Vegas & The Aftermath - Diary

[tikay]

And golf has such wonderful, weird & peculiar ways. Members had - HAD - to address me as Mr Captain (now they must call me Mr Past Captain

For someone who's never been called table Captain, even by your cat, that must have been quite nice.

I had the most dreadful of stammers until I was 20. OMG, the memory of the shame I felt for being an adolescent stammerer & stutterer sends shivers down my spine even now, but it sure builds character.

How did you get rid of it?

Also, loved the charity story. Nice touch.

Lol, but that was pre my Poker days.

Talking of "Table Captain", name me a WSOP Bracelet Winner who always announced upon arrival "Good Evening Ladies & Gentlemen, tonight I shall be your Table Captain". And what became of him?

Brian Wilson?

Correct. And well done for not answering my rather un-necessary supplementary.

I think it has been pretty well documented what happened to him so I left it. I am sure he is not the only one from that era on the poker circuit to go the same way.

Correct. That era? A lot more might - will - already have? - go that way soon, too.

I've never known the poker economy to be so debt-laden, so reliant on credit in it's various guises.

The world economy failed because of excess credit, Dubai followed, don't be surprised if Poker gets a black eye very soon. I've never known so many people in hock over poker, & in my little circle, I'm aware of several Bankruptcies, all gambling-related, this year alone. It's terribly sad, in my view, almost everyone wants to play beyond their means, & the game, & gambling generally, is so horrendously addictive.

And I'm not moralising here, as I've done some seriously daft gambling things down the years which I'm ashamed of. But now, at last, I've reached a calm & happy place in poker where I play for small-change, & I've never enjoyed the game so much, ever.

Regarding era, he had some notable successes in 2005, in poker terms it is virtually the dark ages. The standard of play in those tournament and side games, is much higher now especially with the young internet generation coming through that a lot of the old school probably found their games inadequate to cope.

Of course people will go bust in the poker world all the time, for poker and other off the table reasons.

Quite. But in that era, the majority of "credit" & borrowing in poker was in Live poker.

Now the pendalum has swung the other way, big time, & the credit worry is Online, with oh-so-many in a terrible hole. Which explains why so many peeps get so upset at beats, because it really hurts to take a big beat when you are in the hole.

How many Online Sites do you know of who offer Staking these days? And how many players do you know who rely on staking? (Rhetorical).

I dithered on the rights & wrongs of this for a long time, but not any more. It'll end in tears, trust me.

[lazaroonie]

i cannot see how playing in any significant poker tournament from which the buyin came from 'credit' can be anything but majorly negative EV. The pressure must be huge, and it will affect how you play. it must.

staking i see similarly. i tried it once, my theory being that i might actually play a bit more sensibly with other peoples money, but in the end i played tighter than a trumpet players arse, because i felt really under pressure to get a result for my stakers. silly i know, so i dont think it is for me.

[tikay]

i cannot see how playing in any significant poker tournament from which the buyin came from 'credit' can be anything but majorly negative EV. The pressure must be huge, and it will affect how you play. it must.

staking i see similarly. i tried it once, my theory being that i might actually play a bit more sensibly with other peoples money, but in the end i played tighter than a trumpet players arse, because i felt really under pressure to get a result for my stakers. silly i know, so i dont think it is for me.

I feel much the same, & if I'm gonna play poker bad - & I'm told I do that very well - I want to do it with MY money, I don't want to be accountable to someone else. If I mess up with my own money, I can beat myself up, but I don't need my funder to be on my case. How much fun would that be?

In reality, your final para is wrong, it's back to front. Think of the guy that owes his bank 10 million, & he's got nothing. It does not matter if it's 10 mill or 11 mill, it makes no difference, he can't pay either! And in poker, if you were, say, & heaven forbid, £5k in the hole with a backer, & you play a £100 Tourney, what would be your mindset then? "WTF, I'm £5k in the hole already, what difference does another £100 make, I need to gamble to get out of it? Call!". And the hole gets steadily bigger.......

I'm utterly fascinated by this subject, & could talk all day about it, but I better go do some work now.

I've got a job now, you know, & I love every moment of it, my remit is peripheral to everything, but includes a bit of everything. Perfect. I have no working hours, or days, I come & go as I please, some days I'm here at 7am, other days 11am. And if I get tired in the afternoon, I wander down to the Green Room & have a nap. This box has a great big tick in it.

But before I go......

[tikay]

Some more old photographs from the tosh mountain at home. These are photos of photos, hence serious quality issues.

Company Christmas do, I fancy. !980 -85, maybe.

[tikay]

Positively the most embarrassing pic ever taken, but hey, warts & all is ok. Mid 1980's I think.

[tikay]

Don't tell me about being cool, please. I was that dude.

[TightEnd]

Big ashtray, that

[Dingdell]

Positively the most embarrassing pic ever taken, but hey, warts & all is ok. Mid 1980's I think.

Did you drive a Cortina in those days? In this pic you have the air of a man who leaves work and drives his cortina home. Don't know why, you just do. 

[Claw75]

Don't tell me about being cool, please. I was that dude.

lol. you have a touch of the ben stiller's about you there.

[Claw75]

Positively the most embarrassing pic ever taken, but hey, warts & all is ok. Mid 1980's I think.

Did you drive a Cortina in those days? In this pic you have the air of a man who leaves work and drives his cortina home. Don't know why, you just do. 

I'm going with a Capri or a Chevette.

[tikay]

The Gent on the right - no idea, but I suspect he was a Notts Taxi-Driver who we kidnapped or adopted one night.

The Lady - Annie Murphy, a proper legend in Nottingham back in the day. I was working on the The Victoria Centre in Nottingham (10 or 12 years prior to this photo) & opened a stationery cupboard in the Site Office one day, & Annie was inside. As was George Smith. George Smith, oh my word, he made Flushy look positively angelic when it came to excess. Annie later married Mick - Mick Murphy - & they lived in Stabbo, but moved to Portugal a while back.

The bottle? Well I've bee teetotal since I was 21, so it can't be alcohol. Can it?

[lazaroonie]

Positively the most embarrassing pic ever taken, but hey, warts & all is ok. Mid 1980's I think.

Did you drive a Cortina in those days? In this pic you have the air of a man who leaves work and drives his cortina home. Don't know why, you just do. 

I'm going with a Capri or a Chevette.

austin princess

[tikay]

Positively the most embarrassing pic ever taken, but hey, warts & all is ok. Mid 1980's I think.

Did you drive a Cortina in those days? In this pic you have the air of a man who leaves work and drives his cortina home. Don't know why, you just do. 

I'm going with a Capri or a Chevette.

Yup - a Capri. White. Of course.

I had a Cortina, too - a 2.8 Ghia with all the trimmings. Beautiful bit of kit, but I went through 4 engines. And two driving licences.

[pokefast]

Yeah being backed is not all its cracked up to be i can tell you. I guess you have got to have the correct mindset to begin with, i have only been staked once and it led me to making some unbelieveably stupid decisions and losing the lot.

Which led to allsorts of unpleasantness on both sides. But you live and learn so they say and as well as paying the cash back ( which will take time but will be done with interest ) i will never ask anybody in any aspect of life for another penny again. Don't mind being a staker but never again a stakee.

For me its my one poker regret.

Nope neither a borrower or a lender be,i've just not got the mental capacity for it.

[tikay]

Finally, a gathering at the snooker club.

That'd be, on the left on the sofa, Sharon, me, Wendy, & Steve. My oh my, that was some game of Musical Chairs.