Haha yup – another guy who has no problem telling it like it is!

Lots of truth in there for sure… (although I still find parts of it thrilling, within reason… That last part being the most important ;))).

Thanks for forwarding this along though – haven’t read his thoughts on it before.

Well this was a fascinating read! Appreciate the honesty and rawness man, haha… I find myself not being able to stop either when you win FIRST THING like that :) Not that I play much anymore since “settling down” and having kids/etc… (no more time!)

Really hope you can find some good people to share your life with too… You sound super interesting and obviously very smart working for yourself like that. Has gambling gotten in the way of it for you, or do you find yourself just killing time and think you’d be good w/ stopping when/if the day comes to settle down with someone?

Wishing you all the luck in the world either way… I’m glad you’re googling this stuff and keeping it real with yourself! Keep going, man!

I don’t think it’s a moral problem. I just don’t understand it. That’s how I feel about it. I do not get a thrill out of losing money that I’ve worked for. That’s not entertaining to me. And you’re not going to win. The house wins. That’s how they build those palaces called casinos. It’s an industry. It’s called the gambling industry. Some of those companies are publicly traded, and the profits they make off of your stupidity giving them money and calling that entertainment drives their stock price.

I don’t grasp how it is entertainment to lose money. It’s not entertaining to me. My suspicion is always that when someone says, “Oh, I just do it for recreation,” that what you’re really honestly saying is you think you’re the exception and you’re actually going to win. Otherwise, there’d be no thrill to it. If you were just going to throw money down the toilet, you could just throw money down the toilet, literally. If that’s entertaining to you, lay, like, $100 bills in your toilet and flush. It’s kind of the same thing. Whooo! There it went. Watch it. It’s gone! Wheee! That was fun. Let’s do it again!

It’s the same thing as pulling the one-armed bandit, isn’t it? The slot machine. Wheee! Bing, bing, bing! Took your money. Wheee! It’s gone. Wow, that was fun! I’m so entertained.

I just don’t get it. I really don’t grasp it. And why do all the people sitting at the slot machines look like they’re people that can’t afford to lose money? They look like sad, broke people. Lonely people. They don’t look like people that are winners in life. Sorry, guys, if that’s you. You’re kind of pitiful-looking. Maybe you change when you sit down at the slot machine, but maybe you were a winner and when you walked in there, you got a different body language and suddenly your face aged and I saw stress in your eyes and hopelessness going across your countenance.

I’m not entertained by this. It’s not a big moral thing to me. I just don’t grasp it. So no, I’m not going to be in the casino. I don’t even play blackjack, and that’s at least some kind of a somewhat of a control over some part of the game. But wheeee! We lost money! Oooh, that was fun! How is that fun?

– checked at 2pm oh I see a free hotel room & nothing else to do today
– told myself before I came in, cut off at win $300 lose $1k MAX
– won $300ish within 20 minutes well hell I drove 60 miles let’s keep it rolling…. 2 hours later im down $2000
– I did hit platinum status on the tier card (yay more free hotel rooms!! damn $15 resort fees though!!!!!)
– got $20 food come late night chicken tenders for free yay!

I’m a little more fortunate as I’m self employed so i have the possibility of making a lot of money if I work hard…last year did $40k. this year I’m around $200k I think. (Taxes are going to take like $60k though!!!!) The $2k loss hurt tonight obv since I’m googling and its funny I still have a bank roll or $5k with me, probably will go spend $1k more max in morning at high limit slots and see what happens…
money comes and goes. And I’m single. No kids. Nothing else to spend it on besides strippers drugs and alcohol. Fortunately I’ve managed those 3 things pretty damn good considering the fortunate position I’ve been in since 17 years old. No trust fund. Work hard play hard. I brought bank roll going to mall and was doing $1k a Xmas present for each family member (only 3 people are in my life and don’t have any fiends really)
Cliff notes: Don’t gamble but if you do, don’t kill your self if you lose because you will probably lose!!! And if youre in a relationship or have a family, just don’t gamble. Not worth it at all. I wouldn’t lose or give up love for gambling!!! You are already ahead and won!!! Don’t gamble!!!!!!! Unless you can truly control yourself but still don’t gamble!!!!! Just give the money to the wifey or hubby and watch. Honestly I’d have more fun watching a girlfriend or wife play than myself playing.

I’m drunk it’s 2am and I’ll pop an adderall at 7am to ensure I make it through Wednesday, do my last minute gambling while it kicks in, and get back to real work.

I almost like playing scratch offs better despite worse odds because at least that money goes to the states education fund and helping people. LOL

Life Is Good! God is Great!

Good luck everyone and remember be kind to all

Okay, I think you’re the most diligent gambler I now know, haha…. Love it! And it’s obviously working for you work/life/balance-wise since you’re thriving in all the other areas. Kinda like a hobby for you vs obsession, yeah? (At least while you still have a day job :))

Thanks for stopping by and sharing today… Fun going back 5 years for me too when I published this :)

I apply this to my last 12 months net income earnings.

So for example, 3 years ago I net about 100K and so I would gamble annually, $3K until it’s gone. Any profits or deficits do not carry over to the next year. So If I win $2K (come home with $5k) and my earnings were the same next year, I still only gamble $3K.

This was easy when I knew that my only gambling trip was to Las Vegas one time per year. I live in South Florida and I’m 1 hour away from Hard Rock so my Trips are sporadic and the wife and I usually go down on both Birthdays and a few of the couple holidays (valentine, new years) so im averaging about 4 trips per year.

It’s also a bit different b/c my income last two years I’ve have been fortune and have net ~400K after taxes.

So this would be ~$12K/year divided by 4 expected trips is ~$4k/trip. All of these trips have been with my wife so it’s basically our collective budget.

Again, I won’t roll over any left over cash or profits from trip to trip so it basically implies that the most I’m willing to lose is 3% but unless we were extremely unlucky/careless, it’s going to be less.

This is point I wanted to make the most. First several years my Wife always has a hard time gambling because she sees it as cash that we might need and explaining and making her grasp the budget to relative income just never works, despite trying to tell her to pretend it’s just monopoly money and to have fun with it.

In my head, I know where we’re at but what made it easier for her and I is to have a monthly budget where our income automatically goes towards all the important stuff:

– Set aside emergency fund (6 months)
– Max out 401k / SEP IRA annually on monthly basis
– I put 5% of earnings into Stock Market
– Auto set aside $ for kids college funds
– Auto set aside $ for Health Savings Account
– Auto set aside $ for expected annual taxes
– Auto set to put aside in checking account budget for monthly expenses

Once I put all of these things in place she’s willing to spin away knowing that the most important security items in life are taken care of. It was easy for my to gamble before but this helps me out a lot too when I have the urge to have a $100/hand blackjack session or put $500 on black/red or do some $10/spin on the slot machine.

Mainly, there’s a difference between having the money for the important stuff and taking action to put it away through a budget.

Do I have a gambling problem and am I addicted to gambling? …YES, but you’ll always have more fun losing it if you come up with a budget that works and you stick by.

Awwwwwww

I tend to be one of “those people” too when i go on a losing streak, it sucks… granted, I’m only playing with $20 or $50 max at any given point in time, but still – it eats away at you! Yet another reason I can’t go pro ever – it consumes me too much! (Though not like I don’t let things like blogging do that now, haha…. at least it doesn’t cost me money :))

You can write of gambling losses??? How does that work? You should be able to write off ANYTHING then in that case, haha… #stumped

You know, that might be a good place for us to finally meet :) But no way I’m sitting down w/ you at those tables! I’ll be like one of your poor people to be pushed around!