I remember trying to explain it to a freind of mine. I tried to explain odds and everything. Tried to give the example of if you have a coin that lands on heads 60% of the time and yo ucan always pick heads ect ect.. He kept going back to "yah but you could win or lose, its all luck right?" He didnt understand that just because there are 2 possible outcomes it does not neccessarily make the odds 50/50.

My two most hilarious experiences that haven't been duplicated in this thread so far:

- Out of nowhere, a friend of mine looked at me and with a hesitant look of extreme curiosity asked "...Do you play other casino games too?", as if he was expecting me to know the magical secret to beating roulette and that I'd share it with him.

- This has happened on several occasions... my family and close friends are aware of the excellent salary I make playing poker. But it always BLOWS THEIR MIND when they find out that I got my iPod for free with a year's worth of PartyPoints... I still can't figure this out.

Try living in a country where 95% of the population never heard of holdem. Whenever I tell someone I play poker for a living they think I'm playing 5 card draw with Clint Eastwood or something.

ZOMG Y IZ EVERYBODYS FRINEDS SO DUMB I HOPE THEY R GUD 4 OTHER THINGZ I STILL HAVE EMPATHY THO!!!!

roflcopter @ this thread.

i'm a white male in my early/mid 20s from a middle-class family, and so of course the expectation is that i'm in college. i'm not, because i make more money playing poker, and my life is such that many occupational doors are closed to me (long story). of course, since i am not in college, i must have AIDS or terminal cancer or something, and so I always have to answer the "well, wtf do you do all day?" question. "I wait tables, and I play poker." that is apparently not the correct answer.

"ZOMG how do you get money into/out of poker?" (this is the most common one I hear; I'm considering drawing a little picture of how Neteller works and keeping it in my wallet for visual aid purposes)

"ZOMG poker is awesome this one time at a free bar tournament I...."

"ZOMG how do you make any money, everyone i know says they're a professional poker player, and if you're all playing perfectly, you all can't win!"

"ZOMG you are a gambling addict and will die in a gutter when you go BUSTO!"

"ZOMG you're breaking the law and the IRS will get you!"

"ZOMG you can't just play poker for the rest of your life!"

LOL.

My roommates are all pretty cool about it, though. One of them was surprised to learn that I do things like study and discuss; "I thought you were just fooling around!" The only thing that gets me is their surface-level interest: "How's poker going / How did poker go last night?" I want to tell them all about how I pwnt a villian in the face with a tiny, tiny bet, or how I got pozzed by villian's better garbage, or about any number of other good stories that would make their eyes glaze over...

so hours and hours of effort, and all the commensurate joy and pain, are distilled into either, "Good; I won." or "Crappy; I lost."

So a neighbor of mine, who also happens to be a hot girl, asks me yesterday if she gives me money will I win for her, I say that I already have money to do that, but that I will teach her how to play poker with her own money so she can win.

I thought that was a pretty good comeback.

ZOMG CANADA STILL ROOLZ!!!


EDIT: Why did I think you are from Canada? Of course they've heard of NLHE. I'm leaving this post though because the picture is funny.

Whenever people ask me what I do for a living, I just tell them "Equity analyst."

Tell her you will teach her to play in exchange for sex.

-I usually try my hardest to refrain from telling people I play. They almost always recoil as if I have some sort of highly contageous, terminal disease.

honestly. how many girls have you had look at you as excitedly as possible and say "wow, so how much are you up?" and get fixated on that question. if my friends are too nitty to do the mansion bet than theyre too nitty for real risk

rj

my new housemate was talkin to my mom while moving in. my mom apparently told her i play poker and she responded with "oh, well hes gonna have some competition"...yeah, somehow i doubt that...

rj

yah, its the funniest when people try and challenge you and they are serious through and through. I was at a home game with my brother. These are his freinds that have the game, and they are mostly pretty baller. The buyin is just 40-100$ though. Structure is pretty bad, but its fun to [censored] around. Anyways last week I busted first and my brothers loud mouth freind starts to berate me. I ignore him. Later he busts and hes saying how hes better then me and stuff because he lasted longer (neither of us moneyed.. dumb ass..) I tell him I dont really care about this home game its just for fun, a 40$ stt isnt a big deal. He then says "ok lets play for some big money then, just me and you one on one. How about for 100$!!" Keep in mind this guy is pretty balla, yet 100$ is a BIG hu match to him. He probably thinks that thats big money to me too.

I think its increadibly hard for the average person to imagine wagering hundreds and thousands of dollars in poker.

i dont know guys - i'm kinda wishing i was still a pokr player so i could tell women.

this happens so often - last night i'm out at a bar and she says oh so what do YOU do after talking about her job forever. i say i'm a consultant, then the normal "what do you consult" blah blah blah then i'm like "but i just came off of a career as a professional poker player" and she gets all interested and talks about how cool it is and we have something awesome to talk about and i wind up closing the deal.

i feel like very often it actually helps with girls rather than hurts - other people don't feel that way?

I played a bunch of home games while visiting a friend 2 weeks ago. I got berated multiple times by this guy, telling me what a bad poker player I am.It was a $10 sng. EVEN after I told him i play 5/10NL for a living he still thought I was a bad player.

He figured poker was poker- buy in shouldn't matter- you should always try to play your best.

Thats a promising story, but Im still caught in two minds as to whether I would use this line when I meet girls in bars.

Last year, I attended my first year at college, and when I met girls it was the pretty standard "yeh Im a first year Business major, whats your degree" BS chat up lines.

But this year, I quit college and am playing poker completely full time and Im not sure whether it will be +lifeEV if I go round telling girls I meet in bars that Im a poker pro. Overall, I think it depends on the girl, since you will get the type who will be like "WOW you made 40k in 3 months playing an internet game, thats awesome" and then the type who will be like "ZOMG you are dropout degenerate gambler".

Just a side question, what do people think is a good profession to tell people who you do not think should know that you are a poker player? I mean, I still want something that sounds impressive and can explain my decent income for my age, but not something that is A TRAGIC GAMBLING ADDICTION!!1!!

A while ago I actually tried explaining how I win money at poker to a group of people. Convo went something like this.

Someone: Isn't it mostly luck though, eventually you will lose

Me: No its more percents. Like flipping a coin is 50/50, but with my skill advantage in poker Its more like 65/35 in my favor.

Someone Else: So you could lose?

Me: Yes

Someone: Have you?

Me: Ofcourse
(disgust looks at me)

Someone: So you could still lose all your money

Me: Well I have enough money saved just for poker that I could handle an unlucky run of cards.

Someone: Ya but you could still lose it all.
(laughter and the group looks at me like I'm an idiot)

Me: (getting angry and wanting to kill everyone in the group) Ya theres a chance I could get in a car accident driving home too! Should I just stay locked in my room?


Nothing is more annoying that a bunch of ignorant people laughing at you. I hate people.

hang out with more intelligent people.

seriously, i get this conversation a lot too but what usually happens is either a) people understand that there are weighted probabilities and the idea of variance (not necessarily knowing the terms but understanding the concept)

or

b)they give me the benefit of the doubt for what i say because they know i'm pretty smart and probably wouldn't do anything to [censored] myself up. also i like to use big mathematical words when describing it so that adds to the effect =)

Ya I should have used the word standard deviation. Their heads would have exploded.

My friends ex gf (she sortof cheated on him) was being sort of a bitch to me last night. Then we started talking about poker and she asked me how much I make. I said " I dont like to say it, but ill tell you this. I make 750$ an hour." That shut her up a bit but I was still pissed from before so I bought shots for everyone at the table but her and her friend I didnt know, and toasted

"bros before hoes" while making sure to look at her when I said hoes.

Yeah, sorry for being OT

Annoying Person: So you could lose all your money??

You: No - Standard Deviation

Annoying Person: ohhh right(pretending not to be confused - convo is over).

LOL, complete pwnage, nice one!

i usually don't get people doubting my ability too much these days, but I'm glad to have something Official to point to if they ever wonder if i can really make a living doing it

A few months ago I did see a guy I used to play $5 buyin games with in college. He was kinda cocky about his game then, and wanted to play me again. I was kind of like "Ummm LOL while you were off working at some Christian center for $13,000 a year I was playing poker for a living, but sure"
I'm going to see him again in a week or so. Hopefully he thinks he's still got it on me.

hopefully hes down to play for a years salary.

i just tell people i have my own business in the liquidation and acquisition of assets field.

Gentleman jewel thief is always good.