As some of you may have noticed, the blog has been dormant while I took a few days off for a little Thanksgiving trip to New York and Philadelphia with my son. Seeing an event at Madison Square Garden was a bucket list item now checked off as we saw the Knicks beat the Toronto Raptors with a comeback that included a 28-0 run.
I was also looking forward to experiencing the renowned Football Factory in New York for the round ball game, but this wasn't such a great occasion. The problem wasn't that the prices were high even by New York standards, but more that it's one of these establishments which automatically add on a (very generous) 20% gratuity, and then leave space for an unwitting customer to add an additional gratuity on the credit card receipt, which always seems rather a dirty trick.
Someone a little drunker than I was or a little less 'on the ball' regarding prices, might easily have been duped into leaving an extraordinarily generous tip. Nothing wrong with that of course, if the service warrants it, but that wasn't the case for us. When I commented that others arriving after us had been served first, my son informed me that I was getting like my Mum, at which point I left the bar, walked around the corner, went up to the observation deck on the 102nd floor of the Empire State Building, and had to be talked down.
Fortunately there were plenty of other bars in the area where football was being shown and overall it was a good trip, and for the record, the view from atop the Empire State Building is quite spectacular.
I was also able to see the Temple Owls lose their final home game of the college football season to ranked, and at that time unbeaten, University of Central Florida Knights, which leads nicely into the update for the Small Road 'Dogs in that sport.
Weeks 12 and 13 of the season made a small loss with a 7-8 record:
League Two Aways also had a poor run while I was away, losing 11.39 points over the last three rounds of matches, and are currently -12.52 points (ROI -5.3%) on the season. The National League Aways also lost points while I wasn't watching, but 'only' 3.68. I blame Joseph Buchdahl.
My holiday appears to have been well timed.
As a reminder that life is about much more than winning or losing bets, Betfair co-founder Mark Davies writes eloquently about his surviving a recent heart attack here and with an update here. Worth reading if you think losing a few points is a disaster.
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