By LuckyJimm

I'm now in my third week out of work and have been watching movies and winning at poker. My first win came on Friday when I deposited £50 and spun it up to £300 playing a juicy $0.50/$1 PLO ten-max where everything went right.

On Saturday afternoon I cycled along the canal with an old school friend and had a mixed kebab at Mangal, then made another visit to Hackney City Farm. We found ourselves imagining how big a field you'd need to hold all the animals ever cooked over Mangal's charcoal grill. I think Noah's Arc wouldn't hold them. He told me he'd fixed a date for his wedding, and I found myself aware of how far away I am from even having a girlfriend. I mean where would I meet her? What would I tell her I did? How could I possibly present myself? The whole thing's impossible, and I wish it wasn't.

Back home I lost £120. Half went donking around on Cryptologic, and the other half in two hands over two hours of patient, solid play at $0.50/$1 PLO on Party Poker. One hand I raised with strong kings and bet out into my one opponent on a K92 rainbow flop, but he made a backdoor straight. In the second and fatal hand, I raised with aces and potted the AJ4 flop, but the villain caught a low flush on the turn after almost all of the money was in. I am capricious and temperamental, so after this decided to close my Party account. Since the start of the year I'm down £600 there, so can do without it.

It was raining heavily on Saturday night so declining an invitation for coffee in Soho I stayed in and spun £50 into £200 on Microgaming. After midnight I deposited elsewhere and lost £94. On Sunday evening a 2+2 buddy offered me a freeroll with a $500 bonus he didn't want to clear. I could play $0.50/$1 with a one buyin stop-loss, and we'd split any winnings 50/50. I won $244 in a couple of hours, largely due to a $320 pot when my aces held up three ways, so I'll get £61 for this. I told him to change the password until the withdrawal goes through, lest I tempt fate at a higher table. Later this week I'll try and do it again. And this morning I won £158 playing $0.25/$0.50 10-max, meaning I'm up a total of £405 over the last four days.

Whilst I've resumed my friendship with my Italian housemate, I just had a nice argument with the rude, monosyllabic Frenchman. I am by nature chatty, expect to be liked and will talk to anybody, so sharing a flat with someone who won't talk to me is unusual and irritating. He sells advertising space for a Sunday newspaper, and spends his evenings watching television or playing on his console whilst eating takeaway food or smoking on the balcony. He's in his mid-30s but doesn't have a girlfriend, and his social life appears to be non-existent. A couple of times I have tried to engage with him, but he has no interest in friendly overtures. When he told me off for the third or fourth minor transgression this morning, I suggested he tried learning to communicate beyond telling people off, and that he might find getting a personality would help him get on in life. He made his dislike for me as clear as possible for someone so inarticulate. I don't intend to let him bother me - I guess we'll carry on ignoring each other.

It does bother me, though, to see I share his failings. What do I do beyond eat, smoke and watch videos? Working in an office was fatal for my weight. Eight hours a day of boredom, and nothing to do but eat. Well, as of yesterday I'm on a diet. For all my obsession with class, I've always lacked one hallmark of the middle and upper classes: I've never known how to feed myself. I walk into a supermarket and have no idea what to buy, so walk out with the usual junk. The only thing I make at home is pasta sauces from fresh ingredients, but I add so much salt and eat enormous portions. I eat a lot of meals out and all of them are unhealthy. I binge on food in the same way I binge on everything else. I don't even like eating any more, since I just stuff my face. So yesterday I spent the buyin to a $0.50/$1 table on fresh fruit, vegetables, rice, garnishes and meat from the butchers. I'm going to try to stop eating all the bad things I normally eat, and start cooking healthy meals. It has to happen, because what's my future otherwise?

I'm also trying to give up smoking. It's now twenty nine hours since I had a cigarette and I feel terrible. I didn't start smoking until I was 25, and it was the dumbest thing I ever did, just another way to feel bad about myself. My method to quit is to use medium-strength patches for a week, then go cold turkey in the second week whilst reading Alan Carr. It's worked in the past, although obviously I've later relapsed. The patches make me feel nauseous, and I'm hardly less on edge than I'd be without, but I'm bored of smoking and want to quit before I turn 30. I think it could go either way. I will hold as my inspiration the thought that I don't want to be like the miserable Frenchman.