the worst lawn mower of all time

i just had the misfortune to use the subject title of this post. what appears to have happened is the company 'cutting edge saw' other lawnmowers and thoguht, how hard can it be? so they tried to copy others, in the process, making each and every aspect awful beyond comprehension.
Equipped with the shortest cable i have ever seen it just allows me to reach halfway down the garden.
They have obviously noticed that other lawn mowers have arms and decided that they would make theirs detachable. they are so detachable in fact, they fall off incessantly. move it in any direction that's not directly forwards, and the arms just fall out. heaven forbid you should need to move backwards.
they saw for safety that you have a button to push and a handle to hold down to start the machine. and you need to keep the handle squeezed to keep the motor running. i have big hands yet find it incredibly awkward due to its retarded shape. luckily you are already deterred from trying to turn it but should you choose to do so it will stretch your skin on your palm and fingers giving you massive blood filled blisters leaving you to type at 4 words per minute using just your left hand.
they saw that other mowers have this box thing at the back. unable to work out what it was for they left it as some sort of showpiece. grass doesn't get funnelled into it very well, just clogging up the blades instead. you may try to remove this unnecessary trophy box since it's primary role is falling off the back. however, take the box off and the panel that covers the back of the mower it prevents any grass exiting. so you have to leave it on to ensure it only jams every 30 seconds instead of every 10.

great names, bad games

i saw in the news that someone called goodwillie has had rape charges against him dropped. obviously it's tough to know what happened without being there, although all i'm really interested in is how soon are you allowed to make a joke about his name combined with his innocence. and does this also mean that badwillie is a real surname too? do his friends say to women in clubs, "would you like to see a goodwillie?"

i'll stop now.
i also have stopped poker for one month. i don't really want to take a break but i do. i want to decide whether it's worth pursuing. may start again at end of august, if only to get the $4k bonus. but chasing those always ended up costing me money in the past so maybe i'll just spend fpp's on stress balls, cuddly toys and sunglasses.

i think i've had enough

been breaking even for about a year now. think i'm not cut out for poker.
i keep looking back at how much i've made over the past 4/5 years. feb 2007 i think was when i started seriously on stars and even though my net withdrawlas are around $40k right now i cannot see myself ever making money again. this year i have been losing at 1/2 ffs!

so depressed. think i might not play again till september. who knows, tomorrow, i might wake up and not be such a melodramtic wally.

i just commited a criminal offence

i called the council just now about paying their tax, though it was for a house where my name isn't on the account. (possibly because i don't live there). why would i do such a thing? whilst my ladyfriend is at work i thought i would give them the date she's moving out along with a request for a final bill to pay the remaining months - they did just send a final notice for payment of a huge amount which kind of indicates that they didn't get the payment from 1 month ago so i wanted to request a statement too.

the twat on the other end of the phone though just kept saying he couldn't discuss the account with me since i wasn't the account holder. i said i want to pay you!!
his response was "you are actually committing a criminal offence"
incredulous, i asked "wanting to pay you is an offence?"
i did my best not to say, no wonder so many people get away with not paying you.
he claimed that wasn't what he said, and he can't give any information out either. i asked him to listen to the recording of the call where i said i wanted to give you information so i could pay. so i asked to speak to his manager's manager. he didn't take kindly to this. so naturally, i asked again. he decided to hang up! lol.
not before i asked for his name. he wouldn't give his surname but instead asked for mine. i think he may have been an inner city schoolboy on work experience.

so i called back and spoke to someone else who gladly took the tenancy end date, agreed to send a final statement and i wouldn't be surprised if she also put the reminder notice on hold.

tomorrow i go to town

this always leads to awkward situations, bizarre occurrences or both. even today, i didn't venture out much beyond a trip to the tennis courts. and there was a sexy milf playing complete with short skirt and grunts! i thought those were special effects just for tv. like champions league music shortly before kick off. turns out they're both real things. sometimes the line between real and fake does get blurred. i sometimes pick up my ps3 controller when f1 is on telly just to confuse my flatmate.

still getting caught up in the shorttermism of poker. this, just t'other day is the biggest pot i've played all year. (WARNING CONTAINS NOT UNLIKELY BAD BEAT)
the hand was so beautifully set up it could make a james bond hand look realistic (i jest, nothing could do that).
the villain is a monster fish who was guaranteed to be squeezing. i'm dancing around the room on the flop. i'm not a good dancer so i didn't get to dance for long.

Seat 6 is the button
Seat 1: villain ( $396.95 USD )
Seat 2: bb ( $249.80 USD )
Seat 3: utg ( $318.85 USD )
Seat 4: mp ( $200.00 USD )
Seat 5: hero ( $516.25 USD )
Seat 6: btn ( $161.30 USD )
villain posts small blind [$1.00 USD].
bb posts big blind [$2.00 USD].

** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to hero [ Kc Kd ]
utg raises [$6.00 USD]
mp folds
hero calls [$6.00 USD]
btn calls [$6.00 USD]
villain raises [$27.00 USD]
bb folds
utg folds
hero raises [$60.00 USD]
btn folds
villain calls [$38.00 USD]

** Dealing Flop ** [ 9d, Qh, 6c ]
villain checks
hero bets [$96.00 USD]
villain raises [$192.00 USD]
hero raises [$354.25 USD]
villain calls [$138.95 USD]
hero wins $119.30 USD

** Dealing Turn ** [ Qd ]
** Dealing River ** [ 3s ]
villain shows [Qc, Ah ]
hero shows [Kc, Kd ]
villain wins $804.90 USD from main pot

my last post was awful

i hope this one is less bad.

last few weeks i've been trying to improve my motivation to do stuff in general and not waste time. making small improvements and constantly keeping them up is apparently the tough stuff. so i'm doing one thing at a time till they become habits. firstly, i really need to tone up a bit. so one thing i have been doing is 30mins working out a day. the test will come when i really don't want to, but when it's tough is when you achieve something. like that last lift of a dumbbell. (dumbbell is a funny word, just look at it!)

also, i really need to hurry up and finish writing my thesis. i've taken far too long with it, and need to finish it so i can concentrate on other ventures, not least poker. i think i have to move out of my flat. they say location, location and location are the three most important things about where you live, but i think they forgot the most important which is not living with a wally. he's not a cunt, but he has many features which are the complete opposite of things i aspire to such as thinking of others, energy efficiency (ie not having every light in the flat on at once, and then going out without turning them off), and many other things.
the next thing after this will be learning languages where i'll make a commitment to learn something every day.

more onto poker now, and it seems that i am going to set a goal and stick it on the right hand side. it will be hand based and money based. so far this year i'm down about $6k and i want to turn it into +$5k by end of september when i go supernova. more accurately, i will retain supernova but going supernova sounds much better.

my first session of the month was yesterday and it didn't start too well.

well, the only way is up, one hand at a time....

time flies

when you're doing nothing too it would seem

i did go to wimbledon last week, if just to break up the monotony of looking at x-ray diffraction spectra i don't understand. it rained. i tried to get into court 3 (i think to take a pic). I went in the wrong entrance, and just asked an honorary steward if i could take a picture. he asked if i was press (presumably because i had a camera) and i said no. he still let me go in. even before that point i wasn't sure what an honorary steward is. as far as i could tell from those that i saw, it meant over 60.

i also found a comedy blog. it's funny.

finally, the poker front, i think i lost again this month. the only results i checked were ev adjusted. turns out i lost $300 and 4 buy ins below ev. so a pretty rubbish month though in the middle of it i had a 20buy in upswing!
working on my volume is one positive, and got to 22k hands which is the most i've done for a very long time. aim is to get to 30k per month by the end of the year.
first half of the year has been terrible. no where near where i wanted to be in any terms. need to readjust lots of things to correct this. i have started by regaining motivation for learning and playing

last nights dreams

had a dream i was sitting on a little wall, a few hundred yards from a hospital, got my phone out and called for an ambulance since i couldn't move my neck for the pain was immense.
i woke up and couldn't move my neck for the pain was immense. took me about 20 minutes to work out how to get up. fear not though reader, for i have some deep heat which cures all known ailments excluding eye and groin injuries.

sadly, not all my dreams came true, i'm pretty sure i was being serviced by a lady in my dreams, which did not happen when i woke up.

writing

i never used to enjoy writing.
they made me do it in school. i never thought i came up with anything creative or original and i hated having to be so expressive. why use 100 words when 10 will do?
more recently i've come to really appreciate writing. not just the importance of being able to communicate clearly - and writing is a great tool for this, people can't interrupt you, and people aren't just waiting for their turn to speak - also for the expression and clarification of my own thoughts.

this blog has changed that. whilst i write for myself and have an interest in looking back and reading about the many mistakes i thought weren't mistakes, i am mindful that other people will read what i write. and even if it's only one person, this ensures that i take better care, and proof read it afterwards.

i enjoy finding humour in social situations. i enjoy letting my mind flow to explore different avenues of thought. and i enjoy writing about them and looking back occasionally.

i recently noticed that i became quite 'old' in a lot of my thoughts (for want of a better word). by this i mean a lack of patience and inflexibility in thinking, and a reduced willingness to learn in many situations. i like that i have caught this and am trying to regain some of the traits i have lost, including humility to a degree.

anyway, that's enough nonsense for one day. here's an image of a bird. a very sad picture.

ps i might do one of them poker blog things soon where i set fanciful new targets like 40k by the end of the year and try to track it regularly. first i need to start winning! lets hope this month finishes well - i've stopped tracking money and now track ev adjusted totals. weird i know, but i like that i know it's not the real amount since it doesn't affect me positively or negatively as much, yet it still quenches my thirst for results.

the great outdoors

there's nothing great about it. the worst part of owning a little bit of the great outdoors is that you have to take care of it. and it doesn't give much back in return other than a place for foxes to take care of any business they have.
worse still is when your lawnmower appears to be from the 90s. the 1890s. and falls apart when you try to move it in a direction other than forward in a straight line. and you have to stop every minute because the grass clogs up the exiting channel from the blade, waiting for you to stick your hand in to remove it..
next time, i wont wait 6 months to cut the grass. the weeds were bigger than me. i was using shears to chop down weeds and stinging nettles. i was shouting timber as they fell but they still often fell on my head. how inconsiderate. i did feel quite manly doing it though, i can now see why people cut down the rainforest.

poker? i don't want to talk about it. at least i broke even last month. lost 4 buy ins of ev in first 400 hands this month, never ending run of misery please end soon! i have even taken to studying properly and fixing leaks. i think i have many more to repair.

advertisements

does anyone else feel cheated when bad products have great adverts?
carlsberg and the orange cinema ads to name just two

sometimes i feel very hungry. then i remember tarrare and realise i'll never be that hungry. i'm not sure how his story isn't more known. maybe someday someone will make a film about it. then again, thinking about the content, probably not.

and one last pic for now...

the great carbon emission lie

there are lots of clever people in the world. many of them make a difference for the better. some even have positions to influence governments. and some make policies for governments. however, it would seem that most decisions are based purely on politics, rather than what is correct, and sometimes their decisions lead to the exact opposite of what they're supposed to be doing, yet everyone seems happy.

an example:
LED lighting. the new energy efficient lighting that will save the world from carbon emissions caused from wasteful tungsten filament bulbs! or are they?
well, they do run on a tiny amount of the power of bulbs. and they are much more efficient with much less heat wastage. and they last longer! but how are they made? well, they are made at around 100 times the cost of bulbs. that is real $ cost. which comes from the energy cost. which means over the course of the lifetime, from creation of product to when it is no longer working, they generate more carbon emissions globally. but because they are made outside of europe, european governments are generating less carbon emissions. for themselves. which is all they really want to do.

this is not a unique situation. if you know anyone who has a prius, don't tell them to find out what's in the battery of their car. so many rare earth elements, the mining cost of which no doubt exceeds the carbon emissions saved by using the battery.

answer: real clean fuels (and other energy sources) need to be researched. but whilst government policy only cares about their own country emissions, and researches need government funding, nothing will change.

politics. to paraphrase groucho marx, anyone who wants to be a politician should not be allowed to be a politician.

competition

natalie portman finally has some

go here for more

battered

so i played a game of football at watford. to say i got taken out by their striker would be an understatement. it was quite early in the game and it wasn't till i woke up on monday that i realised my body wasn't happy. muscles i didn't know i had were making any movement difficult. i tried to ice my muscles using tubs of ice cream but that didn't work because i just ate all the ice cream.

sitting in my chair to work became slightly more pained so i found a youtube video showing 4 stretches for tendons to help for carpal tunnel.
though i still think i need to buy a chair - any recommendations? might go to sit on a steelcase one in town. they're supposed to be pretty good.

McDonalds' Burger King

you've no doubt heard about the man who's eaten 25000 burgers from mcdonalds. A bit of a weirdo who records how many he buys, it appears he is romarioesque in that we only have his word to take for it.
The best part of the story is of course, the last line added by a special at the bbc (or perhaps a comedian?) "Doctors have said they do not recommend Mr Gorske's diet."
Did they actually go and ask more than one doctor whether it was a recommended diet?

Speaking of doctors i went to see a physio the other day for a troublesome ankle. trying to locate the pain by applying pressure and asking if it hurt wasn't going that well. i thought she was gonna give up cos nothing hurt. eventually though, she found the spot. i was impressed. especially after the GP i saw acted as though i was faking it. turns out a tendon is rubbish. i'll be playing football this weekend anyway, in a proper football stadium and after that will have to wait and see how long it takes to strengthen my ankle. hopefully not more than a few months....

well, google stole my comments

unreal. my last post garnered approximately 21 comments (error margin of +/- 20)
and then google destroys them. as everyone knows, all (most) bloggers say they write for themselves. (except of course i really do just write for myself). but comments are nice. they're the massage equivalent of a happy ending for my brain. and google stole them. i can't blame google, everyone likes a happy ending. except for the guy that wrote the book which the film the mist is based on.

anyways, i bought the mental game of poker. i heard some rave reviews. not believing anyone else i found some excerpts of the book online. read about 20 pages and there were 2/3 really great thoughts written there. i was worried about the style of the book. by that i mean, it's all very well having some great points but i wanted to know if there were exercises in the book so that you could teach yourself to put into practice the things you'd learned. i needn't have worried. it's hard work to set things up, and no doubt will be to maintain them too. examples of this are things like a warm up and cool down around sessions. it sounds ridiculous but it really improves your frame of mind away from the tables.
the book is one of those things that pays for itself almost instantly. i can't recommend it highly enough.
today i played 4 sessions. i don't think i've ever done that before. i didn't let earlier sessions affect later ones. one thing that helped was i stopped looking at money in hem after sessions. i now look just at ev adjusted results. this gives me the results i crave for, but it shows how i played better than actual results do. i also have completely lost the urge to look at results during a session. i finally understand that being able to perform your best is affected when you are worried about results and those two ideas should be kept separate by your brain.

here's my plagiarised thought of the day (brought to you via Prof Sadoway)
graphite is the stable form of carbon. diamond is the metastable form. So which should be the symbol of eternal love?

girls don't like boys, girls like cars and money

boys will laugh at girls when they're not funny.

apologies for quoting bad charlotte although i think there is merit to this second line. i have found in my brief existence that there aren't many funny girls. and last week i had the displeasure of meeting a girl, who not only thought she was funny, and seemed to think she was a stand up comedienne, she was also spectacularly unfunny. beyond the realms of what i thought capable. bruce once lamented that laughing at people who aren't funny so they don't feel bad is in fact the worst thing you can do for them since they continue to attempt humour. ever since then i have oft tried to avoid the nervous laughter that breaks the awkwardness. these days, i try to embrace the awkwardness or increase it through vacant stares. luckily, on this occasion there were a few of us subjected to some words lacking humour. it is a well known fact that when in company you laugh more than when alone. researches suggest it's due to bonding or to prove you understand the humour or something. either way, none of us even contemplated laughter.

this post really is just a public service announcement to let you know that i have hopefully stopped such a humourless career, thus saving you all from being afflicted with words i probably would wish upon my worst enemy.

after all that doom and gloom here's a treat:

2 leaks i have found so far

one is a long standing problem where i never fold when i get raised. this, i know, is a hallmark of a the fish.
two, when i don't know what to do in a hand, i often just click call. need to beat this one out of me.
3, i hate losing to fish and it drives me crazy when i keep losing over and over to people playing 75% of hands and more.
4, my attempts to do basic mental arithmetic are flawed through laziness more than a lack of ability.

swingathon

i still get caught up in short term and medium term variance too much.
it's tough not too when swings like this happen. but i need to not let it affect me!
at the two troughs of the graph i was over1k down for each session and almost stopped.

the second was brutal with consecutive hands against a tard getting tt vs jj and then jj vs qq whilst inbetween those hands, on another table against the same tard losing kk vs tt!

overall this whole year has been just terrible. need to fix it. this begins with 30mins study per day of my hands before playing any new ones. no study, no play.

summertime

i guess the hairdresser was right about no rain on the royal wedding day. i believe his sound arguments were appreciated by the weather.

of course, i don't really believe that. i would think that a more likely scenario is that he has a swiss heritage (and not the apparent greek one he shows off) and kept up to date with the happenings of Böögg, the explosive snowman, which as everyone knows, predicted a good summer this summer.
Furthermore, "Researchers from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology found that...it is a good indicator of global climate change."

a pine in the mouth

if i cared about google rankings i would have called this post pine mouth.
a few weeks back i started getting a funny aftertaste in my mouth. i couldn't really describe it very well. food would be delicious followed by an horrible after taste. a little metallic, but i don't usually eat metals so was hard to be sure. at first i thought the chocolate bar i ate was off. but i then noticed it with everything. so in this time of medical need i turned to the only viable source, google.
a brief search, lasting a mere 0.00223 seconds, brought up many words of information. a brief perusal of the first 2 pages (i used to do 3 but am getting more efficient) narrowed my condition down to two possible causes.
1)bloody mouth
i did not see any blood when brushing my teeth, nor was there any other signs of blood or possible causes such as fisticuffs or rugby (nor did i use fake blood)
thus, i ruled this cause unlikely
2)pine mouth
it would seem that some chinese pine nuts can cause a metallic aftertaste in some people. it occurs two days after ingestion (possibly due to EHR according to wiki) and many googlers said it could last up to two weeks! and two days ago i had eaten some pine nuts - from china!

eating became more of a chore than usual. furthermore, i kept forgetting i had this condition so would eat things like cheese sand witches and think they were very off, throw it away, and then remember it was just my tasting inabilities.

someone mentioned to me today that kanu still plays football. it reminded me of my second original joke, which my brain made up subconsciously, the day after he missed a penalty for arsenal

roses are red
violets are blue
i can score a penalty
kanu?

off to play some pokers now. realise i hadn't done an update for ages. thats how bad it was going. i'm beginning to turn a corner and then last friday all the american sea creatures (fishes and sharkes) got caught in a net of bureaucracy. it's a pretty stupid situation and like all things political, getting stupid things reversed takes a stupidly long amount of time.

hopefully i can suck all the money out the sea before they return (don't worry, that's a joke, the ice caps are melting so we'll all just end up drowning)

how people find my blog

a yahoo user found me by typing "pma positive mental attitude kriss akabusi advert"
i was quite pleased i was found using those terms till i got to the last three words.
but they have nothing on a google user who found me by typing "is everyone on omegle wanking"
i understand this is a tough question to answer because omegle only lets you type and not see your opponent (unlike chat roulette i am told)
however, i can confirm, should they be interested, that the answer is yes.

a week of mentals

the past week has seen the meetings of new mentals and conclusion of old mentals.

the story begins many months ago when i was driving. i wasn't moving at the time, but stationary in my car, waiting at a junction, looking to the right to avoid driving into other cars. alas, other drivers on the road do not share my idealistic driving philosophies and one of these creatures used my car to stop their own. i hit my head on the window but luckily no lasting damage was done to me. (maybe there was but it would be probably be hard to tell)
i got out my car to survey the destruction to find that her car was fine and mine had it's bodywork damaged. the lady who hit me said nothing. literally nothing. no sorry, no are you ok, no comments about any damage, no accepting responsibility. having avoided these driving philistines all my life i wasn't aware how exactly to deal with the situation. i only took her details. in future, i will always be writing a statement of accepting responsibility and getting them to sign it.
i asked her to pay for the damage, telling her to give me £250 in cash to cover the respraying, assuming there is no further damage after visiting the garage. she didn't say much back. surprisingly. it's not like she had a shocked expression on her face either. i got the impression that this was a common occurrence for her.
i went to my mechanic and he said there was no further damage to the car. i called her to inform her of her luck. and this is where the fun started. she wanted quotes and receipts and confirmations and to pay the garage directly and all sorts of nonsense. it was as though i was doing her a favour by getting cash from her and avoiding the insurance company. i had enough and told her, no - you have your quote, you pay me, not the garage, no receipts or they'll charge more. she agreed. if she didn't i was just going to go through insurance.
this happened months ago and she finally paid last week. my favourite moment was when she sent an email confirming she would pay the quote. she started it by saying "without prejudice"
i'm no lawyer but that is generally reserved for litigation correspondence when someone is making an offer by mail that later can't be brought as evidence before a judge. i don't think many insurance claims for under £400 have ever made it to a judge.
she was mental.

yesterday i met two more mentals.
1) i felt sorry for this one. she was old, and old people like to talk. she talked about all the buses lined up in a row. "i've never seen so many. and i've been coming here for years!" i pretty much got her family history after that. it's quite difficult to leave these people. though i shouldn't feel so bad when i do abruptly leave, they probably don't notice.
2) the mental it's ok to laugh at. hairdresser. it started sensibly, commenting that it's impossible to predict the weather more than a couple of days ahead. and definitely not forecasts for the summer. i was about to agree with his point but couldn't get a word in. he continued:
of course, it's the royal wedding coming up. it will be sunny on that day. the weathermen make sure they get it right. the royals always choose good weather for their weddings and funerals. imagine all those people outside in the pouring rain.

i was gobsmacked. not only are weatherman in fact able to get long range forecasts accurate 'when it's important' eg events such as royal weddings, they don't apparently try for anything else. furthermore, for funerals, the royal family also consult weathermen about when the best time to die is. they wouldn't want their subjects getting wet whilst mourning their beloved rulers.

*i realise i wrote weatherman and not weatherperson. i don't even know if thats a term. also weatherman is quicker to type and weatherperson sounds odd. no one complains when one writes mankind do they? if they did, i think it says more about the complainee than anything else.

story of the day

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-12968538

shocker! politician lies!
calls in radio station to support himself pretending to not be himself after calling as himself and being told he couldn't take part since he was a politician.
like someone making 4 forum identities all vouching for the op. ha.

my favourite two things about this story are when the person who appears to be his boss backs him in public by saying
"I think it was a genuine mistake, I don't think it was deceit and lies."

erm, it definitely was lies and deceit. it may also have been a mistake but to say it's not a lie/deceit is like saying i don't think his picture on that website makes him look at all like a ladyboy. which was my other favourite part of the story. i honestly thought he was in fancy dress when i saw that picture.

twitter

i still don't get it. i use it primarily for ease of getting thoughts down. for on my phone i have 'dragon dictation' which means i can talk to my phone and it will make the words in written form. and usually correctly! it says it understands names in my phonebook but i haven't yet found that to be true. though i was using a nickname based on a non existent word. however, that's what i thought it means, surely real names like, Steve or Leopold, are already understood.

Anyway, as i was saying, i can talk to my phone then push two buttons and it posts to twitter. this is the kind of laziness that i like. i call it efficiency.

it helps me get down fleeting thoughts which otherwise would be lost to the ether. i don't really like repeating myself but thoughts include:
how the northern lights were explained before science cos they look mental in pictures
how i don't mind the neighbours playing piano. well, i wouldn't mind if they weren't so terrible
and whilst waiting in the gp that patients need patience. and what would the people who have problems spelling those words the right way round do if they had that same thought?

this post in other words: i am soul destroying;y awful at pokers. i lost lots. worst. month. ever. busto account. deposit money. start all over again.

adventurous creatures and my massive failings. in reverse order

so my internet kept dropping whilst playing which annoyed me. i mentioned this a few times to o2 previously, and the other weekend it was every half hour so i called them again on monday. this time, instead of saying it's my fault they say, "known issue with the router, we'll upgrade it, will happen within 72 hours"
brilliant. thanks for being wring lots of times before and not actually looking into it and not letting me know when you did find a problem or at least upgrading it automatically.

that however, is the least of my worries. i have been haemorrhaging money at a fantastic rate and have begun to question whether i know what i'm doing in the slightest. i know small sample, variance, etc etc but it's difficult not to just think i'll never make enough to make this a worthwhile pursuit. this is my greatest concern. long term results speak louder than my own ego and this scares me.
due to get a 4k bonus soon so will take proper stock after that.
at the end of the day, i have just been making way too many mistakes. if i can't sustain good play for many days and months on end i should put efforts into making monies in other ways. that was always the plan, the was just to make money to invest in other things.
still, gonna get back on the horse at the weekend

also gonna start posting more often. been slack of late. so nature got me back to posting. i knew i shouldn't have watched episode 8 of the 'human planet : cities'.
yesterday i saw a very well fed rat walking towards me. i called it splinter it was that big. it ran away when i took my camera phone out. two days ago as i walked out my flat main front door i spotted an enormous creature was walking towards me. at first i thought it was a cockroach (ok, so it wasn't enormous but noticeably big when i saw it in my peripheral vision) but then i saw it was a spider. aren't they supposed to run away from humans? i guess they're so used to us they don't any more. as if to prove this point to me, last night i was touching myself inappropriately (and lazily enough that my trousers were only as far down as a gangster rapper) when i saw a spider walking along my thigh mere inches from my throbbing member. luckily, i'd already been to the toilet a few minutes earlier.

a post in songs

1) the beast of tilt returneth.



what happens when you lose everything? you just start again. you start all over again.

2) just watched the fighter. great film. every time i see mark wahlberg i see a reflection of vinny chase.




3) this song, i just like. makes me sad and happy at the same time.


4)no video, but i think i've found a flaw in the royal mail recorded delivery system. lets say i purchase an item off ebay. it gets sent recorded delivery to me. post man pat takes it to a house up the road instead. the lady who lives there signs for it. and here is the flaw:
it will look to royal mail like it was signed at the correct address and said lady keeps the package.
luckily, this lady had no desire for football gloves and delivered them to me today instead of keeping them. would have been tough to track her down.

eagle eyes

eagle eyed critical readers such as myself will have noted that the last post had 2 glaring errors.
error 1) only went up to 100
error 2) forgot to mention the greatest timewaster of all time - the interweb!

luckily, these two errors cancel out as they meet in unification, unlike matter antimatter interactions and more like the carnal meeting of two opposite sex cross dressers. both are wrong, yet when they come together it still works in a way that still doesn't seem quite right. not that there's anything wrong with it. (there is). (there isn't).

101 things to do to avoid writing for work with a distant deadline

1. tidy room thoroughly
2. take out the rubbish
3. take out more rubbish
4. hand wash keeper's top for the first time in >1 year
5. do laundry
6. watch latest episode of house
7. avoid playing ps3 till after 7pm when you'll feel less guilty
8. read forums
9. write a blog, perhaps post more frequently
10. work out, preferably twice a day
11. eat (more often)
12. drink (non alcoholic drinks, more often)
13. side effect of 11/12, see nature more often
14. take longer in food preparation

....

98. read more books
99. call people, just to chat
100. wake up late

another gender equality oddity

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12606610

this story says insurance companies cannot base their pricing on gender. they essentially have to ignore that in their statistics and do equal pricing. so obviously this won't mean they lose money, but will slyly gain some instead.
some men will gain, some women will lose, overall common sense will lose massively. i don't understand why, if this is the case, it is still ok to discriminate pricing on age, marital status etc

it appears that once again people equate equality with being the same. much as people have a hard time differentiating between envy and hatred. often people feel envy and it all channels to hatred. doesn't make sense to me. if you see someone doing something well, something you wish you could do, it should channel you to better yourself to become like them in the aspects you envy/admire. eg how so many people can hate celebrities without ever knowing/meeting them is amazing.

hands

i don't post many hands, i dunno how interesting it is. i think these are the two biggest pots of the year, since i've moved down to 1/2. one was at regular 200 buy in table. t'other was at a deep table. both hands played out perfectly, just as i'd envisaged when making each bet/call.

Seat 6 is the button
Seat 1: SB ( $226.50 USD )
Seat 2: BB ( $200.00 USD )
Seat 3: utg ( $208.00 USD )
Seat 4: Hero ( $358.20 USD )
Seat 5: WHALE ( $383.25 USD )
Seat 6: BTN ( $200.00 USD )
SB posts small blind [$1.00 USD].
BB posts big blind [$2.00 USD].

** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Hero [ Qc Kh ]
utg folds
Hero raises [$6.00 USD]
WHALE calls [$6.00 USD]
BTN raises [$25.00 USD]
SB folds
BB folds
Hero raises [$62.00 USD]
WHALE calls [$62.00 USD]
BTN folds

** Dealing Flop ** [ Qs, 7s, 2s ]
Hero checks
WHALE bets [$72.00 USD]
Hero calls [$72.00 USD]

** Dealing Turn ** [ 5d ]
Hero bets [$218.20 USD]
WHALE calls [$218.20 USD]

** Dealing River ** [ Ad ]

Hero shows [Qc, Kh ]
WHALE shows [5c, As ]
WHALE wins $741.40 USD from main pot


Seat 4 is the button
Seat 1: agg reg ( $692.80 USD )
Seat 2: mp ( $547.65 USD )
Seat 3: fishy ( $261.00 USD )
Seat 4: Hero ( $487.00 USD )
Seat 5: SB ( $407.35 USD )
Seat 6: BB ( $455.05 USD )
SB posts small blind [$1.00 USD].
BB posts big blind [$2.00 USD].
agg reg posts ante of [$0.40 USD].
mp posts ante of [$0.40 USD].
fishy posts ante of [$0.40 USD].
Hero posts ante of [$0.40 USD].
SB posts ante of [$0.40 USD].
BB posts ante of [$0.40 USD].

** Dealing down cards **
Dealt to Hero [ Ah Ac ]
agg reg raises [$6.00 USD]
mp folds
fishy raises [$18.00 USD]
Hero calls [$18.00 USD]
SB calls [$17.00 USD]
BB calls [$16.00 USD]
agg reg raises [$60.00 USD]
fishy folds
Hero raises [$116.00 USD]
SB folds
BB folds
agg reg raises [$626.40 USD]
Hero calls [$352.60 USD]
agg reg wins $205.80 USD

** Dealing Flop ** [ 4c, 3h, 7s ]
** Dealing Turn ** [ Qh ]
** Dealing River ** [ 8c ]

agg reg shows [Jc, Js ]
Hero shows [Ah, Ac ]
Hero wins $1026.60 USD from main pot

things i've learnt to apply to life

specifically, things from poker.
i think the correct term is transferable skills. and i also think that the ones i pick up from poker are ones that i will find easy to apply to other aspects since they are in a very pure form when playing poker. and these are things that when you do them better your see the results.

there is a long list, ones i once considered adding to my cv. i may have even blogged about it before. i think it would be useful to keep them all in one place. but to start, i will just write some of the most recent ones that cropped up in my mind here.

responsibility
by this i mean taking responsibility for your results. "how is it possible to do this in a game where luck is so heavily involved like poker?" i hear you cry.
well, it is. accepting that you are responsible for your results is the first step to being able to improve. believing that you have the ability to create the results you desire is important, not just in poker, but quite evidently in life too. and i wouldn't hesitate to say that there is a large slice of fortune there too.
and one of my favourite quotes is by golfer Gary Player "The more i practice, the luckier i get"

mental blocks

on my betfair account many moons ago, i would run £50 up to £1k before promptly losing chunks. i tried many things to correct this such as withdrawing amounts etc, but could never significantly get past it. i still don't know why, but i do know that i now longer have any fears or lack of self belief about breaking that barrier and going past £2k. maybe it just took practice or maybe a bunch of other factors combined.
this transfers to life since i think there are many self imposed blocks that i place upon myself. and most of them aren't real but pigments of my imagination. much as henry ford was a terrible human being he was right when he said "whether you think you can, or think you can't. you're right."

auto pilot

this one will be familiar to any poker player. playing without really concentrating, surfing the tinternet, watching telly, talking on the phone, or just not really paying attention to what you're doing. all give you poor results. sometimes, you can even win when playing on autopilot, but really, you know how terrible it is for your results. if you're gonna do something, commit to it, and do it properly. if you're going spend 2 hours playing, either play to the best of your ability or do something else.
i don't think this is too hard a concept to apply to real life. make sure you know what you're doing and why you're doing it, and then commit fully to it - don't be on auto pilot, simple reacting to what happens around you; you are the one in control.

poker epiphany #16.2

i went to play live last night. once again i am reminded not only how much i don't like it, but also how bad i am at it.
afterwards i was quite depressed. and annoyed with myself. and a wee bit angry. all at the same time. and then this afternoon i started playing a little bit with a focus on decision making. I have really got to learn to take all this very seriously else i will be resigned to getting a job in the not too distant future. and this was when i realised something which made me happy when playing. something really obvious, but i hadn't put two and two together.
everyone knows that winning or losing, in the long run, is based on making the correct decision. and so i always tried to judge my play on whether or not i'd made the correct decision. but i'd always based my happiness on winning/losing. and it doesn't really make sense. and it's something really obvious but i'd just been reacting to winning/losing by the first thing that came to mind (happiness) instead of how i want to react.

of course, i'd always got annoyed with myself for making mistakes too, but never been happy with making the right decision. this should be obvious to everyone, it's kinda obvious to me, but i like this way of thinking about things. this might even be the post i was looking for to reread before i start each session. so that i know exactly what i want to be focussing.

as for playing live, saw some amazing beats, and comments. the best by far was all combined into one hand. on an a82 all spade board, a massive whale who bet with nothing and called with any pair/draw got all in vs a standard live player, with a9 against standard's 83ss.
turn9. river a.
table erupts in headshakes and disbelief with but one man banging the table in glee.
after this dies down, a kid on my right says nice hand, not loud enough for the winner of the hand to hear, but close enough so that the loser could. the guy who lost understandably, doesn't take it too well, saying "not actually a nice hand was it?"
kid replies, "no, but you're supposed to say that to the winning hand aren't you?"

internet commentators

much as i wrote this blog for me, it's always nice to get comments.
however, i can understand why you's wouldn't want to. it was bruce who once quipped that "..as everyone knows youtube commentators are the lowest forms of intelligence"

i have written many an article on the complete lack of thought that goes into many a bbc article. this is often the journalist, though not infrequently the people they quote. i have of course, always avoided reading the general public's opinions because whilst as a group the conclusion can be sensible, individuals' thoughts are alarmingly alarming.
and sometimes it's hard to tell when they joking, mostly because i'm hoping they're not serious more than anything else.

this article is about crocodiles eating you. as some comments rightly point out, the whole article is retarded by saying the best way of not getting eaten is going nowhere near them. so stupid on a few levels. not least because the article is titled "How do you fight off a crocodile?"

and then the comments section. early on, a comment worthy of youtube intellect appears, and doesn't seem to be anything other than serious. remember, this is on an article about how to defend yourself when a crocodile is about to kill you:
"...I don't think poking it in the eye is the best idea. You do that your going to drive it mad, because its in pain and the last think you want to do is drive a man eating creature with 13 tones per square inch gob mad."

reading just that part it actually seems quite humorous, although i think that's just because it's taken out of context. and once again, i'm hoping it's a very witty person who has caught me out, because the alternative is so disappointing.

award time

an early contender for moron of the year goes to this lady
she, an employee for the department of transport, complained that messages she posted on twitter were used by journalists. she expected them to be private. obviously a ruling was provided that they are in the public domain. no doubt a decent waste of taxpayer money was wasted somewhere trying to defend her idiocy.

something else accidentally moronic happened today. i sky plus'd match of the day and went to watch it. as is usually the case, the programme begins recording at the end of the previous one, so you catch the last minute or two of the preceding one, which in this instance was the news. as usual, the last news item is sport, and the first thing that i heard when starting the programme was hearing the newsreader finish saying,
(if you don't want to know the scores)
"look away now..."
together with an image of all the day's results.

had another epiphany yesterday when losing a bunch of money. i often berate myself when losing money for making mistakes and bad calls. much as i try to avoid results based thinking there is a huge bias when looking at results which involve the calls that you make because you don't see the results from the times that you fold.
when i make a good call i assume it will be correct every time and bad calls are wrong every time. i don't think it's as simple as that but even after the event it's occasionally hard to know definitively whether what i've done is + or - ev.
and i shouldn't abuse myself so much. except when i've made stupid mistakes which i still seem to do an awful lot of. need to focus on correcting that and having better plans for hands when i invoke the call button. at least i'm worrying less about winning and losing. even though i need to pay rent!

also, got an hdmi cable for my ps3, and it's like my eyes are now open. fifa is much more beautiful! all for the princely sum of 37 great british pennies + delivery. and now i must sleep.

know thyself

i think it was sun tzu who said something like "know your enemy and know yourself and you'll win every battle"

like a lot of things i've been learning about recently, there is one more obvious step beyond this quote, which is that you need to be able to apply it. further, i think that the application of this is quite interesting.
i know myself, but recently i began thinking about really understanding what causes me frustration (especially at the tables) and most importantly, knowing how to deal with it in a way that will please my brain.
so this month i've been setting out to play 1000 hands, and i keep an eye on the number of hands played (not too frequently) and make little milestones in my head. so i notice when i'm 1/3 of the way through, half way through, two thirds of way through and also when i reach the 1k mark. then i decide how i'm feeling and whether to continue.
i find these milestones help relax me into not doing anything rash. this has kinda helped my overall play.

playing a bit of football and tennis recently and i think i've tweaked my hernia. i assume this is possible since i've done it before and it took a couple of weeks of rest to recover. whenever i hear hernia, i assume it's a terrible injury but that's just a pavlovian response i think.

on a related but an unrelated note i tried to call my gp today at 3pm. they'd already closed. what if i was ill!?

i wasn't though. but when i was relaxing on the throne i realised that i'm pretty sure the smartphone was invented by someone bored of reading the toothpaste ingredients for the umpteenth time whilst sitting on the toilet.

great success!

not really on the poker results front.
as is clear from my last post, i have what seems to be the football pundit mentality: you're only as good as your last result.
so regardless of whether you've won 7 in a row before throwing away a four goal lead, or you're bottom of the league and beat the league leaders your season's performance isn't as important as your last game. clearly, this is utter nonsense. though obviously it's more difficult when analysing your own performance, when there is no team involved. there is just variance.

anyway, i stopped feeling sorry for myself when i woke up the next day. that was a success. but the great success just followed this evening's session where i completely forgot to check my results till just now.

i need to concentrate and run good again as i need to withdraw some more money for rent. not much else been happening. other than a minor car crash. i was waiting (stationary!) at a junction to join a road, woman drove straight into my car. brilliant. when i was getting her details she seemed completely unfazed by the whole experience because i figured she was either out of bounds (an actual retard), giving me false details or has done this before lots of times. i was going with c.

last thought for today, i was watching the superbowl last night (first half till i couldn't stay awake any longer) and was most impressed by the coin toss ceremony. more accurately, the way the packers' fans celebrated winning with the stadium erupting in cheers!
finally, a statistic for the superbowl - the nfc team has won the coin toss for the last 14 games! variance!!

worst run i've ever been on

i would first like to note the general tendencies of the last 4 sessions
hands = 6.5k
$2k below all in ev
went to showdown, below average in 3/4 sessions
won at showdown, well below average in 4/4 sessions
premiums dealt, aa only dealt less often than 2 other pocket pairs.
AKs less often than all but 2 other Axs
Ako less often than every other Ax
today was very depressing when within a few hands i flopped bottom set, got it in against an overpair and lost both times. should have known it would be bad when first hand got aipf with kk vs jj
8 buyins down in ev just today!
it's not helped that my play has been average at best for this month. this is the only thing i can control so this is where my focus will lie.
just hope i don't have to deposit money, and can actually win in february. one k down in january so need to reach 11k before i will go back to 2/4. still hoping to reach this by end of march. should reach a 4k bonus by end of march but that will not be included in the 10k total.

SEXism

this is what grinds my gears about sexism. whilst most people in the western world (under that age where you're seemingly encouraged to be racist) are against it, the people most vocally supporting it can be retarded.
there are two main issues i have. firstly, is that rather than wanting equality, the peoples who were 'wronged' want to be in more power to make up for it. as everyone should know, two wrongs don't make a right. just cos you make a mistake on the turn, doesn't mean you should compound it on the river.
the second thing that really drives me barmy (or used to, now i realise i no longer need to choose to feel rage at the idiocy of others) is that no one seems to understand that equality doesn't mean you are the same. the best example i can think of is that of identical twins. yes, they look the same, and yes you should treat them equally (or so i'm told, i don't have any) but it doesn't mean that you should treat them the same. they are different people!
similarly, men and women should be treated equally and fairly, which does not equate to treating them the same.

the reason i have posted about this has come about due to the dinosaur comments made by sky sports presenters about a female lines(wo)man / assistant ref. whilst i may have had a similar thought in my head along the lines of 'lol she doesn't know the offside rule' i didn't say it out loud. and i wasn't even in a studio. with a microphone i had left on.
(i also enjoy the apologies that come following these types of incidences where they never actually say sorry for their opinions; it seems they are entierly sorry for being caught).

but there follows a comment made by a lady here stating the game needs more women refs. whilst that sentiment is not one of contention, the comment that follows is retarded.

"But when they're appointed, sadly, they'll get the same abuse as their male colleagues."

lol. if you want equality, don't complain when they get abuse from fans. they aren't getting it for being women, but for being wankers and needing glasses. whilst the fact that no refs should be getting abuse is a valid one, it has nothing to do with sexism and if that's what they are trying to say in this article it is confusing, irrelevant to have added, and i apologise for not understanding.

disclaimer: as it comes from a journalist the quotes are likely to be made up or taken out of context.

danny trejo

my door has no doorbell. well, it has a doorbell which doesn't work. so the other morning someone is banging on the door. i know it's gonna be a delivery since they're the only people who visit unexpectedly. i open the door without looking through the peephole and i see this guy looking at me

he asks to come in. i say no. so he pulls out a knife. i don't say "that's not a knife, THIS is a knife" because i am a little scared and also not holding a knife. i manage to get him in the bathroom and i close the door from the outside. i'm not sure how this confused him but it gave me time to get my phone and keys from my room, get out the flat and lock him in. i call the police and they say they have no one around to help. even though there's someone thieving me whilst i talk to them! as i'm about to say, don't worry, i've found a gun and i'll go deal with it (based on a funny joke, i expect that will get them to show up) i am woken up from that dream by a banging on the door. i decided not to answer it. just in case.

iplayer

hopefully this post will rank up my blog when people search for iplayer.
iplayer makes me laugh almost every time i watch something on it. they have this warning which stops youngsters watching inappropriate material where you have to click a button to say you're over 16. how will a 5 year old get past such stringent measures? then again, i'm reliably informed that porn sites have the same strict security measures.

clouds

took this awesome picture. should definitely share it with the world. twas right after a short but violent lighting and thunder storm. the contrast in clouds and the colours as the sun sets are magnificent.

boiler broke down over the weekend. the worst part is having to wake up early to let the plumbers in to fix it. it's funny how many coincidences have occurred with this. Firstly, the hot water was on, downstairs flat did some gas works and then the boiler broke. apparently, unrelated. i'm not so sure.
secondly, with new boiler installed, kitchen sink tap drips. again, i'm told that it is unrelated.
like all trades, i can't really argue with these people and say it's rather a convenient excuse for you not to do any more work. not just because they know lots and i know nothing but also because i want them to finish the job well.

M&S

actually, just M. punishing myself.
having been playing really badly for the last few months of last year so i've dropped down a stake to repair my mind. it's not going particularly well. there are lots of things i'm doing badly. i really have to think about things better whilst playing. i slowly think i'm getting there. i'm gonna stay at 1/2 for at least 20k hands i reckon. maybe more. maybe till i get to $10k.
also beginning to worry that i will begin to need more money soon. this will lead to an increase in play rather than getting a job just yet i hope! i've been really bad at organising my time properly and this will change.
one thing i've always wanted in order to improve my life is a whiteboard. i finally inherited one this week. so far it contains my new fitness regime (currently unfilled in as i haven't started yet. oops.) and also an imitation escher diagram, the devil fork. so it's working out well so far.

was about to eat a chocolate but don't see the point as i'm about to brush my teeth and go to sleep. eating chocolate now would feel like a waste since i wouldn't get to savour the flavour in my mouth.

and finally, the alarm just went off in my roommate's room. it's 330am. and he's not getting up for a work shift. his lady friend is with him. and he sets the alarm so that he can kick her out.

healthy eating

in not a bid to get healthier i have begun eating more oranges. it's simply that i choose them over chocolate at the moment since they are nearer. i think i usually go for chocolate because it never involves washing/peeling not eating parts of it along with all the other hassles of eating fruit.

and i just lost my train of thought after having to take another ladybird out my room. both red with black spots. i remember seeing yellow ones when i was younger and being amazed. i still get amazed when i see new animals. i only found out about the okapi a few years ago and then shortly afterwards i saw one in london zoo!

hmm, another ladybird flying around my lamp like a fly on crack.

just went outside in the rain to wash my car. i thought it was a great idea, saves me taking a bucket, and saves water. sadly, there wasn't enough rain. and i need to t-cut and polish and wax my car which you can't do in the rain, or direct sunlight either. lucky i live in england where it's usually overcast.

weird dreams

first of all one that i can't remember whether it was a memory from a film or a dream? one guy facing another rips out his septum. sounds like it could be from a film. except he then places it in his nose where his septum should be. I'm unclear as to whether it was to replace one that he was missing, or in addition to an existing one.
then i have had an F1 dream where i was out on a sunday so spent the day not checking the bbc website to avoid knowing the result so i could watch it later (disclaimer: i have never and will never do this!) except i part checked the results accidentally and when i started watching the replay on iplayer i realised it was boring so just found out the results. vettel won and webber was knocked out. however, the weird part is that just as they were lining up on the grid, a coded messages was sent to the red bull drivers about elephants being cold. martin brundle later explained that this meant the team decided to not support both drivers equally, but have vettel as number 1, and webber as number 2. stranger still is that i think team orders are now allowed.

went for a run yesterday to try to get a bit fitter. i used to be able to jog for quite some time. yesterday i ran to the next tube station. the way back was uphill and almost killed me. i kept having to stop. except at one point, a terribly long hill, i overtook a lady pushing a pram going at an incredible rate (her, not me). I wanted to pause for breath but felt a bit embarrassed lest she overtake me so had to keep going. maybe i should employ her as my motivational coach.

material provided for me

i think writing this blog more often will force the universe into providing me material. not long after my previous post i went out and stopped off on the way home to pick up dinner in the form of a kebab. (flafel actually). whilst waiting, a cross-eyed chinese dude walks in, with satchel, and asks if anyone wants a DVD. This reminded me of the time about 10 years ago playing 5-a-side when someone i barely knew who we were playing with asks my friend "do you like DVDs?"
this was his opening gambit into "would you like to buy a film off me?"
brilliant. we still laugh about it to this day.
so anyway, i was thinking that thanks to the internet this chinese dude no longer makes any money since if you're gonna steal a film, you might as well steal it for free rather than a small fee. but no! the guy working in this shop must never have heard of the internet as he requested a film.

estate agents

no one likes them. not even their mothers. i recently been helping someone move flat and the agency are run by morons. a lot of little things annoyed me about them such as not cleaning the flat properly, leaving things broken etc but the worst was their blatant flouting of the law when they decided to finally deliver some furniture. i asked them for at least 30 mins notice, which is quite reasonable when they're supposed to give 24 hours. i asked in writing and on the phone. of course, they gave me 5 mins notice, and when i turned up 7 minutes later it was all delivered. this was pretty much the final straw so i sent them an email saying how it was disappointing and shouldn't happen again. i finished it with the sentence

Further, I would like the name, number and email address of the manager of your 'agency' to make an appointment and register my displeasure.

I sent it on Friday, since it happened Thursday afternoon. A minute later i get a phone call from one of the disgruntled mongs. who firstly tells me he is the owner/manager (i laughed on the inside) and that he doesnt like receiving "these sorts of emails on a Friday afternoon" (i laughed a little on the ouside). Avoiding asking him if it were better that I should send future ones on Monday mornings he launched into some tirade or other. sadly, the moral of this story is that they are now relatively accommodating. I find it disappointing that they should only choose to do this when people have to complain after being wronged. i remember when i had a job as a finance department, I always tried to treat the nicer customers better than the horrible complaining ones.

google searches

lots of people found me thanks to vinny chase.
but someone found me using the less well used search term:
"i would love to meet you, get to know you and show you round the flat so that you can see what you are renting but i have been having problems with ti" which had visits = 1.

i also had the search term "mudwig blogs" with visits = 0
which i think is amazing. no people got to my blog searching google for that. i wonder what other terms people didn't search to get to my blog.

I would also like to have a belated party to myself for reaching 20 followers. you may see it says 21 but one is me. which doesn't count. and i only joined so that it would reach 10 as a nice round number instead of nine. i'm still more a fan of popular and better blogs.

i've taken to doing two things to improve my poker playing. firstly i've withdrawn some monies so dropped to 1/2 to build ip money and confidence. secondly i have written some notes which say
"SIT DOWN
BREATHE
RELAX"
i have this covering my hem shortcut so i can't play without reading this. i forgot this and dropped 5 buy ins today. then i remembered and won them back. i fear it was more due to luck than breathing but hopefully my brain will think otherwise and i'll condition myself to meditate for 2 minutes each time before playing.

also, i was thinking of blogging every day, or every other day. i would have to make it funnier. which is a lot of pressure. but also don't know if any one reads it that frequently to make it worthwhile?

once again

firstly, an article i've been meaning to post for a while. it elegantly shows journalistic standards. though it does come from the daily mail which is hardly a bastion of intelligence.
why is this article so retarded? in the penultimate paragraph it states
"The player, who cost £5million in August,..."
though you may have noticed the caption for the first photograph says
"Family affair: Konchesky has failed to win over the Kop since his £4m move"
perhaps a simple typo neither the author or sub-editor noticed. or perhaps they make up the transfer figures half the time. or maybe they wanted to cover more bases. whatever the reason, it's pretty slack.

right now, i have more pressing concerns. i once again find myself needing the toilet. alas, my flatmate who didn't want two bathrooms when we were looking for places to reside is in the shower. and even if i knock whilst about to piss myself (not through laughing) he won't hear since the radio is on at full volume. i know this because i can hear magic fm (which, if you've never heard of it, you're lucky as it's terrible) and it wasn't till after i moved in he told me how he likes long showers. really long prune inducing showers. i think people started pissing in bottles or sinks because their housemates didn't leave the bathroom, especially in the mornings. then they got used to it so continued to do it when driving or working at the computer. and as society gets more crowded and the shower to person ration decreases and people get lazier it'll probably become more acceptable.

the other day i went to shower only to discover my shower gel had been thrown away. by him. the irony was that he left his empty bottles in there for months, yet throws mine out before it's finished?!

and today's final gripe is that he has filled up the 250Gb sky+ hard drive with simpsons. he then deleted all the tv (two shows of 8 episodes) i had saved; luckily i'd watched them. thus he could completely fill up the hard drive with simpsons that he has seen before and/or doesn't watch now.

get cape wear cape fly had a song that went "you are not your job, you are not the clothes you wear, you are the words that leave your mouth, so speak up..."
as a doctor i would have expected him to be unselfish, but it appears that you are in no way a reflection of your job. which is strange because one of the first things you usually ask when meeting someone is "what do you do?"
now i feel this is rather a redundant question and perhaps i should start asking people "what are you like?"

i will choose to not be annoyed by any of this. though it is much tougher than i anticipated, as it is how i imagine gonorrhoea to be - a constant source of irritation.

proactive

lsat year i think i said how the new year was irrelevant to me, and the only reason i use it for poker results is for convenience with tracking software. i still stand by that. i preface the following post with that as a disclaimer since the following may appear as a resolution of some sort, but it's not. well, it is, but it's nothing to do with a new year, it's because i starting reading the 7 habits of highly effective people. i started a long time ago, but got bored after the intro section. on saturday i returned to it, reading section 1. the first thing that struck me was how many of the major points it mentions, i had learnt through poker. for example, there was a little bit about projecting your thoughts onto others as a default way of thinking. (coincidentally, i read on article on this from a writer on betfair just days earlier)

however, one thing i have learned which wasn't mentioned in this book was the difference between being told something, understanding it and being able to apply it. eg, one of the first things i heard about in poker was it's a game for the long run. immediately, it is clear that this is true. sadly, it took many many hours of play to understand this, and even longer to be able to properly apply it to my thought process and play.

i found it easy to autopilot when playing and not concentrating on applying any new fixes to my game until they become a part of my autopilot process. and i find it can be very easy to fall back on bad habits such as this. i'm pretty sure that this can also be applied to real life.

i use the term autopiloting, as it's a familiar one when playing lots of tables of poker. without full dedication to each table (i find 3 the maximum i can play with an almost full dedication to all) a lot of the processes in making decisions become more automated. and then you are playing a reactive game rather than a proactive one. this is what i have taken from the first chapter of the book. whilst this method is fine for poker, because my hourly rate increases (and the hourly rate is the most important thing to me), this process is not good in life in general.
the second thing i have taken from this chapter is that all your actions are done by your choice. again, this is almost too obvious a thought, but the implications when you understand and then apply it, are vast. whilst you cannot control what happens to you, you can control your response. aside from physical pain, you can control your response. it may not be easy but it should always possible. i find all i have to do is remember i have a choice. when driving, if the schmohogs in front are driving terribly, i am learning to think "i don't need to get annoyed by them". getting annoyed doesn't help. (an even more favourite saying of mine is now "change the things i can control, accept the things i can't, and have the wisdom to tell the difference").

sometimes it's really hard to not just react to others even when you know you have a choice. i find it easier for now to reframe my thoughts prior to choosing to not be annoyed. so instead of thinking the retard driver is a retard but not to be annoyed, i decide instead to praise my own driving for anticipating their idiocy, and that i once again managed to survive on onslaught of drivers who seem to be attempting to kill me.

i will also apply this to when i play poker. when i get outdrawn, or impatient, i will remember i have a myriad of choices. i don't have to get annoyed by anyone else, i can take my time, i can relax, i do have to concentrate if i want to do well, and ultimately, i don't have to play right now if i don't want to.

the goal you set for yourself after this first chapter of the book is to spend one day thinking about the language you use, to remind yourself you have the choice (ie not saying i have to, but instead i want to, etc) and also to spend thirty days being proactive rather than reactive.

at the moment, when i wake up, i don't think about any of this. i hope at the end of thirty days, it will be ingrained in me in such a way that when i wake up i will consciously be choosing a lie in when i choose to lie in.

one more thing i want to do is to read something before i start playing to get myself in the right frame of mind. i found a few things but nothing yet which is perfect. if you know of anything let me know. if i find something, i will of course post it.

for now, that's all i can be bothered to type. i've improved my posture and seating position such that i can type for longer. i think the most important thing i'm starting to do is to type properly ie be less lazy and use all my fingers especially little finger for backspace. this has greatly increased the amount of time i can type for without massive wrist/arm/shoulder/neck pains.

head in hands

just finished playing. this month i've played about 5 sessions and been hit by the most ridiculous outdraws. runner runner runner super gutshot straight? no problemo. oh ook, i hit 2 pair on the turn/river. opponent has a set. nice. i have made no money from any big hands. i think i'm still paying ok, not much has been frittered away on tilt but i'm now down 5k for the month and with 5k left online i either have to redeposit or drop down.

mostly need to work on improving. something i haven't been doing since august. oh, and improve on playing better. checked my yearly results and without bonuses it's not down to about 5k. doesn't really seem worth it at the moment.

need a serious rethink of life strategy at the moment.

what a depressing post. i'll cheer myself up with joke:

I hate people that say, "He's a nice person once you get to know him."
They might as well just say, "He's a dickhead, but you'll get used to it."

for the first time in a week i shaved my face

i scared myself catching my reflection in the window this morning and knew it was time to shave. truthfully, i knew a few days ago. when i can see the hair on my upper lip out the corner of my eye (the bottom corner, it would seem) it's probably time to shave.

been out for a couple of drives in the snow. the danger element also coincides with a fun element. or maybe they're the same element. either way, it's quite enjoyable to slide round corners even though you have to drive slow. maybe if this happens next winter i'll start selling snow tyres. and snowmobiles. i'm surprised they don't have them in scotland where it snows every winter. because snowmobiles aren't just useful in snow. they so much fun. oh, and since they have tank tracks they work on not snow too.

managed to cut both corners of my lip. again, a body part that doesn't really have corners, yet you'll know what i mean. i imagine it's something they do on jackass for a laugh. what that show doesn't depict however, is the pain they will suffer when the cameras stop rolling. physically and mentally (probably).

i also have one gripe (at least) with those kebab chefs. when you ask for the spicy sauce, for unknown reasons, some of them don't seem to spread it out. instead they put it all in one little place. so instead of some spice flavour throughout the sandwich (if i may call it that) you are subject to none at all. except in one surprise bite which makes you cry, and leaves you rendered helpless like you've been pepper sprayed intravenously.

oh and played some poker, got an ev backlash. 3 buy in's down for the month so far. wanted to finish 8 up for nice round yearly numbers. think i'll have a little time to play in the next week or so, and then none till february.

confirmation

according to ricky gervais i am in idiot. this is because i think karl pilkington is a genius. he may be an accidental one, but he is amazing. his thought process is like a child (from outnumbered) crossed with einstein. and it's at least one level above mine.

i figured he'd be on twitter but he's not. i decided to try twitter. to write down my thoughts so i wouldn't forget them. i don't seem to get a following on there. probably because i'm not famous.

from the last three days here are things i would have otherwise forgotten:

i hate waking up hungry. i did this again today. i don't know why it happens so often. it may be related to my sleep pattern. where late at night, for example now at 244am, i am not tired. but i know i will be tired in the morning when i wake up. which brings me onto another tweet - why does sleeping make me more tired? i am awake when going to sleep and tired when waking up. this is the opposite reason for sleeping. i must be doing something wrong.

anyway, my ps3 is nice. i have been trying to get good at cod modern warfare 2. though i don't really know what i'm doing, i noticed when driving a couple of days ago my reaction times have improved. i blame this on too much cod. maybe i will play some more.

and today, whilst driving, i was escorted much of the way my a bmw in front and behind me. i was lucky to survive.

finally, the only real news which has happened to me of late is an estate agency showing off their abilities to lie, deceive and cheat to your face. i will mention this more in my next post after i receive the contract i have signed but they haven't given back yet. these people are as useful as jellyfish.

justifications

people lie to themselves all the time about why they do things. such as, it's ok to steal from tesco's because they're such a big company they account for this in their prices/won't notice or any other 'reason' from a myriad of excuses. this is purely to justify the action they are taking which they know is wrong but don't want to admit to themselves.
i try to avoid doing this. i'm mental enough without having to keep track of the lies i tell myself.

there is however, one area of my life which i just justify by saying "it's ok, it's for poker, poker pays for it"
i did this with my computer last year, and just now with a evoluent mouse i bought from amazon. amazing mouse it is. clicking at the right time, or rather not clicking at the wrong time, is taking some getting used to but it's really nice to hold.
sadly, still struggling with my wrist pain. i thought i actually need the mouse to protect my wrists so must be getting it. i don't even know if i was lying to myself or not.
i have however, come to the conclusion that the mouse was only a small part of my problem. the keyboard/desk height/chair height situation is the real problem. typing gets excruciatingly awkward after a sentence, especially in my right hand. i cannot find a comfortable height for anything, even typing on my lap as yakshi, and many less famous people responding via google, have said.
so i may need to look at a new keyboard and i can be sure i at least know why i need it and why i need to pay for it.
two reasons currently affect my thinking in these matters. i have no source of income other than poker and i've basically stopped playing for the last 6 weeks or so. secondly, i hate having possessions. owning things just leads me to worry about all the things i own, having to move them when i move is a pain, and most things are completely unnecessary. computer (with internet!), phone, bed, a few clothes, food, car and library card (in that order) are pretty much all i need to be happy.
i don't understand how my housemate (who is male) can have three pairs of identical shoes. and about 8 smart shoes. i don't get it. 1 pair boots, 1 pair everyday shoes, 1 pair trainers, 1 pair football boots, 1 pair astros and 1 pair smart shoes are all that is ever going to be necessary. other things i don't understand about my housemate include that he leaves empty shower gel containers in the shower for months abd when he runs out uses mine without mentioning it to me (i couldn't not notice because close to half of it disappeared in under a week); then a week after throwing his empties out, he throws mine out. not empty. i don't even know how to bring this up.

speaking of happiness, i was reading a karl pilkington book and it turns out the weird stuff he finds on the internet aren't at all made up. ideas such as the see through toaster were already invented. and sheep following each other off a cliff really happened. i guess that's why they're called sheep but 1500 of them went off the edge. and the best part? 1050 survived as their falls were cushioned by the first 450.

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That would ensure everyone knows it's a 50/50 chance of getting what you want rather than thinking you probably made the right choice


So I played the first ukircoop (I think that's what it's called). It was a $50 rebuy. I only needed the initial buy in (100) and the top up. With 90 of the 280 starters remaining I was top for a minute or two. A couple of mistakes later and I was back in the pack. approaching the bubble, 5 handed I open utg with KQo to 2100 at 500/1000, with my 60k stack. I get reraised all in by the big blind. I laughed till i realised I'd misclicked and opened to 21,000. Pissed off I called to be shown qq and say goodbye to the almost guaranteed minimum of $400+ if I wasn't such a retard.

shock horror

england don't win the world cup bid because
a)they are too developed, needs to go to country that will build new stadiums
b)twatter and pratini don't like england
c)fifa is corrupt, coincidentally this revelation was uncovered by british journalists
d)all of the above

following this, and the real reason for my post, graham taylor announces (toward the bottom of the link) "I'm just surprised that we're surprised," he said.
Following this laughing at people for being surprised:
Taylor also criticised the decision to give the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, adding on BBC Radio 4's PM programme: "It really is surprising."

i no longer feel bad for not listening to him when he talks as clearly he can't be bothered, so why should i have to?

smiles

the worst football team in the world
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/nov/29/football-team-concedes-227-goals
the highlights include losing 55-0 (had 7 players and no keeper)
11 games, 11 lost, 227 conceded
but my favourite part of the article is that they aren't bottom of the league as another team has had points deducted.

london town is notorious for being miserable. or more specifically, the people that inhabit it. i don't think it's as bad as others make out. last week (prior to the snow) i went out and in one day made two complete strangers smile! one was when i stepped off the pavement and into the road as the pavement was narrow and the young lady smiled in appreciation. the second was when i offered a fake seat (not really a seat, but the cushion part near the seats) on a tube to a different young lady.

also, i think i need to point out to people who are now finding this awesome blog with Netgear N150 WLAN card probelms, it doens't like kaspersky, which is a real pain. and I have still not been able to figure how to stop it disconnecting after the computer wakes up from sleep. other than unplugging and plugging it back in.

finally, i am still waiting to hear from the mongs at BA about my compensation from march's volcanic eruption where they forgot to fly me home leaving me stranded in sweden and fighting to catch many trains home. it's been almost 9 months and dealing with them, they might as well be based in India. In a mental home.

the stock markets and the news

i don't know much about the markets. i tried to look into investing but quickly realised i knew nothing. however, it appears most people know nothing. although i am basing my evidence here on the sample of journalists who write for the bbc.
yesterday i read this article, which stated that the reason the market was going up was because of the EU bail out for Ireland. (note, it was a reason given explaining why the markets were going up, not a prediction.)

i had to find it in the google cache because it has since been deleted. because the markets changed.
there is now this article, preceded by this article, which states the markets are going down, because of the EU bail out....
The exact same reason is given for why the markets are no going down. note again that it's not a prediction, but a reason given for why something happens.

This indicates to me they don't have a clue what they are talking about. which is somewhat comforting and makes me think if i learnt enough, and was lucky enough maybe i could invest. but don't hold your breath.

i have realised all the bbc is good for is unintentional humour.
see this article, about a man whose home was infested with rats in lala land. what was the first thoughts of his neighbours? call a reality tv show. obviously.

just when i thought it was boring...

i sat down to whack out an entry this morning and realised nothing of note had happened. at all. so i decided to go out for the day and see what would happen. i was not disappointed. 
first, there was the sign for the psychic fair. i figure they should all know when and where it is without being explicitly told.
then there was the 3 yard run to the bank. maybe it's just me but i know there is always a massive queue. so when, like today, i see someone walking to the bank i up my pace to overtake, or if coming from opposite sides, beat them to the door. but today i did not play this game. for i was going to change money which has it's own queue, so i held the door open for this little lady. good deed done.
bizarrely, it was the second bank i had tried to change money in. the nearest one i went to didn't change money for non customers apparently. surely, anything that makes them money is profitable and if they're already set up to do so, why not take my money fleecing me on the exchange rate?
haven't played since last weekend. read a bit of omaha strategy and might give it a crack for small stakes during the week ahead.

been a little while

not too much happening at the moment. which is no bad thing. got a few things in life to sort out which means i'm not gonna play much for the remainder of this year.
i did have to go outside the other day. not before a man came to take my electricity meter reading. bizarrely, i don't think he was from the company that supplies me.
went out to a shopping centre (not out of choice). i despise people that get to the top of an escalator and then just stop. standing still at the top with torrents of people behind them. even worse when they have little kids with them. it's just a recipe for disaster. what i'm saying is, even though i ran into them on purpose, it wasn't my fault. (i didn't but a small part of me wishes i had)
i also walked through a department store known in the business as john lewis. they put the perfume counter right at the entrance. just like the shops who make men walk through all the women's section to get to their stuff, the shop layout people know that men don't go shopping by choice so they only set things up for women. i have no problem with this. i merely state it to explain why i walked through the perfume section to see the hilarious sight of the attendants (is that what they're called?) of one company wearing white lab coats. brilliant. because that's what makes you a scientist, and thus all the people will believe you products are the best.

my last observation was when walking behind two girls who i guessed to be about 14. i reminisced about people i knew in their twenties who were short. as i overtook them i noticed they were probably both in their late 50s.

whilst i haven't played much poker people clearly haven't forgotten me and must continue to think i'm a retard (they're only semi correct)*

6-max Seat #1 is the button
Seat 1: villain ($400 in chips)
Seat 2: small blind ($148 in chips)
Seat 3: big blind ($400 in chips)
Seat 4: utg ($439 in chips)
Seat 5: hero ($934.20 in chips)
Seat 6: co ($719.40 in chips)
small blind: posts small blind $2
big blind: posts big blind $4

*** HOLE CARDS ***
Dealt to hero [3c 3d]
utg: folds
hero: raises $8 to $12
co: folds
villain: raises $24 to $36
small blind: folds
big blind: folds
hero: calls $24

*** FLOP *** [Ad 3s 8c]
hero: checks
villain: bets $52
hero: raises $80 to $132
villain: calls $80

*** TURN *** [Ad 3s 8c] [Th]
hero: checks
villain: checks

*** RIVER *** [Ad 3s 8c Th] [Qs]
hero: bets $766.20 and is all-in
villain: calls $232 and is all-in
Uncalled bet ($534.20) returned to hero

*** SHOW DOWN ***
hero: shows [3c 3d] (three of a kind, Threes)
villain: mucks hand
hero collected $803 from pot

*** SUMMARY ***
Total pot $806 | Rake $3
Board [Ad 3s 8c Th Qs]
Seat 1: villain (button) mucked [7d 7c]

*or maybe he doesn't pay any attention anyway and is just not very good?

honesty

i didn't really want to post last month's graph. in fact, i didn't really want to ever post again after that last session. with too many things stressing me out in real life, combined with internet not keeping a stable connection my head finally went again. i haven't played a single hand since then. i need to be able to put things in perspective better. being couped up just writing and playing cards, without seeing much of the outside world it's easy to get lost. i hear a lot of other people talk about a 'balance' in life, and whilst i think it's correct i think it isn't the best word to use. i went to town t'other day to watch a film from the russian film festival. i don't know why i torture myself by going to the cinema but it seemed that there were less (only perhaps 1 or half) popcorn munchers in attendance. also, the seats were really comfy at the apollo in 'pick a dilly' circus. speaking of circii (which is how the plural is spelt in queen's english) there was a pikey fest at Leicester Square. i haven't been to one since i was cheated out of a rasta doll in on of the old grabber machine machines. but this time it was all different. 6 cans in a two dimensional pyramid, 5 balls, 1 thrower (me). i watched a few other people fail before i decided to have a go. some dude came to within one can of winning on two occasions and lucked out at the final hurdle. my five british pounds wagered that i would go one step further. things started off well when my first ball knocked two cans off. 4 balls left, 4 cans left. the next took another one out, but my third ball ,whilst hitting the target, failed to remove a can from the shelf. three cans and two balls would be an impossible task were it not for the fact that one can was on it's side in front of another. i aimed for that first, knowing i needed to take them both out. my cod training kicked in and i blasted them almost into the bumper cars. one ball one can and i finally believed that i would be winning a massive panda pear (cuddly toy version).
i took a breath, thought of joe montana winning the superbowl in 89 and reminisced about john candy. i threw my final ball and missed by inches. i was crushed.
and then i began to once again appreciate all the things i have and all the things i don't need to do yet, like work with people who appear on x-factor, apprentice etc.

ps here's my worst. graph. ever.