Breakout's Back Again

Without a doubt, the most annoying thing about putting on a night is the fact that you have to promote it. I just want to be able to spin some tunes in front of a packed room full of dancing, cheering, adoring half-naked women without any effort. Is that so much to ask?

Of course, the most important promotion for any night is word of mouth, especially that which comes off the back of a successful night. We're going to be relying on that heavily for next Thursday's event, mainly because I know full well that a large section of our crowd don't go out, or can't be here on a school-night. Still, it's freshers' week at Bristol Uni so we're hoping for an influx of fresh meat to bump up the crowd.

Meanwhile, Bevan & I (as Left Hand Skratch) have a gig on Saturday at the Black Swan. It's the opening slot, 10-11.30, warming up for a gabba techno night. We'll be leaving at 11:31.

Did I say "Half-naked women"?

Anyway, it's not the word-of-mouth side of promotion that's getting my goat. After all, with the wonders of modern technology I can text, blog and email from the comfort of my rocking chair.

No. It's the fact that I have to waste four or five of my evenings in the fortnight before the event driving around the back streets of Bristol sticking up posters which will probably only be glanced at by 2% of the passers by before they're ripped down by some vigilante old gimmer with a comb over and a rusted old bicycle who thinks they're "bringing down the image of the neighbourhood".



Maybe he's got a point.

The End of Online Poker

Well, it is for me anyway.

After 15 months of winning more and more money and thinking it would never end, my fortune took a turn for the worse back in June, and since then I have managed to lose all of my winnings.

Having said that, I'm still a winner! I should explain...

It all started in March 2005 when Jonny came back from a trip to Las Vegas and introduced me to the fad of online poker. Being a sensible fellow, I decided I wouldn't ever put any real money in, but I did enjoy learning the game on the 'play money' tables.

Within a couple of weeks I had turned 1000 valueless chips into 60000, and it occurred to me that maybe I should just stick £10 on to see if I could do the same with real money. Again, being Mr Sensible, I set myself two very strict rules:

1) I would play on the very low stake tables, and never allow myself to up the stakes, under any circumstances.

2) If I lost that money, I would never put any more on, under any circumstances.

For the first couple of months, I came close to losing that money on a few occasions, but always managed to claw it back. Gradually I realised that I needed to be more patient and give up on more hands, and it was then that the bank balance started rising.

By the end of my first full year on the poker tables, I had turned $19.23 into $922.

However, in doing so, I had broken my first rule. You see once I had a few hundred dollars in the bank I gradually upped the stakes, and by the end of the year I was playing on three tables at once: one 50c/$1 limit table, and two no-limit tables, each with a buy-in of $25.

At this point I cashed out $700 to take with me to Egypt at Easter. Had I not done so I wouldn't have been able to afford the two extra day-dives and night-dive, so you could say that if it weren't for poker, I would still never have seen a turtle, stingray or octopus!

Anyway, when I got back from Egypt I turned that remaining $222 dollars into about $450 before the start of the decline.

All of a sudden, I kept losing. In the space of four weeks, that $450 had fallen to $70. I then had another four weeks of ups and downs, and at one point I'd managed to recover to my post-Egypt total of $220 odd dollars, but then I lost over $100 in a single session one night (including $45 on one hand), and before I knew it I was down to below $20.

At this point, I remembered my broken first rule and considered that my greed had been my downfall, but rather than returning to the penny tables I decided to keep going for it on no-limit, in the hope of winning back some big pots. Eventually I went out with the following hand:



My A 10 straight was the best possible hand after the turn (i.e., the fourth community card), so I went all-in and was laughing when someone called me, only for him to beat me on the 'river' by hitting a full-house.

Gutted.

Still, I will always remember the satisfaction that is gained from flopping the nuts...

The nuts in this instance, being an ace high flush. Unfortunately, he folded. Notice the 10 J of spades on the other table?

That went on to give me my fourth royal flush - the best hand in poker. I think that's pretty good going in 18 months. I once hit it on the flop, which is apparently a 1 in 650,000 chance. Anyway again, he folded so I didn't win much with it, and I think I ended up about $20 down on that session (it was one of my last).

I still don't really understand how I managed to win money consistently for fifteen months, and then lose pretty much constantly for the last two or three. I can only think that it was for one these reasons:

1) I was incredibly lucky for fifteen months
2) I was very unlucky for the last two or three months
3) Everyone else started getting better at poker

Actually, I think it might have been a little bit of all three. Perhaps I should consider myself fortunate that I caught onto the poker thing early, and managed to win a lot of money from people who were just discovering the fad and still learning how to play. It seems that all the people who were rubbish have finally given up on it, and only the good players are left. For this reason, I am actually going to keep to my second rule, and never put any real money on again.

Still, the whole experience has left me $680.77 better off, and even though it's gutting that I lost $450 at the end, I will always be up on the deal.

It does, however, mean that I am currently between addictions. Any suggestions?

Fly Porn

What's going on 'ere then?

Only in the Bristol Churches League...

My fifth season with Hope FC rolled into it's second week this-morning. It was our first home game, and a new venue. We now play our home games at Knowle West's infamous Filwood playing fields. Jonny and Mike might remember the grotty changing rooms, which have been burnt out by the locals on numerous occasions. They've now built a new block next door, which looks lovely except that all the windows are boarded up. Apparently, the locals smashed them in within two days of it's opening.

Anyway, I know I said I wouldn't write much about football on here, but this-morning's farce shouldn't take long to cover. The game lasted twenty minutes, until our striker James Taylor slid in on their keeper as he tried to clear the ball. There really didn't seem to be much contact, but their keeper was left writhing in agony on the floor.

We waited about half an hour for an ambulance to arrive, and while we waited some of the opposition started throwing tantrums. They reckoned that the ref, who wasn't qualified (in fact, it was Paul Owen's brother, Terry) had missed a lot of fouls earlier in the game, and that they "didn't feel safe" to carry on. Chew kindly volunteered to swap with Terry and take over as ref, which seemed to pacify them for a while until they realised that their only substitute was going to have to go in goal. Well, lets just say it was somehow obvious that he wouldn't be able to save a thing.

All of a sudden, their centre-back, who had prescription sports glasses strapped around his head, suggested that in fact, he still "didn't feel safe" after all.

The future of the game was balanced on a knife-edge, and patient diplomacy was crucial. James decided to make a suggestion...

"Well, if glasses boy doesn't want to play, maybe he should fuck off and you can carry on with ten."

And that was that. Game over.

Apparently, we can't even claim the 3-0 walkover from the league rules (when the opposition doesn't turn up or refuses to play), because it also states in the league rules that the home team must provide a qualified referee. Bugger.

I look forward to the rematch already.

Anyway, that's not the real reason I decided to write another football related blog. No, the real reason is that we finally had last season's 'player of the year' awards this-morning. Jonny won the award during his first two seasons with hope, and probably would have won it in his third spell too, if he hadn't gone and fractured his skull half way through the season.

Third place for the 2005/6 season went to John Bartley, who was the top goal scorer despite being a centre-back.

Second place went to Neil Watkins, who couldn't be there this-morning as him and Kath were finally taking baby Ben home. Fair excuse, I suppose.

First place? Well, I'm sure you've guessed (hence the real reason for the blog), it was me!

To say I was shocked is an understatement. I was convinced that last year's winner Chris was going to take it. After all, I can't head the ball to save my life and I'm crap at tackling too.

So, I now get the pleasure of sticking this not even slightly tacky, solid gold-painted plastic trophy on my fireplace for the next ten months or so. Obviously, one of the first things I did was to check the inscriptions of previous year's winners to see J. Arman's name. I'm very sorry to report that it was nowhere to be found. Manager Nick assured me that it was still on there, and came over to show me. He looked very surprised when he couldn't find it, in fact he checked each edge of the trophy at least three times, and then ran over to his bag to check whether it had fallen off.



For now, it seems to be missing, but the legend will not be forgotten. Hopefully, it will turn up.

Good Lucks and Congratulations

Blimey. Three blogs in four days. I'm even outblogging Jonny. Don't worry, it won't last. I just wanted to say a few good lucks and congratulations.

Firstly, good luck to Em, who moved to London over the weekend to start a course in speech and language therapy. On Thursday, we went for a lovely meal at our old favourite haunt, the Beijing Bistro, to say our goodbyes.



Chris was suffering with Man-flu.



Ben was suffering with a bloated stomach.



I was suffering with long-neck syndrome



Chew was suffering with 'slightly-out-of-focus-miserable-face' syndrome.



Jess and Em were suffering from being out with four whinging men, but seemed to cope very well...




Good luck Em, and see you at the weekends!


Secondly, I wanted to wish Ella good luck for the upcoming finale to her masters out in Singapore. Apparently for her final piece, she is going to be taking her course-mates and examiners (who have flown all the way from the UK), to a nearly deserted island off the coast of Singapore, where she will be burning a wooden sculpture draped in theatre curtains. I really shouldn't try and explain it actually, as I'm sure I can't do any justice to the amount of thought and preparation that has clearly gone into it. My only input was to give her a copy of 'The Wicker Man' (obviously, the original British horror from the 70's and not the yank remake with Nicholas Cage, which will surely be a travesty). This prompted Ella to the idea of including a sacrifice as part of her presentation. Apparently, there was only one obvious choice.


Thirdly, congratulations to Richard, who competed in triathlon's World age-group championships in Switzerland yesterday. Rich managed to come 63rd out of the 120 odd competitors, which considering it's his first ever international triathlon is quite some achievement (especially as he was a dirty smoking bloater just a couple of years ago). Well done you.


Last but by no means least, Congratulations to Neil and Cath on the birth of their little boy, Ben. Neil was clearly well prepared for fatherhood...



As I'm sure people are aware, poor Ben was born with a dickie ticker, but it sounds like he's going to make a full recovery from his operation and should be home with Neil and Cath very soon. So, perhaps I should also offer them the best of luck for that day when all the full joys of parenthood begin. Good luck!

Token football blog

It's been quite a week for Bristol City fans, and I simply can't avoid mentioning it.

Firstly, on Tuesday night we beat Northampton 3-1 away, despite one of our defenders getting sent off in the first half for head-butting another one of our defenders.

Then on Thursday's transfer deadline, we sold our Welsh international youngster Dave Cotteril to premiership Wigan for £2,000,000. Yes, Two million pounds. No doubt this outrageous fee was influenced by his best ever performance in a City shirt just a couple of days earlier against Northampton, in a game that was shown live on sky. Normally, he's pretty rubbish, and I reckon our chairman was laughing all the way to the bank.

The very next day, two of our first team players were jailed for a month after getting involved in a brawl with the bouncers at Romeo Brown's nightclub on Corn Street. Not exactly the best news in the build-up to the big game against Brighton that took place this afternoon, especially as one of them was our star striker, Steve Brooker.



Before I get to the Brighton game, I must also mention my team Hope FC's first game of the season, which took place this-morning at Bath uni against bitter rivals FC Santos (who always seem to beat us by the odd goal). Two minutes before kick-off, our manager Nick approached me and told me that I was going to be captain. While I was honoured I was also somewhat unnerved, as I didn't see it coming at all, and didn't really know what I was supposed to do. Did this mean I had extra responsibilities?

Perhaps I was put off by the sound of the ref's whistle in the background, but for some reason I quite pathetically asked "What does that mean?" and was told by both Nick and Chewy simultaneously "It means you've got to lead by example." Our Yorkshire keeper Neil Wright then chipped in: "It also means you've got to go and call heads or tails" and he pointed towards the centre circle where the ref and the opposing captain had been waiting patiently.

I won the toss, and then realised that I had to make a decision. I had no idea what to do. I turned to my team for help but they were still grouped together discussing tactics, so I panicked and said "Oh you might as well kick-off, we'll go that way", and pointed to the direction that we were already facing. Really this was my only responsibility, and I fucked it.

As for my other responsibility of "leading by example"? Well, that didn't go entirely to plan either. I got booked. For the first time ever. For dissent!

In my defence, it was the fourth time during the game that the ref, who looked and sounded like Andy from Little Britain and seemed to have sugar on the end of his whistle, had made the wrong decision about a throw-in. The linesman and the opposing player had both said it was our ball, and despite this the ref still thought he knew best and gave the throw against us. I spit the proverbial dummy and lobbed all the toys from my pram at the same time.

I carried on shouting at him while he was pulling his book out of his pocket, and didn't even stop when he was writing down my name. I actually thought my argument was quite convincing, and for a moment I though he was going to change his mind, much like Andy from Little Britain would. But he didn't. I now have the thrill of waiting for an FA fine to arrive in the post. How much is it again, Jonny?

By the way, we lost 2-1. Typical.

Right. So, it's finally time for my moment of glory. I've waited for this moment for 5 years, ever since H came back from Australia with a Brighton fan. Ironically, Jonny claimed to have become a City fan during those five years, and yet describes his favourite moments of watching City throughout that time as the games when Brighton beat them. Even though they were generally very jammy.

Anyway that's all history now. Here we go. My moment has come:

WE BEAT THE

BRIGHTON 1-0!!



Ahh, I enjoyed that.