I Found The Western Eventually

I made my first visit to the Western yesterday.

Not surprisingly I was unable to find it despite it literally being located on the A40. As I drove back and forth between Park Royal and the Hanger Lane Gyratory, whilst taking in the odd industrial estate to enjoy the areas scenic wonder for posterity, I phoned all and sundry to try to obtain idiot proof directions. Did you know that at one point the Hanger Lane roundabout has 7 lanes! I think I tried all of them.

Having eventually arrived I was quite impressed by the layout of the venue, and the homemade food that was available, although I was somewhat less impressed by the clientele. Despite a generally wholesome majority there were more than a few undesireables.

The tournament itself though seems like a winner. A decent sized field and an appropriate clock should be enough to encourage me to make a return visit provided I can find it.

Giddy!

I managed to make a house of aces lose to a pair of 5's and a straight draw a few moments ago. The 10/20 PLO on Blue Square had been quite productive until the running 5's gave my opponent quads.

Hence I am now typing, in a much needed break from the tables before I smash the laptop into about 17 pieces and then head to Luton to play the evening tournament and dealers choice. Unfortunately I will not be able to play online because the computer will be in pieces.

I am quite looking forward to playing the competition at luton tonight. The last few tournaments I have played have culminated in self-induced disasters, so something small is quite desireable to play myself back into a bit of touch. I have been interpreting the game reasonably well for long periods and I have been accumulating chips nicely, however at an opportune moment I have then decided to shoot myself in the head. This is not usually the best strategy - nor has it been recently.

New Link Added

Having just got back from Cork I have some amazing findings to report. There is a player from County Cork who is prepared to pass a hand pre-flop. Now on my previous visit I had encountered the most bizzarre 4 card Omaha game. A game where there were two general policies in operation. 1. It's best to get it all in pre-flop and see what happens. 2. Four separate chances to make a pair equals a premium.

To be honest the game hasn't changed that much, but there were a couple of players who I saw pass pre-flop and consequently I have checked out their blogs. I have added a link to the blog of Kieran "Flipper" Walsh as I think it will make quite a good read.

Swinging Like A 70's Disco

The Luton festival has been and gone and to be honest the three tournaments I have played have been somewhat perculiar.

Fair play and much kudos to Luton casino, they give their regular customers the extended play they request for playing tournaments that have a larger buy-in than the regular weekly schedule. However the upshot is a lot of chips and small blinds, with fields that generally don't really want to play any hands until it becomes a crap shoot later anyway. Conversly I, along with a few others I could mention, saw it as an opportunity to play lots of hands early on. And that I certainly did. In the 750 double chance I played every hand for the first hour and a half (seriously if you don't beleive me ask Ayman Asif) and a few witnessed my brutal assault on everyone including myself.

Playing every hand is something of a dangerous policy. You're as much a danger to yourself as you are to others, and whilst I accummulated plenty of chips I also set fire to a few as well. After a five hours or so and my chips stack swinging like a 70's disco I had double the average with 30 players left. I then decided to move all in drawing dead on the turn. Note to self: It's very hard to raise pre flop, bet the flop and check-raise on the turn to represent trips when your opponent has trips!

To be honest I think Luton gives too many chips for the smaller comps such as the 200 freezout and the 500 pot limit. In my opinion tournaments are meant to be something of a gamble, and a chance to win a chunk of money in a fairly fast time. Consequently few players are eliminated early on and the tournament is dormant for 2 hours. However the slow structures fill the card room so I guess from their point of view they must be doing it right.

I saw daylight this week

I played a game of golf for the first time in ages on Monday. More than anything it was good to get a bit of fresh air and a bit of social interaction. Accompanied by Ray Hammer and Kevin O'leary I hacked round the Bedfordshire countryside. It was my first taste of the summer sun this year and I have to say I hope I see it again soon. Too much time on the internet or spent in a casino can't be good for the mind, body, or the soul.

It was good to see Kevin again too. One of the good guys in an industry plagued by scum. I hadn't realised that until last tuesday I hadn't seen him for nearly a year. With his resignation from Luton casino and my desire to play mainly on the internet we basically had not made enough effort to meet up until then. We intend to play a bit more golf over the coming weeks which should be good for everyones health (except Mark Twain who will be turning in his grave).

His dog Doyle is something of a psycho that has it in for me, so hopefully I can continue to avoid him, but if I don't I'll try to continue blogging with my one remaining hand.