Vegas & The Aftermath - Diary

[reenot]

After an "interesting" night last night, filming at a guys house in Dagenham, I was back at my Hotel pre-midnight, straight to bed, & up and about at 9am, so I decided to have a mooch round Romford Market, which is right behind the Hotel.

As a kid, Markets were where we shopped - there were no Supermarkets then, & Tesco's had not even been founded - & I was sent on errands to Shepherds Bush Market three times a week. It runs from Goldhawk Road to Uxbridge Road, alongside a railway viaduct on which trundle Hammersmith & City Line stock.

When I began work, at 16, I became a regular at what is said to be Britain's longest Street Market, Walthamstow. 

So I was intrigued to see how Markets had changed, & Romford Market still has a 50's feel to it. Fruit & Veg is sold loose, in bowls, & these bowls come at £1 each - you pay £1 & get the contents of the bowl. No weighing then. And the fruit & veg comes in odd sizes, like it used to, pre EEC days, giant, mis-shapen cooking apples, & odd shaped swedes & turnips.

And it has "The Tea Pot Cafe (est 1953), where they still serve Tea from a proper pot. Proper brekkie, too. And I found a bakers, which sold Bread Pudding - not seen that for donkeys years.

WARNING TO KIDS - don't go swimming after eating Bread Pudding.

Here's a Romford Market scene from way back. Note stuff being sold off the back of a lorry.

Happy Days.

The Tesco brand first appeared in 1924. (source wiki)
And I thought the jokes about Tikay's age were just jokes!!!

[RED-DOG]

Before the big name supermarkets got a proper hold, there were lots of small independents. These were ordinary shopkeepers who jumped on the supermarket or ("walkround" as people used to call them), bandwagon.

There was one in particular that I remember, "Dell's" supermarket in Darnall. (Phil Quayle might remember it, but I think he's too young)

Anyway, Dell, the proprietor, a shopkeeper all his life, could never really get used to people helping themselves. He almost drove himself (and everyone else) mad by galloping up and down the aisles trying to serve everyone at once.

[tikay]

After an "interesting" night last night, filming at a guys house in Dagenham, I was back at my Hotel pre-midnight, straight to bed, & up and about at 9am, so I decided to have a mooch round Romford Market, which is right behind the Hotel.

As a kid, Markets were where we shopped - there were no Supermarkets then, & Tesco's had not even been founded - & I was sent on errands to Shepherds Bush Market three times a week. It runs from Goldhawk Road to Uxbridge Road, alongside a railway viaduct on which trundle Hammersmith & City Line stock.

When I began work, at 16, I became a regular at what is said to be Britain's longest Street Market, Walthamstow. 

So I was intrigued to see how Markets had changed, & Romford Market still has a 50's feel to it. Fruit & Veg is sold loose, in bowls, & these bowls come at £1 each - you pay £1 & get the contents of the bowl. No weighing then. And the fruit & veg comes in odd sizes, like it used to, pre EEC days, giant, mis-shapen cooking apples, & odd shaped swedes & turnips.

And it has "The Tea Pot Cafe (est 1953), where they still serve Tea from a proper pot. Proper brekkie, too. And I found a bakers, which sold Bread Pudding - not seen that for donkeys years.

WARNING TO KIDS - don't go swimming after eating Bread Pudding.

Here's a Romford Market scene from way back. Note stuff being sold off the back of a lorry.

Happy Days.

The Tesco brand first appeared in 1924. (source wiki)
And I thought the jokes about Tikay's age were just jokes!!!

I stand corrected! I thought it was founded much, much, later, by Sir Jack Cohen, & I do remember him buying (& later selling) the Viktor Value branded chain in the fifties or sixties.

[tikay]

Bishopthorpe Palace home of the Archbishop of York

Yes indeed, & this is John Sentamu, who holds that Office right now. I'm not sure why, but I was much surprised to realise that The Archbishop of York is currently a black man. (Well, I imagine he's always been a black man, but you get my drift). He's Ugandan, & seems a quite splendid man, too.

[tikay]

...though quite what he's up to here I'm not entirely sure. He does look a little guilty.

[tikay]

When I research something (code for "look it up"), I tend to wander down all sorts of byways, into a never-ending mine of delicious new things I never knew, & I can disappear for hours among google & wikipidea. (Oh to be a schoolboy with a PC now, my mind would be full of incredible information). Before I return to the world of poker, as I must I suppose, here's one last piece I stumbled across today, whilst looking something up.

A commonly seen practice among many slugs is apophallation, when one or both of the slugs chews off the other's penis. The penis of these species is curled like a cork-screw and often becomes entangled in their mate's genitalia in the process of exchanging sperm. When all else fails, apophallation allows the slugs to separate themselves. Once its penis has been removed, a slug is still able to participate in mating subsequently, but only using the female parts of its reproductive system.

You may wonder how I came to dicover that pearl of wisdom, but I have a genuine excuse. I was looking up slime molds at the time. See, it all makes sense.

[tikay]

I had a 1cwt slice of bread pudding this morning, & I'm sure it was spiked, as I fell asleep for 3 hours after I'd ate it. I'm stuck in a Hotel all day, there was no point driving back to Derbyshire last night, as I'm due at a do in London tonight. I'll go home tomorrow.

So, poker, & Wednesday night, I went down to Luton. It was officially Jim McShane's (77dave) last night pre-Vegas, & Nina had laid on a little surprise Buffet in honour of him. Jim always orders baked beans, chips & grated cheese, so that was the Buffet they laid on for him - beans, chips & cheese. And Carmel & the GM took us to the bar & we all had drinks on the house. Nice touch, eh? They are much-maligned, the Luton Management, but their problems are caused by those above, in upper Management at Rank, who have, to be honest, made a bit of a pigs ear of Grosvenor strategically. More of which later. Nina had spent hours contacting many of Jim's friends, & the coup included a nice early start to the Cash-Game, 7.30, perfect.

I sat down with £500, ran it up to £900 early doors, but then dribbled it away, & ended up losing nearly £600, not good.

Sadly, half of Hinge & Bracket decided to throw a wet blanket over the evening, & Bracket never once stoppped moaning & groaning, & I'm afraid my intolerance of such rudeness (it was Jim's special evening, & we were his Guests) & ingratitude is not what it should be, & words were exchanged. I really must try to be more tolerant of rude, me me me type people.

We also had non-stop chuntering all night about the "move table" protocol, & it all got rather unpleasant, & quite spoilt my night. Luton need to do what DTD did to overcome the usual childish petulance & stupidity of poker players - introduce a written protocol, & if anyone don't like it, they can bugger off. Luton has got it's act together in many ways, & the incoming Cardroom Manager will put the finishing touches. I hope he sorts the Cash-Games there, or else they will die. I just wanna go somewhere knowing I can get a seat, & relax at a fun cash-table all night, & not listen to players whinng all night that this, that & the bloody other is not fair. I could have got married or been a primary schoolteacher if I liked that kind of thing.

I'm gonna so miss Jim, he's become a very good friend & his poker advice is invaluable. He also sets up the Cash-Games at Luton by ringing round "the lads", & so we have a fun evening usually, with the likes of Jim, Jeff Buff, Ambro, Dave Courtney, Gino, Anthony, Addy & co. Murray Brown interests me, too, he has a greater "feel" for stud-games than anyone I've ever met, & it's always worth discussing hands with him.

We had two good DC games going all night, but without Jim to organise them, I sense they will fall apart. The House revenue from those two tables, 8 handed, at £9 per hour, is £600 over an 8 hour stint, so two tables (assume 3 Dealers needed) brings in £1,200 a night, or over £8,000 per week, call it £400k per annum. Jeff Buff & I reckon we could easily fill 6 tables per night at Luton, of DC, Omaha & Hold 'Em, so imagine how much House Revenue that would generate - over a £million per year, easy-peasy! Opportunities lost, no wonder Rank are in a mess.

[tikay]

A blonde, who (used to) Post a lot on here, & works in a North of England Casino, told me he's been warned he can no longer post on Poker Fora, as it counts as "fraternisation". Now really, how silly is that?

[boldie]

A blonde, who (used to) Post a lot on here, & works in a North of England Casino, told me he's been warned he can no longer post on Poker Fora, as it counts as "fraternisation". Now really, how silly is that?

what a load of bollox. Casino's will just never learn about decent marketing, will they?

[tikay]

City News.

Ladbrokes have purchased the Northern Ireland "Eastwood Bookmakers" chain for £117 million. That amounts to about £2 million per shop, twice the going rate in Mainland UK. It's very tough to get a Bookies licence in Northern Ireland, only 10 have been granted in the last 5 years in the Province. Laddies ain't daft.

So one Barney Eastwood, better known to many as a Boxing Promoter, (Barry McGuigan was one of his) & his Family have benefitted to the tune of, after Goodwill & Leaseback was accounted for, £135 million. Very nice too.

Laddies is the biggest bookie in the ROI, with 200+ shops, & now owns 25% of the Northern Ireland Bookie-Shop market, which it only entered in 2006. Apparently, Bookie margins are better in Ireland than back here, because they take more football betting, for which, it is said, the margins are better than on the gee-gees.

[cia260895]

Bishopthorpe Palace home of the Archbishop of York

Yes indeed, & this is John Sentamu, who holds that Office right now. I'm not sure why, but I was much surprised to realise that The Archbishop of York is currently a black man. (Well, I imagine he's always been a black man, but you get my drift). He's Ugandan, & seems a quite splendid man, too.

Is this the same man who took his dog collar off on television and refused to put it back on until all the atrocities in Kenya had stopped?? Did he have it on?

[tikay]

More City News

LCI - London Casinos International, owned by Harrahs - is said to have made an approach to Gala-Coral, with a view to a merger. (Takeover). LCI/Harrahs approached Rank, owners of Grosvenor first, but Rank sent them packing, "not interested", in what may have been a bungled negotiating ploy. Harrahs offered a swap, amounting to LCI in return for 28% of the enlarged Rank.

Rank, meanwhile, are very much under siege, & "in play". Despite rebuffing Harrahs, other share raiding is under way. Genting, who own Stanleys now, have upped their stake in Rank from 10% to 11.03%, Guoco (who own Thistle Hotels & other Hotel Groups) upped their Rank stake from 5% to 6%, & the uber-wealthy "Richardson Family" have 9%. Rank is not so much under-siege, as dead in the water, & I imagine the economies in Grosvenor right now are really just cash-saving window-dressing so as to tidy up the Balance Sheet for would-be-buyers.

The "Richardson Family", if it's the same ones, are Black-Country based Twins. They have strategic stakes in many companies, mainly Property & Retail sites, & once controlled Regentcrest plc, which started (& ended I fancy) as a Property "shell" company. I had 7,000 Shares (I think it was 7,000) in Regentcrest, paid pennies for them, maybe 30p per share or similar, & they eventually shot up to £3.85, which was a nice coup for me. I was in San Francisco, on an AMA (American Management Association) course, thanks to John Kirkland, when they peaked, (this would be in the eighties) & I decided to break a goden rule I have in my share investing, & get out of them. ((I'm a long-term, passive, shareholder in all companies in which I own Shares). By the time I got home, they had fallen to £3.20, I decided to hang on until they bounced back to £3.50, but within months they were worthless. Greed did me.

[tikay]

Bishopthorpe Palace home of the Archbishop of York

Yes indeed, & this is John Sentamu, who holds that Office right now. I'm not sure why, but I was much surprised to realise that The Archbishop of York is currently a black man. (Well, I imagine he's always been a black man, but you get my drift). He's Ugandan, & seems a quite splendid man, too.

Is this the same man who took his dog collar off on television and refused to put it back on until all the atrocities in Kenya had stopped?? Did he have it on?

One & the same. He said this at the time......

"Do you know what Mugabe has done? He's taken people's identity and literally, if you don't mind, cut it to pieces. This is what he's actually done to a lot of - and in the end there's nothing.

"So, as far as I'm concerned, from now on I'm not going to wear a dog collar until Mugabe is gone."

The archbishop said power had gone to the Zimbabwean president's head and the leader did not seem to "realise the suffering of people".

[tikay]

Lost your cat?

With its rows of needle-sharp teeth, the pike is a feared predator in the water world.

But this one hadn't a hope when a hungry cormorant decided it was supper time.

The bird pounced on the foot-long pike with its hooked bill and pulled it to the surface of a lake.

The two antagonists grappled for a few seconds before, in one swift movement, the magnificent bird extended and twisted its neck in preparation for supper.

Its highly elastic throat allowed the cormorant to gobble the pike down whole within seconds.

These shots of nature in the raw were captured by amateur photographer Stewart Canham, 61, as he sat quietly in a lakeside hide.

He lifted his camera after spotting the cormorant out of the corner of his eye.

The amazing scene, at Langford Lakes in Steeple Langford, near Salisbury, Wilts, was all over within 10 seconds.

At the end, Mr Canham snapped the bird with just the fishtail poking out of its beak.

Mr Canham, from Gillingham, Dorset, said: "I had been in a hide for about an hour when I saw a cormorant going for a pike out of the corner of my eye.

"It kept diving under the water and then I saw the white belly of the pike on the surface so I quickly jumped into action with my camera.

"The cormorant was desperately trying to get the pike into its mouth but it was struggling.

"Then the bird suddenly stretched out its neck and twisted it before swallowing the pike down in one.

Mr Canham was delighted with his luck.

"Quite often I manage to get pictures of birds after they have swallowed their dinner but never a sequence of the event as good as this," he said.

"It was an amazing sight that was all over in the blink of an eye."

Sophie Atherton, from the RSPB, said cormorants can swallow creatures up to two-and-a-half feet long.

She said: "Cormorants have been recorded to eat 86 different species of fish from tiny fry to two-and-a-half-foot-long conger eels.

"They have an elasticated throat and a special hinged beak that enables them to eat large creatures.

"Basically they pull their distended neck out of shape to get the giant fish down."

She added: "Records have shown that a cormorant was once found to have an 11-and-a-half-inch kitten in its stomach.

[tikay]

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