What a week. I love weeks like this, so absolutely rammed with stuff that you dont get a chance to think straight. Monday and Tuesday were spent shooting. Monday 7 guns and a team of beaters and pickers up went out to shoot some woodcock and a few fesseys on Mr.Pains nice spot of woodland in South Mimms. Was a cracking day, i gave my gun to my old man who doesnt get a chance to shoot much. In return he gave me the worst behaved spaniel on the planet. The thing must be bloody deaf. I let her off on the 1st drive and she proceeded to put up every pheasant in the 200 acre wood. We saw her again at lunchtime. The little cow lol, but you got to love her. We saw a helluva lot of game, in particular the woodcock. He has a large(ish) resident population but the few hard frosts must have brought in a lot of the Scandinavian birds as we saw about 70 over the day. Really we could have used a few more guns, including a few who could shoot straight. Cartridges fired to birds collected ratio was something like 9-1. Shocking. The few Pheasants we saw flew like absolute rockets, although unusually we only saw cock's the whole day.

Lunch was fantastic, a cracking homemade game pie with pickle. The pie contained more species than an Attenborough documentary, with Pheasant, Partridge, Pidgeon, Duck, Venison, Hare and Woodcock present. Delicious. The final bag totalled 15, which was less than expected but every bird was a cracker. A visiting German gun bagged his 1st woodcock which was a great result, a high jinking bird through the pines being dropped with the second barrel.

Afterwards we went to the pub for a nice spot of dinner. Venison stew made with home-shot Muntjac. Stunning. Obv after that we had a monster sesh. I wasnt sure if id be on form having not drunk for a few weeks but we gave the pub a hammering from 4pm to 2am and then more back at Tom's. Ended up sleeping with Tom and his dog and woke with a nasty rash.....on my feet. Blooody mut.

Rest of the week v been busy testing loads of different software. Poker Tracker is still my fave but Poker Academy is a cracking little piece of kit. Still havent tested a couple more so will get all my (meagre) findings out in a couple of months. On the poker front iv been playing a lot more 2/4 plo which im finding softer than any other game on the net, Touch wood its not just a sweet run, admittedly iv been on the good end of a couple of big coolers. Also been playing a bit of small stakes NLHE (.50/1) and having a lot more fun. Not getting as stressed about always clocking a win and getting annoyed about getting the hole for the week. Im not convinced im good enough to beat good poker players on multiple tables all week long. So iv gone back to basics and been findin the softer little games and the short simple session that i find fun and profitable. I think i can comfortably earn more @ .50/1 than 1/2 same no. of table same hours. Maybe its just my head is lighter when im playing. But touch wood i havent had a losing session this week. And if i can comfortably win 10 buyins a day ill be happy. Hell if that could equate to a yearly wage id be extatic (sp? but cant be arsed to look up). £90k a year is where id like to be in a year or two's time from online cash. Plus other fingers in other pies. The live scene has taken a back seat this week, im desperately trying to stop smoking and iv recently found i always smoke when playing poker and its not good. The lungs dont appreciate it on Sunday morning.

Looking forward to the Xmas cracker and the ecoop next week. What a bugger that they clash :(

DTD has opened and im going to pop down in a short time to try out the 6max cash tables. They should be a giggle. Iv been hearing great things about the place and ill prolly take Antony and Mo from Luton with me and set the 6-max tables on fire while propping up the bar.

So Luton Xmas cracker, please 1 time let me go deep in a big live event and round off a pretty average year in terms of expectation with a bonus holiday, damn the Maldives look good.