previous few weeks! Getting ready for VEGGGGASSSS!

Had a quite hilarious yet ironic moment the other week. My shower, which as you know I have considered changing recently, is a bath/shower type arrangement, for the last 5 months I've been showering (which you'll all be pleased to hear!) but without a mat for grip on the floor. I've never slipped, because whenever I get into the shower I always think "Wow, I should buy a shower mat, otherwise I might slip" as a result of this, I am always veering towards caution whenever I enter the shower. The other day though I was in wilkinsons, and I saw a shower mat! So I picked it up, proudly put in in my shower and as I was about to step into the shower the next morning I looked proudly at my new shower mat, excited about my new life, a life free from daily worry, removed from the constant fear for my spine and where the chances of my dying alone in a bathub of my own blood significantly decreased...


What's the first thing that happens? Obviously, I trip on my new bath mat, an injure my spine quite badly. Since then I've slipped twice more and have have subsequently purchased a new bath mat, which I have yet to slip on. Could have been nasty, but luckily, I AM OK!

Right! That's all from me, plans for today are going to evolve solely around sweating the Man U/Man City game, I've actually got a small interest on Man U so will be grudingly cheering them on, I also hold a pretty high dislike for Mancini so don't really want to see him with the trophy in his hands. Either way should be a great game, and a potentially messy night out to follow with the hero lineup, Dave Jones/Geeforce/Shrewdie/Brent and co, going to be a goooooood night!


GL Everyone!


lilD

Great News for online Poker!

Finally!

Rare that I would post 2 blogs in the same 48 hours, but I just read this news and was so excited I thought I would do a blog, explaining why. Firstly, the news itself!

After a legal battle for ages PokerStars has finally been able to prevent sites such as Poker Table Ratings, from data-mining on it's site. For those of you who don't know, PTR is a "data-mining" site, they mine hand histories from the tables as they are being played and on their site they can display a frightening amount of statistics on a person's play. It can tell a savy internet user the amount of hands he plays, how aggressive he is, how often he raises/calls etc and it can go even more in-depth than this. Also, and more upsetting it displays the total profit and loss for each person, and a graph detailing the individual wins and losses. Even WORSE than this, they then give people the option to BUY hand histories so they can further analyse the play of their opponents.

Data-mining sites have been around forever, and there existence has constantly baffled me - how they are allowed operate is simply unbelievable. They cause nothing but damage to the online poker world and bring with them no tangible benefits whatsoever. One thing for sure data-mining DOES NOT #lovethegame.

They allow really sensitive information to be readily available to people cleverer enough to know that it is there, and what's so unfair about these sites is that often, the weaker players have no idea that this level of information is available to their opponents. People they have never ever seen play before have already had the opportunity to look through hundreds or possibly thousands of hands of their play, they will have a good idea of how often they raise/fold/how aggressive they are etc before the victim has even had change to figure out how to pronounce the screen name. 

This lends even more of an edge to the stronger players, and gives weaker players even less of a chance. Is this what "gambling" is about? Is it about have such a monstrous edge over another person that they barely have a chance? Such an unfair system, and so in-line with the gambling industry of today that we don't do more to further the enjoyment of recreational gamblers and keep the playing field fair. Call me old fashioned, but my principle has always been that of a "fair gamble." Sure it might not be fair that I might be a better poker player (or vica versa) than my opponent, but the gamble is fair - everyone has the same information, plays with the same cards, the same money - EVERYONE, regardless of poker ability, has a chance to win, this is gambling and how it should work. 

This is why poker is such a great sport, because regardless of your ability or experience, you can sit against someone who is a fantastic player and you can play, but more importantly, YOU CAN WIN! Far too many "professional" gamblers just want to have every edge possible and it's going to kill the game, seriously damage the gambling industry by ruining what poker is ACTUALLY about, and that's having fun, it's a game at the end of the day. 

Sites like PTR also encourage mocking at the tables, I myself was victim to this on stars the other day, playing HU vs someone who started to mock me for being -$8,000 on my Pokerstars PTR. Now I didn't care about this, I know I'm actually losing a lot more than that (it misses a lot of hands thank god!) I can see how someone less experienced would feel very humiliated by this and also be very wary of how the person has come by this information. Not only would it ruin the experience of playing, but put them off from playing again in the future, further damaging the future and integrity of the game.

PokerStars victory against PTR here is a fantastic step forward for online poker and hopefully this will encourage other sites to follow suit, and then these sites that provide such harm to our industry will have no way to operate, and to profit. I sincerely hope this is the first nail in the coffin for data-mining sites and I urge the sites and the players to work together on this and we can all reap the benefits of a better online poker world.

Well played PokerStars. Very Well Played.

Sorry for the rare 100% poker blog, but I genuinely believe this is a very important step for online poker, and gambling as a whole. Lets stop #usingthegame and start #lovingthegame

lilD

The Worst Thing For British People...

Decisions, Decisions, Decisions....

I remember when I used to work in a sports shop, it was just whilst I was in school and after i left for a bit whilst my Mum was shouting at me everyday for not having a job - thankfully only recently has she stopped this! I used to think how terrible Brits were with decision making, for example this shop during busy times would have the best part of 40 styles of running shoe available, is there ANYTHING worse for the British community than 40 types of show to chose from, people used to spend all day everyday selecting running shoes and it was my job to try steer then towards the "right" choice for themselves. I know, it's a fucking running shoe, JUST PICK A SHOE YOU LIKE FFS, but that's not how we operate here in dear old blighty is it? It's important to us that of all 40 shoes on offer we're picking the perfect shoe for us. 

In America for example they are very powerful shoppers they need shoes, they buy shoes, they need a t-shirt they buy a t-shirt, seems like a much better way of doing things, but to be honest I find it a bit soul-less. I love it how here we pile so much mental anguish into making decisions, a friend of mine is SO BAD at making decisions that a simple decision of whether to go to Leeds or York will require her to make 2 or 3 phone-calls, use the phrase "owwww I don't know" in a really whiny tone and result in frantic pacing around. It's a more rewarding and intense experience than a cold hearted, foreign approach.

So I, myself have found myself victim of a similar type of decision recently, mostly once more revolving around my living arrangements.  I've made plans to go to Las Vegas on May 10th, my flat expires on June 1st, I'm not planning on being home until July 17th, so this would mean paying outright for 7 weeks of living that I'm not going to be living. It's a horrible waste of money, coupled with the fact that I don't LOVE my flat (I don't hate it, it's a perfectly nice flat) and I really dislike my letting agents, I want to just tell them to stick it and just leave for Vegas homeless, with just a dream and a bag full of money :)

You may recall, when I went to Vegas in October I did the same thing, and it worked out pretty well!

   Problem with this however, is that returning from Vegas with no home to go to was one of the most tilting things I went through last time, EVER. Also I don't have many places to put my stuff, plus there is ALWAYS the worry that I might do all my money in Vegas and not be able to afford somewhere to live when I get home. I know what you're thinking, how could anyone lose their rent money in Vegas? Surely that would be really irresponsible and there is no way David would do that. Well if you're thinking that, let me just say...

And, of course possibly the biggest vice we all have out there in the summer....

So you see what I mean, to not factor in the possibility of being broke when I come home would be in itself irresponsible. My main financial vice's in the world are table games (specifically craps) partying and good food, so - I'm pretty under it! There is however, the glass being half full and all, the chance I come home with significantly more money than I set off, so in that situation I might wanna ball out and get a swanky penthouse at Bridgewater place! 

A little slice of elegant 28th storey heaven for you sir?
Don't mind if I do :)

So understandably I've been in somewhat of a dilemma. After getting some advice from some people who are cleverer than me I have decided I am going to LEAVE FOR VEGAS HOMELESS! Like my no-madic forefathers I shall venture into the future with nothing but my dreams and my friendships to carry me... (there will of course be a plane to carry me too, as strong as Rob's shoulders are I don't fancy him having the power to take me across the atlantic, Jamie Sykes' arms on the other hand....)

So there we go, another exciting chapter will begin (admittedly not exactly much different to the previous few chapters!) but for my life, and my world, which revolves solely around me and gambling it is exciting, next stop, 77b Future Street, Lovingthegame Avenue, Happy Toan, G3TT 1NG, The Lot.

Here we go!

 

So I guess the previous driveling wall of text and images could have been summed up by saying "I've decided to leave my flat, not get anywhere else before Vegas, and sort it when I get back."  <<< This is basically what I'm going to do!

Poker, poker, poker. Guess I should cover some poker in this blog as this is apparently the theme. Poker has been going ok - certainly better than when I last mentioned it. Online has picked up and I have recovered from a £10,000 hole nicely to be winning somewhere in the region of £200-300 pounds, which whereas it won't take me to the moon it will however buy some small items, items such as these...

A ridic ballin' remote control motorbike!

A Lego set of the Tokyo international race circuit!

This 12ft Stuffed Giraffe!

Or if you insist on being frightfully dull....

It would pay my electricity bill (lol you'll be alright Scottish Power)

What this means is that whereas results have been poor, I can sit back and commend myself for being able to have generated, through my own abilities enough money to purchase all these extremely cool items. If I were to pick a winner it would have to be the Giraffe. Last year whilst living with Jamie I had a lot of space in my bedroom, I hatched the genius plan of turning it into a zoo for stuffed animals! However me and Jamie spent far too much time drinking Gin, trying to set fire to Gin and calculating how much it would cost to fill various containers with Gin - the most astonishing was an 8person hot-tub which you could fill with Hendricks Gin for a little over £45,000! So as you could see we were far too busy wasting time to get along with anything serious, like building our stuffed animal Zoo.

Such a wasted potential we are.

What was I talking about? Oh yh, Poker! Poker - online going ok, been playing a BIT live and doing pretty average, played at Gala the other night and have never received so much terrible table behavior in my life! It started out by one person accusing me of not being a gentleman on betting the river, announcing "YOU WIN" when he takes all of 2 minutes to show quads. The same player takes all off three minutes to call my river all-in a little later, waits for my to proudly reveal second set before triumphantly announcing "THE NUT STRAIGHT" (the best hand you could have) Everyone else made a fuss of it but I don't care about slowrolls at all, if someone wants to slow-roll they can slow-roll it isn't against the rules. It just means you don't #lovethegame which is your problem not mine! I actually very often find them pretty hilarious :D

As well as this, another ridiculously nitty regular player was berating me constantly throughout the game, kept saying that I was "betting to much" and he was going to "teach me how to play" I lost a pot where I bet £300 on the river and folded to a raise and he, not even involved in the pot, stood up, started waving in my face say "bye-bye, bye-bye" ! Very, very curious behavior! I provided the option of HU game to facilitate my learning, but he couldn't quite raise the mustard ;)

I actually enjoyed all the rubdowns and needles, was a fun game with Simon, George, Neil and Johnny - Johnny cleverly coheres me into gambling with him when he knows i'll play and he has the best hand lol. Neil is always loads of fun to play with cos he has so much gamble and I like to play big pots :) Neil is actually one of the most improved players I've played with regularly (ish) with over the last year or two, he's always been a big bucket of trouble to play vs as he can put you in all sorts of yucky situations, but nowadays he's combining this with pretty solid hand/board reading and the aggression is a little more controlled. I've not been playing the PLO game at Gala but the way he plays compared to everyone else (passive and weak for the most part - not a #lovethegame strategy) I'd be shocked if he wasn't one of or the biggest winner! WP Neil (who often reads these blogs I think, Hi Mate *wave*.)

I was tickled yesterday by reading the story of the Austrian Village "Fucking" (yes an actual place) who are partitioning to have the village re-named after "constant" ridicule and apparently they are losing close to £3,500 a year in stolen signs for the village! A local business women, claimed to be "exasperated" by the situation has pleaded for an additional G to be added, in an attempt to "deter thieves."  Locals also claimed to be "insulted" that women posing naked next to the sign for sleazy calenders had become commonplace! I wonder if it attracts a lot of tourists, "where you and Mark going for easter Sandra?"

"Fucking"

"Oh, I see, slightly over-sharing I think...."

That's all from me, well played and unlucky badpadPaolo69leadboots(1) on his near miss in the .fr Scoop main event, narrowly missing out on the 202,000 euro top prize after some runbads on the final eventually finishing 6th for 47,000euro :( - I guess similar waves should be sent to Rupert who managed a 5th in the Sunday Million for $60,000 on Sunday. Strange thing is with these tournaments is it's such a nice win, but feels like money lost for a bit - still great prep for theses guys just ahead of the real SCOOP (spring championship of online poker) which brings with it in equal measure the opportunity to both accumulate and dust off frightening wads of cash! Luckily I'll be in Vegas away from the sillyness, pretty sure for me playing $5k a box Baccarat at the wynn is +$ on playing the scoop series :D

GL Everyone

lilD

Tough Stuff, Hard to Break...

A Blog!

I'm here! So sorry I've been off the blogging radar for a week or so, It's really cool how people are genuinely sweating the next blog! I always try and keep em coming but this last 2 weeks has been particularly hectic!  I've been running around working, playing a ton online, going out with the boys a bit and railing in some reasonably chunky sports bets!  

First exciting news is Franky's terrific showing on the Party Poker Premier league, he managed to satellite his way into a $125,000 buy-in televised series for under $2,000 and despite a tough-ish group including Trickett, Katcholov, Siedel, FullFlush and Tony G he put in an amazing run and topped his group netting $80k, before a rough run in the final resulted in a 7th place finish for a further $65k. Pretty gutting, but in an alien format, in surroundings he's never been in before with talented experienced players who are used to this style of tournament, I think it was an amazing run, a great effort and will be amazing to watch it all back on TV when it airs!! Go on Franky!!! <3

I enjoyed railing the Master's in as well, not generally a huge fan of watching golf, it's a little tedious for me, however the Master's proves that age-old adage that anything slightly dull can become an intensely good sweat IF you're gambling on it :D I elected to get deep-ish onto Westwood with a couple of little savers none of whom were Bubba Watson although I was very tempted to purely because of the price. I know a couple of people who jumped on for decent money EW at 55/60-1 and anyone who DIDN'T lose their balls and green up (not naming names Spraggs :D) would have had an unbelievable sweat when he's in the bushes ready to hoof it over the tree's. I was rooting for him by the final 3 just because he has a cool name, Bubba - My Westwood bet was a lock EW and I made a small profit so was a nice day :)

He isn't a big guy, but fuck me he can't half hit the ball hard lol

Poker continues to go poorly.  I'm reaching the point with online poker where it's becoming a bit of a disillusionment for me, when I play I feel like I'm playing well, when people sweat me playing they tell me I'm playing well, when I show people hands they often say that the hand was well played, so why is it I am consistently losing? I've been searching for leaks now and  I've found a couple of things but changing them has influenced the results un-noticeably. I'm really really stuck for idea's, I guess just continue to play and see what happens is the best answer but I results have been so bad I'm not sure morale can take much more, Tuesday's session had me so tilted that I decided I was going to punt the UKIPT off, despite there being £250k for first.  I'm just not sure what to do, and this upsets me slightly.  Since returning from vegas I've gone 1/12 winning sessions and the winning session I did have was $230. I always get winning and end up losing it back, so perhaps I'm playing too long a sessions? Who knows! 

Even the worst poker players win sometimes, this is the beauty of the game, so the fact I win NEVER is really disheartening for someone claiming to be a professional! The green sign is looming!

I think postman would suit me, what a lovely peaceful job, you wake up, drive around, deliver some letters say how-do to the locals, pop into the local store on your way home to pick up some cat food and boot polish and off home for a relaxing day! Sounds wonderful, Postman lilDave!

I bet this guy doesn't spend 3 hours on a Tuesday evening wondering if his VPIP is too high from early position, or if he's 3betitng too much from the blinds....

Morale, however, continues to be acceptable - had shaky moments this last week as I've found myself not enjoying my poker. Poker is, for me, the most fun thing I do regularly, which Is why I'm such a vocal exponent of the game being played in a good-spirited way because for me who plays the game every day, I LOVE to play poker. I'm not one of these guys who wants people to get into the game so they can lose money and keep the pro community eating well, I don't really give a fuck about the "pro-community" I care about the game and the people playing it, everyone who plays the game the way it should be played is helping poker, and everyone who doesn't is damaging it. I'll tell you what i witnessed online the other day as a good example of this...

I've said before tthat internet poker is in big trouble, and it's the regs who are ruining it, plain and simple. The other day I was playing online when I noticed higher stakes games filling up - on iPoker where nearly everyone is SHAMEFULLY nitty and bumhunts likes crazy this can mean only one thing, there is a perceived "weaker player" around. The guy in question was someone I recognized, I know his tendencies pretty well and the games that were starting looked good so i jumped on the list. I eventually got a seat (10.20) and very quickly lost two $1k stacks to this player, which is ofc a bit tilting but I'm reasonably happy to lose in these games as they tend to come with quite a lot of variance. 

Having run a $1k stack up to $6k the player decides to quit (which is completely fine) I'm stuck, playing with a couple of regs who I would certainly fancy my chances vs and obviously well up for continuing. However this is iPoker where everyone is scared to play anyone who is remotely clued up, so ofc, the game breaks before the guy has been away from the table for 3 hands.  These regs, the ones who quit like this will be the same guys complaining that there are never any games on iPoker - the reason there are never any games is because you guys break them up the minute they get slightly tough. If we play 3 handed for 15 minutes you never know who might come along and join. But no, far, far too scared.

The story about this day however gets worse, the player decides his spin was good enough at 10.20 he's off to 50/100, the same group of nitty regs soon fill the table and sure enough the guy spins up his 3k to ~$11k before heading to 100/200! The game breaks the minute he leaves and fills the minute he sits. He soon loses his $4k stack and it's back to 50/100, same thing.  The first $3k buyin he busto's at 50/100 everyone snap sits out waiting for him to reload? I mean this is just fucking disgraceful, to have this much dis-respect for your opponent in a poker game is frankly shameful, a few orbits later I even saw one player (having to really stop myself just naming and shaming here) whilst the player was sitting out, tank down on posting his big blind! This is just the most horrible behavior possible and this is what's killing online poker.

How do these guys wake up, look themselves in the mirror and call themselves professional poker players? I'd be completely embarrassed if i were them acting like this. If you're reading, you'll know who you are and take it from me, you're NOT a poker player or a gambler, you're a disgrace to my industry. An industry that so many people try their hardest to make warm, welcoming and friendly - not so we can all make money, but so that everyone can enjoy the game for what it is, A GAME. Money will come as a bi-product for the better players but if it's all about the money then you don't love the game, you USE the game and you don't have a future in gambling, In My Opinion.

I know it's such a hard thing to change because the people who try to change this last will make more money which is unfair, but trust me, everyone IT'S worth it in the long run. I've always been happy to play vs just about anyone because I don't believe anyone has a huge edge of me in my games. Lets take HU PLO vs Ivey, who is prolly the best in the world- we play $5/$10 HU, how much of an edge does he really have? Bearing in mind I've played 250,000 hands of HU PLO? Maybe he's winning 1-1.5bb's per hour from me? That's fuck all and with that kind of edge I could easily beat him over a 20-30,000 hand sample, so if I'm willing to play Ivey HU should he ever sit me 5/10 or below, why the fuck is no-one on iPoker prepared to play tough 3handed games for 20minutes?  

Simple, they want someone else, like me, to start the games and when they get "soft enough" jump in and profit. It won't take a genius to realise why ipoker games are struggling so much.

Basically, what I'm saying it - online players -

I would like to take this time to point out that throughout my online career I have bumped into a few people who have been willing to start games and play heads-up 3handed to keep games running - props to those guys!

So that's my online poker rant out of the way, I've developed a lot of passion for poker during my involvement in the gambling industry. It's really upsets me how as an industry as a whole there is so much negative stigma attached to it. Poker is an amazing game, and it should be enjoyed worldwide by people gambling for what they can afford to gamble with.  We don't breed addicts or skin people, we should, as professional gamblers be instrumental in making poker and gambling MORE fun, not trying to suck it dry. 

I'm going to keep banging this message through until either EVERYONE listens to me, or NO-ONE listen's to me!

The other day I went for dinner.  Not too much of a massive surprise I guess, I go for dinner quite a bit, however this dinner was different, THIS DINNER was about just dinner, no getting drunk, no behaving rowdily and NO night out. I had a lovely dinner with Sophie at Loch Fyne where I decided to get my balla side out and flick the lobster out :D was so good, SO GOOD! Met guy for a quick catch up and headed to the bowling alley to meet Tommy/Rob/Jake/Pez and JP for a little bowling and one more drink. Obviously though as stated previously NO GOING OUT, NO GETTING DRUNK...

...Fast forward about 6.5 hours andd we're ordering bottle of GreyGoose #2 in the silks VIP area and the night has turned into a complete trainwreck! I'm out of the game I spend the next 4 days in a daze betting darts and golf and drinking cider in the dark listening to Katy Perry! You see how easily this stuff can degenerate, I WAS LITERALLY JUST GOING OUT FOR DINNER FFS! 

I'm out of control.

I've been umming and arring for a while now over buying a new shower. The shower I want is one of these...

I've found one that can be re-attached to my existing showerhead but I'm in too minds, it looks amazing how it just pours water onto you, and they have them in the encore spa but how do they work practically for showering? MMM Will have to tank on this for a bit, anyone have one? Advice would be great, would be raging to get it installed only to find that it's actually shit and I want my old shower back! 

Got lots of sweats of %'s in the UKIPT, hopefully everyone plays better than I did. I couldn't really have played worse if I tried was a dreadful showing, I was tilted before it started and got way more tilted as I went on. Dan, a nice guy from blonde bluffed me in a pot just before the first break and as soon as I got back fro that break I was determined I wasn't going to win. My table was really really slow as well but that's not too tilting, I guess I just need to be less of a moron for the next time I play.

Oh well, onwards and upwards we go! Got lots of excitements going o right now, which will be blogged about in good course!  I'm over the moon to be offered a regular collum in UK PokerPlayer, Alun and Keir are great guys and I think the magazine is brilliant, so to be able to contribute regularly is absolutely amazing, hopefully I can bash out some good stuff! My hectic and non-directional writing style is slowly being crafted into something someone might want to read in a magazine. Lets all go and buy a copy of PokerPlayer!!!

I saw this the other day! 
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/9197604/999-mix-up-sees-crews-rush-to-model-train-accident.html


Basically, somehow, and how this happened I have no idea, but a miniature train, which somehow threw 3 of it's passenger off, and the drivers felt that this was cause for a Ambulance to be called, lead to the 999 operator to believe it was a "MILITARY TRAIN" accident, not, in fact a "MINIATURE TRAIN" accident! The result was several ambulances and  2 police squads turning up to assist with giving Phil and Doris a hand getting up and brushing the dust of their polyester cardigans. Thank god!


Apparently we were only steps away from a rescue helicopter being launched! 


People really are ridiculous :D


Even more ridiculous is Facebook buying Instagram or $1,000,000,000 - ONE BILLION? Zuckerberg buddy where are you? Have you seen how many zero's that is? Off your lid mate!  I potentially have an old showerhead coming available, yours for a cool Milly!


Gl Everyone


lilD