ah yea that's pretty nice. one day I will eat locally-grown food too!

How do organic chickens compare to man-made chickens?

+1

Veggies & Hummus = +EV

I don't have any long lasting credit card debt. I always pay in advance, before the due date.

I think I've missed one payment (on my business credit card) and that was because I literally just forgot about it (I always have a balance lower than my bank balances)

Also my goal in life is to never have a 9-5 job :P have had too strong of a taste of passive income/alternative unorthodox income sources

How do you guys eat on only $400? Like what are some examples of meals you eat? Thanks

Is your car unreasonably luxurious? You could sell your car, buy a used one for under $5000, save on insurance and get more money added to your bankroll so you don't feel pressured if you have a downswing.

Also, the car I drive is 100% paid in full. I've had a total of 0% interest expense on anything in my entire life. And going out on vacation and things like that are what make life enjoyable, so I'm going to do them

I drive an old luxury car. It's not worth selling. I did a number of replacements on it that would just be pure spew if I sold it now. Paid cash for it. Maintenance is surprisingly minimal.

Right. You are keeping up with your debt now but obviously you are concerned with your cash flow. If you have a terrible month at poker/business and need to pay either your rent or your credit card, what are you going to pay?

That is how it starts with most people. They start with honest intentions and only get the CC for rewards or emergencies. They miss a payment for a month or two because of a cash flow problem and before you know it, they have racked up a serious debt.

In addition, they keep want to go out with friends and go vacations, but they can't really afford them. But they make a minimum payment and a way they go while the interest continues to accumulate.

I am just stressing that you should be careful and not try to do everything that your friends do. You can fall into the trap. Vacations are fun, but you don't want to be paying for them for the rest of your life.

And if you don't want to have an orthodox job, what the hell are you doing in college anyway?

I will try to post some food later, got to run to a training class right now.

Adjust for your size but for 2 people, my girlfriend and I spend about 600 total on groceries per month. This is a mix of organic and regular. I think some vegies/fruits are ok to by regular while others should be organic if possible. See enf of post for a list of veigies and fruits that you should buy organic.

Here is a few days of meals for me (this is spending about 75$ per week per person-round this up to 100 per week if you want since I am 145-150lbs)

Day 1

Breakfast- 3 eggs scrambled with kale, tomato, sweet peppers, carrots

Lunch- 12 pieces of frozen shrimp made on skillet with black pepper, red pepper flakes, garlic, pinch of salt
Salad with spinich, tomato, sweet peppers, carrots, kale

Dinner-salmon with lemon and various herbs (broiled ~15 minutes)

1/2 avocado

Sauted mustard greens, broccoli, spinich


Day 2
Breakfast- 3 eggs scrambled with spinach

Lunch- Salad with a few handfuls of mixed greens, almonds, 1/4 cucumber, 3 small sweet peppers,a spoonful bannana peppers, 1 tomato, half a palm of almonds

Dinner-left over piece of salmon (palm size),
Half an avocado

Post workout meal- 2 eggs with a baked sweet potato

Day 3
Breakfast- 3 eggs with vegies

Lunch-grilled chicken and salad

Dinner- undecided

1.Peach
2.Apple
3.Sweet Bell Pepper
4.Celery
5.Nectarine
6.Strawberries
7.Cherries
8.Kale
9.Lettuce
10. Grapes - Imported
11. Carrot
12. Pear
13. Collard Greens
14. Spinach
15. Potato

First you need to ask yourself what your expected hourly would be in these games. Are there smaller stakes incase you need to move down? If you're playing in a capped 2/5 games I would say the crushers are making $45-55/hour over a decent sample (1000+hrs). If you have a 1/2 game as well to select from you can probably still earn $20+/hr if you're crushing. I'm assuming by your post that you aren't a crusher. You seem intelligent, but you also need to reduce your overhead. Spending $1000 on food/month (groceries and eating out) is absurd. I spend about $10 a day on food, but I do eat at home and only dine out 1-3 times/month. Even if you could cut your number in half that would greatly increase your chances of survival.

Keep in mind that winning players do go on periods of break-even runs. I've been doing it full time now for a little over 3 years and have had multiple break-even run of about 3-4 months. I also would set aside living expenses first before you consider the size of your roll. In your case I think you could be comfortable if you had say $15k liquid. That's with your side income of say 2k/month. Over my sample the biggest swing Ive taken was a -10k month and it does hurt. Fortunately I'm well over rolled for the games I play to stay in action, but on such a short roll you can't handle big or even average swings.

If you're going to give it a shot I'd only do so if there were a smaller stake to drop to if you had to. Don't play poker with scared money because you will be making costly errors.

I really do wish you the best and you should lean on the very nitty side of bankroll management in order to successfully manage your business.

Thanks for this intel.

Telling you this from experience - having a good job and paycheck is, to me, far more rewarding than grinding poker ever would be. With your skillset, I do think you can be more successful and happier in the real world than you would be playing poker full time.

Also, I think you should get the job first before you set up a high level of expenses. It's ok to plan for the life you want but, for now, live the life you can afford.

Meal examples:

Taco salad - make 2 lbs of meat, buy a bulk bag of salad. Add sauce/other veggies/whatever you want. Get a can of beans if desired, too. Presto, 4 meals for under $5 each.

I like to cook up a chicken breast in seasonings and add asparagus towards the end. Should be a $3 meal.

Also pasta is just insanely cheap but very starchy. Have to watch the portions. Can do pasta + sauce for $1 though.

I used to fry up a potato and a 1/2 an onion in some olive oil. Add seasonings as desired. Another $1-$2 meal per portion.

There's always sandwiches, too. Heck the $5 footlong from Subway really isn't a terrible deal, especially if you eat 1/2 now / 1/2 later and eat some fruit/veggies with it from your home. Turn it into a $3 meal by having 1/2 a sub and an orange or something like that. Just make sure to get a healthy one.

Miscellaneous tips:

Buy no drinks. Just drink tap water. Buy a brita pitcher if desired to filter it. I will admit I can't give up coffee but I just brew it at home. Starbucks is a huge leak.

Learn to do a little kitchen prep. Don't buy the pre cut apple slices. Just eat an apple (or learn how to cut one up). Don't buy the thing of chopped up onion. Learn how to use a knife to do that quickly.

Season your food. Using a little salt/pepper/garlic/onion/whatever fits your dish makes life so + EV

Look online for recipes. You can find anything online.

+1

the 1K a month on food thing is really blowing my mind here, unless you are Michael Phelps or something I don't know how you could spend that much on food for a single person.

Come on guys, OP is obviously a 21 years old pimp, and this pimp has to maintain his pimpin' lifestyle.

Obviously a level...

I agree with some of the other posts that are advising you to move down to 1/2...you can still take shots at 2/5 (7-10% of your sessions) but with an 8k combined life/bank roll, you should't be grinding 2/5... that being said, glglglglglglgl hope everything works out!

Either you guys are not very smart poker players or you have something against eating at a casino. You can order plenty of healthy stuff off the menu. The fact that nobody has brought that up is just not thinking.

You wanna save some expenses on food op. Eat at the casino and pay for it with your stack.

Now your expenses are solved.

Paying for food with your stack is the same as paying for food in a store or restaurant.

Casino food is mostly crap food prepared by under qualified chefs that do not want to be there.

If you hate your body, then by all means, eat in a casino.

What about fruit, just simple toast. I have seen all sorts of stuff. Ice cream cereal eatin at the table.

In LA food is comped, but you go east to the indian casino's you have to pay for your own food. You can actually order from real restaurants in the casino(with real chefs).

I take it that nobody in this thread never eats fastfood. At least at the casino they have chef's. At fastfood place's they have a cook who makes 8 dollars an hour.

My thoughts for saving on the food expense. Use your comps for a meal when possible. I regularly play 1/2 at Cesar's AC and for every 2 sessions i put in (6-10hrs a session) I get atleast enough to cover a meal. Look into the comp rate and it should be way better playing 2/5 opposed to 1/2. I imagine every day you play poker you should be getting atleast enough comp points to cover a meal.

Make sure you go to places that use a 1:1 comp dollar ratio. I know over here other places (not owned by the casino but operate inside them) will take comp dollars as payment but a 2:1 ratio so a 10 dollar check will cost you 20 dollars in comps.

yeah, lean cuisines are a good relatively healthy alternative, and if you actually know how to cook, then even better.

a lot of people have smart phones that dont use them that often, some people actually get value out of them. id say 9/10 people who have smart phones do not need them, especially for the price. it is certainly possible you are the 1/10 (in fact, id bet most poker players are lol.)

First, 1-2k is a lot. Remember, its cumulative. If you save 1-2k every year from ages 18-25, you are 14k richer for the rest of your life. its amazing how much money we waste in our lives on meaningless ****. Buying ourselves a soda from 7-11 for 2.00 when we could have water for free, or buy a 2 liter pepsi from the store for less than a cold 20 oz. Drinks at the bar for like 6 bucks a pop when you could drink with your friends for 6 bucks a 6 pack. HBO...what a ripoff, heck I dont understand why ANYONE has cable that doesnt watch sports. You can pay $8 a month for netflix or hulu+ and stream straight to your TV. I only have cable TV because I cant live without baseball and football (thats my poverty line thing lol). like i mentioned, smart phones and dining obviously. cigarettes and drugs are ridiculously expensive. Buying movies?? My GF buys movies, wtf? she has hundreds of them, as part of her "collection". Great job, you collect something useless, and its cost you thousands and thousands of dollars.

[quote[Guys, I think you aren't getting that at one point in my life, I was making some incredible money considering the amount I worked, and the age at which I achieved it. I've become accustomed to a certain lifestyle. I plan on restoring that element of my life in the near future, and experiencing even greater success in the next 5-10 years. I work harder and smarter than most people and I expect to win.[/quote]

I doubt i do as well as you, but I do pretty well for myself. And despite not doing as well for myself, I am not running into any type of financial trouble right now. I get it, you are young and expect things to always work out for you, but thats not always what happenes.

Its always a lot smarter to use your money on your future. If you invest in your future instead of your present "lifestyle", you will always be able to maintain the lifestyle you are accustomed to. The very wealthy are also the very thrifty. you may not understand why the multi millionaires clip coupons and compare prices at the grocery store, but i can assue you they do. because their understanding of marginal cost is what made them their money in the first place.

FWIW, i'm a 2/5nl grinder, play 5 days a week.

#1, spending $1K per month on food is insane, seriously, as a college kid you should be able to get by on $400/month easy for food.

#2, get yourself a fat ugly girlfriend that will feed you and house you, great way to save money (i'm being serious)

#3, I'm actually worried about your poker, you said its a 3hr drive to and from the casino, or 3hr drive total (90 minutes there 90 minutes back). As a college kid time is your most precious commodity, if the casino is longer than an hour away then I actually don't recommend you supplementing your income with poker as I can't see how that won't interfere with your studies. STUDIES ARE THE PRIORITY!!!!

#4, What is your poker schedule? Are you playing strictly weekends and or over the summer? Are you trying to play during the week during school?

#5, Are you a winning player? I get the sense you don't have a lot of hours vested in live play?

#6, Only way this is going to work is if you play 2/5nl, trying to make a living at 1/2nl especially if you have time constraints is like masterbating via one stroke per minute, just a waste of time and energy and very frustrating

#7, You need to get your bankroll/liferoll up to $20K ASAP. $20K imo is the level where you are out of the danger zone and can handle the worse that variance has to throw your way. Anything under $12K is susceptible to variance and you want some padding to absorb what life has to throw at you.

#8, Summer is coming up, perhaps put poker on the back burner (playing once a week or so) until summer hits and you have some free time, then focus on poker and getting your roll up to $20K+

#9, Back to the fat ugly girlfriend, seriously, she could save you a lot of money, and fat girls give great *$&#*@#*

My school schedule is super easy right now and I only take 12 hours. I will probably get between a 3.25 and 3.75 this semester without studying for more than one hour a day, and I do attend a REAL state college. It's top 5 in my state for sure. I'm just taking extremely easy classes right now.

I have a 50k backup roll guys. That's why I'm being so aggressive with my current roll. Is anyone remembering this? I have $50k of my own money just sitting there, I'd just rather not touch it right now. It is currently invested in real estate. I am nowhere near close to becoming a degenerate credit line user who spends money he doesn't have. I've never missed a payment in my life.

Good point about the job. I might be happier working the job I might get this summer than I would be playing poker. Especially because it could be extremely lucrative.

I am in college to get a degree/maybe go to law school eventually as a back up. I don't see myself working a normal job. But who knows, if I find the correct one, maybe I will! I am also in college for the experience of it.

My poker schedule: I do not have a specific schedule. But I have no classes on tuesday/thursday. I just went today (tuesday) and it was a pretty tough game. I was relying on a few specific big whales to pay for my visit, but one of the whales in question left the second I got to the casino. I also play Fridays/Saturdays. Generally not Sunday as often.

Also about the food comps--I do use food comps. They probably get me 3 free 1000cal+ meals per week. What I do is order chicken breast sandwiches so I don't get too fat. Or If I choose to dine at the buffet, it's one of 2 meals I eat that day so I don't over eat too much.

Also this upcoming month I'm scheduled for I think 3 free buffets in addition to what I normally get, and 2 free nights at a nearby hotel from the casino.

I would never have sex with an ugly fat girl, regardless of the amount of economic benefit she provided. In fact, I'm throwing down on a baller-ass hotel room at this party my fraternity is having this weekend to increase the chances of having sex with my attractive/not fat date.

Also, unfathomable $1000/mo food budget? First off, it's not $1000. It's like $900 or less. $100+ of the groceries are not food related. Also, dining out at any sit down restaurant costs an average of $15-30, probably skewed closer to 25. So if you eat out once a day at a restaurant, and get fast food once a day, that's already $30/day. This doesn't even include the other meal or two I'll eat from my fridge. I also slightly overestimated this expense as I do with most of my expenses. For example I said car insurance was $120 a month but upon inspecting my credit card statements, it's actually $108. I think in reality I eat a sit down restaurant once every 3 days, and I get fast food 1-2 times a day. (Which explains my 15% body fat). I bet my food expense is closer to $700 than it is to $1000.

I don't have that many hours logged in live poker. It's less than 400 total for sure. I can't imagine going 3-4 months breakeven though, how is that possible? The hand volume is so low and the variance is also relatively low to online play... if you're winning 30BB/100 (which is only $20 per hour at 1/2) it's kind of hard to imagine that you could play for a 90-120 day period and not come out on top.

:P

hmmmm....

I sense that you may be too infatuated with poker. Please, for the love of god don't view college as a backup, it needs to be the priority. Poker will always be there, but college won't be and is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I can't stress enough the importance of your degree...

Too bad you can't stomach the fat ugly girlfriend idea, they are super easy to acquire but perhaps you can look into a normal girlfriend that can feed you and bonus points if she can house you as well ...

Your bankroll: You said you have a $50K roll and have logged 400hrs of live play? Well, that is enough to get some degree of confidence that you may be a winning player live. Of course, more is always better... time will tell

You said

I once believed the same thing, I mean, live play is so soft how in the hell can you go breakeven for 2-3 months??? Well, it is possible. Given that you see so many fewer hands variance plays an even greater role. You can have a few great sessions in a row ruined by some set over set coolers or a few sessions where the donks suck out on you and hit their 4 outers. Combine those two scenarios and throw in a dash of tilt and you can easily blow through ten buy-ins. Then add the time pressure you are going to feel since your poker time will always be limited and that is how you end up with a 2-3 months of breakeven play or even down after 2-3 months.

Basically, you are being naive if you think you can't run breakeven or down for 2-3 months. Its poker, variance happens and you are human, you will be prone to the typical "run bad" that happens when negative variance combines with negative emotions (tilt, fatigue, etc)

Anyways, I wish you luck. Best advice I can give is for you to log your play and keep a journal. Take the time to record each session and note all the things responsible for good and bad play.

For instance, I notice a DRAMATIC impact on my sessions when I forget to take a break every 2 hrs, so I have a timer and every 2hrs I take a ten minute break...

LAstly, if you remember, come back in a few months and give us an update on your progress

How long would it take you to get your hands on that 50k if you needed it? Real estate is a long term investment. I can't think of any real estate investing situation where you could just pull money out.

What life of privilege have you come from that thinks you should eat out once a day? We out once a week if I was lucky when I was a kid. I can't remember the last time I ate out at a 'sit-down restaurant.' of course, i'm not dating, so i can see if you are out on a date, that's a real necessity.

Buy a George Foreman grill. Go to the store and buy lots of chicken and steak and grill it if you have to ... You will save a lot of money.