Vegas & The Aftermath - Diary

[Karabiner]

You'll know about the Bowls GOAT, Tony Alcock, tikay.

Good ,but not GOAT  imo.

Good spot of me in the crowd Teeks , was treating my new girlfriend to an exciting day out.

David Bryant and his pipe?

[booder]

You'll know about the Bowls GOAT, Tony Alcock, tikay.

Good ,but not GOAT  imo.

Good spot of me in the crowd Teeks , was treating my new girlfriend to an exciting day out.

David Bryant and his pipe?

In with a shout but Alex Marshall for me

[RED-DOG]

^^^^^

Great piece, Tal, love that sort of stuff.

On which note, there was a terrific TV Show this week about.....pigeon fanciers.

I should start by saying if you are, in any way, into pigeons - racing, breeding, showing whatever, then you earn the title fancier.  

Now even this Diary - or spasm of lunacy as I think it was recently & accurately described - will struggle to get replies if I go into too much depth about pigeon racing.

But here's the thing - the chap below, who would ever have believed he was big in the Pigeon Racing world these days? He lobbies for pigeons - "save the Pigeons" & that sort of stuff, & is an accredited judge in the world of Pigeon competitions.

Who'd have thought that?



 

Click to see full-size image.

I'm glad you watched this. I was going to text you about it.

[tikay]

^^^^^

I'm not sure why you thought I'd be interested, but you were correct.

It was fabulous TV, I found it all a bit moving, & it made me compare the lives of some of those lovely old boys & comparing it to, say, being involved with poker & forums, & all the negativity & mocking we see. Right now, I think I'd swap with many of them.

There was a scene where 3 old boys were sitting in their garden for 3 or 4 hours, scanning the sky, looking for their beloved pigeon to return home from wherever it had been released.

"When my pigeon re-appears, it's the most exciting thing in my whole life" said one. We can mock, of course, if that's what floats or boat, but they were as happy as anyone could be. Which is not a bad way to be in life.

One really old boy was on his deathbed, just hours from his final breath, & he asked his family to bring him his fave pigeon. They gave it to him, & he was stroking & cuddling it, with tears in his eyes. If he died moments later, he died happily.

Another said to the TV crew - would you like to see my (pigeon) loft? Yes please say the TV bods.

So he takes them to this rickety old wooden shed with corrugated asbestos roof, & bird shit all over the shop. And the old boy puffed his chest out, proud as Punch, & said "there, what do you think of that?"

Loved it.

[tikay]

Which still leaves the mystery - how do pigeons find their way home from anywhere?

In the War, they carried messages home from France & Germany ("messenger pigeons"), and they were even awarded gallantry medals - "The Dickin Medal".

During WWII, the Dickin Medal was awarded to;


The medal was awarded 54 times between 1943 and 1949 – to 32 pigeons, 18 dogs, three horses, and one ship's cat

(The cat is another story for another day, as I'm not sure about that).

Pigeons were even carried in RAF aircraft. And they had special little pigeon parachutes. Yes they did.

Click to see full-size image.

Yet, for all the wonders of modern science, it's still not really known how pigeons - &, to be fair, many other birds - can get back to a given spot with such uncanny accuracy.

[tikay]

Ever heard of "roller pigeons". Course you have not.

Here, take a look.

[tikay]

The World Record for a rolling roller pigeon is.....213 yards.

[tikay]

I think that fulfils today's spasm of lunacy.

Enjoy your Sunday.

[Omm]

Thoroughly enjoying Super Sunday, hope to see it every quarter.

[tikay]

Thoroughly enjoying Super Sunday, hope to see it every quarter.

Glad you enjoyed it mate.

Lot of work goes into those things, but I thoroughly enjoyed my little part in help making it happen, gave me quite a buzz.

I see you ran pretty deep in the Biggie without quite troubling the judges.

The winner was a lovely kid, real nice lad, & he had to overcome railtard Heads Up, which can't be easy.

How is your health these days, any better?

[Omm]

Thoroughly enjoying Super Sunday, hope to see it every quarter.

Glad you enjoyed it mate.

Lot of work goes into those things, but I thoroughly enjoyed my little part in help making it happen, gave me quite a buzz.

I see you ran pretty deep in the Biggie without quite troubling the judges.

The winner was a lovely kid, real nice lad, & he had to overcome railtard Heads Up, which can't be easy.

How is your health these days, any better?

Just so happens my 88 couldn't beat the 99 of railtard when he had me just covered, quality player though, his stack was up and down like a whores drawers trying to get the bounties, pleased for the lad that won as well. Such fine margins in these mtts.

Health is ok, chugging along. Could and should do more to help myself weight wise, no excuses really.

Main event overlayed by about £2k although I suppose if you take into account the rake and free seat then a little profit was made. Is an event like this judge on new sign ups rather than trying to profit from rake? I see Grosvner done one recently, played in it but didn't survive long enough to see how well it done.

[tikay]

What an amazing photograph this is.

Taken last week, it shows Bangladeshi Muslims returning home from a religious festival.

Click to see full-size image.

[tikay]

Thoroughly enjoying Super Sunday, hope to see it every quarter.

Glad you enjoyed it mate.

Lot of work goes into those things, but I thoroughly enjoyed my little part in help making it happen, gave me quite a buzz.

I see you ran pretty deep in the Biggie without quite troubling the judges.

The winner was a lovely kid, real nice lad, & he had to overcome railtard Heads Up, which can't be easy.

How is your health these days, any better?

Just so happens my 88 couldn't beat the 99 of railtard when he had me just covered, quality player though, his stack was up and down like a whores drawers trying to get the bounties, pleased for the lad that won as well. Such fine margins in these mtts.

Health is ok, chugging along. Could and should do more to help myself weight wise, no excuses really.

Main event overlayed by about £2k although I suppose if you take into account the rake and free seat then a little profit was made. Is an event like this judge on new sign ups rather than trying to profit from rake? I see Grosvner done one recently, played in it but didn't survive long enough to see how well it done.

Weight problems? We run a "Fat Club" on the Forum Next Door, & since January 1st we've lost a collective 3 stone, between 5 or 6 of us. New members welcome, "report day" is every Friday.

Super Sunday? The numbers are not easy to decipher really. Loads of money spent on Freebies & Promos, so does not make a deal of money directly, but there are all manner of residual benefits which are hard to quantify. Remember, they have a Common Wallet, so Promos attract players from Bet & other parts of SB&G. Many of last week's Prize Draw winners had never played on Sky Poker, & they won Tournament Tickets & suchlike, so that's good X-Sell. At SB&G, X-Sell is one of the most important criteria & is carefully nurtured & measured. Sky Poker is not judged on it's own numbers in isolation, as it contributes a lot via X-Sell to the Group as a whole. Also, during any MTT Festival, & I assume this applies to all Online Poker Rooms, not just Sky, cash game traffic surges, too.

Quite a complex equation overall. They do at least one Promo every month - no exceptions - sometimes 2 or 3. It's pretty tough to keep coming up with fresh Promos month after month, but they do somehow. 

[arbboy]

https://www.racingpost.com/news/news/sky-bet-owners-readying-firm-for-stock-market-flotation/317543

Pretty impressive valuation for the operation.  Always got the impression sky sold it on the cheap just to get rid for whatever reason.  Not bad for a firm that only guarantees to lay a bet to lose £100 on the biggest horse races of the year.

[RickBFA]

^^^^^

I'm not sure why you thought I'd be interested, but you were correct.

It was fabulous TV, I found it all a bit moving, & it made me compare the lives of some of those lovely old boys & comparing it to, say, being involved with poker & forums, & all the negativity & mocking we see. Right now, I think I'd swap with many of them.

There was a scene where 3 old boys were sitting in their garden for 3 or 4 hours, scanning the sky, looking for their beloved pigeon to return home from wherever it had been released.

"When my pigeon re-appears, it's the most exciting thing in my whole life" said one. We can mock, of course, if that's what floats or boat, but they were as happy as anyone could be. Which is not a bad way to be in life.

One really old boy was on his deathbed, just hours from his final breath, & he asked his family to bring him his fave pigeon. They gave it to him, & he was stroking & cuddling it, with tears in his eyes. If he died moments later, he died happily.

Another said to the TV crew - would you like to see my (pigeon) loft? Yes please say the TV bods.

So he takes them to this rickety old wooden shed with corrugated asbestos roof, & bird shit all over the shop. And the old boy puffed his chest out, proud as Punch, & said "there, what do you think of that?"

Loved it.

Another well known pigeon fancier (is that the right term?) is Dave Allen owner of Napoleon Casino's, ex-Sheff Wed owner now owns Chesterfield FC.

I believe when he couldn't get a publisher to print his pigeon magazine, he had it printed independently covering the costs personally.

Here's his DVD for sale....

http://www.pigeons.co.uk/pigeon-videos-all-titles-a-z/DVD008.html

I believe he's a pretty serious player in that scene.