Cassini Springs Back

Thanks to those who expressed concern about my absence from the blogosphere. It was a little longer than originally planned, but rumours of my demise are premature.

Geoff suggested that Crystal Palace's defeat at Brighton may have traumatised me, but my take on it is that this is all part of the plan to maximise income by achieving promotion via the lucrative play-offs (and possibly one or more games against Brighton) rather than the rather boring automatic route. Palace don't do boring.

While technically the skiing trip did result in some minor damage to my teeth, which will be fun getting fixed in the next few weeks, the exact details of the 'accident' are that it happened as a result of some over-enthusiastic pork chop chewing over breakfast one day rather than any loss of control on the slippery slopes. I do like my pork chops and eggs for breakfast.

After the skiing trip, the Green All Over staff, along with the proprietor's daughter, flew to California from whence Mrs. Cassini originates as I have mentioned before. What I haven't mentioned before is that she has two brothers, one of whom she has not seen since the age of four, and one whom she has never met at all. It's a long story. Although, like me, she is shy and retiring in character, there is no hiding these days on the Internet, and contact was established via a third-party and a long overdue meeting was arranged. The rather emotional story actually trended on Twitter for a while because one of the brothers is relatively famous with thousands of Twitter followers and several world records and unique feats to his name in the world of sports. It rather puts my sporting achievements in their place - with a short lived pro-cycling career perhaps the unlikely highlight, but everything in life is relative - pun intended.

On a sporting front, we took in a Golden State Warriors NBA game (the game v Minnesota Timberwolves where the home team clinched a play-off spot) but betting has been very quiet for a few weeks, and to be honest I didn't miss it too much. It seems to be the thing to return from a break and say how recharged the batteries are and how many new strategies one has come up with, but neither is true in my case. April is traditionally my worst month anyway, and the Premium Charge has done its job, and while I will get involved from time to time, I'm of the opinion that it's simply no longer worth putting in long, and often unsociable, hours for sums of money that I can make many times over when the stock market has a good day. I recommend Stephen Harris' article at Betting Exchange on Why do Bookmakers Limit Accounts for anyone who's not seen it. Bookmakers want 'recreational' punters (read clueless) - and for those who are serious about making profits from sports investing, it's becoming ever more difficult.

I did keep the XX Draws selections flowing over the last three weeks, and have kept track of the FTL selections which I will publish once the Monday night games are complete.

In other news while I have been away, rumours abound that a private equity group may be seeking to take Betfair private while baseball is back and (surprise surprise) BETDAQ actually have a baseball game in-running tonight. That's the good news - liquidity is, to put it mildly, on the poor side: