Wednesday, 425 day, and another easy day. Robert Cooper got me out of bed, he's the subject of Poker 425's Caption Comp, he wanted royalties, bless him! He's great fun and a good pal.
Then Roland called, fresh from picking up over a million bucks in Vegas. The plan was to get him to do a phone-in to Poker 425, but it went wrong, so instead we will get an interview with him this week. He lives in London, so The Dummy will organise the cameraman and we will do it over the weekend.
Got the early train (well, 11.04 early train...) to London, and had a ‘secret’ meeting with a guy who's setting something up that he wants me to be involved with on the business side. Interesting stuff too. Quite exciting actually, but time is precious. I dunno.
The 425 recording got delayed by 2 hours, grr, and then, just as we got started, two journos from The Guardian came into the Studio, and wanted an interview. Typically, they had no knowledge or interest in poker, but once Jonny Gould mentioned ‘celebrity’ Poker, their ears went on high alert and they got all excited. Journos, eh?
No idea how the show came out, it's hard to tell from the ‘inside’, and I don't know if I will get chance to catch it this week. I made a silly reference to David Williams, which, afterwards, I regretted, but what's done is done. Hopefully it whooshed everyone.
Managed to get the 6.15 from St Pancras, straight to Sheffield, arrived 8.53, and huffed and puffed into Napoleons with minutes to spare for the Monthly £50 jobbie. A good first 2 hours, well leery and loose, then I got moved to Thewy's table, which spelt trouble. I Raised it up 3 hands in a row with nothing - exploit the ‘no image’ thing - and now it's Thewy's big blind and I find QQ, the perfect trap. There is no way on earth he will pass any hand to me in this situation, and all the chips go in, he ain’t good enough to pass his 99, and with the first card out a Q, he's been busted - but he runner-runner-runners the straight. He's blessed, I tell ya, blessed.
Was booked to do a Poker Night Live phone-in, but for the 3rd week in a row, technical problems caused it to be abandoned. Are they trying to tell me summat?
We both bust out near the dough, and he drives me back to Derby Railway Station where we arrive at 0400, and after a diversion into Tescos to get the cat some nosh, I am home by 0500. Another easy day. Off to The Sportsman on Thursday, am so looking forward to that, and a meet with Monty Burns and Jon Sullivan on Friday morning. Thewy has booked a twin room for me and he at the Cumberland Hotel, I don't mind sleeping with commoners.
I really need to organise my life better. When Wendy was around, I just felt a need to be more disciplined, but when one is alone, with no ‘domestic’ responsibilities, I'm hopelessly undisciplined. Out all day Wednesday in London and Sheffield, back to London on Thursday for a few days, 425 in London on Sunday, Blackpool on Monday, London on Wednesday again, for 425 and my PNL debut, back to Blackpool on Thursday through to Sunday. I need to learn to say ‘no’ sometimes, but I refuse to die quietly. So be it. I have some lovely material to write up, heaps of it, but finding the time is the problem.
Jen and sloppy invited me to come with them to Norway this weekend, and I'd love to do it, but I'm pre-booked with 425, so cannot manage it. Prob for the best, who wants an old geezer hanging round with two young dudes? I'm pretty uncool though, and uncool is the new cool.....
OK, London here we come.