Mark Scores 30 in England World Cup Romp!

Well, I suppose England never like to do things the easy way. They seem to adjust their game to the quality of the opposition. Play a good team, we play well, play a poor one, and we play poor. Saying that, how hot must it have been on that pitch, and at least we won and top the group after the first game. A comfortable win against T&T and we're through.

One point I was puzzled with, is did you see who the FIFA rep gave 'Man of the Match' to? David Beckham or Steven Gerrard (great first half performances)? Joe Cole (probably the most deserving)? No. He gave it to Frank Lampard. Was he watching a different game? Was I watching a different game? I didn't realise he was playing for the first 25 mins? Maybe it was just me.

And the England players think they had it hot? I was at a friends to watch the game, which was great, coz the girlies came as well and we had a good laugh - heading to a local park after the match to show them how it should be done. It was 30degrees and we were running around like mad men (well, I wasn't, have to watch my ankle!) and I think I was on my 10th hat-trick before we realised that it would be much more sensible to sit in the pub and watch the Sweden game. Cathy's mum had kindly agreed to take Mia for the afternoon, so it was good to catch up with friends and spend time together without constantly stopping Mia from trying to eat snails or putting sticks down her ears.

Yesterday my Dad did a BBQ and we headed over there in the afternoon and tried my best to keep Mia in the shade, constantly running after her with suncream wipes of the factor 2,705 variety - which is a lot easier than it sounds! Jeez, it was hot and, like her dad, she's not great in high temperatures and has been a bit lethargic this week. Her bedroom was 29 degrees last night, so we had to have a fan on through the night to keep her cool-ish.

Played a bit of poker Friday night with Mr Acornman and had one of my most profitable times at Ladbrokes in a long time. I've never managed to post a profit over a period of time there, and as I play at places where I do, I stay elsewhere. Was reading his blog the other day and thought, I've never played with him (I think?) so headed to Laddies for a chat and a game. Found him doing well on a 50$ NL table and sat down to play. Was lucky to hit a flush in one of my first few hands and got a caller, then a big two pair, so before too long had doubled up. We decided to play a SNG - when my expert reading skills were in full force, thinking my 9's could beat my opponents raise - he turned over AA - doh! and out I went.

Headed back to the cash tables and again found a run of hands and quickly doubled up my 50$ buy in. Moved to another table and hit a 41$ profit before deciding that, as this is my best ever return at Laddies - to cut my winnings and moved to Poker room where i hit a third in a 10$ SNG and then crashed out in 5th in the second when 96s busted my aces, to break even.

Had a review of my accounts and was pleasantly surprised to see:
Ultimate Bet $282 (cashed this profit as I have too many accounts running), Poker Room 440$ (opened up with 200$), Laddies 196$ (had 55$ left there I'd forgotten about), Pacific 195$ (opened up with $150) and Titan 175 (125$ starting) - so almost 1300$ in my online accounts. Checked against my balance for the year and I'm standing at (if I were to cash in all my accounts now) - £1509 in profit for the year. £700 has already been spent around the house, so not a bad year all round.

The reason I mention this is that I Enjoyed playing with AM and I know, as with Juice, that things may be on a slight downturn, but i firmly believe that if you had a succesful winning formula before, it is still that now. The Sigmund Curve tells that all aspects of our life will go through periods of ups and downs, and it's not always how you react to the ups that make the difference, but how you respond when the downs are kicking in. Martin Luther King said words along the lines of 'the true test of a mans character is not in moments of comfort and convenience, but in moments of challenge and hardship'. I've not been playing the game long enough to be able to give anyone advice, but my own thoughts are to keep doing the right things. I played at Titan last night and flopped 17 open str8 draws - and not one hit. When I play tomorrow, I'll probably only flop 5, but 4 will hit - and that's the way life goes sometimes. Remember, if this were easy, everyone would be doing it and we'd all just break even.

I suppose the important thing is that if you enjoy doing it, how much value can you put on that?