Day 261 ... Titan Recovery Stalls ...

The Shipping Forecast ... THERE ARE WARNINGS OF GALES IN ROCKALL MALIN HEBRIDES BAILEY FAIR ISLE FAEROES AND SOUTHEAST ICELAND.

THE GENERAL SYNOPSIS AT 0100 - LOW FAIR ISLE 990 MOVING STEADILY SOUTHEAST AND LOSING ITS IDENTITY. LOW FORTIES 992 SLOW MOVING WITH LITTLE CHANGE.

VIKING NORTH UTSIRE - CYCLONIC 4 OR 5 BECOMING NORTH 5 TO 7, PERHAPS GALE 8 LATER IN WEST VIKING. OCCASIONAL RAIN. MODERATE OR GOOD. Full Met Office Shipping Forecast

For anyone in the UK and brought up on Radio 4 / The Archers - The Shipping Forcast is an institution and as a child was totally soothing and bemusing in equal measure. For anyone not British this is probably very alien material for national broadcasting but tune into Radio 4 and you will love it - basically its is vital for fisherman in British waters depending on the forcasts to ensure they come home safe. Names of the areas like Viking, Dogger & Fisher German Bight trigger images of little boats fighting with the weather in their own little drama. I always remember the report having an almost hypnotic effect on me as a kid. There is a great photographic documentary book - The Shipping Forecast by Mark Powers

Fete Watch ... Random pick of fete's coming up nowhere near you -
Thorton in Craven Fete Weekend 27th-28th May, North Yorkshire, UK.

All the classics including - Pottery smashing, stocks, The Chocolate Lottery & the unforgetable Owl Man.

Now I hate fete's - Due to a 5+ year stint as a local press photographer I have attended more fetes than anyone should have to endure in a lifetime. There is something quaintly reasuring about the local village fete but after what must be over 250 the novelty wears off. As with all outside events weather is the key to success so I will endevour to bring a weather report for the fete on the day. To my knowledge I've never covered a fete with a "Chocolate Lottery" - This seems a unique new twist in fete stalls - I am sure the local newspaper photographer will be very grateful and it probably means The Owl Man will be off the hook for this year.

Titan Poker ... $ 86.39

$10 cash NL 0.10 ... 00.00 ... - $10.00

$5+0.75 SnG full ... 4th ... - $ 5.75

Titan Poker ... $ 86.39 ... - $ 15.75 ... total $ 70.64 (-$ 45.36)

Well the inevitable end of my upturn came to with a dull thud this morning - after getting up early and deciding to squeeze in some time at a cash game and an SnG. This was a bad plan from the off - I knew I wasn't going to get any other games in as I'd got to go and see the accountant and other family things. It really fel appart when I had aggressively played AA preflop tto get one caller and then when the flop came down Q-10 I decided it required an all-in to safeguard my AA against a call on a straight draw - this was unfounded as the guy seemed happy to call the all-in (4x pot) on a flush draw needing runner runner - of course he got it. In the SnG I got down to 4 players and had JJ on the button so raised heavily looking to double up - the flop came down J23 making me trips but not wishing to get greedy or unlucky I went all-in at again got called this time with a random A 10 and yep he managed runner runner Q K to make a straight.

4kingpoker stuff ...

This week has been mostly behind the scenes stuff but I'm hoping that next week I will be able to tidy up a few things and get on with adding more news content etc. I'm working on another poker related project which has now been weeks in the pipeline so hopefully next week it will be close to launch.

Titan Series this weekend ... It's the 5th game of 6 this weekend at Titan and the last $50 freeroll in the current series. The weekend after it's a $3+0.30 buy-in which needs to be busy as you can only qualify for the highest 30 scorer final if you've played in a buy-in tournie. The series seems to have been a success and we're just sorting out the details for the Titan Series II which is great news.