My poker story

Did some math and moved some money around. I'd like to retire at 55, but I needed to make some money moves.

Of the $100k cash I have, I put $60K into the SPY and I’m committing $1, 500 per month from discretionary work income into the stock market going forward. On top of that, I have a pension through work that I contribute to and my employer matches. I can access that at age 55. Between the SPY contributions, compounding, and the initial $60K, I should have around $800Kish in SPY by 55. The pension will add another meaningful layer on top of that. So I'll have like $800kish in the SPY and an additional $2.5kish per month in the pension I get, so that should translate into something like ~$5K-$6k/month in retirement income without needing to work until I die. Retiring at 55 with $5k-$6k per month without needing to depend on social security or needing to find a wife to wipe my ass or anything is the smart move for myself.

Right now, that gives me a bit of a reset mentally. I’m single right now, no real financial obligations beyond myself, so the focus for me should just be to build security first, then let everything else run inside that framework instead of threatening it before I fuck up an obvious opportunity to retire early. Slaving in public schools is something I'm absolutely going to hate myself for from age 55 - 65 if I could have done something now to avoid it.

So that means now I'll have a $40k roll, with a clear path to retire at 55 comfortably. I think that's better than just having 30 racks in a nightstand 50 in the bank some in the stock market some in my wallet and glove box lol. That's fun but also just stupid money management. It gets me into the $25/$50/$100 NLHE games on my breaks or doing $1k craps rolls that are just stupid money moves. I have an edge at poker. I think I have an edge in fantasy sports. I try to avoid craps and slots and sports bets because those are all losing bets for me.

On the cash flow side, after bills and the $1.5K/month investing commitment, I'll still have an additional $1.5K/month in discretionary income. That’s roughly $15K/year. Between that and the $40K roll, I’ll have enough flexibility to take shots and live a little without messing up the long-term plan. Feels solid. Not trying to overcomplicate it...just stacking the boring foundations without worrying about blowing up at old age. Maybe take some shots in some tournaments here and there. Maybe some more realistic mid to higher stakes cash games at times, all while knowing when to pull and when to push. Maybe I flip the $15k/year + 40k into some adventure & meaningful life moments in the process.

Summer plans? Been thinking of going back to Vegas. Maybe Tampa. Maybe Thailand. I don't know yet. I have to do some car repairs my brakes are squeeking so we'll see what the mechanics say about my vehicle don't want to be driving around the country in a fucked up vehicle.

glad your doing okay, had some ups n down happen to me too but this is your blog so ill just keep it at that lol. lets go upswing 😀

Hopefully on the up for you bro. I am ready to grind summer is almost here. Can’t wait.

Today was a good fucking day. District had off today, so no work. Was able to get my car into a mechanic. He fixed up some stuff on my brakes & rotors and some other stuff. Was $800 but it's in good shape now he says. Then got my oil changed after and filtered replaced, new wipers, gassed washed and cleaned. That bitch is ready for a road trip.

The money I been moving around is all settled in bank accounts and Webull and stock market. Feeling on top of it. Just really thankful in this moment & lucky for what my life is right now. While car was getting done went for a long walk got in about 6-7 miles which for me is a lot. Legs hurt, but good for me. Weather is cold but breathing in cold air through my lungs was rejuvenating. I hit up a Chinese buffet that smelled delicious. Stomach is full of the best Orange chicken you could imagine. Picked up a few energy drinks & gonna hop into some fantasy football drafts with the heat cranked up under my blankets.

Work isn't pissed at me for taking medical leave. Had to smooth that one over with a few people but picked up some extra stuff since been back and it's all smoothed out. That could have taken a different direction lol had I said fuck life. Turned that ship around quick and in the right way. That's what I do.....get knocked down but I grab the life by the horns and make it my bitch.

Dad also received some good news! Went through treatment last few months and doctor said his cancer is looking really good, but we're all taking that news cautiously same thing was told to my uncle before it came back strong all within a week. Summer is 1 month away then off for 3 months. Have to move out of the apt beginning of June & be back for some family commitment stuff end of July but have about june 5th - July 20th to explore.

On a bit of a heater up $8k today. Didnt have to work so drove down to Milwaukee last night been grinding a 2/5 game and hit a nice craps roll. Played late last night woke up an hour ago gonna go grab some food go for a walk and play more cards this weekend. Haven’t been gambling much since I returned from Tampa been doing some fantasy football drafts but haven’t done much else. Was watching some poker YouTube games and got the itch.

Haven't really been all that motivated to update this much, but figured I'd post a quick one. This week is my last week of school before summer. Work gave out the contracts for next year I got one with a slight raise for cost of living increase, so thankful for that. Almost stayed in Florida for Spring Break when I was stuck. Glad I found it in myself to get my shit together and pull through. I'm moving out of my apartment in about a week. Going to put my stuff into a storage unit near my Parent's house. I've been playing more poker on the weekends trying to get warmed up & derusted. I've been running poorly but feeling good. Won a bit this weekend. The stock market is way up. I got into AMD around $200 and that's gone on a nice run up to $500/share. SPY has also been on a nice run, so I've managed to go up a few thousand or so from everything since my last post. I still don't know what my plans are this summer I guess I'll figure that out once my stuff is moved. First few days my cousin, aunt & uncle are stopping by, so gonna visit with them do some fishing and we'll see where I go from there. Maybe back to Tampa to play at Seminole Hard Rock. I wonder what I could do in that room playing a solid 8-10 hours per day for a month and a half or so. Not sure if I trust myself with that amount of discipline though...so we'll see.

Got my little cousin that's coming to visit in about a week a pretty sick graded PSA 10 Victor Wembanyama card for his bday. He's in 6th grade and collect sports cards and is obsessed with Wemby so excited to give that to him. 4 days left of work I'm getting burnt out for sure but I can put up with 4 more days. Not looking forward to boxing up my stuff I have an apartment and garage full of shit I have to shove in some containers so when my dad helps me move it's not a disaster for him.

Going back to Tampa on June 17th for a month. Will play poker along the way. Maybe start in Milwaukee, to Chicago, then south from there. Then gonna come back to northern Wisconsin and hang out with family until mid - August. I'll be back mid-June to update.

Moved my stuff into storage. Did the family thing with Aunt Uncle Cousin Mom Dad. Gave cousin Wemby card unfortunately he had 2 others just like it… so much for spending $200 on a gift for him. He did appreciate it but wanted to get him something he didn’t have yet. We caught some big bass and like 50 blue gill crappie and sunfish so that was a good time. They are leaving tomorrow and I’m staying through Tuesday night. Have to check out of my apartment with landlord Wednesday morning at 9am then it’s South for poker.

Coming back July 17th to Parents. Parents don’t like poker or gambling so just told them I was taking a vacation to Florida. Not that I care too much what they think I’m my own person and **** the haters but they can be a bit of a hag if I tell them more than they need to know so I left out the poker part just said I wanted to get out of Wisconsin and wanted to visit Florida lol. They know about what I make from work but they don’t know that I have like $120k roll. As mentioned in earlier post most of it is in stock market with aim setup for early retirement but between cash in hand bank accounts and Webull portfolio I have about that much at disposal. I think they think I’m living paycheck to paycheck. When they ask I telll them I’m doing pretty good just so they don’t worry and feel they need to buy anything for me but leave out the details.

Goal will be to make as much money as I possibly can between now and then. Nearly booked a trip to Thailand at last second but decided against it because I’m hungry. Month in Thailand with flights lodging fun all expenses would be about $5k so hopefully I don’t end up losing much more than that since poker grind is a real grind. Gonna try and keep a tab on life expenses and income to see if the trip even ends up making sense or not. Seems crazy probably is but gonna try and put in 10 hours a day playing cards might start in Milwaukee then go to Chicago then to Tampa but we will see how I run and where the energy levels are at. Mostly just want to put in solid hours playing good cards and turn a nice profit. I’m a little nervous from how the last trip to Tampa went but not gonna let that happen I’m still a bit sick from that loss. I have deep pockets for this trip though and if I get stuck deep might chase it. Could be a big summer could be a horrible summer. I’m betting on myself it’ll be a good one.

Decided to drive to Vegas. Was literally on way to Tampa but 5 mins in decided to go to WSOP. 25 hour ETA. Gonna try and drive most of it probably will have to pull over for a quick nap. lol I am the worst planner ever.

GL man was just there, enjoy the trip! The more I go to Vegas the more I like it (in small doses). Where you staying?

Change of plans again decided to go to Bangkok LOL. My trip started out heading to Tampa, within 5 minutes turning around toward Vegas, within 10 mins deciding to go to the airport to fly to Vegas and get a rental car there, to then booking a flight to Bangkok. Going for a month flying back mid July.

Poker will come another day for now I gotta get a few things out of my system.

glhf!

lol

Degens gonna degen what can I say. Drafting a few fantasy football teams waiting to fly out. 25 hours of flight time to get there from Wisconsin. Put $5k cash in my pocket. When I moved I had to figure out a good spot for the nightstand money so I stuck $80k under my parents mattress if they find it they might have some questions lol. Also I told my parents I was going to fish in Florida. What could go wrong. As long as I don’t contract HIV I should be alright. Poker in August?! Could have woken up in Vegas this morning but oh well…BANGKOK HERE I COME

from Tampa to Vegas to Bangkok, lol. think you said you hate Vegas in the summer anyway. Bangkok sounds like more fun. stay safe, enjoy it! the poker tables will still be here in a month.

Haha I know but I was thinking it’s kinda silly to plan playing 10 hours of day in a single room when I could just go to Vegas during WSOP and hop around between a bunch of different rooms and games. Anyways yeah Bangkok it is buttttt….

The world works in strange ways bro because my flight to Bangkok went through Minneapolis from Wisconsin and it was supposed to just be an hour layover but they ended up having to cancel my next flight because of mechanical issues (Delta 171). So I got put on 24 hours of unexpected layover and ended up tonight in this hotel room in the twin cities. But instead of going from Minneapolis to South Korea to Bangkok they are sending me from Minneapolis to LAS VEGAS to South Korea to Bangkok. Only 2 hours of layover in Vegas though…maybe enough time for a quick session at Bellagio?! Haha nah. My bag got sent to Thailand so I’m in same clothes and missing my flight and being stuck in Vegas would be an inevitable epic disaster. Maybe the universe is telling me to hop in a tournament???? I think it was the French existentialist Sartre that said we often meet our destiny on the road we took to avoid it. Hmmmm :p

But I did call Delta and complain and they are giving me 15,000 sky miles. They did pay for this room and gave me a $12 food voucher which I used towards an overpriced salad from outback steak house, but without calling and waiting for 2 hours to connect to some Indian call center dude I wouldn’t have been given the Sky Miles. I don’t even know if 15k miles is good or not lol but I looked on Reddit and saw I could probably get them for the bullshit I experienced today. So yeah maybe a flight to Vegas or a few if I could get that out of the miles that’d be worth. Oh yeah I drafted some banger fantasy football teams when I was at the terminal all day.

Let’s get it.

Flying into Vegas at 8pm. Flight got delayed 30 mins so can’t make it to strip and back through TSA before I leave, but if I get an extended layover here I’m going straight to Bellagio $5/$10. If flight gets cancelled I’m requesting a delayed flight to Thailand too. Please one time.

Decent last read haha. Have fun in Bangkok or whenever your ass will land!

No delay. Guess it wasn’t meant to be. Flew out on a Korea Airline filled with degenerate Asians on vacation no doubt. I I may have been the only American on an Airbus lol. They even fed me Korean food and Korean beer. I miss America already that **** was ass.

I’ll update few times before I leave if anything exciting happens. Also holy **** Korean women are hot. Maybe I’m ******ed but most of them look the same to me. Probably because they stay away from guys like me that’ll contaminate the gene pool

Been getting some awful blisters from the amount of walking I’ve been doing, but my body has needed it. Ordered a hypodermic needle to burst them. Disgusting but without draining them it’s more painful. Bangkok has all these guys riding motorcycles around making deliveries just like that to people so that was super convenient to pay 50 BAHT and have one show up in the hotel lobby within 30 mins. Feet feel better.

Bangkok is a beautiful place but also very sad and poor in different ways. Streets are dirty. You see rats sometimes in trash cans, like big ones. The city is very safe and tourists are able to walk around wherever whenever and not have to worry about much. The city smells bad in certain places, and then the next moment the air will fill up with the smell of street food. But the smell of sewage mixed with humidity and rain makes for an overwhelming smell at times. Similar to Vegas. Maybe too much debauchery and hedonism.

Much of the economy in Bangkok revolves around tourism. Locals trying to extract their money from the tourists because they are their economy and the tourists exploiting them knowingly or not. Maybe that’s the best way at the end of the day, maybe there’s a better way. I don’t know the answer to that.

The amount of ladies on the streets when the sun goes down is depressing to me. Some very beautiful women just desperate for baht. Massage parlors literally everywhere. Yesterday I wanted to just get my feet massaged because they were sore but the therapist begged me to let her boom boom because she didn’t make salary. I just said rub feet and I’ll tip nicely and I did and she was grateful. But it seemed a very strange concept or taboo for me to even say just massage nothing else. Not India type poor like plenty of Thai professionals going to work in the morning dressed in business attire and friends hanging out, but just very different than Western Culture. It’s kind of sad to me but everyone does seem very happy. I been giving away all coins in pocket to those that seem most in need and tipping very nicely everyone and just trying to be respectful because I feel bad about the fact they had to grow up this way.

I believe we are bacteria in a Petri dish relative to the universe but at the same time I believe strongly in reducing suffering and looking after one another and not taking advantage of each other. Do something nice for someone and appreciate what you have in life.

Thinking about calling Thailand a wrap and flying to Vegas this place is mostly depressing for me I’ll be honest. Just want to play some cards and watch YouTube videos and draft fantasy football teams and stay inside my bedroom. There’s been some fun times. Like today I hopped on the worlds fastest tuk tuk rider that shit was impressive yet hella scary I thought i was going to die. Imagine being on the back of a motorcycle going like 50 mph in and out of bumper to bumper traffic because we literally did that but I put my trust in him and we fucking sent it. Maybe I will try exploring more of the cultural aspect to Bangkok because I’m in a bit of an interesting area perhaps. I’m not really into the cultural aspect of things but I’m willing to give it a try. Maybe there’s some deeper answers there someplace.

Why not take a cheap to krabi, head to that beach south if there, prob most beautiful beach in world (and not crazy like Phuket)

Good idea but I don’t want to fly in sick of terminals having come from USA and it takes so goddamn long to get here. At the metro though gonna hop on random train and explore an area.

Bangkok is coming along okay. Exploring the surrounding areas have shown a different side of Thailand. A little less touristy. The area I’m staying in called Sukhumvit has a lot more of the nightlife scene with Soi Cowboy and Nana Plaza nearby which brings in a unique vibe especially when the sun sets. Went to both. I like more of a personal connection with people when I go out so it’s not really my thing. For example was just trying to spark up a conversation with a lady and when I asked her name she told me her bar ID number and then asked me how big my dick was. I think she was fucking with me so after answering and her asking me where I was from I just told her I lived permanently in Bangkok and then she instantly changed her personality. Maybe that’s the meta.

Been partying at night and walking during the day and taking naps whenever. Not really a lot of vibey day bars to chill at as much. Unless there’s a World Cup game on then the Europeans will start showing up. The night bar vibe is pure degeneracy but a bit too heavy on the money grabbing for me. Then just hopping on a tuk tuk and then just going to random areas. It’s been interesting. Been hanging out with this nice younger lady last few nights just to have a +1. She brought me a crazy looking fruit I’ve never had before. Said her sister picked them and she wanted to bring some for me to try. Tastes a bit like a pear.

Thai people seem very very sweet and nice. Also very savvy but mostly just nice respectful people. Only ran into one beyotch so far who wanted me to go back in a long line after not having understood what I was saying but it’s all good. They must get so sick of us stupid foreigners taking pictures of normal shit and not speaking their language. I use a translator app and that’s helped. I came here on a round trip ticket with a return date of mid July but I have this room here through next week so I may go to Pattaya then. Macau is also only about a $120 USD flight that takes 2.5 hours so maybe I’ll go there too.

If you’re gonna degen why on earth pick Thailand over South America ?