Saturday 3 January 2009

How it started....Part 1

Being Greek you're never far from a deck of cards and so as a kid I played various different games and it was always something I really enjoyed. My dad and uncles had always been keen gamblers. (Don't think the sort of gambler that spends all day every day in Ladbrokes or going to the casino once a week to donate on the tables but people who went on a night out once every three or four months together to play at the casino or their own home games). My dad and one uncle even managed different bookies for a while when I was a baby so betting of sorts has always been in the family.

My dad actually had a job in a computer company yonks ago and began playing a little bit of backgammon with his work mates at lunch times. He was in such demand for games that his co workers offered to manage his workload if he would stay in the staff room whilst they alternated with each other losing money to my old man. How could he refuse?! He was trippling his wages back then but when it came time for their systems to change he was the one who hadn't learn't how to use it.

One night, I must have been no older than 10 or 11 my dad was going to one of my uncles houses where 7 or 8 of my uncles would play cards all night. For some reason, I don't have a clue why now, I kicked up a massive fuss because I wanted to go with him. That night I remember being fascinated by the game. They were playing stud and each had about 500 quid in front of them on the table. I literally thought this was the coolest thing ever and even though I didn't have any idea of the rules of the game I was more than happy to try and figure it out myself whilst watching the psychological battling and the money moving around the table. At one point my dad got in a big hand and had to call a big bet on the river. I had no clue what my dad was holding nor my uncle, but I said 'Dad I think he's bluffing you'. Another one of my uncles promptly told me to shut up in the middle of a hand. My dad folded and my other uncle turned over the bluff...I was right.

In the sixth form of school I used to play a lot of killer pool in the common room which was only for pounds and 50p's but my money was always on the table ready to play anyone. Me and a few mates used to bunk off lessons a lot and go to our local snooker club to practice. By this time a few of my mates were driving and we had already started having a few home poker games, normally at my house. We started playing the £5 double knockout pool tournaments in 8-ball and 9-ball. We all won both tournaments a few times before our handicaps went up and things became a lot more difficult but it was still great fun nonetheless. I remember winning my first one and getting £50 quid to come home and wake my dad up to tell him about it! Lol donkaments. As it goes, Nick Persaud used to play that tournament most weeks and at the time I didn't even have a clue that he played poker or was an old boy from my school. Hopefully Potters Snooker and Pool club in Streatham is the breeding ground for poker success! Probably not judging by most of the Pikey retards who go in there...

They did have a roulette machine though which was my only access to gambling before I was 18 and I did do my burger on that fcker many times. It was around this time that my best mate Shan met another one of my now good mates David. David's brother had a website called casinobonusexpoits which involved wagering through thousands of blackjack scams on most online casinos to be able to cash out their bonuses. We began doing this and were making roughly £200 for every online casino, each one taking about 4-5 hours to wager through properly. Happy days when ur 18 and making that sort of money.

I already had a nice savings account of about 10k + all this money when I went to uni. Luckily I never needed a student loan the two years I was there. I went to Nottingham to do Spanish and Portuguese but wasn't enjoying my course at all. I loved languages (did Greek, Spanish, Italian and French at GCSE all A* and got two A's in French and Spanish A-levels) - shameless brag but I can't help it. I had no organisational skills and just slept, went out and got stoned for a while basically. Until the second term of uni hit and we had a lads night where we got suited up and went to the casino. Fck me it was so much fun - betting like 8 quid a spin on the touch screen roulette was such a buzz. We started going regularly and 40 quid was a standard 'call it quits session'. Fck knows how we used to make that little money last so long but beautiful were the days when money actually had value and meant something. As exams got closer everyone began going to lectures and the library more often whilst I couldn't be bothered with all that and just planted myself at gala.

I will finish off the Uni/Gala story in my next post(the brilliantly named part 2) . This one has taken me aaaaaaaages to write a load of shit that I already know and probably no-one else will even read. Maybe I should whack a whole load of porn links in here to guarantee some traffic.

In terms of Poker stuff today has been a bit of a rollercoaster with me dropping almost 800 in the early part of the day to claw back a few hundred odd profit by the end (now 6.45am fml). I ditched the 25p50p plan - I was just spewing playing that low trying to win every single pot I played. I'm going to be playing NL100 for the time being as it's just as soft but I put a bit more effort in there.

Had 33% of Snoopy in the Dusk Til Dawn £300 freezeout with £25k+ to the winner but after much grinding he was card dead and made it through half the field before a cutoff shove got snapped off by the blinds AK. ul m8. Let's just hope good bud Pete Linton can take it down from here. He's chip daddy going into day 2 and has a sick ability to run up a stack early in comps.

Laters

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