Vegas & The Aftermath - Diary

[tikay]

Well a pleasing evening. I was determined to ensure George was "settled", & he gave a great performance on the Show. It's pretty daunting to do, but he soon had it in hand. Shelley was in the Gallery, too, & she was as proud as Punch. He's set off back home now, to Leicester, & tomorrow, he goes to Prague. I hope he gets the lot.

What a change in his demeanour in the last year - wonderful to see.

[mondatoo]

I have to say I'm enormously interested in the events at Pearl Harbour. How wonderful to have been to the place and seen it for yourself.

When I learn about these huge, world-changing events, it's always the little individual stories that capture my imagination and make it real for me.

I can't for instance grasp the enormity of all those people dying in the tsunami, but it all comes to life when you see it through the eyes of one person.

I spent some time talking to a Holocaust survivor a couple of years ago, and it was one of the most moving experiences of my life. 

Apparently there are still some Pearl Harbour veterans alive and kicking.


http://www.kare11.com/news/blogs/article/950289/458/Pearl-Harbor-survivors-live-to-see-70th-anniversary

That link is a wonderful story Tom, thank you.

What a wonderful tool the internet is, if properly used, eh? How much has it developed our understanding of life, & our education?

Many poorer parts of the world - deffo large swathes of Africa, for example, & I'm sure parts of South America, & Asia, still don't have much by way of internet, or even reliable electricity supply, but when the infrastructure starts to support the internet, the education gain will be immense.

I'm hopelessly addicted to it, & spend countless hours researching & reading stuff. But not wasted hours. I'd wager I have learned more in the last 5 years than in my entire life.

I reckon I learn more from watching QI than anything else, then after that, reading grampa's diary. Today I've learned all about Pearl Harbour and that Air France crash off Brazil. I flew from Brazil to London a few months before that, they don't mention this norious area that planes struggle to get through around the equator when you're booking your flights do they

I would say the same, problem is some of it isn't actual correct so now I wonder which bits are right and which aren't. Blidey clever people making shit up that nobody knows is wrong to challenge them, glgl getting that through past the internet Mr Fry.

[tikay]

The exit of the two Manchester Clubs from the CL last night was quite something. The bookies, of course, loved it, they had a grand night.

Twitter was almost on fire with a torrent of comments about United's exit.

It's easy to understand why supporters might celebrate success - a win, a goal, a fine shot, etc, but harder to understand why they would celebrate failure, even if it is to a Team they don't support. Where does all this hate & rage come from? "Haha, fu** Manchester" was typical of the Twitter responses. What sort of comment is that for an adult to make, & be pleased with? Does it really make their day, to see a wonderful Club humiliated? They actually ENJOY seeing faiulure? What? That's their idea of a good day? Well done lads, well done.

Sir Alex, clearly not best pleased with his night's work, did it better - so much better - when chiding Roy Keane, for Roy's comments, as reported to him in the post-match Press Conference.

"I don't know why you are bringing up a television critic. Roy had an opportunity to prove himself in management too".

Now that's MUCH better, must have stung a treat, & got Roy right between the eyes. Watch & learn, kids, brains beats abuse 24/7.

[tikay]

That's me done for now, & the Diary may go moribund for a day or two.

First thing tomorrow, I set off ffor the long trek to Newcastle, for the Sky Poker Tour, via a few stops, including home to sort some stuff. It's about 250 miles, on the Motorways, on a bad weather Friday, so not looking forward to it so much.

We are staying in the not-so-elegant NewGate Hotel, the sole advantage of which it is nice & close to Aspers.

Hope to arrive mid-afternoon, then a meeting weith the Head of Poker, Head of Product, & Thewy, to go through some software enhancements. Thewy has fitted us like a glove, but that's another story, for another day.


At 6pm, am supposed to hook up in Chinatown with a bunch of the lads, & Thewy, for a bite to eat, then to Aspers @ 8pm for a £20 jobbie. An early night would be a huge bonus, so I'll push those chips around a bit lively.

Work starts @ 10am Saturday, prepping for the day, though Tighty has it all organised to a tee. The meeting & greeting, & schmoozing, is quite enjoyable, except for the occasional sort who wants a bit of sport. 2pm, the Tourney begins, we have a Live Stream, & I'll be commentating for most of the day I guess.

All being well, we should be done for 2am.

Sunday morning, around 8am, I'll head back South, another 250 miles, but if I can keep the Starbucks flowing, it's not so bad.

A Newcastle kid - a lapsed blonde in fact - has been trolling on my Cash Tables for a week or more now, just dissing me & making daft comments, asking dumb questions, night after night, "baiting", & I just ignore it. It's his idea of fun, I guess, the poor sad soul. What else can I do, but ignore? Part of the job I suppose. I can't be arsey with Clients, but I'm playing in my own time, with my own money, & I need to really concentrate when I am 4-Tabling Omaha cash. Anyway, I expect we'll bump into each other on Saturday. That'll be fun.

Have a grand weekend, all of you, & good luck all those playing the Monte Carlo in Notts. Bad timing that, for me, but I saved a grand, so not that bad......

[Geo the Sarge]

The exit of the two Manchester Clubs from the CL last night was quite something. The bookies, of course, loved it, they had a grand night.

Twitter was almost on fire with a torrent of comments about United's exit.

It's easy to understand why supporters might celebrate success - a win, a goal, a fine shot, etc, but harder to understand why they would celebrate failure, even if it is to a Team they don't support. Where does all this hate & rage come from? "Haha, fu** Manchester" was typical of the Twitter responses. What sort of comment is that for an adult to make, & be pleased with? Does it really make their day, to see a wonderful Club humiliated? They actually ENJOY seeing faiulure? What? That's their idea of a good day? Well done lads, well done.

Sir Alex, clearly not best pleased with his night's work, did it better - so much better - when chiding Roy Keave, for Roy's comments, as reported to him in the post-match Press Conference.

"I don't know why you are bringing up a television critic. Roy had an opportunity to prove himself in management too".

Now that's MUCH better, must have stung a treat, & got Roy right between the eyes. Watch & learn, kids, brains beats abuse 24/7.

probably the most accurate and best post I've read all year.

Geo

[mondatoo]

Have a good weekend, wish I could've made it, gotta grind though.

[GreekStein]

Don't understand why people can't be happy that man united or man city went out of the cl?

Man United are a team that it's easy to dislike. After years and years of success (which is obviously admirable) they have built up a lot of rivalries. Why would these rivals (chelsea, arsenal, liverpool, newcastle, man city etc) want them to do well in the champions league? It's better for all these teams if man united are out. 

Their fanbase is a joke - just how many are from manchester?!

I support chelsea who I think over the last 6 years or so have run pretty good with refereeing decisions for the large part but the way man utd run is joke lol. Another reason people are happy to see them out.

[Jon MW]

Don't understand why people can't be happy that man united or man city went out of the cl?

Man United are a team that it's easy to dislike. After years and years of success (which is obviously admirable) they have built up a lot of rivalries. Why would these rivals (chelsea, arsenal, liverpool, newcastle, man city etc) want them to do well in the champions league? It's better for all these teams if man united are out. 

Their fanbase is a joke - just how many are from manchester?!

I support chelsea who I think over the last 6 years or so have run pretty good with refereeing decisions for the large part but the way man utd run is joke lol. Another reason people are happy to see them out.

Why does it matter how many of their fans are from Manchester?

As an aside I think their has been at least one statistical study of refereeing decisions which has shown that the perception that Man U run good on them is just a myth but my main question would be - it's all well and good to not like them, but why HATE them?

Because that's where the mindless abuse comes from, not dislike, but hatred.

[GreekStein]

FML just deleted a rly good post. Fyugdfghjfsdfgh

[david3103]

FML just deleted a rly good post. Fyugdfghjfsdfgh

If the deleted post was on the subject of your dislike of Manchester United, I doubt the adjectival accuracy of this.

[GreekStein]

I assume you're not really a football guy mr british cowboy sir?

It matters to most proper fans because usually fans understand what it is to be a supporter. You go to somewhere like newcastle where every single fan is wearing the team's shirt or pompey where the crowd don't stop singing even if they're 5-0 down.

Being a real fan is usually about following a fairly local team so that you can actually 'support' them.

That's why most proper mancs support man city. 

What link to manchester united do most of their uk fans have? Nothing but the love for being a glory hunter or perhaps an open day visit to manchester university 18 years after first supporting them.

Look at the typical united fan on this forum - someone like bedi. Travels all over the uk to play donkaments but bet I've been to see more games at stamford bridge by the time I was 8 than george has been to man utd games home or away his whole life.

That's partly why true fans resent man united. Yes their manager is remarkable and yep they've had some amazing players and history but a lot their fans don't deserve to see such success. I'm not saying the club itself doesn't deserve it.

The survey you mentioned - can't really give that any credit til I've seen a link.

The hatred thing I agree with but think this is going to come down to semantics.

As a chelsea fan I have what I'd like to think of a healthy dislike for some of our rivals. When I say 'I hate man utd' or 'I hate arsenal' etc I don't literally mean hate. I think the same is true for 95% of football fans and people in general who throw the word hate around far too easily.

[rex008]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-16094360

Scotland pics of the storm, pic 13 shows a wind turbine catching fire due to the 165mph winds.

I wonder why the wind turbine caught fire? Not to be silly, but was it "whizzing round" due to the gale force winds? Surely not? They must "damp" those things, no?

They are supposed to have brakes, but they do occasionally fail. When this one finally lets go (about 17s in), it's quite impressive.



Presume similar happened to the Scottish one, but failure mode was slightly different.

[Lucky]

FML just deleted a rly good post. Fyugdfghjfsdfgh

Whose post did you delete?

[david3103]

I assume you're not really a football guy mr british cowboy sir?

It matters to most proper fans because usually fans understand what it is to be a supporter. You go to somewhere like newcastle where every single fan is wearing the team's shirt or pompey where the crowd don't stop singing even if they're 5-0 down.

Being a real fan is usually about following a fairly local team so that you can actually 'support' them.

That's why most proper mancs support man city. 

What link to manchester united do most of their uk fans have? Nothing but the love for being a glory hunter or perhaps an open day visit to manchester university 18 years after first supporting them.

Look at the typical united fan on this forum - someone like bedi. Travels all over the uk to play donkaments but bet I've been to see more games at stamford bridge by the time I was 8 than george has been to man utd games home or away his whole life.

That's partly why true fans resent man united. Yes their manager is remarkable and yep they've had some amazing players and history but a lot their fans don't deserve to see such success. I'm not saying the club itself doesn't deserve it.

The survey you mentioned - can't really give that any credit til I've seen a link.

The hatred thing I agree with but think this is going to come down to semantics.

As a chelsea fan I have what I'd like to think of a healthy dislike for some of our rivals. When I say 'I hate man utd' or 'I hate arsenal' etc I don't literally mean hate. I think the same is true for 95% of football fans and people in general who throw the word hate around far too easily.

A better post than I anticipated, but still much to disagree with here - probably not the best place for that though.

But just, if I may, two small points.  

The hoary old myth about Manchester City having the bigger local following has been disproved time and time again. Academic studies undertaken and published. Truth is, all big clubs have supporters with no local ties.
You think Chelse is different? This link is to an official Chelsea FC map showing the location of their UK supporters clubs. Given your view that all clubs should be 'local clubs for local people' one can only assume that the clubs exist to support solely a diaspora of the true inhabitants of half of SW6. http://www.chelseafc.com/page/SupporterClubsMap


2 - The fact that many fans are wearing the overpriced replca shirt is surely no measure for the level of 'passion'

Happy to continue this over in the Manchester United FC thread.

[GreekStein]

Believe me, I'm not not arguing that chelsea's support base is perfect. In fact, it has deteriorated hugely post abrahamovich but increased in numbers.

[ ] Will be posting in a mufc thread.

Football supporters (inc myself) are too irrational when it comes to talking about their team.