An Evening At The Dogs

Our plans for this weekend were set in the calendar for quite a few weeks, we were to travel to Romford to the Greyhound Racing Stadium and hopefully win some money on the dogs.

Early Saturday morning we headed off into Basildon with the intention of getting some new work shoes (in my haste to walk into work each morning, I had completely worn through my old pair) and Katie would be purchasing some more loose fitting clothing in the lead up to her getting a tiny bit bigger in the coming months.

Regarding the twins, we have started telling people who ask or have be interested in what’s happening with us. We have decided to have a little fun if people do ask if she is pregnant, our reply is: “No, I’m just fat”. Trips to shops have now resulted in Katie dragging me to the little people section where she plans everything she wishes to dress our little one’s up in. In three weeks we will hopefully have a 90% idea of what sex they will be, remembering the fact that as they are non-identical, we could be having one of each sex.

I digress.

Returning home after our jaunt out, we cleaned the house, had a bit of a rest and then got ready to drive to the stadium. We followed our friends there, having not been there before, arriving just after half past six. Paying just £5 to get in each, we acquainted ourselves with the venue and how to put down our bets with a nice cold glass of beer.

As the minutes to the first race counted down, we found ourselves a nice place to watch the races. Although we were on the other side to the finish line, we were next to the traps for the longer races.

Our tactic was to stake £1 per bet and place two bets each per race. We would put down a Straight Trio bet which meant we would have to predict the first three finishers and a Winner bet which was to simply choose who would win. This tactic fared well as Katie and I managed to finish the night only £20 down.

The last race was at half past ten and for this the six of us decided to put all of our money together and decide on a Reverese Trio bet. By staking a large bet and predicting this time the dogs that would place in any order within the top three, we would cover all the costs for the night and go home with some extra change in our pocket. Needless to say, out of the three dogs we chose, the top two were our choices but our remaining dog was edged out on the first corner and didn’t finish anywhere near the rest of the pack. We went home happy but frustrated our final bet hadn’t worked out, because the losing dog was actually the odds on favourite!

We zipped home down the A127, getting into bed just before midnight, a good night was had by all. The decision was made to make it a regular occurrence on our social calendar, you have more expensive nights out going just for a meal.