Voy Por Ustedes

So I'm having a cappuccino this morning and a couple of Daily Mail readers are putting the world to rights at a table just east of my position. According to them there are now more single mothers under the age of 20 than Topic bars (or something) in the south of England.

Patricia (I assume that was her name) argued that this statistic coincided with the demise of the Girl Guides while Brenda (that was her name) argued that it was the Government's fault.

They want girls getting pregnant she argued because keeping them on benefits is cheaper than having them in the workforce because they can get Hungarians to work as secretaries and nurses for peanuts.

Something like that anyway, I could only catch the gist of their rabid hysteria over the sounds of Mel Tormé's Careless Hands. I don't think the eastern European waitress quite agreed with her logic, but I think we both agreed that Brenda's cardigan was pretty.

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Speaking of careless hands, controversy at the Pigeons last night; with only seven runners and the blinds at 200/400 I'm sitting before a healthy stack of approximately 12,000. Steve v.03 UTG (I think) shoves for 3,500. Steve's range is quite rangey. I elect to call with 6-6. Alan on the button (I think) comes over the top for about 3,500 more again.

I decide to call. Alan has Kings and isn't happy when I hit my set (666 the number of the Asno) and bust both players. A fair enough point of view considering how big a dog I was and how often he has had Aces and Kings cracked in recent times.

My justification for calling was the somewhere between 3/1 and 4/1 odds I was getting from the pot and the chance to knock two players out of a seven runners tournament in one go, one of which was one of the better players and the other of which was Steve...whose rangey range is a double edged sword. I also have average chips if I don't hit my set.

Careless? Oui. Wrong? Not in that game. My strategy in the Pigeons is a potent blend of laggy play laced with raw lunacy and my results there seem to suggest it's quite effective so I'm sticking with it. In 'proper' games however I accept a more circumspect approach is necessary.

Finally, I almost took a shit today without pulling my pants down. I pulled my trousers down but not my pants, I realised something wasn't quite right just in time.

A final update then on Cheltenham. Mildly pissed off A. P. McCoy decided to ease off on Refinement and hand the race back to Whiteoak after having it all sewn up.

Not quite as pissed off as Ruby Walsh must have been though when Derek Thompson asked him if he thought he should have chosen to ride Denman instead of Kauto Star immediately after the race which Denman won comfortably.

Tommo really is a senile old duffer. What a fucking stupid and insensitive question. How was Ruby Walsh supposed to respond to that? He was actually very diplomatic - "Tommo that's the most ridiculous question I've ever been asked." I'd have been less restrained - "Would you rather have won this race Rich?" "Erm..let me think.." SMACK!

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So it's here then people. Gold Cup day, in a couple of hours anyway. It's been an odd festival this year, not least because I've actually secured a profit for the first time in three years, but the cancellation of day two has discombobulated the card - nineteen races in two days, it's all just two much man, I can't cope.

Racing before 2pm is not natural. Anything before 2pm is tricky for me if you want to know the truth. I've been going to bed at 10pm just to prepare myself.

Cousin Vinny secured me a profit for the week, so tomorrow with only a proper bet on Refinement in the first race, it will all be about enjoying the build up to the big one as I've only had a cheeky each-way bet on Neptune Collonges (48 for the win).

I can't be backing horses at the 'Nam at Denman and Kauto Star prices no matter how good they is. Who shall win it though eh? Eh?

Well, I've been a Kauto Star man up until today but now I'm drifting like tumblewood towards the Denman camp. It ought to be a cracker though, one of the few races I'd want to see without having a vested interest in it.

First of all, I hope they both finish the race. It'll be a terrible anti-climax if Kauto Star thrashes his way through a fence and ends up hooves over tits as he's been threatening to do for quite some time. I'd actually prefer Kauto Star to win. It's a tenuous and haughty reason, but I like Clive Smith and I'm afraid I have a snobby dislike of the brash working class hero types.

Harry Findlay is either a lovable rogue who spills his peas all over the table cloth at posh dinners or just one of those loud cockney spiv types who we can all do without.

I'm not sure which, so for now I'm siding with Mr Smith. To my knowledge there's yet to be an Englishman named Clive you couldn't depend on. Let's hope this still holds true tomorrow.

I've been dreaming about Vegas a lot recently, which is understandable as I'm off there pretty soon. But it's the Mirage Hotel specifically which keeps popping up in my dreams and this I cannot understand. No sir.

I've only ever been to Vegas once before and I didn't go into the Mirage and I'm not staying there in May, so why..why the dreams? Why? Well now, I think last night I figured it out; it's down to memory triggers I reckon.

You'll have seen Rambo and similar movies involving Vietnam vets where they go all crazy cause some innocuous object reminds them of their hellish war experiences. Usually it's ceiling fans that remind them of helicopters, of grates or grills that remind them of bamboo prisons.

You see? So in my case I think my Mirage dreaming is down to my heaters. This is the last thing I see at night before the sandman chucks sand in my eyes:

You see, it looks just like the Mirage no? Sort of. Since Vegas is on my mind a lot anyway, I think that, combined with the similarity of my heaters to the Mirage's facade is causing my Mirage dreams. Oui? You can scoff, but it wouldn't surprise me one bit if Steve Wynn had storage heaters in his house. The End.