Online Gambling Addiction

The title says it all. But I feel that I may have just conquered it. I cancelled both of my accounts. Yeah, that's right, both. I didn't participate in just one of those throw-your-money-away-while-gaining-nothing sites but two. For those who have not stepped into this world, good job. I was introduced to Bowmans poker a little over a year ago by a friend of mine whom I had played poker with for maybe a year at that point. At first, it was really enticing. I entered $5 tournaments and won a total of 32.00 each game when I placed first. Then I got greedy and started playing bigger games. I even played a few $100 games and won one and lost the rest. That might not seem like much to some online gamblers, but it was way more than I should have been fucking with. At one point I had over a grand in my account and instead of quitting while I was ahead, I lost all that and another $200. Stupid. During my foray into this website, the same friend who originally introduced me to it showed me to yet another. This one was new and if you have been in the same bars or types of bars that I have been lately, you would notice their posters. Bodog poker was new and apparently all the people who were on it, including myself, had no idea what was going on. The first month went alright. I was up about $100, but then I started calling hands when I shouldn't have and played when I was at home, bored. Not a good idea. With a direct link to my bank account, I was able to lose a lot of money. I didn't go into debt or have to sell my car, but I went down enough to hurt pretty bad for a while.
What's funny to me about all of this, because I am over being pissed about it and I know I was hella dumb for doing that shit in the first place, is the people on there. I don't like to judge people but the folks who gamble online are of a different breed. I can't say I am much different because I was addicted to that shit like a fat kid on candy, but people took it way too seriously. There is a small section on the screen for chatting and on a daily basis, I had people telling me how bad I was for winning a hand with cards I really shouldn't have been gambling with in the first place. If I went all-in with shitty cards and somebody called me with good cards yet I won at the end, instead of saying nice hand or something like that, it would be a firestorm of insults. My personal favorite was being called a fish. Apparently, this is what poor poker players were called in the wild west over 100 years ago and only the famous Doyle Brunson, and only Doyle Brunson, could possibly use it nowadays. Yet here they were, 22 year old poker hot shots who were so steamed over losing $1.25 in a hand they had to go and call me that. You see, online poker makes people think they are good at what they are doing. Really, the companies who set that shit up are making a killing. They get clowns like me who buy in for 20 bucks, lose it, and buy in again and again. I don't know what my total losses were for that shit and I don't intend to because I will probably cry. But back to the people. For me, I rarely got upset at the computer or other players, except for when I would get dealt bad cards like 10 hands in a row. Then my blood pressure would rise. People would freak out about so many things that I kind of got fed up. People complained about others playing poorly and taking their money. It's like they thought they should be guarenteed the money if they have a good hand. Time and again, I found myself saying outloud to my computer, "It's online poker! It's gambling! It all comes down to luck." Of course, you need to hear me say that so once I find out how to put my voice on here, I will. (not really though) Whatever. Online poker is wack as fuck and I hate it. Of course, all I wanna do is get back on and try to double up my buy-in, but that's what got me here in the first place. Poker is luck, no matter which way you cut it and right now, I ain't got none.

glad you could make it

you might be asking yourself, "mr. hustle, what is a fronter?"
Well, that is a very good question. Instead of giving you my definition right off the bat, I was thinking that maybe it could be revealed to you as I keep this updated. I guess I started doing this because it has been a long time in the making. I have friends who blog and they inspired me to get this going, but what really sparked this was a conversation I had last night at my mom's 60th birthday party with one of her friends. She was telling me about blogging and how she loves it and she was also asking me about teaching and technology. (I am a high school English teacher in San Francisco and a lot of what I write on this might be as a direct reflection of that. I hope you don't mind.) We got to talking about what I have been doing and if my students blog and if I blog and if I could somehow incorporate blogging into the curriculum and so on until I said to myself, "Well, Mr. Hustle, I guess it is time we got this going" and I decided that this morning I would begin. I have a lot of ideas for what I want to write about, so this won't be completely full of confessions, nor will it all be a complete front. I will leave that up to the reader to decide. As for now, I must go fire up the volcano and do some washing.