Wasted weekend part deux

This time wasted means totally pissed.

Out on Friday for a few beers. Met up with a couple of mates about sevenish, got home about oneish. £40.

Car boot sale on Saturday morning with my Daughter. £20.

Out at one for the footie, first round £25. Watch Wales struggle against Italy and then Ireland v Scotland. Another £25 round. Then, as Wales had played Italy, off to the most expensive Italian I've been in. £50 a head, £35 of it on shite wine.

Get home at fuck knows what time.

£40 in Tescos on Sunday morning followed by Sunday lunch at a Harvesters which was another £40 for three of us. England v Wales down the pub and then the Celtic v Rangers game. Another £25. Poker in the evening plus a few beers in my other local. £25.

All in all reckon I've done well over £300 this weekend and all I have to show for it is another two chins. I could have flown to Rome, two nights in a hotel, ticket for the match and a shag and wouldn't have spent £300.

Worst still, next weekend is going to be even worse.

My ticket for the Wales v Ireland Championship decider is £75. There's at least ten of us out which means £30 rounds. Then there's food and rip off prices in the Stadium and a taxi home when I only live fifteen minutes walk from the centre of Cardiff. And even worse it's Mothers day.

Now I don't mind spending money on my dear old Mum and I've seen a nice watch I think she will like. A chain of high street jewellers were doing a two for one deal before Xmas so I bought my Missus and Daughter a couple of nice watches. I also had a 50% off voucher for the new year and has I need a new watch I reckon £100 will cover the both of us.

But having a ten year old means I have to buy my Missus a Mothers day present as well.

My Daughter asked her what she wanted and she said to get something for the garden. I'm thinking of digging a six foot hole and when she peers in cracking her over the head with a shovel.

I stopped off at a garden centre today and what a load of crap. Water features so shite and so expensive you would be better and cheaper off flying to Niagra Falls once a month. And don't get me started on the statues. Why are they all of animals? Frogs, Rabbits, Weasels??? I'd rather buy one of Kauto Star. Jeez, I'd rather get one of Frankie Dettori. He's only four foot fucking four so a life size one can't cost that much.

Anyhow, I seem to have picked up a few American Mom readers so what would you Ladies like for Mothers Day? I'm guessing you do have Mothers Day in America or did Bush start taxing it so you could invade the Christmas Islands? Come on Moms, give me some ideas and inspiration.

Won £2.60 today playing poker. So lucky I've got a second income from poker to subsidide all this spending.

Wasted weekend

I’d like to say it was wasted as in totally pissed all weekend but it wasn’t. It was wasted as in, did nothing?
Had a half day Friday and was going to play Golf but didn’t. Picked my Daughter up from school, took her to ballet, mooched about for a bit, went home, cooked dinner, went to bed.
Saturday, went to a car boot sale. Now I absolutely love car boot sales and can spend hours browsing around the stalls but I couldn’t be bothered this week. Bought four books, Jimmy Whites autobiography, Filth by Irvine Welsh, The world according to Clarkson and the Witches of Chiswick by Robert Rankin. Also bought a few DVD’s, the Matrix, Deep Blue Sea, Van Hesling, some Doctor Who DVD’S for my Daughter (and Missus who watches more children’s TV than my ten year old) and a Led Zeppelin on the rock trail DVD. In the afternoon I watched Wales win the Dubai sevens which was quite unexpected. Played some poker in the night and broke even.
Sunday, went up my Mums for dinner with my Daughter. My Missus was dead rough all day Sunday, throwing up everywhere and generally getting on my Daughter and my nerves. Why can’t women suffer in silence like us guys? Played some poker in the night and broke even again.
I’ve been playing on William Hills and have been entering these headhunter tournies. They aren’t for me. My MTT game is all about no risk early on and then total maniac once I’ve gone deep. I also played a £3 scalp tourney. Even though I final tabled in one and made the money in two more, I managed to make about £7. The scalp one summed up the entire weekend. I hadn’t read the rules beforehand because I registered with about two minutes left. I had been playing for one hour and twenty minutes when a little screen flashed up saying “congratulations for making the final table”. I had $20,000 in chips and was the shortie of the six left but the chip leader only had $50,000 so I was pretty confident of making a late charge. A quick check of the lobby showed that 170 had entered. Brilliant, guaranteed 6th of 170, how much was I looking at. That’s when I noticed there was no prize pool. You only won by taking scalps. Of the 164 people who had fallen by the wayside I had managed to knock out 2. Fucking 2. I had amassed the grand total of £5.40 and it had cost me £3.30 to enter. £2.10 profit for one hour and twenty minutes of grinding. What a fucking waste. I've had street urchins from Bombay e-mailing me all day taking the piss, £2.10 for one and a half hours work, pffft, I wouldn't get out of bed for that!!!
On to other business. When I have nothing to do my mind races. I suppose I’m quite creative and my imagination seems to have no bounds. I’ve actually started writing six books over the last twenty years but haven’t finished one of them (not quite true, read on). I get about ten chapters in and my brain goes off on another tangent and I start another. I’ve got one going about a bent cop who takes over Cardiff’s underworld. Unfortunately, I started watching the Shield and realised it was never going to be as good as that so gave up. There’s another about a serial killer who strikes at the Brecon Jazz festival. Sex, drugs, guns, Sex, murder, sex and Jools Holland. Got seven chapters in and gave up. That was eighteen years ago! One that I did finish is sitting, all typed up, in the attic of my ex girlfriends house. At least it was when I walked out for a pint of milk fourteen years ago. Never went back so not sure if it’s still there now, seriously doubt it. That was a comedy but can’t really remember what it was about. Anyhow, blah, blah, blah.
Was sat about all weekend, mind racing at a thousand miles an hour, body in total shutdown and came up with a story about all the bloggers I’ve been reading over the last few months. If anyone fancies reading it let me know and I’ll commit to writing it.
Later.

How I shut down Cardiff

We were talking in work today about cars and specifically our first cars. Mine was a Datsun 120y. My Mum bought it for my 17th birthday and it was my pride and joy.

I'd had it a few months when a girl got raped in the town I'm from. The only thing she could tell the police was the man was driving a Datsun 120y. Needless to say I had the police up my house and after giving my alibi (in Spain), was obviously eliminated from any enquiries.

Unfortunately, for me, that didn't stop me getting pulled in every time I drove my car anywhere. Due to the seriousness of the crime I didn't mind but it was starting to get to me. I was playing amateur league footie at the time and had taken a few of the boys to some of the matches only to be followed by the cops before getting pulled over and questioned.

A couple of months after the first attack another girl was assaulted so I had the cops back up to my house. I yet again produced an alibi (for anyone reading I was innocent just in case you are wondering) and yet again proceded to get pulled over every time I left the house in my car.

Now what you have to realise was I was very young and very stupid. There's only two main roads into Cardiff one of which is Manor Way. Anyone who has driven to Cardiff via the M4 will probably have used Manor Way to get to the City Centre.

So finally, one Monday morning, I'm driving to work in Cardiff. Manor Way is about 2 miles long and has several sets of traffic lights on it. At the first set of lights I'm at the front and pull away first. There's a small rise a few hundred yards up the road and as I reach the top there's a copper with a speed gun. He was holding it like Dirty Harry and as it was early in the morning and I was getting paranoid about the number of times I had been pulled over I immediately thought "he's going to shoot". I let go of the steering wheel and put my hands over my eyes. As I went past him I could see out of the corner of my eye he was now holding the gun by his side, mouth agape in a stunned "what is this freak doing" wonderment. One second later I hit the central reservation at sixty miles an hour. My car spun around about five times before rolling onto it's roof.

Manor Way and therefore half of Cardiff was shut down for about five hours.

When I was recovering in the hospital I told the Police about the rape and all the times I had been stopped. I then explained about how I thought the copper was going to shoot me. The one copper laughed so much I thought he was going to puke.

My car was a total write off and when I rang my Mum and told her what had happened she said "Don't worry I'll sort you out a new car". She only went and bought me another fucking Datsun 120y. Within 24 hours I had the cops back up my house questioning me about the attacks. It took another 3 months before they caught the twat.

Played poker tonight and won $120. Just thought I would add that seeing as this is supposed to be a poker blog.

Later.

Ten things to do this year

1. Meet her.

2. Cash a five figure sum in Poker or on one of my stupid Saturday punts.

Nearly did this last year but it would have been a total fluke. Was in my local Willie Hills doing an accie whilst standing at the counter talking to the Manageress. She's quite attractive and my mind was obviously wandering and not focusing on the job in hand. About sevenish that evening I'm just about to go out and I have a quick check on Xscores for the results. The first thing I notice as I get the coupon out is £12,600 on the bottom for my potential winnings. I knew I had cocked up because of the amount and on checking realised I had bet against Galatasaray and Olympiacos. A quick scan down the results showed they had both lost to the bottom of the league teams who were something like 12/1 and 16/1. I also had two draws which had come in and after triple checking my ticket realsied I had nine out of ten with the last team being AZ Alkmaar. The game was still going and they were 2-0 up after 70 minutes. I went out and got absolutely blasted. Bought everyone drinks all night and spent around £500. Got up in the morning with the hangover from hell and checked the results one last time. Everyone had come in. No, wait, AZ drew 2-2. Fuck. To make matters worse the goals were in the 91st and 96th minutes and the oppositions goalie scored the equaliser. I spent the next ten minutes throwing up before going back to bed for the day.

3. Go somewhere different for holidays this year.

I've been quite fortunate to have visited quite a few countries. Been to most places in Europe, Done Florida, New York and LA. Seen the Carribean. Quite fancy Cuba or Mexico. Maybe even Mauriitus or the Seychelles. Anyone been? Got any ideas? Would have to be suitable to take a ten year old. Let me know.

4. Weekend blast in Vegas.

Fly in Friday, get totally shit faced, fly home Sunday. If I went for any longer I'd imagine my bank balance would suffer. A week would probably mean too much time on your hands and therefore too much time sitting around the felt. 48 hours would mean a quick ten minutes at a table and the rest of the time on the piss. Obviously, no ten year olds on this trip.

5. Buy a convertible for the Summer.

Would you believe it but my car is back in the fucking garage. I normally put £35 petrol in and this lasts me two weeks. Put £20 in on Monday morning and had to put another tenner in tonight to get home. Years ago I was a F & I Manager in a Ford Dealership. I was lucky enough to be able to take whatever car was on the forecourt home so had a couple of Cosworths and RS 200s. In the Summer I would have a Cabriolet but they were pretty shit. One day the Sales Manager comes in and says "look what I picked up in the auctions last night". He only had a Mercedes 500 SL with the electric roof. I think we priced it up at about £22k or something like that. He had it for three weeks and it was killing me. He would press a button and the boot would open, roof would fold back and that was that. It used to take me about twenty minutes to sort my fucker out. It was mid June and he was off for two weeks somewhere and as I had pestered him non stop he relented and left me the keys. One day after he went this twat walks in the showroom and buys the fucker. It had pissed down as well so I never got the chance to pose. Might see if I can pick up something cheap and cheerful when the tax runs out on my shit heap.

6. Have a nice meal in a Michelin star restaurant.

Somewhere that's the real dogs bollocks but doesn't have them on the menu. Mrs Rubbish and I used to go out quite regularly before my daughter was born but since then we don't really go out as a couple. My Missus will go out with her mates and I stay in, I go out with the boys and she stays in. If we do go out together we normally take my nipper which means pub meals. Not that there's any thing wrong with a nice pub meal. I think the most we spent pre parenthood was £200 on a night out and about £150 of that was on booze. Yet again, if you know of anywhere nice leave a comment.

7. Buy a race horse.

Was thinking along the lines of a syndicate membership but the way my car is going it would probably be cheaper to buy Denman and ride him to work everyday. My Missus isn't a gambler but she did mention a couple of years ago that she would like to go to a race meeting. I did look into a syndicate then and I think it was about £200 for a year which included visits to the stables along with passes to a meeting of your choice. Never got around to sorting it out but I might do this year.

8. Watch a derby match.

No, not Derby County. Milan v Inter, Rangers v Celtic, Real v Atletico. I've been to a few big matches, FA Cup finals, Internationals and the like but I've never been to a full on Derby match. One of my mates went to Boca v River Plate once and said it was incredible. Frightening but incredible. Anyone been to one?

9. Win the Lottery.

Not a big one although that would be nice but a few quid. There's 44 of us in work in a syndicate. We pay £2 a week and last year we got back £28. Not bad, £104 for £28. It would be nice to win maybe ten grand so that we would all get a couple of hundred quid to do something decent with like a day at the races or just a huge piss up somewhere.

10. Do something nice for my Mum.

She's seventy this year so I'd like to do get her something special but I haven't a clue what. Luckily, she's comfortably well off and has everything she needs. I'll rack my brains on that one.

Later.

What's wrong with me?

Car's back on the road so I'm driving yesterday morning and realise I've taken all the CD's out before I took it to the garage. Get home last night and look in the bag I've chucked them in. 127 of the fookers I had strewn about my car. I blame car boot sales which I'm hopelessly addicted to. So bad am I when I go to one I'll do a write up on Sunday to let you know what I've bought.

Having been born in the 60's I grew up listening to Led Zeppelin, Free, Jimi Hendrix et al. Now I'm into The Stone Roses and Oasis et al. There was a fair mixture of those sort of CD's plus a few strange ones. From Abba to AC/DC, Van Morrison to Van Halen. You name it, I had it. I must admit to liking most genres now though I can't stand rap or hip hop. There was also a Take That and a Robbie Williams CD amongst them. I mention that because the Robbie CD was titled "Singing when you're winning" which was a thinly veiled jibe at Gary Barlow. Supposedly, after the Take That split Robbie had made it and the rest of them hadn't. Wonder what Robbie thinks of that now has he sits in the stands of Port Vale, looking to the heavens hoping to spot an UFO whilst Gary Barlow sits at his piano looking at all his multi platinum CD's, 5 Ivor Novello awards and OnePoll.coms greatest British songwriter award. I know the Take That boys regularly read this blog so here's an idea for your next Album title, "He who laughs last". Go on Gary, you know you want to.

Was reading Joppas blog yesterday and spotted a new blog on his favourites. Clicked on it and spent the next three hours reading all these girlie blogs, mostly from American Moms. Suprisingly, to me anyway, I actually quite enjoyed them. What's wrong with me? Mid life crisis? Fuck knows.

I've listed my favourites down the bottom right of this blog if anyone fancies reading some of them. Not that they need any more viewers. Some of them post "Hi" and get about 250 comments, figures even Amatay would be proud of. Think my favourite so far is "my boyfriends a twat". I,ve only gone back a few months and there's been a few laugh out loud posts. If you read this Joppa and find a few hours to kill, give her a twirl.

Right, just watched Inter v Man Utd and now I'm off to read http://www.momscrazylife.com/.

What the fuck is wrong with me?

Just watched "If Hitler gave me a wax job" on BERNTHIS.COM . Fucking brilliant.

Knackered

Finally got my car back after ten days in the garage. Getting to work has been a nightmare. Have had to get up at 4.30 every morning and haven't been getting home until six in the evening. Friday was the worst. Up at 4.30 then home at three for a quick shower before going to work at the Blues v Warriors match. Finish there at 9.30 and nip down my local for a few beers. Leave there at two in the morning and then spend all day Saturday in bed. Haven't done fuck all today either. I think I'm going into some sort of hibernation. Car is going to cost me £475 to boot.

Was reading about this Alfie Patten kid who managed to Father a child before reaching puberty? Seems there's about a dozen other toe rags now claiming to have slept with every parents worst nightmare as well. Alfie hasn't taken this very well and has now joned Fathers for Justice. He doesn't understand the politics but he does have a very catching Batman outfit.

Luckily not all teenagers are knife wielding thugs or degenerate one finger saluting fools. Danny Lee made European Tour history today when he won the Johnny Walker Classic at 18 years and a couple of hundred days old. He not only is the youngest ever tour winner and only the second ever amateur to win a title but he is also the youngest ever winner of the American Amateur title beating the record of one Tiger Woods. Of course, it goes without saying I didn't have a penny on him.

When I was growing up I wanted to be a Rugby player. I would have settled for a career as a Footballer and at a push I wouldn't have minded a few years as a journeyman Golf Pro. Unfortunately things never go the way you want.

When I was sixteen I played Golf off nine, was playing Amateur League footie and School Rugby with one of the stongest teams in Wales. One fateful week saw me have a School boy trial for Welsh Schools Rugby on a Saturday. I then had a trial on the Tuesday for Bristol City the same day Trevor Francis made his debut as the first Million pound player for Notts Forest against them in the Cup. Then on the following Saturday I broke my leg playing Amateur League, which I shouldn't have been playing as I was too young, and spent a year on crutches. Worst still, I never grew an inch after and was too small to play first class Rugby. Some would say I wasn't good enough either which was probably true.

Anyhow, been watching the French Rugby today. Nine players in the Toulouse match are in the French squad to play Wales on Friday night. What an absolutely crazy decision to play them. Even if they got through them match unscathed they've only got five days preparation time. Will be placing a nice little bet on Wales for that match and will also have a few quid on France HT, Wales FT.

Oscars are on tonight and one film I saw last year isn't anywhere to be seen. Not sure if it was only released this year but if you haven't seen it, you should. http://www.viewlondon.co.uk/films/taken-film-video-25223.html

Later Gators.

Top weekend

My weekend couldn't have started better. Got up Valentines morning and Mrs Rubbish has only come up trumps.

Normally I get the same old crap for Birthdays, Fathers day etc. but this time I get series 5 and 6 of the Sopranos. Well happy.

I love the Sopranos, probably my favourite show along with 24. For some reason though our cable switched to Virgin a few years ago and Sky 1 disappeared without a trace. No Sopranos, 24, Simpsons, Prison Break and Lost. To be honest, Lost was starting to do my head in but I was gutted when the other shows went. I was planning on having a quiet weekend this week and now I know what I'll be watching.

After a nice little potch about with Mrs Rubbish I headed into Cardiff to watch Wales v England. Few ciders before hand and then into the Millennium Stadium. What an atmosphere!! Playing England is always special for us boyos and when you're overwhelming favourites and playing as well as we are then Saturday was better than most of the England games I've been to. The only match I can remember where the atmosphere prior to kick off was better was this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jdrr1PwcCw&feature=related

I think that video sums up the feeling in the stadium far better than anything you get on TV.

Anyhow, England played really well and worked Wales out. Worsley was outstanding and only the yellow cards kept Wales in front. Goode and Sackey being substituted was a baffling decision and certainly turned the match in Wales' favour. The match wasn't a classic but a win is a win as they say and hopefully Wales will have Shane Williams and Gavin Henson fit in time for France.

Had a fair old drink after the game and suffered yesterday. Being the trooper I am though I headed off down the pub to watch the Ireland match. As I wasn't driving this morning I hit the Guinness big time. Watched the Rugby then Man Utd then the Milan derby. Shows the pulling power of Beckham, he plays and BBC screen the derby live. Bet they wouldn't have if he hadn't been on the pitch.

Get my car back tomorrow thank fuck. Might not have to pay straight up has a mate has been fixing it so Paris may still be on. In a drunken stupour on Saturday a few of us slurred about going to Rome. Not sure how serious everyone was but I'm deefinately considering it. Could even bump into "Would be" and take a few of his Eastern European girlfriends of his hands. If you're not sure what I'm rambling on about then read this http://would-be-tales.blogspot.com/

24 has just started and Cardiff are getting a drubbing from Arsenal so time to concentrate on the box.

Later.