Predator314's Poker Journal

Is it Friday yet? It's been a bad week so far. Last week, I didn't go to work any. I was seriously sick all week long with a nasty stomach virus. So when I get to work this week, I gotta hear about missing the entire week and how it affects the company. I know how it affects the company. I don't want to hear about it everytime I am sick and don't feel like being at work.

So I'm at a crossroads here. Where do I want to go in life? Fucked if I know. It's really depressing too. The only thing I know is that honestly hate my job.

Reasons for hating my job

o My boss is a prick. He's not ingorant and he's a pretty damn good salesman. However, I just cannot stand him. He has no sense of humor. He expects nothing in your personal life to affect you going to work. He cannot handle pressure at all and it's embarrassing to be on-site with him when he starts to flake out. Worst of all, he is condescending to others, especially people that work jobs like fast food. I refuse to order with him for fear of getting a loogey burger.

o I have to wear a tie. This really isn't a big deal, but it irks the shit out of me because there is no good reason for it. I can understand being dressed up when going to a customer's location, but we do not have customers here. The only people that come into our office throughout the course of the day are the UPS Man, Fed Ex Man, and an occassional salesman.

o My job is mind numbing work. It's not demanding. Some of my responsibilities include setting up new Windows 2003 and SCO Unix servers for new or upgrading customers, coding enhancements, bug fixes, etc to our software package, technical support, on-site training for new customers, and on-site installation of new servers for new or upgrading customers. It's just mind numbing work now that I've been here for 5+ years and know everything really well. The days pass by VERY slow.

o I dread going to work every day. It's literally work making myself go to work anymore. I don't miss a lot of work, but I do use every personal day and vacation day available to me. I've never had a job where I dreaded going in so bad. I need a job where I actually enjoy going in or at least don't mind it.

o The employees. We are a small company and there are only a couple of employees. I'm the newest, yet I've been here for close to 6 years. The other employees here are good people, just not my type of people. There's no chit chat or anything like that. I'm the only one without kids, and if there is any non-work discussion between us, it's usually about their kids. I need someone I can tell a dirty joke to every now and again to break the tension.

o Travel. When I took this job, I figured the travel would be a nice change of pace. We have customers in various states from Illinois to Florida and most states in between. Most of my customers are in the 5-6 hour driving range. Some of the places I've been to are nice, some are scum holes. I live in a rural community and love it. People put down West Virginia, but I think it's a great state to live in. Hardly any traffic, beautful scenery, and it's just a laid back state. However, with that comes some disadvantages. We don't have any major sports teams and there's not much to choose from as far as concerts/shows go. When I go to Atlanta, I'd like to watch a Braves game or a Falcons game. Not with this job. We work from the time we get there, to the time we leave. We are even expected to work on enhancements in the motel rooms at night.

Good Points of my Job

o I don't have to deal with the general public.
o It's an easy job
o Pays good (not great)
o Free health insurance
o Profit sharing

I'm not sure what I want to do with my life. I do know what I don't want to do. I don't want to work here forever. I'm also not sure of what will become of the company once my boss retires. I'd say he is probably close to 60 years old right now. I've been to his house and seen his toys. The guy is loaded. He doesn't finance anything, so he's liquid too. I'm sure he will be retiring soon. One of these days I'm going to ask him what will become of the company when he retires.

Now that I've been out of school for a while, I have a better perspective on what is important. When I was in school, it was all about the money. So that's what I went for and look at me now. Updating this stupid blog, bitching to the entire world about how much I hate my job.

So if it's not money I'm going for, what do I want in a job?

I want to work doing something that I enjoy. I used to enjoy working with computers, but I've grown out of it. If I am to work in a team atmosphere, I'd like to do it with people more like me. At least someone with a good sense of humor and doesn't always have some sort of drama going on.

I'm not all caught up in "making a difference" in the world. I just want to do something that is fun and I get paid for it.

OK, so now that I've pretty much narrowed it down to something fun, let's take a look at my hobbies and how I can maybe/maybe not make a career out of them.

Hobbies

o Poker (of course)
o Shooting Pool
o Bowling
o Video Games
o Golf
o Music
o Movies/Television

Lets start with poker since this is supposed to be a poker blog. I just don't know if I have what it takes to become a professional poker player mentally. I don't think I'd have any trouble making the money to live life. I have a good winrate. I've survived the ups and downs. But how will I react if I have a losing month and my mortgage payment depends on my poker winnings? How long can I do it for a living? I'm 28 now. What will the poker industry be like in 10 years?

I don't have the writing talent of Otis or Dr. Pauly to become a professional poker blogger/writer. These guys have a very special skill that makes their writing stand out. So if I'm to make a living in the poker industry, it would have to be by playing the game.

Shooting pool, bowling, golf: I don't have the talent in any of these sports to play them professionally. I guess the closest would be pool. However, the life of a professional pool player is not a decent one. Sure, you've got the lucky few who thrive on TV and have big time sponsorships. Most other ones make their money by gambling. Pool has also become a "chemical" sport. I'd venture to say that at least 75% of the pool players that make a living at it are also hopped up on cocaine. I had a well known professional tell me one time that when he was on coke, he could spot God the 8.

Golf is fun to play. But again, I don't have the talent. The guys you see on TV are fucking amazing. A couple years ago, I was playing 3 to 5 times a week and was rapidly moving towards becoming a scratch golfer. It was amazing how much my game progressed from the beginning of the year to the end. Of course that will happen when you play over 200 rounds of golf in a year. As far as working for the golf industry, I'm not sure what I would do. I'm sure there are various office type jobs working for the PGA, USGA, etc. I am qualfied to be a greens keeper :)

Bowling: see Golf. Not good enough.

Video games are intriguing. Development of video games is something that I'm perhaps qualified to do. However, I've looked into it and everything I read is pretty much the same thing. You have deadlines to meet, you've always got someone over your shoulder telling you about the deadline and you work very long days. That's not for me.

The music industry is something that I haven't really looked into a whole lot. I love music. I play guitar, but not well. So don't expect to see me on stage rocking out with Ozzy or anything. However, the industry is so huge, there's gotta be a crap load of stuff I could do. One really fulfilling thing would be to help some up and coming bands/artists break through into the industry. I've listened to a lot of local bands. We got some quality talent in this area. Better than 95% of the shit you will hear on the radio. They can write their own songs, play their own instruments, and actually sing. Seems like a winning combo to me. I'm sure there's a lot of politics in the music industry, but I'm gonna check into careers in the music industry anyway.

Getting work in the movie/television industry would more than likely require moving to L.A. Not a chance. I'm sure L.A. is nice for some people. A country hick like me wouldn't last a month.

One job that interests me that doesn't really fit into any category I've mentioned above is teaching. I'm not good with children, but I wouldn't mind teaching high school students or college students. The college professor route really intrigues me. In my college experience, many professors did their job very poorly. All too many times, they ended up pushing their political and personal opinions on your rather than just teaching the damn class. I'm not sure what the deal is, but from the people I've talked to, it's an epidemic across the nation. I have in-depth knowledge of computers, programming, networking, etc. I currently train customers. Why can't I teach a bunch of hippies how to set up a TCP/IP network?

I apologize for the size of the post. I just needed to get some things out of my head. I'm just going polish my resume and get my name out there and see what becomes of it. Sitting here and bitching about it isn't going to help anything.