[whorasaurus]

Ok, allow me to address these responses:

“Why don’t you just play online?”

The simple answer is that I just don’t like playing online. It’s a completely different game, and one I never enjoyed. There’s no question that playing online gets more hands/hr and ultimately more cash, but I just don’t like it. I feel like PAHUD and other poker support software strip something from the game. I also don’t like the prospect of such an antisocial living. I am not a huge extrovert, but right now I’m not getting enough interaction w/ different people as it is; I don’t want to highlight that by playing online full time.

“Why not play more at FW before making such a gigantic shift?”

This is a great question. First of all, I have no plans to quit my job tomorrow. If I go through with something like this, it won’t be before 2008. In the meantime, I’ll continue to log hours at FW on weekends and such. I live a little over an hour from the casino, and that makes frequent trips hard. FWIW I have already had limited experience supporting myself with poker. Immediately after graduating, I had 3 months left on a lease in a town about 90 mins from Turning Stone. I grinded (ground?) 1-2NL there about 3 days a week and barely broke even after rent, food and bills. It was hard, but I found that the 3 hour round trip commute wore me out a lot more than playing. Hopefully by living near a real set of cardrooms I can play shorter, more frequent sessions.

“You are hurting your future job prospects by doing this.”

This seriously concerns me. I do not intend to maintain this life for more than a year (unless i go seriously ROBUSTO). Poker is great, and a fantastic way for a kid like me to earn decent cash, but I don’t think I’ll be satisfied with my accomplishments 20 years down the line if I’m still a Vegas hustler (again, unless I is ROBUSTO). I want to ask some of the older, respectable members of the B&M community, how much will a year of this hurt my resume? I plan on graduate school when I’m 25-26 in law, international relations, or something completely different. Is it going to be extremely hard to explain a year spent doing this? If this is the case, I may seriously reconsider this choice.

“Overseer55: LOL, I make 200k at 27, you didn’t study in skool AMIRITE?”

I worked pretty damn hard at college too. I double majored in chemistry and biology, but decided late that I didn’t want to pursue a doctorate in these fields. There are few juicy opportunities for those with a only bachelor’s in the sciences, hence the present spot, and the desire to go to grad school.

“Wait, 15k is barely enough.”

This is probably true. I will probably try to accumulate about 25k in living expenses+roll before attempting this. I’ve never had the pressure of playing to eat, and I agree that minimizing this pressure through conservative bankroll management is the best way to optimize your winrate. I would love to hear what other live pros have to say about this.

The point is, I need to get out of this. This job is killing me, and I think I could make this work. I am actually surprised that so few people mentioned how important it would be to find good roommates to support me through this. To me, I think its absolutely critical to have social, poker playing roomies that you can both discuss the game with, and go out drinking with. I could be wrong tho.

Thanks to all for the insightful feedback, this thread has been the best one I’ve created on 2+2.