"Every time I think I'm out....
- they pull me back in!"
A parody by the magnificent Silvio
Line of the week must be from Brian, a Big Brother contestant:
Politics, that’s just showbiz for ugly people
Now a roll call of congratulations and some big thanks
Congrats to me old mucker Andy Ward on his excellent 2nd place in a World series of Poker event and the little matter of trousering a decent 6 figure sum.
Also winning in Vegas and copping a six figure sum, kudos to Bad beat Channing, my flatmate of many years in Battersea.
Also big well done to the McDonalds for their double cash in the big one and big cheers for `The Guvnor`, Willie Tann in his efforts to become the 2007 WSOP Champ.I do hope they all have my address in Spain in case they wish to me send a food parcel.
Next up a plethora of thanks to those who have kept the Spillanesters spirits up over the last few weeks.
Without a drink I can turn into a gibbering wreck that can yell and scream more than a new born baby without its bottle, so special thanks to those who made sure that this particular baby got his bottle (and filled it with Heineken and or Magners).
AJ, Bobby, PF, Kenny, Ady, Hayley, Big Paul (formerly known as Ginger Paul), Johnny Ireeeee & his crew now known as 'The Spice Boys' (Kelan, Simon, Rob), CD & Russell....cheers I salute you.
If you have seen the Godfather part 3 you will recognise the blog heading, it was of course parodied in a hilarious way by Silvio in the Soprano's.
I said it out last week as I made my reappearance in the Stan James office in a shock move that surprised many and certainly shocked a few more than that.
I have been working on a project for my old gaffer and as I don’t have a pc I asked if I could use a desk in the office and he kindly agreed.
You can only imagine some of the looks I received from ex colleagues when they saw my good self stroll in and take a seat, Osama turning up at the White House would have got less a reaction.
I nearly didn’t actually get into the office in the first place. I arrived to meet the gaffer at the appointed time and spotted a manger and a director having a discussion outside.
I said my hellos and informed them I had a meeting with the boss and they needn’t worry that I had just recovered from a long spell of amnesia and was intending to go back to work.
'Fine, no problem'
was their collective response and they informed me the gaffer hadn’t actually arrived yet (bear in mind it was only 3pm and the gaffer loves his beauty sleep even more than I do).
'Fine'
I replied and wondered if they would want me to wait in the lovely cool air conditioned office or outside in the baking heat, it was of course the latter. The gaffer turned up eventually and wondered why I was outside, when I told him he pissed himself and said both were doing their jobs better than he could have hoped for, cheeky git.
The reaction to my return
I seem to have been doing a lot of Stan’s related things recently.
First up was Bobby’s barbeque attended by all the great and good of SJ, which was until the police arrived and forced the party into early retirement.
Next up a few of my old colleagues suggested a night out at a new restaurant in La Linea, an all you can eat Chinese buffet. How they expect to make a profit by allowing greedy chaps like us in and only charging 11 euros for the pleasure is beyond me but I intend to eat their amazing food until they get wise to it.
As much Fillet steak, crispy duck, jumbo king prawns, along with a zillion other dishes for about 7 quid, definite value.
I did spot an Englishman (I recognised the football top he was wearing) who must have also paid his 11 euros but didn’t quite grasp the fact that there was terrific value in this place. The first time I bumped into him his plate was overflowing with prawn crackers and boiled rice, the next time he again had ignored all the king prawns, fillet steaks and sushi, you guessed it, his plate had only one food item on it, chips.
Tuesday evening was the football league bash and I managed to blag myself an invite.
This years incumbent in the role of manager was unwell which allowed me to fill in for the evening and how happy I was to do so, especially when those two words that send me giddy every time I hear them were mentioned, 'free bar'.
Amazingly only two teams turned up so as well as the free bar the free buffet got a decent hammering from us all as well and to make matters even better I managed to get a medal for the 'Betting Jobs, Cup Final Runners Up'.
It will not take much imagination to picture the state of the 8 or 9 of our group by the end of the free bar. Of course to go home at this stage would have been foolish and so the night kicked on into Spain where other SJ delinquents joined the party and it ended in as some may have predicted, in a kebab shop.
Now I have in my time drunk in some very peculiar places in my time, none more so than at the afore mentioned Kebab house next door to the Irish bar where at around 5.30am we got a lock in.
The owner did little to eradicate the stereotype that many Turkish men like a lump of meat between their slices of pitta. He must have hugged me at least 5 times before I could get out but I did the honourable thing and told him he would have more luck with the one remaining 'spice boy'. I did feel a little guilty the next day; I hope he didn’t get an extra sprinkling of chilli sauce he wasn’t expecting.
Leave it alone Ali!
Wednesday saw me attend the Gibraltar sports stadium to watch the SJ cricket team take on a Victor Chandlers xi in a normally very competitive 20/20 fixture.
SJ won on the bridle but the fun was as usual the banter that goes on in a fixture like this and typically it was AJ that got the ball rolling.
Stan’s had to chase a 116 and in the 2nd over one of VC's fielders on the boundary in front of us turned round and asked AJ to update the scoreboard. The answer he got was not one he was expecting, 'why?'
The Mick Hucknall look-alike (portly, red hair in a ponytail) seemed shaken by this and we had spotted that he wasn’t the shiniest euro in the till; his brain short circuited but after a couple of moments he did muster 'just do it mate, alright?'
Now if you know AJ as well as I do you will know this wasn’t the smartest remark to have made. As sure as eggs are eggs this would come back to haunt him and the following over the games began.
The Hucknall look-alike misfielded resulting in Stan’s getting a boundary instead of single, cue loud hoots of laughter led by a choir of supporters and orchestrated by AJ. A few balls later he dropped a simple catch; cue more huge cheers and roars of laughter. Next over his aggressive throw to the stumps resulted in overthrows cue all out celebrations and delirium in the stands. It of course continued all match as the ball seemed to home in on him every other delivery and by the end he looked liked a broken man but fair play to him, he shrugged it off and even took a wicket with some comical bowling before the match was won.
VC´s star performer after the match
Of course working in the SJ office has bought back many happy memories of working in the bookmaking business.
I knew I would one day end up working in a betting office but was unsure whether to try to work for the more gifted people at a spread firm or joining a fixed odds firm. There is a huge difference between both, perhaps best highlighted by the afternoon I spent at the shared officers of City Index, a spread firm and Blue Square, a fixed odds firm.
My old mucker Bad Beat was grafting away at City and had suggested I come along to watch the game between Chelsea and Leeds, as a blues fan and knowing that two other of my mates, The Camel and Tim ‘Albi’ Amos were working for Blue Square, it was a no-brainer.
I arrived a minute after kick off and not much was happening in either the game or both betting companies which were not separated by a wall but were both sharing an open floor space.
Early into the second half Leeds scored which led me to make my life long decision. The city offices went into meltdown; phones ringing off the hook, traders screaming prices at each other, throwing bits of paper at each other and generally running around knocking over anyone in their path.
Meanwhile at the Blue Square desks things were somewhat different if not a little more intriguing.
Albi was busy writing new prices down but they were nothing to do with football. Rebecca and Shannaz, the other two Blue Sq employees’ were feeding liquorice allsorts into a blindfolded Camel's mouth as he shouted out 'Orange', correctly in this case as Albi priced up the next flavour. A career working for a fixed odds firm beckoned for me at that exact moment. More trading floor tales next time.
Next week sees me sneak another single and hit 41 not out and what a year it has been. I hope it is nearly half as good as my 40th year which will definitely go down as a vintage, if only I could afford another bottle of the stuff.
Finally this weekend is without doubt one of the best reasons to live in Spain, it’s Domingo Rociero time, which translated into English means, ´one great big piss up in the name of religion`.
I wrote a piece about it last year on the SJ poker blog and its well worth a revisit methinks; hope you enjoy rereading it as much as I did.
Domingo Rociero
When I was awoken this morning by the sound of hundreds of people outside, singing after quite obviously drinking, I thought all the Ivey backers had come up with the ultimate wind-up.
It took me a few moments to realise it was actually the beginning of Domingo Rociero, a traditional celebration in Andalucía, where every town goes out and gets absolutely shredded under the guise of a religious celebration and in LaLinea's case it was in honour of the Virgin del Carmen.
What a day, what a crowd and what a party. I only recently mentioned to a friend of mine that I didn't think I had ever seen a drunk Spaniard; today I don't think I saw a sober Spaniard.
I meandered out onto my balcony to be met by a wonderful cacophony of noise; music blaring, bottles being opened, people laughing, food sizzling and then more bottles being opened.
Everyone it seemed had come out to celebrate and from my balcony I got a bird eye's view. I kid you not when I say people came armed with Alcohol and every possible devise or vessel was used to bring it; Bottles, sacks, bin bags, shopping trolleys, kegs, wine skins, all types of measuring jugs, cans, tins and what genuinely appeared to be a fish tank.
You know the best thing about it all? The people bring their booze to share. That's right, share. The idea is you get a glass attached around your neck with a piece of string or leather and when your empty people just top you up. Not only do people top you up, it became clear everyone likes to cover you in whatever concoction they are drinking; it appeared tinto de verano (wine mixed with lemonade) was the drink of choice.
The square was covered in booze so it was no surprise to see the local wino lolling about with a huge smile on his face. This must be his Christmas Day Birthday and any type of anniversary rolled into one.It didn't seem appropriate to cook whilst all this was happening beneath me so I passed on the fry-up and went with a tub of Strawberry Cheesecake Hagen Das and retired to the balcony.
I literally couldn't believe what I was witnessing, thousands of people (with many in traditional dress), dancing to the mixture of sounds that was being blared out by the drinks vendors. Local music clashed with 'its raining men', Flamenco was just about heard over 'I will survive' and to the girl in the gorgeous black traje de flamenco fanning herself with an abanico and dancing to the pussycat dolls', yes I do wish I had a girlfriend and yes I do hope she's 'hot like you'.
The Flamenco dress must be the most stylish and sexy of National dresses. I observed a Penelope Cruise look-alike Flamenco with a Salma Hayek look-alike which was nice, though not as nice as what I spotted in one protected corner. The temperature was middle 30's and one stunning local took the time to literally water herself down just below me. If a collection plate would have been passed at this stage my life savings would have gone in (£11.83).
Everyone was either drinking, throwing drink, dancing, kissing or running from an attacker armed with a jug of wine. I spied one local Antonio Banderas clone running away from his girlfriend only to bump into a local lady whom I guessed was in her 70's. Rather than be upset she planted a smacker straight onto his lips and by the look on his face she had slipped her tongue in as well. He was last spotted lying on the ground mouth open, gargling with his girlfriend above him pouring the wine.
The local wino appeared to peak to early, I saw him passed out at one stage with a couple of concerned locals giving him a gentle smack to wake him up. When this didn't work one of the vendors took matters into his own hands by emptying an industrial sized bin full of iced water over him and when this had no reaction things looked bad.
Of course I knew how he could be woken and it took one like minded local to find the cure. He approached with a full tumbler full of vino to which our hero bolted upright and emptied the contents in one slug. I last saw him with his top off jigging his way around the fountain.
Yet none of this was the highlight of my afternoon's voyeurism. That moment belonged to Clifton Green (CG) our most excellent new web designer. (Stan James employees were well represented especially our Marketing department).
I had spotted Clifton and his girlfriend enjoying the festivities when he leaned forward appearing to offer his girlfriend a kiss. As she leaned forward to kiss him he took the opportunity to pour a jug of vino down her top, little did he know what was to come.
I immediately turned the tap on in the kitchen and filled a huge mixing bowl full of cold water. I set up my angle of attack and waited tentatively for CG to reach the perfect mark. When he did I released. A few innocents were caught in the tidal wave that descended upon him but they saw the funny side. I laughed till tears were rolling down my cheeks and then laughed some more.
His girlfriend was pointing at me in a heroic way so I rewarded her by gently pouring some red wine I had opened the night before. It took a few seconds to realise I was trying to pour a decent bottle of chateau du neuf du pape into a thimble from about 7 meters and I quickly switched to a bottle of watered down ribena instead.
Then sadly I had to leave the mother of all parties to go to work. It was disappointing because everyone seemed to be having so much fun and I was overjoyed observing it all. The positive energy lifted my spirits completely and the four hours I had stood watching it all flew by.I cannot imagine an occasion like this ever taking part in England. People bringing cartloads of booze to enjoy with each other, no fighting or public urinating, no girls getting hassled; kids running around in the middle of it all screaming with joy and all members of the family in attendance. The Spanish seem to have this festival thing sussed and I for one applaud them.'
I shouldn't beat yourself up to much over this Ivey thing' some wag at work said upon my arrival today, 'PF will do it for you!' Ha-ha very funny. I did make a rick not quoting Chip Reece, I hadn't seen him play a tournament for a long time and he wasn't on the database of runners we have.As expected the gloating has begun in earnest, i will take it on the chin of course (not much choice i hear you say).
Only one punter offered to buy me a beer and so Ms.Coren i thank you for that and will collect said beer in Vegas.Good luck to my good mate Julian Gardner in tonight's final. Julian is someone I have long admired as both a person and poker player. I owe him big style after a night out we had many moons ago which would have ended in absolute disgrace for me had he not saved the day. it will of course cost us money as Julian has proved popular already at 5-2 but nowhere near the extent of Ivey job as it is now known.
I played the first of our weekly Heads Up matches tonight. It was against the league winner 'TonyCorbett'. We play for $250 and if one of the Stanspoker team wins it is doubled till the following week. The match tonight lasted 5 hands; even I can win with Aces. That’s the bar set for the rest of the team.
Finally, as we haven't shared one for a while I thought we would share this gem we received this afternoon
You can stick you f*****g chat service up your f*****g arsehole !
Priceless.
A parody by the magnificent Silvio
Line of the week must be from Brian, a Big Brother contestant:
Politics, that’s just showbiz for ugly people
Now a roll call of congratulations and some big thanks
Congrats to me old mucker Andy Ward on his excellent 2nd place in a World series of Poker event and the little matter of trousering a decent 6 figure sum.
Also winning in Vegas and copping a six figure sum, kudos to Bad beat Channing, my flatmate of many years in Battersea.
Also big well done to the McDonalds for their double cash in the big one and big cheers for `The Guvnor`, Willie Tann in his efforts to become the 2007 WSOP Champ.I do hope they all have my address in Spain in case they wish to me send a food parcel.
Next up a plethora of thanks to those who have kept the Spillanesters spirits up over the last few weeks.
Without a drink I can turn into a gibbering wreck that can yell and scream more than a new born baby without its bottle, so special thanks to those who made sure that this particular baby got his bottle (and filled it with Heineken and or Magners).
AJ, Bobby, PF, Kenny, Ady, Hayley, Big Paul (formerly known as Ginger Paul), Johnny Ireeeee & his crew now known as 'The Spice Boys' (Kelan, Simon, Rob), CD & Russell....cheers I salute you.
If you have seen the Godfather part 3 you will recognise the blog heading, it was of course parodied in a hilarious way by Silvio in the Soprano's.
I said it out last week as I made my reappearance in the Stan James office in a shock move that surprised many and certainly shocked a few more than that.
I have been working on a project for my old gaffer and as I don’t have a pc I asked if I could use a desk in the office and he kindly agreed.
You can only imagine some of the looks I received from ex colleagues when they saw my good self stroll in and take a seat, Osama turning up at the White House would have got less a reaction.
I nearly didn’t actually get into the office in the first place. I arrived to meet the gaffer at the appointed time and spotted a manger and a director having a discussion outside.
I said my hellos and informed them I had a meeting with the boss and they needn’t worry that I had just recovered from a long spell of amnesia and was intending to go back to work.
'Fine, no problem'
was their collective response and they informed me the gaffer hadn’t actually arrived yet (bear in mind it was only 3pm and the gaffer loves his beauty sleep even more than I do).
'Fine'
I replied and wondered if they would want me to wait in the lovely cool air conditioned office or outside in the baking heat, it was of course the latter. The gaffer turned up eventually and wondered why I was outside, when I told him he pissed himself and said both were doing their jobs better than he could have hoped for, cheeky git.
The reaction to my return
I seem to have been doing a lot of Stan’s related things recently.
First up was Bobby’s barbeque attended by all the great and good of SJ, which was until the police arrived and forced the party into early retirement.
Next up a few of my old colleagues suggested a night out at a new restaurant in La Linea, an all you can eat Chinese buffet. How they expect to make a profit by allowing greedy chaps like us in and only charging 11 euros for the pleasure is beyond me but I intend to eat their amazing food until they get wise to it.
As much Fillet steak, crispy duck, jumbo king prawns, along with a zillion other dishes for about 7 quid, definite value.
I did spot an Englishman (I recognised the football top he was wearing) who must have also paid his 11 euros but didn’t quite grasp the fact that there was terrific value in this place. The first time I bumped into him his plate was overflowing with prawn crackers and boiled rice, the next time he again had ignored all the king prawns, fillet steaks and sushi, you guessed it, his plate had only one food item on it, chips.
Tuesday evening was the football league bash and I managed to blag myself an invite.
This years incumbent in the role of manager was unwell which allowed me to fill in for the evening and how happy I was to do so, especially when those two words that send me giddy every time I hear them were mentioned, 'free bar'.
Amazingly only two teams turned up so as well as the free bar the free buffet got a decent hammering from us all as well and to make matters even better I managed to get a medal for the 'Betting Jobs, Cup Final Runners Up'.
It will not take much imagination to picture the state of the 8 or 9 of our group by the end of the free bar. Of course to go home at this stage would have been foolish and so the night kicked on into Spain where other SJ delinquents joined the party and it ended in as some may have predicted, in a kebab shop.
Now I have in my time drunk in some very peculiar places in my time, none more so than at the afore mentioned Kebab house next door to the Irish bar where at around 5.30am we got a lock in.
The owner did little to eradicate the stereotype that many Turkish men like a lump of meat between their slices of pitta. He must have hugged me at least 5 times before I could get out but I did the honourable thing and told him he would have more luck with the one remaining 'spice boy'. I did feel a little guilty the next day; I hope he didn’t get an extra sprinkling of chilli sauce he wasn’t expecting.
Leave it alone Ali!
Wednesday saw me attend the Gibraltar sports stadium to watch the SJ cricket team take on a Victor Chandlers xi in a normally very competitive 20/20 fixture.
SJ won on the bridle but the fun was as usual the banter that goes on in a fixture like this and typically it was AJ that got the ball rolling.
Stan’s had to chase a 116 and in the 2nd over one of VC's fielders on the boundary in front of us turned round and asked AJ to update the scoreboard. The answer he got was not one he was expecting, 'why?'
The Mick Hucknall look-alike (portly, red hair in a ponytail) seemed shaken by this and we had spotted that he wasn’t the shiniest euro in the till; his brain short circuited but after a couple of moments he did muster 'just do it mate, alright?'
Now if you know AJ as well as I do you will know this wasn’t the smartest remark to have made. As sure as eggs are eggs this would come back to haunt him and the following over the games began.
The Hucknall look-alike misfielded resulting in Stan’s getting a boundary instead of single, cue loud hoots of laughter led by a choir of supporters and orchestrated by AJ. A few balls later he dropped a simple catch; cue more huge cheers and roars of laughter. Next over his aggressive throw to the stumps resulted in overthrows cue all out celebrations and delirium in the stands. It of course continued all match as the ball seemed to home in on him every other delivery and by the end he looked liked a broken man but fair play to him, he shrugged it off and even took a wicket with some comical bowling before the match was won.
VC´s star performer after the match
Of course working in the SJ office has bought back many happy memories of working in the bookmaking business.
I knew I would one day end up working in a betting office but was unsure whether to try to work for the more gifted people at a spread firm or joining a fixed odds firm. There is a huge difference between both, perhaps best highlighted by the afternoon I spent at the shared officers of City Index, a spread firm and Blue Square, a fixed odds firm.
My old mucker Bad Beat was grafting away at City and had suggested I come along to watch the game between Chelsea and Leeds, as a blues fan and knowing that two other of my mates, The Camel and Tim ‘Albi’ Amos were working for Blue Square, it was a no-brainer.
I arrived a minute after kick off and not much was happening in either the game or both betting companies which were not separated by a wall but were both sharing an open floor space.
Early into the second half Leeds scored which led me to make my life long decision. The city offices went into meltdown; phones ringing off the hook, traders screaming prices at each other, throwing bits of paper at each other and generally running around knocking over anyone in their path.
Meanwhile at the Blue Square desks things were somewhat different if not a little more intriguing.
Albi was busy writing new prices down but they were nothing to do with football. Rebecca and Shannaz, the other two Blue Sq employees’ were feeding liquorice allsorts into a blindfolded Camel's mouth as he shouted out 'Orange', correctly in this case as Albi priced up the next flavour. A career working for a fixed odds firm beckoned for me at that exact moment. More trading floor tales next time.
Next week sees me sneak another single and hit 41 not out and what a year it has been. I hope it is nearly half as good as my 40th year which will definitely go down as a vintage, if only I could afford another bottle of the stuff.
Finally this weekend is without doubt one of the best reasons to live in Spain, it’s Domingo Rociero time, which translated into English means, ´one great big piss up in the name of religion`.
I wrote a piece about it last year on the SJ poker blog and its well worth a revisit methinks; hope you enjoy rereading it as much as I did.
Domingo Rociero
When I was awoken this morning by the sound of hundreds of people outside, singing after quite obviously drinking, I thought all the Ivey backers had come up with the ultimate wind-up.
It took me a few moments to realise it was actually the beginning of Domingo Rociero, a traditional celebration in Andalucía, where every town goes out and gets absolutely shredded under the guise of a religious celebration and in LaLinea's case it was in honour of the Virgin del Carmen.
What a day, what a crowd and what a party. I only recently mentioned to a friend of mine that I didn't think I had ever seen a drunk Spaniard; today I don't think I saw a sober Spaniard.
I meandered out onto my balcony to be met by a wonderful cacophony of noise; music blaring, bottles being opened, people laughing, food sizzling and then more bottles being opened.
Everyone it seemed had come out to celebrate and from my balcony I got a bird eye's view. I kid you not when I say people came armed with Alcohol and every possible devise or vessel was used to bring it; Bottles, sacks, bin bags, shopping trolleys, kegs, wine skins, all types of measuring jugs, cans, tins and what genuinely appeared to be a fish tank.
You know the best thing about it all? The people bring their booze to share. That's right, share. The idea is you get a glass attached around your neck with a piece of string or leather and when your empty people just top you up. Not only do people top you up, it became clear everyone likes to cover you in whatever concoction they are drinking; it appeared tinto de verano (wine mixed with lemonade) was the drink of choice.
The square was covered in booze so it was no surprise to see the local wino lolling about with a huge smile on his face. This must be his Christmas Day Birthday and any type of anniversary rolled into one.It didn't seem appropriate to cook whilst all this was happening beneath me so I passed on the fry-up and went with a tub of Strawberry Cheesecake Hagen Das and retired to the balcony.
I literally couldn't believe what I was witnessing, thousands of people (with many in traditional dress), dancing to the mixture of sounds that was being blared out by the drinks vendors. Local music clashed with 'its raining men', Flamenco was just about heard over 'I will survive' and to the girl in the gorgeous black traje de flamenco fanning herself with an abanico and dancing to the pussycat dolls', yes I do wish I had a girlfriend and yes I do hope she's 'hot like you'.
The Flamenco dress must be the most stylish and sexy of National dresses. I observed a Penelope Cruise look-alike Flamenco with a Salma Hayek look-alike which was nice, though not as nice as what I spotted in one protected corner. The temperature was middle 30's and one stunning local took the time to literally water herself down just below me. If a collection plate would have been passed at this stage my life savings would have gone in (£11.83).
Everyone was either drinking, throwing drink, dancing, kissing or running from an attacker armed with a jug of wine. I spied one local Antonio Banderas clone running away from his girlfriend only to bump into a local lady whom I guessed was in her 70's. Rather than be upset she planted a smacker straight onto his lips and by the look on his face she had slipped her tongue in as well. He was last spotted lying on the ground mouth open, gargling with his girlfriend above him pouring the wine.
The local wino appeared to peak to early, I saw him passed out at one stage with a couple of concerned locals giving him a gentle smack to wake him up. When this didn't work one of the vendors took matters into his own hands by emptying an industrial sized bin full of iced water over him and when this had no reaction things looked bad.
Of course I knew how he could be woken and it took one like minded local to find the cure. He approached with a full tumbler full of vino to which our hero bolted upright and emptied the contents in one slug. I last saw him with his top off jigging his way around the fountain.
Yet none of this was the highlight of my afternoon's voyeurism. That moment belonged to Clifton Green (CG) our most excellent new web designer. (Stan James employees were well represented especially our Marketing department).
I had spotted Clifton and his girlfriend enjoying the festivities when he leaned forward appearing to offer his girlfriend a kiss. As she leaned forward to kiss him he took the opportunity to pour a jug of vino down her top, little did he know what was to come.
I immediately turned the tap on in the kitchen and filled a huge mixing bowl full of cold water. I set up my angle of attack and waited tentatively for CG to reach the perfect mark. When he did I released. A few innocents were caught in the tidal wave that descended upon him but they saw the funny side. I laughed till tears were rolling down my cheeks and then laughed some more.
His girlfriend was pointing at me in a heroic way so I rewarded her by gently pouring some red wine I had opened the night before. It took a few seconds to realise I was trying to pour a decent bottle of chateau du neuf du pape into a thimble from about 7 meters and I quickly switched to a bottle of watered down ribena instead.
Then sadly I had to leave the mother of all parties to go to work. It was disappointing because everyone seemed to be having so much fun and I was overjoyed observing it all. The positive energy lifted my spirits completely and the four hours I had stood watching it all flew by.I cannot imagine an occasion like this ever taking part in England. People bringing cartloads of booze to enjoy with each other, no fighting or public urinating, no girls getting hassled; kids running around in the middle of it all screaming with joy and all members of the family in attendance. The Spanish seem to have this festival thing sussed and I for one applaud them.'
I shouldn't beat yourself up to much over this Ivey thing' some wag at work said upon my arrival today, 'PF will do it for you!' Ha-ha very funny. I did make a rick not quoting Chip Reece, I hadn't seen him play a tournament for a long time and he wasn't on the database of runners we have.As expected the gloating has begun in earnest, i will take it on the chin of course (not much choice i hear you say).
Only one punter offered to buy me a beer and so Ms.Coren i thank you for that and will collect said beer in Vegas.Good luck to my good mate Julian Gardner in tonight's final. Julian is someone I have long admired as both a person and poker player. I owe him big style after a night out we had many moons ago which would have ended in absolute disgrace for me had he not saved the day. it will of course cost us money as Julian has proved popular already at 5-2 but nowhere near the extent of Ivey job as it is now known.
I played the first of our weekly Heads Up matches tonight. It was against the league winner 'TonyCorbett'. We play for $250 and if one of the Stanspoker team wins it is doubled till the following week. The match tonight lasted 5 hands; even I can win with Aces. That’s the bar set for the rest of the team.
Finally, as we haven't shared one for a while I thought we would share this gem we received this afternoon
You can stick you f*****g chat service up your f*****g arsehole !
Priceless.
posted by lionel hutz at 7/14/2007
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