Car Troubles

2009, the year of the run good, hasnt quite got off to the best start, nothing to do with bad luck or downswings, simply because I havent really played yet. I've been really busy writing and been having some car troubles, so that has been taking up most of my time. Whats more, I havent really wanted to play poker that much, largely because I've been busy but also a certain feeling of not wanting to throw myself back into the lions den again just yet. I played my first session yesterday and ended it two buy-ins down, mainly down to a few hero calls on my part rather than any big coolers, so 2009 can only get better at the tables.

Car trouble - I take my car into the nearest garage for its MOT, fully aware that I had a problem with the steering (veering to the left ever so slightly) - I get a call from them later saying 'you are in for a shock' and they proceed to tell me it will cost me £1200 for the parts and labour, new steering rack apparantly. I choose to mull it over for a few days and the guy tells me when I pick it up "I know someone that would buy this off you if you didnt want to get it fixed". Then my Dad kindly swings the car round to his mechanic friend and my girlfriend starts looking at parts on the internet. Turns out I actually just need a Steering Column, which cost about £60 and my Dads mate is going to fix it, for we reckon less than £200.

£1200! What a fucking shark, thats a GUKPT and travel expenses, I'm pretty certain he wanted to buy my car on the cheap because its in great condition, so I wont be using the Waggon & Horses in Chesterfield Road in Sheffield again, other than possibly for the MOT retest just to see the dodgy smirk on his face when I tell him I got it sorted for 1/6 of what he quoted. The part hasnt been fixed yet, so I cant help but think that the whole drama aint over yet. I hate cars.

I'm a writing machine at the moment, I sometimes get in these moods where I cant stop writing and I have loads of ideas running round my head and now is one of them, probably because one is being introspective after the end of the year. The durrrr challenge has been the only thing we have been writing about on Pokernews and yesterday I had to vet and rewrite a formula a chap called Sam Glasson made for us on how big his earn rate has to be for his challenge to be at least break even, my job was to make it sound simple enough for anyone to understand it. Hopefully I've done that but my god, my head is pounding, havent done that much maths since ever. The feature is here and I hope its correct.

Hopefully will start playing in some significant volume this coming week, as long as my car doesn't cause me anymore grief, and let the year of running good commence.