General: “Old Photos” project

On July 15th 2012,  embarked on project to digitise my old 35mm films and slides. I've got around 100 films, mostly 36 shots per film.  Estimated will take 5 months and actually finished it just now, so was spot on for my estimate.

Was quite monotonous at times, but was fun to relive some of the events in my life, a few I had totally forgotten about !

Here are a few pictures thought would be interesting to share, in no particular order:-

I’m the one on the left !  New Year eve 1981… had hair back then…

From 1993, but no idea what’s going on…..

One of my earliest photos of Aldeburgh High street, not sure when but probably 30+ years or so…

Where were you when Live Aid was on (July 1985)  I was in this holiday cottage and watched it from midday to midnight.   Probably only remember the first three or fours hours for some reason though

I seem to have a lot of photo’s from Aldeburgh This time Carnival time in 1991

Also seem to go to Brooklands Motor Museum a lot… this one what it looked like in 1995 (there’s an industrial estate at the bottom of the hill now!)

and one of my many trips to Goodwood Festival of Speed

My first Lotus (1998)

Many trips to our timeshare at Carihuela (Costa Del Sol) always lovely weather of course….

Our old neighbours party (2000) – 1970’s theme in case you’re wondering…

It’s not all holidays, cars and parties…. went to Rome for a long weekend for some culture in 2005….

The fish is definitely fresh in Aldeburgh… this from circa 1980, although the fisherman is probably still going strong now….

You don’t often see gigs like this “True Life Confessions” one back in early eighties anymore… think they call them something else nowadays

My love of gardening started with my first house in 1988……

 

That’s all for the moment.  Will doubtless get the urge again to post up some of my more recent digital photo’s, but there are even more of those to trawl through !!

General: Fitness Review 2012

During 2012 my Keep Fit regime changed completely, so can’t do a direct comparison to my 2011 fitness review.

In June, we decided to get in a personal trainer for a couple of private sessions at home, mostly to get Lynn a suitable regime but also to give me some more motivation.   After looking around locally, decided to get in Carl Bradshaw   It certainly worked, in that it got Lynn back into a fitness routine and I now do a wider range of activities.

This is my weekly routine now:

 

	Warm up - Exercise / Time	Intensity 0 –easy 10 -Hard	Main Aerobic session	Intensity 0-easy 10 Hard	Resistance	Stretch
Monday	Running 5 min @5mph	4	Cycling 25 min 14mph level 12 (6.0m – 1.2)	7	Yes	Yes
Tuesday	X/trainer 10 min Level 2 @57 watts	4	Rowing 25 min @30spm	7		Yes
Wednesday	Cycling 5 min Level 10 @11mph	4	Running 25 min @7.0mph (2.8m)	7	Yes	Yes
Thursday	Running 5 min @5mph	4	x/trainer 25 min Level 3 @80 watts 19-16 & 8-5 back	7	Kung Fu + Weights	Yes
Friday	X/trainer 5 min Level 2 @57 watts	4	Cycling 25 min 14mph level 12 (6.0m – 1.2)	7	Yes	Yes

I have got into this new routine, but have recently been a little sporadic.    Will make sure I get back into the proper routine after Xmas of course

I don't have much in the way of analysis but for the main exercise have done a couple of measurements:

Monday heart rate peak at average 138 and peak 147
Tuesday 144/151
Wednesday 154/168
Thursday 133/145
Friday 140/148

Of course the regime is totally different to last year, but overall I think the results are pretty good.   I’m still able to avoid chocolate, cakes and biscuits Mon-Thur and not going too mad Fri-Sun… and my alcohol intake is worrying low recently  

For 2013 it will be to stay with the current programme, and try to increase the time to 30 mins for the main exercises, whilst also increasing the Resistance training a bit over the year as well.    We’ll probably get Carl to come in and do another review of our progress in the new year, so will give an incentive to make sure we keep to the schedule !

Poker: Home Tourney–December 2012

The final Christmas edition of the League was a jovial event, with an "end of term" feel about it

It was slightly disconcerting that Andy was the first to need his addon chips, but in level 2 normal service was resumed when Sean managed to get all in on a bluff against Jon who had trips...    Sean subsequently went on to be the first out before the break, but the shock of the night was Karen being taken out the last hand before the break!!

Luckily Sean and Karen stayed during the break, so we could all eat the goodies they had kindly provided :)   I was also able to make the 1st place presentation to Darren as he was looking a little low on chips ;)

I managed to crash out shortly after the break, first loosing a big flip against Steve then Bill took the small amount of my remaining chips.   The consolation was that I could sit there and eat more cakes :)

It also wasn't long before Andy and Lee both hit the rail, leaving few contenders to challenge Jock for 2nd and Karen for 3rd

Derek nursed his short stack, but eventually had to get it in but was taken out, with Darren busting soon after

The remaining 5 had decent stacks so was a battle before Bill was the next to succumb.   The remaining four was a surprisingly short encounter.  Alex was short stacked and was soon the money bubble boy.   Steve W had his best result of the year but could only manage 3rd.   

After a couple of hands, the heads up battle saw Jock raise the button and Jon call.  On the T-x-x flop, Jon checked, Jock raised all-in and Jon called.  Jon's K-T looked promising until Jock showed his A-A !  Another T on the turn looked to have cruelly robbed Jock, but Jock could his 2 outers as well when the A came on the river and Jock is our winner and takes 2nd place in the league overall

What a great game to finish off a great year of games !    My own performance over the year was pretty poor by my own standards, and seems everyone has  picked up their game.... but this gives me greater incentive to improve my own game and adjust better for next year

Can't wait, but in the meantime - Happy Christmas and New year to all

Poker: Financial results for November 2012

Plan

My monthly targets are:
- Play 600 hands of cash on NLHE $0.50 Full Ring or 6-max, 600 cash hands on PLO $0.50 6-max, all with target of breaking even
- Play 20 NLHE STT hoping for +10% ROI

Monitor

Overall results for the month:-

Pokerstars      :  -$   70.87
Black Belt Poker:  -$  243.37 (-£151.43)
Live play       :  -£   41.00

For Pokerstars, my 8 game cash was a little disappointing this month with loss of $155.53 over three sessions.  On a slightly brighter note, I tried Zoom Omaha cash a couple of times and made profit of $27.08

The Micro Millions tempted me, but didn't have any joy in four attempts.  Three 8 game MTT saw me cash in one, but still lost $5.88   The 8 game STT saw two cashes out of three attempts, with profit of $14.35
  
8 Game wins/losses by game type for October:
2-7        -30.03
Limit HE   -61.95
Omaha HL   -12.54
Razz       - 9.95
Stud       -22.95
Stud HL    -30.18
NL HE      +53.81
PLO        -41.74

BBP results break down as follows:

Cash results (-£91.96 overall)
NLHE Speed  ($0.20)  664 hands   -£37.55
NLHE 6-Max  ($0.20)  619 hands   +£22.64
PLO         ($0.50)  475 hands   -£81.57
PLO8        ($0.20)   89 hands   +£ 4.52

Tournament Results (-£59.47 overall)
11x   MTT           -£40.21
12x   6 seat STT    -£19.26

Reflect

Pokerstars 8 game is still my favourite, so will be continuing playing as much as possible.   The PLO Speed might be something I would continue with as well, but it might be a struggle to fit it into my schedule !

I'm still adjusting to the Black Belt cash games, but have switched to the lower levels 6-Max and Speed poker.  Both these formats I am comfortable with now, so hope to now get more consistent (positive) results.    The PLO loss was all down to one short one session, where three or four hands ruined the session for me.    

The BBP MTT tournament results were down to trying to qualify for iPOPS III, but came nowhere close sadly.   The STT's were mostly Jackpot SnG as not much else seems to run nowadays.   Might start giving those a miss, although normally do OK in them.

Adjust

For Pokerstars, concentrate on 8 Game cash and maybe dabble a bit more in Zoom PLO cash

With BBP, will continue to play $0.20 Speed and 6-max NLHE and continue with the $0.50 PLO and $0.20 PLO8 cash games.   I will probably play more MTT and less STT but do need to be sure I have enough time to play the MTTs

Targets

* Keep to my revised Poker Plan
Surpassed Cash games hand targets for NLHE but didn't hit the PLO target.  

* Play BBP London Live and UKIPT Brighton tournaments
Played two BBP Live events this year

* Aim for break even month on month on all cash tables
NLHE near enough but for 6-max result, PLO OK apart from the odd poor month, PLO8 looking a bit better

* Use learning tools and resources to learn and improve my NLHE, Omaha and PLO8 cash and tournament play
Am putting in the effort to do some learning.

* Avoid entering any BBP grading process !
Managed it this month :)

* Win a BBP league :-)
Won the 2nd leg of the new league, so a step in the right direction.  Two more chances this week !

References

January 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/poker-financial-results-for-january.html
February 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/poker-financial-results-for-february.html
March 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/poker-financial-results-for-march-2012.html
April 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/poker-financial-results-for-april-2012.html
May 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/poker-financial-results-for-may-2012.html
June 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/poker-financial-results-for-june-2012.html
July 2012 http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/poker-financial-results-for-july-2012.html
August 2012 http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/poker-financial-results-for-august-2012.html
September 2012 http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/poker-financial-results-for-september.html
End of third Quarter 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/poker-financial-results-for-end-of.html
October 2012 http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/poker-financial-results-for-october-2012.html

Cars: New car, again!

It wasn’t all that long ago I got the Alpina, but for various reasons decided to get another car.

After extensive thought and research (which was a lot of fun in itself) settled for the Ford Focus Estate ST3

I’ve only driven it the 2 miles back from the garage, but am l looking forward to many happy miles with it    I’ll have to read the manual before the next outing as it’s got some whizzy in-car entertainment, etc with phone sync which I’ve not had in previous cars…. good job I work in technology !    If you get any weird phone calls from my mobile and can just hear background noise as if someone is driving… that’ll be me pressing buttons accidently

General: Redecoration–COMPLETE!! (well…..)

It has been a surprisingly long time to get two bedrooms redecorated… but at last we are finished…!

Small Bedroom

Main Bedroom

It all started the end of September, so has taken two months to complete.

The final part was getting the curtains installed by Curtain Flair.  The one tiny bit we are still missing are a pair of tie backs for the small bedroom, but can live without that for a few more days.  Apart from that, we found Curtain Flair were very efficient and took time to help us decide what we needed and gave suggestions on what would go and what may not be such a good idea.   The main issue with them was they are horrendously expensive, but have been very happy with their service

Of course we are not quite finished in the small bedroom, as we don’t have any furniture, but that was always the plan for the moment.   Next year we will be buying a bed and cupboard for the small bedroom and also table and side board for the living room, then that really is the whole house done for the foreseeable !!

Looking back, it is quite interesting to see how it all progressed, so to summarise the different stages, here are the previous reports:

Phase I completed – stripping out and painting

Phase II – furniture installation

Phase III – Carpet

Phase IV – Bed delivery

Phase V (this report) – Curtains

So we’re both very pleased that it’s all finished and can now move back into our main bedroom.    I’m really glad I didn’t have to do any of the work myself, as just project managing it all was hassle enough for me

In hindsight, we could have done things differently to get everything in quicker, but timescale wasn’t really a big deal for us.    The lead time of both the bed and the curtains were a bit of a surprise, so maybe should have thought more about these items earlier in the process, but otherwise it was all OK really.   

So now the house is just as we want it and plan to stay here a long time…. why does Lynn keep looking at house prices in Devon….. ?

General: Redecoration–Phase IV completed

It all seemed to be unravelling slightly two weeks ago, when it seemed Furniture Village had let us down badly over the bed delivery.

Today however, it has all come together and the bed is in and ready for use !

After complaining to the sales manager, in fairness he did come up with a solution that was acceptable to us.     It still wasn’t perfect, in that he promised delivery the next week and someone would ring us early in the week.  When no one had rung by Wednesday, I called in and was told I’d get a call back.  Ten minutes later I was called and given a delivery date of a week later.    After that it was plain sailing and came together as promised, so all’s well that end’s well I suppose.

I still think their customer communication is appalling as it was always me having to chase them….. not sure I can recommend Furniture Village, and will certainly think twice about dealing with them again

Having mostly moaned about the bed delivery, it didn’t delay us moving into the bedroom, as we are still waiting for the final element being the curtains.

Hopefully they will be in next week and we can finally move into the bedroom

Update: 16th November 2012

A few days ago, I got email inviting me to give feedback on our purchase from Furniture Village, which I duly did

Got call today from Furniture Village to discuss the issue and try to placate us.    We are basically happy now anyway (although could have done without the hassle at the time) but is good to see them taking the trouble to follow up on bad reviews.

General: Redecoration–almost there !

Why can’t all redecoration be this easy……

1.  Ask decorator for quote and date.

2.  Decorator turns up when expected and takes as long as he said

3.  That’s it

OK, so it was only a bit of painting in our conservatory… but even so, all jobs should be this easy

This is before:

and here is after:

from the photo’s, the difference is subtle, but closer inspection it looks a lot cleaner and fresher than before.

Just got to get the bedrooms finished off and that is the whole house done in the three years we’ve been here !!

Now it’s all done…. shall we move house, or just start redecorating again

Poker: Home Tourney–November 2012

12 took their seats for a key game, as Darren needed a poor result to avoid taking down the 2012 title today and take it to the wire.

There was no evidence of nerves from Darren, as he was happy to call down my raises and bets with poor Aces (still won the pot tho ) and seemed to be hitting cards all night.   My game was fairly active early on and although needed to double buy in a couple of times, was around average chips at the break, but Jon and Derek were the chip leaders on my table.

Andy had a fairly normal game, and was bemoaning his luck, when he tripled up on the last hand before the break with his rubbish cards hitting a straight… at least that should shut up his moaning for a while

On the re-start I wasn’t getting or hitting anything, and just drizzled my blinds away.   With Lee being short stack on my left, managed to steal his BB a few times and picked on Roger a couple of times as well… but was glad when Jon bust Lee and Roger, which meant I had made the final table !

I was on around 4k, which was about 8 big blinds by now.   Resisting the temptation to shove the first hand, managed to wait until the third hand before shoving any 2 against Andy in the SB.    

Sean managed to dust off his big stack, firstly by giving some chips to Darren, then polishing off the remaining 21k to Karen shortly after.  

Bill was short stacked and in the BB and got in against Darren, but Darren was ahead and improved on the flop, taking him out.    Couple of hands later it was my turn, with Q-Jo being called by Darren in the BB with A-x   Sadly for me the A came and I’m out and Darren is cruising with a huge chips stack.

It took until the last round with the excruciatingly high blinds before Andy was out in 5th and Jon soon followed on the bubble.

We were three handed into the last four hands.  Karen was shortest with around 24k, Derek on 33k and Darren 45k appx

Derek managed to double up Karen, giving her the lead and on the last hand, Derek went all in blind with 11k, Karen decided to re-shove and Darren called… so it was all in the lap of the Poker gods as to who got what spot.   

As it turned out, Derek had the best hand, but Darren had a better hand than Karen, so ended up with Darren winning (again!) Derek 2nd and Karen 3rd

Another great game, but has settled the winner of this years league, as no one can catch Darren now….

Congrats to Darren, but still all to play for as 2nd place is wide open !

See you next time

Poker: Financial results for October 2012

Plan

My monthly targets are:
- Play 600 hands of cash on NLHE $0.50 Full Ring or 6-max, 600 cash hands on PLO $0.50 6-max, all with target of breaking even
- Play 20 NLHE STT hoping for +10% ROI

Monitor

Overall results for the month:-

Pokerstars      :  -$   99.74
Black Belt Poker:  -$  522.15 (-£323.12)
Live play       :  -£   40.00

I only managed a couple of 8 game cash sessions on Pokerstars, with result of -$31.34.   I dropped about $70 on one NLHE hand, which was a correct call but didn't give me the result I wanted.  That one hand defined my months result on Pokerstars really.    My other activities were to spend $49.50 trying to qualify for PCA (but not got anywhere near :( )  Also played a two low stakes 5 draw and a PLO MTT which along with one 8 game STT account for the rest of the losses.   

8 Game wins/losses by game type for October:
2-7        +13.93
Limit HE   - 5.99
Omaha HL   -15.92
Razz       - 8.86
Stud       +11.96
Stud HL    + 0.26
NL HE      -70.01
PLO        +43.29

BBP results break down as follows:

Cash results (-£386.41 overall)
NLHE Speed  ($0.20)  441 hands   -£21.41
NLHE 6-Max  ($0.50)  837 hands  -£365.10
NLHE FR     ($0.50)   74 hands    +£6.84
PLO         ($0.50)  652 hands   -£16.24
PLO8        ($0.50)  105 hands   -£27.18
PLO8        ($1.00)   23 hands   +£36.68

Tournament Results (+£63.29 overall)
7x  MTT           +£71.38
1x   2 seat STT   -£13.14
12x   6 seat STT    -£3.64
6x  10 seat STT    +£8.69

Reflect
Not a huge amount of volume on Stars, so fairly content with the results.   I'll be having a bit of a rest from EPT satallittes for a while and hope to get more volume on 8 Cash with my new schedule

Black Belt cash games are fewer and tougher it seems, I literally cannot get a Full Ring NLHE game now.  It seems partly down to the iPoker2 split and partly down to the rise of Speed poker.    This meant that I switched to 6-max NLHE and got severely pwned every session I played.   I also dabbled in Speed poker and have got used to that format a bit more now.   You can certainly rattle through the hands, so is something I think I will play more of.  My PLO and PLO8 cash results are about what I would expect.  It's very difficult to get a game of PLO8 at $0.20 or $0.50, which is why I played a session of $1, but hope to stick to the lower stakes really.

The BBP tournament results were saved by my win in the BBP league, although the other games I'm fairly happy with.   The STT table volume is certainly lower at $20-$50 buy-in levels, so am back to playing mainly $10 games.  

Adjust

For Pokerstars, with my new Poker schedule I hope to get to play more 8 Game cash, as it's something I really enjoy.. and normally do OK at!

With BBP, I need to drop down when playing 6-max NLHE and play a bit more Speed Poker as well.  

Targets

* Keep to my revised Poker Plan
Surpassed Cash games hand targets in October

* Play BBP London Live and UKIPT Brighton tournaments
Played two BBP Live events this year

* Aim for break even month on month on all cash tables
NLHE near enough but for 6-max result, PLO OK apart from the odd poor month, PLO8 looking a bit better

* Use learning tools and resources to learn and improve my NLHE, Omaha and PLO8 cash and tournament play
Am putting in the effort to do some learning.

* Avoid entering any BBP grading process !
Managed it this month :)

* Win a BBP league :-)
Won the 2nd leg of the new league, so a step in the right direction

References
January 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/poker-financial-results-for-january.html
February 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/poker-financial-results-for-february.html
March 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/poker-financial-results-for-march-2012.html
April 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/poker-financial-results-for-april-2012.html
May 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/poker-financial-results-for-may-2012.html
June 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/poker-financial-results-for-june-2012.html
July 2012 http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/poker-financial-results-for-july-2012.html
August 2012 http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/poker-financial-results-for-august-2012.html
September 2012 http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/poker-financial-results-for-september.html
End of third Quarter 2012 results http://sceaga.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/poker-financial-results-for-end-of.html