Vegas & The Aftermath - Diary

[the sicilian]

Hi Tony,

Any chance you can schedule me in somewhere?

Busy man is Tony..Ive been waiting a month for his attentions...sigh GG me...

[Laxie]

After speaking to you yesterday, I now realise/understand just how 'up to yer eyeballs' you are at the minute.  With that in mind, I've decided to spare ya the torture of having to hunt for the video I was on about.

[tikay]

After speaking to you yesterday, I now realise/understand just how 'up to yer eyeballs' you are at the minute.  With that in mind, I've decided to spare ya the torture of having to hunt for the video I was on about.

Lol, she's not far out there with Nic!

Today has been better, I've cleared some personal issues & managed to claw back a bit of the workload backlog. All good.

So many thing to Diary, though.

[tikay]

Nits know best.

[tikay]

A quite amazing story has developed at Newbury racecourse today, where several racehorses were accidentally killed by electrocution, after a faulty cable "earthed".

Two of them, I gather, just keeled over in the paddock, & died there & then, & several experienced burns in the mouth, where the "bit" is.

What an incredible thing.

Allegedly, only one sixth of the electric current required to kill a human is required to kill a horse.

The story starts near the foot of this page, on Chompy's diary.....

http://.com/forum/index.php?topic=51332.390

I was at Newbury today, producing their "Newbury TV". I had just asked the paddock cameraman to give me a close up of The Merry Giant when the horse started "playing up". Nothing too unusual about that, just a sign of a highly strung or nervous horse, I thought. Just as he calmed down, Fenix Too came into shot, jumping all over the place & we were focusing on him, with the live pictures going out across the racecourse, including the giant screens. It then became obvious that Fenix Too was "wrong behind" and his hind legs had gone. As I was telling our cameraman to "go wide" on the shot & getting the director to go to another camera out on the course, we noticed another horse (Marching Song) had collapsed and died. We were totally shocked in the OB Van by what we were witnessing.

There were hundreds of people around the paddock for the first race & it must have been most distressing for them to see all of that happen close up, not to mention how the owners must have felt.

There's a lot of speculation about what happened but some sort of electrocution is top of the list of theories. It seems that the horses were more affected when they were on the grass rather than the rubber walk way around the paddock. There will be a lot of enquiries to find out exactly what happened.

Racing UK's Nick Luck (who handled the event with spectacular professionalism) had an email sent to him from a colleague that reported on an incident at a horse arena sometime ago. Apparently there was a slightly broken cable 2 feet under the arena floor, which was wet, and that was enough electricity to kill the horses.  It seems that an electric shock that just gives humans a tingling sensation is enough to electrocute a horse.

A very sad day for all of those involved and, sadly, a day when Horse Racing will make the top news on TV & in the papers for all of the wrong reasons (again)

Thanks for that Steve, must have been terribly distresssing for all those who witnessed it first hand.

I assume, as a HorseRace TV Producer, you have a policy not to "linger" on situations where a horse falls heavily, or gets killed, in a jump race? As a viewer, I want to know if the horse is OK, but I don't want to actually see the result of the fall. Personally, I like it when the commentator utters the words "both horse & rider have got up safely".

You doing the Grand National this year, or Cheltenham?

I'm not sure if you've seen it, but one of the blonde Diaries I'm sure you'll enjoy is this one (below), written by an ex Racing Post journo, now a full time layabout & fashion icon. He has a white car with tinted windows, & a personalised plate. Honest, I kid you not.

It's here.....

http://blondepoker.com/forum/index.php?topic=51332.0

[tikay]

Thought this might appeal to you, Mr Kendall.

http://primaxstudio.com/stuff/scale_of_universe/

They should have tried harder on the soundtrack.
Radiohead would have been good.

Still pretty awesome, though.

Talking of Radiohead, how the hell did they manage to suddenly get that album out last week which there had not been any whisper they were making? There's usually plenty of rumour & goss about that sort of thing, but I never heard or read a word, then, whoosh, suddenly it was available. Most peculiar.

Anyway, as usually happens in such cases, I spent all week revisiting the RadioHead back catalogue on You Tube (what a great resource You Tube has become!), & the more I watch & learn about Mr Yorke, the more fascinated I am by him. Very peculiar chap, mad genius, maybe? His lazy eye only adds to the mystique, too, for some weird reason. It's quite cool, in his case.

[tikay]

Went to Luton last night, really only to settle up poor Tighty, who was grappling with a £400 blonde Tax Penalty, & it needed paying pronto. I also had to pay him the Live Update pledges, so those two came to about £800, then £110 to enter the 11 runner Tourney.

I managed a full double-up very early, so with 23k I'm home & hosed.

The very next hand I was in the BB with K-K, & Matey Boy in the SB had A-A. Back to 11k.

Now I got George'd, big style, with 

George held Q-T o/s, we saw a board of      (the money gets shovelled in on the Turn) & I'm down to 4k.

The exit was equally comedic.

I have 4,500, & it's early in the 100-200 Level, & I'm looking to get busy.

My BB, It goes limp, limp, limp, then the Button, clearly intending to limp, goes colour blind & chucks in a 1k & a 100. It WAS a genuine mistake, but perfect spot for me.

There's some "does it go?" debate, I keep schtum, "yup it goes" (obv) & I now shove my 4.5k in. To be fair, it looks for all the world like I'm trying to take advantage of the "accident" - well in a way, I am, but I was jamming there anyway. 

He asks for a count, & not unreasonably, makes the call, which is OK, as I don't mind a call, the way my stack is.

He flips over a Chompy-esque 9-10, & so that was my Luton evening done & dusted.

Filled up with Diesel on the way back, £85, so GG £1k.

I swerved even turning on a computer yesterday, I just needed a break, all the hassle is a bit much sometimes. Today, I iz a new man, happy, rested, bouncy & zippy. Just don't need to think about that £1k too much. I don't 'arf seem to get through some money, one way & another. It will have to stop when I retire. Trying to get G-R day & skinto day to match is quite a neat trick.

[tikay]

I needed to 2 front tyres, & so I cleared the boot out (call it a full wheely-bin) so that I could see if the spare was OK.

No spare. What? Regards grimmed me?

Eventually, I figure it it not intended to have a spare, it has "run-flats". Good grief, whatever next? I can drive 50 miles with a puncture, apparently.

What happened to those thin "get you home" spare-wheels? Are they old hat now?

So, two front tyres, another £350. In truth, considering their use, & reliability, I guess that's not too bad, they lasted a year, & 30,000 miles. 

[tikay]

Needing to park the car somewhere close to Central London, & hating driving right into the middle of town, I dumped the car at the Edgware Road Hilton Metropole one day last week. I was there 5 hours, & the car park cost was £22. Nice doing business.

[boldie]

I have 4,500, & it's early in the 100-200 Level, & I'm looking to get busy.

what have you done to TK?

[tikay]

Ken Olsen died last week. He was pivotal in the development of "mini-computers", & was at one time worth bilions, but he then sort of lost his way, & it all ended in tears.

Arguably, Bill Gates & Windows may not have existed without what Olsen did.

It seems strange to reflect - this was back in the 60's, I think - but his "mini-computers" blew the computing world, (such as it was then), away. IBM Mainframes were standard issue at the time, but he invented "mini-computers" - they were the size, apparently, of two chest-freezers!

Reading up on his history, & how he was instrumental in the development of computers & computing, was the first time I've realised that, in fact, computers & the internet did not arrive together. I'd always assumed they did. In fact, there was a gap of several decades. Seems so obvious in hindsight. I suppose most things do.

There would appear to be some secrecy as to the cause of his death. At 82.

He "found God" in his later years, too.

RIP Mr Olsen.

Here's how the Guardian saw his life.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/feb/09/ken-olsen-obituary

The "Quotations" section of his Wiki Page is quite interesting, too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Olsen

[tikay]

I have 4,500, & it's early in the 100-200 Level, & I'm looking to get busy.

what have you done to TK?

I know, outrageous stuff, eh?

I was not awfuly "conmfortable" there last night, truth to tell, no real reason, but my legendary patience/nittiness was missing. Clearly, a better route is to blind down to 2 Bigs.

Anyway, it gave me chance for an early night, refreshed & ready to roll up my sleeves today & dive headlong into a thicket of nettles which need grasping.

[tikay]

Tom's gonna lap me if I'm not careful. He's dropped the fat end....of 2 stone in less than 2 months, but I seem to be marooned at just over a stone of loss in 6 weeks.

The sheer cheek, he can't diet better than me.

I began at 13-13 & am currently, 6 weeks in, at 12-10, but it seems to be dropping incredibly slowly.

I'm happy with my food intake & quality, zero-tolerance, absolutely, it's just not going as fast as I'd hoped.

But my health has improved, only had need for Nurafens once, no Rennies at all, & I'm sleeping like a log, in fact, I can't bloody wake up in the mornings.

My "growth" on my chin stopped growing, & so I sort of zipped it off, but it's started to grow again, bugger. Maybe that's the extra weight.

[TightEnd]

Nits know best.

what does the graph refer to please?

[tikay]

A peculiar thing happened at Luton last night, too.

I'm sitting with Tighty, before the Comp, doing our business, nice & quiet, & Trevor Webbor walks up & pointedly says Hi to Rich, but cuts me dead. Mortified, I was.

It seems a few comments have been made about him over on the Luton Thread, ditto about his mate (& mine, too) Pino.

I don't recall writing anything about him that's out of line, if anything. He's not exactly my cup of tea, but that's not a hanging offence (not yet, give me time), I'm ambivalent towards him really, & I've always got on fine with Pino.

Just fun-ribbing, I believe, by "the boyz", the usual poker banter, but I gather he's taken offence at me because it was on blonde. Seems fair enough. I blame Vinni. If Vinni keeps insulting him, Trevor may never speak to me again.

PS - Please don't be rude about China Mug.