Too many 'gates' spoil the news

It seems these days that every time there is a scandal it is referred to as some kind of 'gate'. There's been loads in the past.

Obviously the first was "Watergate": the "Watergate tapes" revealed conversations which took place in Republican US President Nixon's office, implicating him in attempts to cover up a break-in at the offices of the Democratic National Committee, located in the Watergate building in Washington DC.

A couple of others include:

"Squidgygate" - tapes of the Duchess of York and some bloke who's name escapes me cavorting in some way or another.
"Bloodgate" - the use of the fake blood capsules by Harlequins rugby union team to con the match officials into allowing a player substitution.

If I could be bothered I could come up with a few more, I'm sure - maybe somebody could add some in the comments.

Now there's "Crashgate". This is the story that Formula One team Renault ordered one of their drivers to crash in order to slow down the rest of the field, in order to give a major advantage to their other driver, who went on to win the GP. Later, it transpired that there were tape recordings of the conversations held between the pit crew, team bosses and the driver who crashed. Renault have subsequently stated that they will not contest allegations of race-fixing, so it seems that the tapes are pretty damning.

For me, there's a few lessons to be learned here:

1. It's not a real 'gate' if there's no tape recording
2. If you're going to plan anything dodgy, try not to make a tape recording that can link you to the conspiracy
3. If you work in the media, strictly observe all cliches, no matter how much they gate [sic]

New home

We started looking for a new house to rent this last couple of weeks. We’re going to downsize and save quite a bit of money as we negotiated our current place when the supply of decent rentals was pretty thin.

It looks as if the UK house-price crash has stopped now. I still believe that houses are over-priced, whatever that means, but there are a number of reasons why property is still an attractive investment for people with excess funds to invest. Low interest rates offer next to zero returns on safe savings: property is higher risk but the returns are in proportion and over the long-term the ‘capital’ risk is fairly low. Demand for rented property is high as the large deposits now required by lenders have still to be, and may in many cases never be, saved by first-time-buyers.

I read somewhere that the percentage of UK dwellings being owner-occupied has increased every year since 1950. I’m not sure when that statistic was penned or if it is still true. If it is still true, I can’t imagine it will remain true for long.

I think that the gap between rich and poor is going to grow over the next 10-20 years and I wonder if it will ever close again. The major dividing line is going to be home-ownership: there will be ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots.’ From what I can gather this will be a return to the 1950s.

The UK is different to how it was in 1997 and we could well view this administration as being the one that allowed things to run out of control. Historically, Conservative governments have done less than Labour ones in redistributing income from rich to poor. Once the Conservatives are in power, it will probably be another 9 years before there is the remotest possibility that Labour will govern again. By this time, surely houses will have become even less affordable for first-time buyers.

The last year

Long time no update:

-started to play full time last August
-ran bad but played OK
-unable to get on a decent playing schedule
-bankroll depleted leading to drop in stakes
- struggled to pay bills
- bankroll depleted further
- quit poker as job but plan to play for fun in future
- started full time job 1st Sept

Blog now to become about news, sports, work and maybe some poker content if I come across anything interesting

Any comments welcome