TV appearance, being a calling station & random other news.

I was in the filming of a TV programme 2 weekends ago. I really can't say much more than that except it should be good viewing - I have to wait until Spring 2010 before it airs though!



Made one good hero call last week at the Vic and made one horrible call in Luton this weekend. Since I barely write about any particular hands in here I'll try and recall them



First was a £1/2 game at the Vic on a saturday afternoon. Bunch of limpers and I make a largish raise to £16 isolate one guy who was incredibly weak loose. Old guy calls in the BB, the target folds (eh!?) and a young american guy who talks like he's a board on the 2+2 forum calls. I have J6cc.



Flop = 10s 7s 5c



They both check to me and I decide to check back.



Turn = 6h

Mr 2+2 bets £35 quite quickly and I call, though a little worryingly tight guy calls behind me.

River = Qs

Mr 2+2 insta bets £95 and I quickly decide he has air but have to snap to show some sort of strength so that old boy passes which he does. Young kid fires his hand towards the muck and as I turn my hand the typical bad live players are surprised to see how I played the hand and how I called the turn and river. American kid even has the cheek to try and say he mucked A6 until I pointed to his two cards and told him he could take the pot if they were A6 but he'd have to pay me double if they weren't. Quite comedy as I completely stumped him and he soon left the game.

I realise all the 'live tell' stuff is quite lollable but the speed with which the guy bet turn and river when it was checked to him didn't really make sense given how the board had changed. I often find that live when people bluff they do it really quickly with no real consideration of whether their line is believeable for the hand they are repping.

The other hand was in a cash game in Luton. I 3-bet an open with AK otb and checked down a 56QJ6 board before calling a £45 river bet and being shown 55. Old guy thanked me for the call too. TILT.

In other news I will be playing the £1k Monte Carlo £250,000 gtd event at DTD on December 18th and am really looking forward to it. I'll use up my '1 time' for this event pls.

Also, to anyone who hasn't seen it already, take a look at Dale's blog. He knows his stuff about SNG's and puts his effort into his blog, unlike this greek degen who can barely be bothered at times. http://daleroxxu.blogspot.com/

gl at the tables.

Have Some Bollocks ffs.....

To anyone that's posted on my blog within the last few entries as anonymous, grow a fucking pair and put your name to what you write please. I don't mind criticism but by writing from anon, you must know deep down it makes you a fucking pussy. xx

Will be going to DTD this weekend. Looking forward to bubbling!

Message from Fleck...

Dunno if anyone remembers Fleck, the flea infested little cunt, but i got a message from him.

'Woof Woof'

On the Radio Show tonight....

Well I've just had a call and it looks like I'm going to be on the Radio Show tonight. An educated guess tells me someone their end has seen what's gone on with blonde and are perhaps expecting me to unleash the way I can on people or things I don't like....

That's not the case with blonde whatsoever and what I don't want to happen is a slanging much.For the most part I love blonde and wish I still posted and played on there. As sad as this sounds the forum meant a lot to me but I feel at the moment I'm making the right decision.

A few people have used terms like 'throwing my toys out of the pram' but I feel I should explain my reaction and reasoning a little better since I can't post on the thread, (despite a moderator addressing questions to me on there. Rubdown) ?

If you look at my posting history on blonde I've only ever slagged off people like Andrew Feldman, Carl 'The Dean' Sampson etc. I think most people who have a clue about what goes on in the poker scene would agree with me, just not many are willing to say it how it is. I've always been like that and I think it surprises most blondes when they meet me in person how easygoing I am.

For those who don't know, this guy (Salfi) posts on blonde, who always comes across as a complete dousche and we tend to universally disagree on everything and I know I'm not the only one he pisses off starts being his usual annoying self. Who knows, he might be a nice guy in person, but he just comes across as a massive toolbox whenever he posts. I snapped and told him to leave and join another forum is the general crux of it. Not my place to do so and it was out of order. I acknowledged I was wrong and in the morning told I'd be back on tomorrow. No huge deal and the mods didn't need to blow it out of proportion which is what happened. I obviously wasn't happy at even one day but felt it was fair and I can't think because I'm a contributor to the forum in many ways or a decent raker on the cardroom I'll go unpunished.

Then in the evening I get told my ban is being decided. I'm like wtf!!? Is that really necessary? Ok I was wrong but it didn't warrant a longer ban - I felt that was put in place because the mods wanted to show their authority and make an example of me and Rooks. I could also understand a bit better if I was in the sin bin a lot but this is my first ban so to speak.

A blonde moderator made similar out of order comments that night, making a wrong assumption that Rookie had put someone up to making a paedophile joke when it wasn't him yet nothing happens. Surely by the rules 'out of order' comments like that warrant 3 day bans no?

Some people have also commented that I needn't stop playing on the cardroom as they are two separate entities but the card-room supports the forum. How can I continue supporting a forum that made decisions against me that I don't agree with?!

I know I was gonna get the odd post against me from people like Mantis. At least he had the honesty to say when he didn't agree with me on the forum. I'm fine with that.Kinboshi is a mate who's pissed me off greatly in all of this but he has to have his view as a mod and he's still my mate. There's also the odd idiot like Acidmouse who posts some nonsense once he knows I'm banned. Desperate to be a mod much?!

Otherwise thanks all for the support and to those who were sensible enough to see that the ban was kind of unnecessary. I'll answer any questions if anyone doesn't understand anything as I've just written this quickly.

Cos

Banned from Blondepoker

As a lot of you who read this will know, I'm an avid poster on the blondepoker forum. I've made a lot of friends through there that would still be friends even if I quit poker tomorrow and think it's a great place, both in terms of community and content.

I started out just lurking the site and reading the stories on the main page until I deviated to the forum. In the last few years I've spent a hell of a lot of time logged in and posted over 5000 times. When I play any live event I wear a blonde badge and always talk it up as much as possible, which I did both times I was on the Pokershow. I've also tried to contribute to many of the charitable things that have gone on and I did a fair bit of staking too, as well as making some blondes a bit of money with my PLO cash staking too.

All in all I've been a pretty good member of the community I'd say. I do say exactly what I think however which can sometimes make me come across as harsh etc but that's just how I am. I love the silly banter too. Every blonde I've met in person I've always got on with. 2 nights ago I did a bit of flaming of one of the members. Pretty much any blonde I have on msn thinks the guy is a complete idiot and probably should have been banned already but thats another matter - admittedly I was out of line with forum rules.

I came in to work this morning to see I'd been given a 24 hour cooler. Not happy but a fair enough punishment and I swallowed it. Then this evening I find out my ban is being extended. I think this serves no purpose other than to piss me off and is too harsh. For that reason I won't be posting on blonde anymore or playing on the cardroom. Not something I wanted to have to do or thought I would do ever and will take some getting used to but unless things change that's the decision I've made at the moment.

I'm staked to play on blonde so I will be shipping any staker that doesn't want me to move site with the stake their money back and carrying on as normal. To those who I probably won't be contacting again best of luck in future.

Hope to bump into some of you soon.

Ireland Part 1

Well sorry for the lack of updates, I'm going through a very lazy at life in general phase atm and have the flu which won't fuck off.

I went to Ireland 2 weeks ago for the IPO. A big group of us travelled, mostly guys from the blonde poker forum. My dad had plenty of Euros left over from his holiday so I took 3.5k with me so I had some ammo for the cash games. Turned out I needed it as Dublin is the most expensive city ever, and that's coming from someone who spends 5/6 days a week in central london!!

At the airport I'm already losing 200-250 Euros in PLO flips, for 50 euro a pop when I just cant hit to save my life despite being dealt like AKKQJ10 every hand. Sigh. Not even in Irish air yet and I'm on tilt. This trip could get expensive...

Anyway we land and finally I win a flip, Amatay has to pay for the taxi to the hotel. Only 193 below EV now. No poker on the first night, just drinking in the hotel and Amatay loses the next flip when we go for a burger and chips (25 Euros for 2 people! - lol Dublinaments). -185 below ev and on the road back to even....

We hit the hay about 1am wanting to get a good night's rest before the tournament the next day. Me and Amatay get a taxi to the venue and he loses the flip for the 16 Euro taxi ride.... - 177 below EV and heading back in the right direction.

Chipping up in the tournament is easy, some really bad play and as flushy said to me, "this is like playing tournament poker 5 years ago". I flopped the nuts with Q10 on an AKJ rainbow and thought I was going to stack the only other capable player on my table but he had Q10 too....norrrrrrrrrrr. Some comedy hands take place though. At 75/150 I'm playing about 16k from my inital 10k stack and theres a raise in early to 450. After 4 callers I decide to call on the button with 67 and see a flop of : A 6 8. Guy in BB leads for 600 and all 4 players fold. I'm never folding here and decide to peel one. Turn: 4. Picked up a gutterball too, 6 7 5 I know are all good and he leads for 600 again into the bajillion chip pot. Ok sir I call. River is a beautiful 5. I lead for 3700 and he snap jams. I auto assume A7 and call straight away. He declares proudly, 'Sorry mate, rivered 2 pair!' as though he got me. I instantly turn my hand and after a second he realises he's beat. [ ] Good value jam though buddy.

When I move tables I continue chipping up and make 3 hero calls within the space of 2 hours and I'm opening pretty much every hand and taking 90% down. My favourite hero call came at 200/400 when I open the hi-jack to 1025 and the BB calls. Flop is K56 and villain check-calls 1350. Turn brings an 8 and villain leads for 4000. I call. River is a Q and he slides about 16k across the line. I call fairly quickly and his hand hits the muck. I got a few looks after that and I was allowed to just chip up in every pot until I reached 70k.

An updater came to take my photo and ask my name as apparently I was 3rd in chips of the 700 or so entrants that day. The only problem was my concentration. I sometimes get impatient when playing donkaments. I'm a cash player through and through and will sometimes sit and play a session for 1 hour and other times I can play for 20 hours straight. I go for dinner with Flushy and Blatch and I even suggest to do a flip against the two most golden people in the history of the universe for the meal. After I pay I head back to the tournament. At level 10 I'm on 90k and there are still probably only a couple of stacks ahead of me. I'm shattered by now and really don't wanna be sat there but do my best to get through the last few levels....until the TD said we were playing through to the end of level 18. Needless to say my chips were gone 3 hands later. ffs Cos you massive prick. I just didn't wanna be sat there. This is something I really need to work on, my patience. Anyone been through the same and got any advice?

I went to the bar with Maria 'Chili' Demetriou for a bit so I could moan to her as if I'd sat down in cash I'd have insta spewed. Have a few drinks and then hit cash, where I win a monkey and can sleep a bit easier. Still feel like a dick. More annoying was the fact that most of the lads busted really early and were already in town, after 10/11 levels of play I didn't feel like meeting them when they were all pissed already.

Part 2 to follow

Overdue update...

It's been a rather long time since I last made any sort of significant update so I thought I'd better do one now before I give up on the blog altogether.

I'm now being staked to play cash online. I put up a proposal on the blonde forum and it was a nice feeling to sell out within like 1 hour. I had to take a look at things logically and I just wasnt being sensible with my own money - tilt led to me moving up limits or stupidly playing house games. I guess I just had zero respect for my own money so even though I've been a big winner this year at small and low midstakes PLO I was never holding on to the money which essentially just meant I was wasting my time.

I'm learning bankroll management and to just call a losing day a losing day. Not once have I messed around with stakers money or played different limits and won a few buy ins the first month which was a little turbulent after some sessions where I wasn't in the best frame of mind held me back a little. This month has been going much better and despite two shots at the $109 PLO comp I've won around 24 buy ins with 16 of these coming on one massive sunday session. I've cracked the styles and the regs at these limits now for the large part - time to press on and make some mad ones. I'll only quit the stake when I'm 100% confident and rolled to move onto my own dime without fear that I'll do anything silly.

I went and played the £200 freezeout at Luton this weekend and I was playing so well early, just destroying the table who all hated me for opening so many pots and being so aggro as live players do but I lost almost every flip I got into and ultimately lost a biggun at the death of day 1.

The friday before I went to the Empire casino which turned out to be quite a good laugh too. I got a picture with Todd Brunson, Howard Lederer, a Freddy Deeb lookalike and the best of all.....a very fit waitress who I'm a little in love with. I'll try post the pictures with the next post. Howard Lederer's face was a picture when a very drunk me decided to start asking him about activating the boomswitch on my Full Tilt account - he really needed that when standing outside the casino on his 5-minute break when about to go heads up for a bracelet!

Met up with the Amatay there too as well as some other blondes. I heard Amatay shagged 3 or 4 of the valets that night. good work mate.