https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-suffolk-62608112
Holy dogshit.
I was thinking about Jimmy White, best known as a snooker player of staggering talent and dominance, yet the permanent grit of having been denied the World Championship in the final six times, I think each time by Hendry (no, Alex Higgins was one, too?). Snooker though is a game of extraordinary precision in maths, trigonometry (ok they’re not identifying the cosine) and arithmetic, physics of hitting balls with X power combined with the above to achieve a specific final location, having sent Z ball(s) into whatever direction directly and indirectly. It’s about precision and absolutes. Phenomenal enough. But White, who eschewed formal education bar an open minded headmaster who saw his talent and brokered a deal, is in fact a world champion poker player – which is much more about probabilities, risk assessment, and bluff, not dealing one on one but with multiple variable players and uncertainties with cards, whereas the balls are all there on show. What a mind.
This also made me laugh so hard thinking about it I had to pull over on the drive to EdinB. Yet thinking of it when listening to Song For Guy, it’s desperately sad.
robintudge 