The North

Above: Me, Alex, Daz

Apologies for not posting sooner but I haven't had a moment in the last few days where I've felt like I'd be able to write a decent entry. That's not to say that this post will be brilliant, but..... you get the picture.

So, the main things that happened when Daz and I went to see Alex...

Traffic
It took Daz and I seven hours to travel about 250 miles. We encountered two accidents on the motorway and an unavoidable set of roadworks about half way. Then we met one more massive jam when we were right on Alex's doorstep. Although it was long, I still enjoyed the drive. Plenty of Annie Mac on Daz's sound system kept us going. I think we got a slight case of cabin fever during our seventh hour in the car without a pit-stop and ended up in fits of hysterical laughter when Daz mentioned that the only other thing that could go wrong was if he "hit a raccoon or something". Poor old Daz had also been complaining that he needed a piss from before Nottingham - that's a long time, and he legged it straight into Alex's toilet when we finally arrived.

Omaha, Nebraska
From previous trips and outings, a common frustration has been that we get loads of photos taken but the picture-taker inevitably misses out. This time I took to asking random people (ok, girls) if they would mind taking our picture, but using a thick American accent with a variation of the following line; "Hey there, my buddies and I are out here on an excursion from Omaha, Nebraska and I'd be mighty pleased if you could take a photograph of us". It had surprisingly good results (see photo above)!

The smell
On the Saturday, Daz ate a can of baked beans for lunchtime and boy did the rest of us pay for it. This was probably a taste of my own medicine but my God the smells he was coming out with were just vile. Several times he cleared space in the pubs and bars, leaving innocent bystanders struggling for air.

Football
We watched a lot of footy over the weekend and played a lot of Pro Evo but I don't really want to talk about football at the moment after Arsenal-Spurs last night.

Random quotes
Daz: "... as long as we don't hit a raccoon or something".

Me on the way home [in a conversation about how people grow into their ears/feet when they're kids]: "I always had to grow into my dick"
Daz: "I'm still growing into mine"

Alex: "Does anyone know Wray Ashman?"

Eastern European girl [when she saw the Nebraska technique being used on another unsuspecting victim]: "Is that your chat-up line?"

These quotes will sound awful to everyone who wasn't there, sorry for that.

Thanks for reading nonetheless!

Going North

Today I'm going up to Yarm with Daz to see Alex for the weekend which will no doubt be a crazy couple of days. I need to relax after the stressful events of Wednesday so this little sojourn will hopefully be a good tonic for broken alternators.

Only a quick post as I need to get my stuff together, go for a dump and have a bath before we set off. Last night I went to the RE Bar with Daz, Chopper and Lauren and afterwards the three men shared a family meal from the chicken shop - this was stupid, it was so much of the stuff and today I feel immensely guilty for eating it.

Haven't done any more bets since Monday's football as I couldn't see anything which tickled my fancy. More to come after the weekend. I need to get cracking because this alternator won't pay for itself...

Looking back over some recent posts there are some comments which I failed to spot at first and didn't reply to - many thanks to John the Gambler and Mark Bellew a) for reading this and b) for commenting; feedback makes it much more satisfying to write!

Ok, I'm Northbound.

Costly mistake :-((

Got out of work today at 12.45pm, was in a good mood because the sun was shining and I had the whole afternoon to relax. Got in my car, it wouldn't start. Not even a whimper. I'd left my bloody lights on. The bloke in the car park office offered me a jump start but it didn't work. So I had to call the AA out. £130 straight off the bat.

Vital statistics: the battery has had it, and so has the alternator. Unusual for both to go at once but they had definitely both gone.

New battery: £40
New alternator: £120
Labour at the garage: £70
AA: £130

Then VAT on top of all of that.

So it's nearly a fortnight's work just to pay for that costly error of mine. IDIOT. Plus all the hassle and stress from the afternoon, and the effort to get it to the garage and so on...

I'm still worried that I might leave the lights on again, because my car doesn't make a noise if I open the door and they're still on.

I have work at 4.45am tomorrow which is too early for the tube and the car will be out of action for the next few days. Which means I have to try to find someone who's nutty enough to give me a lift at 4am.

Not a happy boy :(

PROFIT

Bet 6 result: +£4.27

Starting kitty: 20

Aston Villa to beat QPR: -5

Inter to beat Werder Bremen: -5

Ancic to beat Rochus: +1.66

England v Kazakhstan over 3.5 goals: +4.04

England to beat Belarus: +2.09

Newcastle v Man City over 2.5 goals: +4.27

Overall: 22.06

PS. Formatting on Blogger is SHIT

Bet 6

I am surpised to see a high price of 1.9 available on over 2.5 goals in the Newcastle v Manchester City game tonight. Both teams have played 7 games each so far. There have been 20 goals in Newcastle's games (2.9 per game) and 30 in City's (4.3 per game). Overall that's an average of 3.6 goals per game which would suggest that the price should be lower than 1.9, and even worth a punt on over 3.5 goals which for some reason is at odds of 3.3. I'll stick to just the one bet though seeing as I'm still not yet in profit.

So there you have it, bet number six, £5 on over 2.5 goals at 1.9.

Betting, fantasy football, travel

Betting
I've been struggling to find a good bet this weekend. I am tempted to back Spurs this afternoon seeing as their price is above evens (against Stoke! hahaha) because they are going to get out of this hole sooner or later, though I sincerely hope they don't. It was funny enough them losing on the first day of the season, but seven games on the fun is still going!

I was also tempted to get involved in the Madrid Masters but my track record with tennis betting is dire. Murray's price to win it this afternoon is also very short, so doesn't look like I'll be having a bet today.

Fantasy football
I really enjoy doing this and I actually put quite a lot of time into it, but my team is doing so badly. On paper I swear it is a quality lineup but it just never seems to perform. This week I was also rocked by injuries to Martin Skrtel, Ashley Cole and Patrice Evra (basically my whole defence). Or, when I think I've had a good week, I get onto the computer only to see that everyone else has Rooney or Lampard as their captains and surprise surprise they've both scored and had seven assists or whatever. 30 points if you had Rooney as your captain this week!! I had him in my team for a month at the start of the season and he did nothing so I transferred him out. Oh well.

Travel
I'm itching to book a trip somewhere seeing as I recently acquired my staff concessions at BA having worked for them for six months. For some reason though I'm delaying in deciding where to go. I'll also have to pin down those who have expressed interest in coming with me and get a final go-ahead before I book anything.

That's all for now.

Clawing the way back

Bet 5 result: +£2.09

Starting kitty: 20

Aston Villa to beat QPR: -5
Inter to beat Werder Bremen: -5
Ancic to beat Rochus: +1.66
England v Kazakhstan over 3.5 goals: +4.04
England to beat Belarus: +2.09

Overall: 17.79

I had also been tempted to put a bet on Theo to score, not sure what the price was but thankfully I didn't.

Weighed myself this morning and it was 84kg, so 2kg gained in the last week. Only 2kg to go to match my heaviest ever. That's probably not a good thing, but I'm so bored at home these days that going to the gym and eating are the only things that are keeping me sane.

More soon.

Time to chill out

I haven't seen any of the guys now for nearly a week; all I've been doing is working. I had another night in yesterday and have caught up on all the sleep I lost doing the early shifts, so I'm raring to go for tonight. We're going to to the tennis club to watch the England game, and have agreed to have a Smirnoff Ice each for every goal scored (on top of everything else). We did this last year for Arsenal's Carling Cup games, which resulted in some pretty severe drunkeness. Having said that, now it's probably going to end up being a boring 0-0 affair. It's also important to make sure that everyone sticks to the agreement; no pulling out of the challenge on the third or fourth goal. Goals in quick succession will also make for great entertainment.

Apart from that... the weather is very dark and wet and gloomy, which I need to change because I have to go down the road and buy myself a steak for later. I was meant to weigh myself this morning to see how much I've gained since last week but I forgot and had eaten something by the time I remembered. Will try to do it tomorrow.

One more thing. Some Welsh girl at work keeps flirting with me and will be interesting to see where that ends up.

Ta ta for now.

Bet 5

England to beat Belarus

£5 at 1.44

Why oh why didn't I back Taylor to win the darts...

Wahey

Bet 4 profit: £4.04

Two winners in a row eh, whatever next. Not too much longer until I'll be a millionaire. England did have me slightly concerned in the first half though...

Starting kitty: 20

Aston Villa to beat QPR: lost 5
Inter to beat Werder Bremen: lost 5
Ancic to beat Rochus: +1.66
England v Kazakhstan over 3.5 goals: +4.04

Overall: 15.70

Bet 4

England v Kazakhstan

Over 3.5 goals

£5 at 1.85

Come on Ingerlund

Fishing for a bet

I see Alex made a post this afternoon and he's been up to exactly the same thing as me; looking around for bets to make. This is not a healthy pastime and I was nearly tempted into gambling on the Rotherham v Leeds game tonight in the Johnstone's Paint Trophy (???), something I know absolutely nothing about. Thankfully I didn't wager anything. There's still a lot of tennis on, so I'll probably be casting my eye over the coupon in the next hour or so. I have a mountain to climb now seeing as Alex is in profit and I'm still nine quid down.

Away from gambling. I'm back lifting weights now and hopefully I'll be able to keep it up. I made a post a few months ago about getting back in the game but that was really short-lived. Now that I'm more familiar and comfortable with my routine at work maybe things will work out better. I had a look back at my calendar from last year where I chronicled my weight whilst I was taking the lifting seriously (being unemployed left me with literally nothing else to do apart from lift and eat). At my heaviest I was 86kg. Presently I am 82kg, so it will be interesting to see how quickly I can return to that weight if at all. I went to the gym this morning with Daz and then made an immediate trip afterwards to Karahi buffet with him and Chops. Good way to kick-start the old anbolism.

That's all for now.

-J

RESULT!!!!!!!

Bet 3 profit: £1.66
Would you believe it, a win!

Starting kitty: 20
Aston Villa to beat QPR: lost 5
Inter to beat Werder Bremen: lost 5
Ancic to beat Rochus: +1.66

Overall: 11.66

Still plenty of work to do though obviously!

Bet 3

Like Alex, I'm turning to tennis in the absence of football.

£5 Mario Ancic to beat Olivier Rochus at 1.35

This stands to make me all of £1.66.

So......

..... I haven't been updating too often, which is poor. Apologies for that. I had been hoping to go on a winning streak with the gambling challenge and to be making gambling-related updates all the time, but obviously that hasn't happened so far! Just ten pounds left in the kitty with zero winning bets made. There's not any decent football on for the next fortnight either so I'm unsure what I'll be looking towards to punt on.

Saturday we all went out for my birthday, and I ended up being pretty damn wasted. Started drinking in the afternoon and then headed into a bar in Camden. There I had a fair few Jagerbombs and what not, and that was where I began to succumb to the alcohol.Unfortunately we split into two groups towards the end of the night. The others went to some club (apparently) while I went to another bar with Sam, Daz and my sister. It turned out to be pretty crap so we headed back to my sister's halls at UCL where we ran riot. For some reason I told my sister to set her alarm for 7.30am, and we all woke up at that time covered in toilet roll. Sam had nicked a couple of industrial-sized bogrolls from somewhere and had given us each a blanket of tissue paper. My sister was in her bed whilst the three of us were all on the floor, and Sam said it was probably the most uncomfortable he'd ever been. We said farewell to my sis and then trudged back to Euston Square in the pouring rain and made the miserable, hungover journey home.

Hopefully I can catch up with the others tonight to find out what they got up to after we split up.

I should be posting sometime soon with my next bet.

Oh, and Spurs are still bottom of the league, ahahahahahahahahahaha!

-J

Worst gambler in world?

Probably.

Bet 2

So it's time to put on my second bet in the little gambling challenge I'm doing with Alex. I see that he put on a courageous double last night that didn't come off and is left with only £12 in the kitty. Let's see if I can make a step forward.

I've been having a look at tonight's Champions League game between Inter and Werder Bremen, which is a very interesting clash. Looking firstly at Werder Bremen, their domestic results this season:

Drew 2-2 v Arminia Bielefeld (A)
Drew 1-1 v Schalke 04 (H)
Lost 3-2 v Monchengladbach (A)
Won 3-0 v Energie Cottbus (H)
Won 5-2 v Bayern Munich (A)
Won 5-4 v 1899 Hoffenheim (H)

As you can see, a pretty disappointing start to the season which was revived by a wild result against Bayern Munich and an another strange one lately against Hoffenheim. However, they had another disappointing result a fortnight ago in the Champions League by drawing 0-0 with Famagusta (a ghost town in Cyprus).

It's quite obvious that there are some weak teams in the Bundesliga, and also that Werder have a tendency to concede a lot of goals. Yes they seem to be able to score a lot (sometimes) but I don't think that will be the case when they play away against Jose Mourinho's Inter, who have had a solid start to the Italian season and in Europe with a 2-0 win away to Panathinaikos. Indeed they lost in the Milan derby at the weekend (which will have pushed their price up a bit for today) but knowing Mourinho, who is not a loser, he will have his team fired up for tonight to get them right back on course. Italian teams are notoriously hard to break down and I think Werder will struggle.

Inter's Domestic results:

Drew 1-1 v Sampdoria (A)
Won 2-1 v Catania (H)
Won 3-1 v Torino (A)
Won 1-0 v Lecce (H)
Lost 1-0 v AC Milan (A)

So, tonight's bet:

Inter to beat Werder Bremen
£5 at 1.56