Quote from: amishmanish on January 30, 2020, 03:07:13 PM

This thread has a lot of anecdotal information and you make many references to the world of gambling that a new person would find not identify. I get that someone will need to actually be immersed into it to get all the references. My question was aimed at getting a bird's eye view of what the "Gambling world" is like. How would you describe it to someone in a way that they can decide if it is for them or not, the triumphs and the tribulations?

Hmm, ok, I can maybe talk a bit about how a normal day (of betting) looks for me. Not all days are the same. Beginning of the week, there is not a lot to do for me normally or only in the evenings, when I can actually watch some sports. So lets take a Saturday maybe, which is always the most busy day. I am a night person, so would get up rather late without any alarm being set. I would have breakfast and some tea/coffee and go through my mornings internet routine. Like checking mails, checking some general news, this and that. At 1pm the games for second division football in Germany start, so I would watch the pre-coverage starting at 12:30pm and check the line-ups, check the latest odds. In my mind I already know, what I will look for in these games and what I will do if X or Y happens. So from 1pm I will be watching the matches and see, if there is some opportunity to get in. Games finish 2:45pm and I will switch to pre-coverage for Bundesliga then, check the line-ups etc. Those games start at 3:30pm and finish 5:15pm and I will look to get some food afterwards - waiting for 6:30pm game in Bundesliga. This late game in Bundesliga is often times not very interesting to me (Bayern, Leipzig, Dortmund playing some scrubs), so my attention turns more to german Basketball, where you have games at 6:30 and 8:30pm on Saturdays normally. Basketball I can only stream and not watch on TV. There is a ~30sec delay with this stream, so I have to adapt my trading accordingly. Trading german Basketball on Betfair is pretty pointless though, since there is next to no liquidity and I don't feel comfortable with this 30sec delay anyway. So I will wait for a time-out or half-time to take some action if any (this is more of a punt at a bookmaker then).

During american College Football season, I would have some game running on TV after the late Bundesliga game has finished and which is normally running muted on TV while I focus on Basketball. The Basketball matches finish at around 10:30pm. The last weekends I would then watch some NFL playoffs. I am not betting on NFL with the intention or the hope of making money, I just do it for fun to add some spice while watching. The NFL is my big love and I watch as many games as possible, but I am not able to bet on it profitably, so I see my bets on NFL games just as a hobby and don't care too much about winning or losing. Stakes are pretty low there too then.

During all the time, there is always some distraction with mails arriving, talking to my fellow punters, phone calls and whatever, so it can get quite chaotic and hectic. I should probably shut down all things that could get me distracted, but I never chose to do so. Watching a match of football can be very boring at times, so some distraction is maybe welcomed deep inside of me, I don't know.

After I finished betting for the day, I will eat something. Then go away from the computer and go to some supermarket, for a walk or just watch some TV (no sports then!), meet with friends or family (those that are maybe still awake^^) and do what other people do as well in their spare time and then go to bed.

On contrary on a day like today, there really isn't much to do for me betting wise. I am wating for the german second division football match today, which starts 8:30pm, where I will monitor what is happening and maybe do something inplay. Other than that, there is nothing to do today.