Anger Management

When you have a really bad day on the tables, and you just need to take it out on someone, don't take it out on someone you know, take it out on someone you don't know.

I was sitting at my desk when I remembered a phone call I'd forgotten to make. I found the number and dialled it. A man answered, saying "Hello." I politely said, "This is Mark. Could I please speak with Robert Campbell?"
Suddenly a manic voice yelled out in my ear "Get the right f*kin number!" and the phone was slammed down on me.
I couldn't believe that anyone could be so rude. When I tracked down Robert's correct number to call him, I found that I had accidentally transposed the last two digits. After hanging up with him, I decided to call the 'wrong' number again. When the same guy answered the phone, I yelled "You're a C*nt!" and hung up.
I wrote his number down with the word 'C*nt' next to it, and put it in my desk drawer. Every couple of weeks, when I was paying bills or had a really bad day, I'd call him up and yell, "You're a C*nt!" It always cheered me up.
When Caller ID was introduced, I thought my therapeutic "C*nt" calling would have to stop. So, I called his number and said, "Hi, this is John Smith from BT. I'm calling to see if you're familiar with our Caller ID Program?"He yelled "NO!" and slammed down the phone. I quickly called him back and said, "That's because you're a C*nt!"

One day I was at my local Shopping Centre, getting ready to pull into a parking spot. Some guy in gunmetal grey Land Rover cut me off and pulled into the spot I had patiently waited for. I hit the horn and yelled that I'd been waiting for that spot, but the idiot ignored me. I noticed a "For Sale" sign in his back window, so I wrote down his number.
A couple of days later, right after calling the first C*nt (I had his number on speed dial,) I thought that I'd better call the Land Rover C*nt, too. I said, "Is this the man with the gunmetal grey Land Rover for sale?" Yes, it is", he said. "Can you tell me where I can see it?" I asked. "Yes, I live at 129 Well Street, in Torrington. It's a terraced house, and the car's parked right out in front. "What's your name?" I asked. "My name is Steve Hansen," he said. "When's a good time to catch you, Steve?" "I'm home most days as I'm currently unemployed." "Listen, Steve, can I tell you something?" "Yes?" "Steve, you're a C*nt!"Then I hung up, and added his number to my speed dial, too.
Now, when I have a problem, I have two a**eholes to call.

Then on one particularly bad day, I came up with an idea. I called C*nt #1.
"Hello?" "You're a C*nt!" (But I didn't hang up.) "Are you still there?" he asked."Yeah," I said."Stop calling me," he screamed. "Make me," I said.
"Who are you?" he asked."My name is Steve Hansen.""Yeah? Where do you live?""I live at 129 Well Street, Torrington, a terraced house, with my gunmetal grey Land Rover parked out the front. "He said, "I'm coming over right now, Steve. And you had better start saying your prayers.
"I said, "Yeah, like I'm really scared, C*nt," and hung up.
Then I called C*nt #2. "Hello?" he said."Hello, C*nt," I said. He yelled, "If I ever find out who you are.....".
"You'll do what?" I said."I'll kick your a*se," he exclaimed. I answered, "Well, C*nt, here's your chance. I'm coming over right now."
Then I hung up and immediately called the police, saying that I lived at 129 Well Street, Torrington, and that I was on my way over there to kill my gay lover. Then I called Channel 5 News about the hoodie war going down in Well Street, Torrington. I quickly got into my car and headed over to Well Street. I got there just in time to watch two C*nts beating the crap out of each other in front of six police cars, an overhead police helicopter and a News crew.

What's that about anger management? This is great anger management.

The Quickest Night of Poker - Ever!

10$ NL
First hand at Bodog on the BB, dealt Kh 10h. There’s a raise to 3 x bb and 6 players call. I already have 1 forced bet in and the odds for a call are obvious.
Flop is Ah Qh Jd.
I’ve flopped the nut straight, and also the nut flush draw (and royal draw). I bet 2 x BB, hoping for a raise by the pre-flop raiser. There’s a raise to another 4 bb and 3 call along with me. I check the turn (2s) and a 5 x bb bet is raised to 15 x bb by me, just 2 callers.
Now maybe the correct play here was to put the guy all in, he clearly has a hand, but there is also player 3 to keep in the hand. Maybe I could get burnt here if he has trips or two pair, which could turn into a full house on the river – but I am trying to maximise my winnings without giving cheap draws.
The river is a 3h so the nuts I flopped just got even stronger. I move all in and both players call.
One also has a flush, and the other had flopped a set of Jacks.
I move from 10$ to 27$.

Fold, Fold, Fold, Fold, Fold, Fold, then AQ

I raise to 8 x bb and get 2 callers. Flop is Q 10 3 so I bet the pot. Once caller, one raises double my bet. I call and so does player 2. Turn is 7, I bet half the pot, other 2 call. River was a 7, I bet 5$ and two call. The raiser has JJ, the 2nd player KQ.
Tough for the KQ to get away from the hand, you could argue, in a 3 handed game with a Q high flop you gotta think you’d be favourite more often than not. JJ was crazy play in my opinion. There’s an argument for a raise if my history had shown that I would’ve bet the same with AK (no match) so he though he was ahead. But my bet on the turn indicated I had something better that 2nd pair.

I move from 27$ to 49$

Then I think, ‘you’ve done well tonight, Mark’.
OK, this is 10$ buy in and not the highest stakes, but you’ve returned a profit of 4 times your buy in. I clicked the ‘sit out next hand’ and thought for a few minutes. If I finished the night 40$ up, I’d be quite pleased with my play, so why play on?

So, in a never-seen-before level of self-control and discipline, I shut down my laptop and put poker away for the night having only played 8 hands.

Under Attack!

It’s that time of year I suppose. It’s getting colder and damper outside, so they look for somewhere warmer and dryer. Well, you would I suppose, why should spiders be any different?
I’m not afraid of spiders, I don’t like them, but they don’t cause me any undue stress or discomfort. Unfortunately for me, Cathy is very afraid. And when I say afraid, I don’t mean a girlie squeal and ‘ohh, horrible, there’s a spider’. I mean shakes, cold sweats, pale face and I swear once or twice she has been close to passing out she’s so frightened.

Why? I’m no psychologist, but her mum does the same so she was obviously very frightened as a child to see her mum so upset and these deep, subconscious memories come flooding back and she is unable to control them. Now this is where I upset Cathy. She is able to control them, I tell her, but chooses not too. There is no reason for her to be afraid of spiders. Harmless, inoffensive creatures that reduce the fly population (now you should be afraid of flies – they spread horrible diseases). Long story, but I believe they both actually want to be frightened of them. Kind of an attention thing in a weird way, when I see one (and I try and shoo it away before Cathy see’s it), she always has to look and see it – even though she knows the feelings this will bring on.

Anyway, I digress. There have been an increasing number of them invading our house recently, quite a size some of them by UK standards, and not shy in running towards the middle of the room where they can be clearly seen.

But I have to tell you about one in particular. It was so big I actually measured it. I joke you not.
Now I’ve travelled the world in my time and have seen Tarantula’s in the Arizona dessert, huge things in Nepal I can’t remember the name of, and things in Hong Kong that eat rats. So I’ve seen, in real life, proper spiders, big things that could wear your shoes.
This one in my living room was a house spider that was 15cm from curled leg to leg. I approximate this size, as spiders are not good at sitting still whilst you get the tape measure out. They are not used to having their inside leg measured, I suppose. It was so big I looked up some spider information on the internet. Apparently it is very rare for a house spider to grow larger than 15/16cm so this was at the larger end of the house spider scale. I’m glad Cathy was out or there could have been an ambulance required. I was tempted to keep it in a pint pot to show people lest they think it was a fisherman’s tale, but I’d be evicted immediately if she saw it.
Sitting with laptop on knee (glad I didn’t have a hand at the time), I saw it crawl up the curtains and sit, maybe napping, across the other side of the room. Even I thought, sh*t, what the hell is that – maybe it’s one having a piggy back ride from the other – but no, I walked up and had a look for a few minutes. Thick, hairy legs, chunky body and two hands required to pick it up in a piece of kitchen towel and deposit it outside.

Maybe I should have let it bite me (all spiders bite, apparently) and seen if I could climb walls and swoosh from building to building saving pretty maidens in distress.
Mia could have had it as a pet and taken it for walks (or runs) on a leash.
Cathy actually thinks Mia is the reason there are so many at the moment. She runs around on our wooden flooring at some pace, and like worms will surface when you tap the ground, she is disturbing the spiders and they are seeking refuge away from her thudding footsteps.

Either way, it keeps Cathy on her toes, peering cautiously into rooms before entering, and then yesterday, she had to stay in the living room for 2 hours as there was one on the doorframe and she couldn’t walk past it and out of the room in case it got her. Luckily, I had decided to nip home for lunch and could save the day.

The things we do for our women, huh?

The odds of that, huh?

'You're not Mia's Dad, I am'
Here we go again, I think. Another teenager gonna make some wisecracks about Mia's parentage.
'Yawn' I reply.
'Sorry, don't get me wrong m8, I have a daughter called Mia also'
'OK'
'Yeah, she was 2 and a half last week'
'Really' I reply 'My Mia was two and half last week also'
'Yeah, on 9th April'
'Wow, My Mia was born on 10th'
So it continues, it turns out that his Mia was born about 10 hours before my Mia.
And we meet at a Poker table 30months later...... The odds of that, huh?

Decided to play in the Ladbrokes $3k guaranteed using 700 of my poker player points as the entry fee. I'd bumped into Juice on a cash table 10mins before it was due to start and he asked if I was playing. (I've been wondering what to do with those points!)
Anyway, decided to enter and managed to scrape into 14th place, though quite how I got that far I'll never know. Hit a flush early on that got paid off, but only had one premium pair in my 4 hours of play (QQ) and hit AK and AQ twice each. My all in with 44 beat a call from AK and I can't remember seeing much more action, other than the odd steal. I think my patience and steady play over the last 2 weeks paid off here.
OK, paid off to the tune of 27$, but it all counts and my laddies account now sits at 80$ up for the month.
Bodog briefly increased to 121$ before I lost a buy in to an unlucky river and currently stands at 111$ - not bad from a 10$ start :-)

Hit the park yesterday, though I decided to have the picnic indoors first, as the ground was too wet. Mia was a bit sniffly most of the afternoon and looks like a full blown cold is on the way judging from the stuff exiting her nasal passages this morning. It was wellies on and 100mph as usual, but she loves it so much and I got some great pictures on the digi-camera. Gonna have an indoor play day today with these sniffles, though a bit of fresh air is probably what she needs. Trapped in a house with heating on etc etc probably isn't the best, but when it's cold outside, I don't fancy taking her out and making things worse. Shame, as it's a lovely sunny day.

Toodle Pip, enjoy your weekend, it's nearly over!