maryhadalamb: jd summer update

Hi everyone – I’ll be posting on this blog from now on, as well as Tommo and Flash and goodness knows who else in the future.

This summer has been a good one for me overall, being the slacker I am I’ve done very little productive. Term ended with a sombre drink down the jug with Tommo and Flash and then it was back up north.

The weather has been spectacularly bad this summer – even by Newcastle’s standards, we had perhaps 3 weeks of sun in total not to be whining. The earlier parts of the summer were spent playing football and dosing with the lads from back home. The monotony was first broken with my trip down to the big smoke…

Obviously I was flying down to Stanstead and naturally assumed my good friend Dave Lu would be picking me up en route from Stratford. Unfortunately, despite being bullet-proof the rover was powerless to resist the Spetsnaz’s concentrated efforts to ruin the trip by tampering with the gearbox. Shown is a picture of one training to take down the Lu.

Fear not readers – Flash was eager as ever to swoop into action until a puncture put a stop to that. So Stanstead express it was… having been delayed by an hour at Newcastle and bought Flash a present for picking me up I was still feeling chipper. With the promise of an awesome structured tourney coming up. Tommo, Dave, Jambon, and myself went to get some pre-tourny grub in a restaurant Flash recommended. Why on earth you would recommend a restaurant where everyone is Serbo/Italian and can’t talk English is beyond me but I soldiered on through my steak. I’m such a trooper.

Despite my best hopes Gutshot was a bit awful, really really hot and a particularly offensive brand of cockney inhabited it. Nevertheless I still drew Doshi to my left at the start so I had someone to talk to. Played one hand in the first 90 mins where I folded TT to Dru’s 4-bet (after some tard minraised in front of me), I showed and he kindly showed QQ. After that I was moved to in position on Grundy fairly short stacked after the first break. I picked up AJ in the big, some woman who seemed pretty loose from Dru’s observation raised it up and someone who is supposedly good flatted in position. I figured my raise would fold out all the pps he’s calling there and I can only really see AQ there that I’m worried about. I was confident I was ahead of wifey’s range so I shoved to be called by the woman’s AT and the other guy to fold. Thinner than I thought. The flop gave her a flush draw, the turn gave her a gutshot as well, and then somehow the river chopped it. I was a little annoyed to say the least. Next orbit I’m in the big again and Flash completes, I check AT. Flop K-high. I call to shove the turn because I always think he’s bluffing despite him showing the nuts every hand since term 1 year 1. Turn is A, he bets small I think and I shove, he has bullets obv. Now I was busto I could concentrate on some railing with Ed Roger for a bit and later Jambon. The highlight of which was Jambon being accosted by the TD for not being behind the rail. He was an awful TD and an awful person from what I gathered – Gutshot: Serious Business. Obviously the good players left dominated and Tommo told you what happened in his post.

Afterwards at about 5am in London Dave thought the best plan of action was to wave around a £3k roll for ten mins waiting to get mugged – I got a lift from Jambon. Without Dave.

The next day we played some tennis which was awesome fun, especially seeing as my David Lloyd card works in LDN, then headed to Dru’s balla pad for a homegame. Jamie and I were HU and I ran AJ into his KK and failed to improve.

Since then I have been grinding away but hardly playing any hands which may make it a contradiction in terms, but I am playing party 100NL at the moment and fewer tables than before for a much better win rate. I went to Venice last week with the family which was nice for a change. One week at home now until uni starts for my masters – I have to get there a week before everyone else and do 6 hours a day inc. weekends and an exam at the end. Beat. At least Dave, Chattie, Will, Jack, and some guys I know through Jujitsu will also be there so it should be ok.

In other news – I’m confident me and Flash will be sharing a bathroom in claycroft this year, here is an artists impression of the setup.