It's amazing how easy it is to burn through $36,000, and when I left Mexico a few months ago, I suddenly found myself on the short end of the stick down to scraps.
I whiffed through most of my winnings from Stars scores early last year to pay off numerous debts to the tune of about 9 grand, bought the Jeep, and paid my rent in Puerto Nuevo for almost a year in advance...the rest I burned through drinking tequila, partying my ass off, and eating like royalty.
But after 2 years in Mexico, I found myself missing the United States, and decided to head back across the border for a variety of reasons. One of which was a newfound personal sense of American pride, inspired by our next president of the United States...Mr. Donald J. Trump
But quite honestly, the # 1 reason I returned to the land of the free and home of the brave was simply because I missed my FOOD
In and Out Burger, Outback Steakhouse, Chipotle', Sonic, The Habit, Red Lobster, Ruth Chris, etc etc...all my favorite places to eat simply don't exist south of the border. I mean a man can only eat so many fucking tacos.
It was time to come home
After crossing the border in San Ysidro, I ended up puttering around San Diego for a few weeks grinding 1/3 at Oceans 11 hoping to run it up, and made a few stops at Commerce in L A, but quickly found my bankroll slowly withering away.
Hotel rooms in Southern California certainly aren't cheap, and my win rate grinding low limit cash games simply wasn't high enough to sustain blowing 600 bucks a week on rooms at Travelodge or Motel 6 and supporting my 'extravagant' lifestyle in the process.
Within a few weeks, I was pretty much flat broke sleeping in my car in casino parking lots feeling slightly desperate to say the least.
I borrowed a few hundred bucks from a friend just to survive and keep gas in my car, then started to head up north 101 with the intention of hitting up family for a few grand and trying to grind full time in Sacramento at Capital Casino, the Limelight & Thunder Valley.
I took my sweet ass time driving up the Pacific Coast Highway, and ended up landing on the central coast near San Luis Obisbo for about a month working for a good friend part time just to stay afloat, but was basically spinning my wheels and drinking heavily to cope with an overwhelming sense of depression, when the reality started sinking in that I had to make a bold move.
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I'd been squeaking out a couple grand a month building WordPress websites for small business owners, but the truth of the matter is that I fucking hate web design.
Actually its more the fact I despise cold calling and prospecting for new clients, and also that after spending the better part of 25 years in various sales positions, I can emphatically state with conviction that web design clients are the biggest pain in the ass ever.
I'm actually decent at the creative aspect of the business, and started getting pretty good at CSS, but I find it beyond tedious to sit in front of my computer all day uploading images, writing meaningless brain-dead content, and dealing with impatient, rude and demanding clients (big shout out to Robert Pickering)
That particular experience left a pretty sour taste in my mouth, and was one of the the mitigating factors in my decision to get the fuck of website design once and for all.
So trying to grow a small web development company was not an option anymore
Then I started entertaining the idea of putting my resume' together and trying to land an account executive position in print advertising sales again.
I did spent 4 years working for a major Yellow Pages publisher, and then 2 years at the Los Angeles Times as an account executive, but quickly scuttled that idea because I refuse to spend whats left of my life as a bloodsucking piece of shit salesman.
I'm talented at sales, and enjoyed a lot of success in previous positions at the aforementioned companies, but the prospect of being forced to whore myself out for a paycheck in sales again seemed not only nauseating, but also felt like I'd be taking a huge step back to a place I didn't want to go.
I could sell ice cubes to Eskimos, but returning to a sales career to me seemed like a virtual death sentence.
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Some of you know that I spent 9 years working as a merchant marine.
I started working for American Hawaii Cruises back in the late 80's as a waiter and cabin steward, and then spent almost a year in culinary school upgrading my ratings with a maritime union under the umbrella of the AFL/CIO
There are three departments on any maritime vessel....deck, engine and steward.
A few months ago, I reconnected with a shipmate I hadn't seen for 20 years on Facebook, and he was still shipping on various container ships, tankers, and LNG's (liquid natural gas) ships.
We got to chatting and talking again, and he was doing very well working as a Chief Steward making major bank.
I learned that the contracts now are infinitely better than they were when I was still shipping, and that the union was hurting badly for qualified people.
Back in the late 1990's before I decided to stop shipping....I was sailing as a Chief Steward for a company called 'Amsea' and then also for 'Dyn Marine Services'. My last time spent shipping was with Dyn Marine on the worst ship I'd ever been on stuck in Korea as a Chief Steward. One of the worst experiences of my life.
A Chief Steward is basically a hotel manager who is responsible for writing daily menus, ordering provisions, delegating and keeping track of overtime, and managing a crew of anywhere from 3-8 steward department personnel.
So anyway, I called human resources at the union, curious if I would have to go back to school in Maryland again, and inquired if my certifications as a Chief Steward were still valid after almost 20 years.
To my surprise, yes...I still had a valid Chief Steward rating despite not having shipped out since late 1996.
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I contacted the port agent at union headquarters, and asked him to explain in detail exactly what I had to do to restore my merchant mariner credentials again, and what exactly was involved with the qualifying process.
He emails me back with an extensive laundry list of mandatory tasks that I needed to complete before I would have a chance at shipping out again.
I open the email he sent, and after scanning over the bullet points, my immediate reaction was...
'you gotta be fucking kidding me'
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1) Apply for a TWIC card (Transportation Worker Identification Card) with the Department of Homeland Security
2) Complete BST (Basic Safety Training)... including Firefighting, Water Survival, First Aid, & CPR
3) Coast Guard physical and drug testing
4) Union physical, blood testing, TB test, secondary drug testing, & functional capacity exam
5) Completing VPDSD Anti Piracy training (Vessel Personnel with Designated Security Duties)
6) Pass ServSafe (Food Handlers Management Exam)
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Naturally, none of that shit is free
The (5) day BST course had to be completed at a recognized maritime academy and the fee was $1500.00.
TWIC card was another $128.00...the Coast Guard physical was another $250.00, Union physical another $415.00, VPDSD was another $250.00, and the ServSafe exam was another $270.00
None of this included the cost of rental cars, hotels, or other expenses driving from Sacramento to San Diego and the Bay Area multiple times, gas, food, 1/2 pints of Fireball to stay sane etc.
To get this all done, I'm was gonna need some serious financial assistance, but the end game gave me some serious collateral
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I secured a half a dozen loans from friends and family to to the tune of approximately 5 grand which made it possible to pursue returning to a career which I never imagined in my wildest dreams I would ever revisit.
I never planned on returning to this line of work, and quite frankly I fucked up bigtime when I quit in 1997 because I was literally 45 days away from securing premium 'A book' seniority with the union which I could have parked.
My disadvantage now is only that I have to start out as a scrub 'C' book. Meaning that I can't pick and choose the jobs I want. I have to lick up the table scraps and take it the jobs the higher echelon union members don't want.
But the good news for me personally, was that the union is hurting BIGTIME for personnel, in my opinion because the process for qualifying is so expensive, time consuming, and this incredibly demanding, and arduous process.
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Decision made, and necessary funds secured...I head to the California Maritime Academy in Vallejo, Ca to pay my fee, and sign up for Basic Safety Training. It's a week long course (mentioned above) that was to say the least...BRUTAL.
I turn 52 years old next week, and the class was a dozen guys 1/2 my age just now venturing into the maritime industry as noobs with no previous experience in shipping.
I breezed through all the facets of training except for firefighting where we had to don full breathing apparatus tanks (weighing about 60 pounds) in all the standard fire resistant gear....boots...jackets...masks....and then put out mock fires in a training ship docked shoreside.
Also important to note that the night before, I got tanked and overslept and showed up 30 mins late. But still managed to score 94% on my final and got my certification. One of the instructors was pissed, but I managed to charm him into letting me complete the day.
The next step was 'Water Survival Training'....one of 5 components of attaining BST certification.
We had to get into what they call 'gumby suits' and simulate being stranded at sea and how to climb into life rafts. This all took place at Cal Maritime in an olympic sized swimming pool. I was hungover as fuck that day, but still managed to bang it out like a champ.
CPR and First Aid was a breeze. The last segment of BST was a no brainer...and boom....I passed the course and my certificate was issued. Step one complete
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Prior to attending the BST course at the maritime academy, I had to apply for my TWIC card...which requires extensive vetting by the Department of Homeland Security.
I paid my fee, went through a rather intrusive questioning process, and had to sit on my ass for over 30 days waiting for them to issue my card. The worst part being that I couldn't make any other moves to expedite the process until these assholes issued my TWIC card.
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Finally my TWIC card arrives
Now I have to take a course called VPDSD (Vessel Personnel with Designated Security Duties) but they aren't offering it in the Bay Area for 2 months....so I have to rent a car and drive to San Diego
This was such an eye opening class
The instructor was a straight up ASSASSIN
Dude worked for the CIA and Homeland Security and spent over a decade as an anti-piracy expert. This one guy in the class asked him on lunch break how many people he had killed, and the guy just snickered and said 'a few dozen'. By far the most riveting aspect of my journey was attending this course.
He also noted that its a fucking miracle that we haven't been infiltrated by Islamic terrorists via our wide open ports and been victimized by some form of dirty bomb or nukes.
Long Beach for example is the busiest port in the United States receiving countless thousands of containers on a daily basis from dozens of other countries. I raised my hand and asked him 'How can we possibly inspect every single container coming into this country and evaluate them for nukes or dirty bombs etc'
He just shook his head and laughed and said 'we can't'. His view about the ability for our country to protect ourselves was laughable. He was way beyond cynical
He went on to say that maybe 5% of all the goods being imported into the United States via container ships are inspected.
This man also said he wakes up every day and thinks its amazing that the United States hasn't been nuked yet.
sobering reality of impending terrorist threats to the U.S. imo coming from a seasoned anti piracy combatant. I learned a lot from this course about the threats our nation faces and how clueless we are when it comes to defending them.
I really enjoyed that class
scored 100% on my test btw
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Next step was my food handlers management course for ServSafe....which I assumed would be the easiest facet of my qualifying regiment.
WRONG
I showed up the first day and sat through 6 hours of mind numbing lecturing from an instructor who makes Rosie O'Donnell look like a porn star
Took all the practice tests online, none of which reflected the true deceptive nature of the actual test.
I failed it twice at $65.00 bucks a pop
Granted, they don't want to just hand out ServSafe Manager credentials to any random schmoe, so I can respect the fact they threw out some curveballs on the exam...but that was downright ridiculous.
I did manage to score 88% on my 3rd try last week, and finally crossed the finish line for the final step in this long journey.
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Called the port agent at human resources with my union on Monday this week and exclaimed proudly (3 months later) 'I'm finally done !' and my job has been shipped to the Bay Area for pick up.
$12,700 a month with full benefits as a department head.
I'm based out of Cape Canaveral, Florida with (MSC) Military Sealift Command.
Most of the time my ship is in port, but it does head out off the coast of Panama, Florida Keys and Cuba for strategical ops several times a year.
It's a US Navy support vessel tasked specifically for supporting submarine navigation systems testing, and providing ballistic missile testing support services for the Navy
flying out probably Tuesday to Orlando as soon as hurricane Matthew burns out
obv been Googling poker rooms in Orlando
would have been there already if it wasn't for Matthew
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My plan is to work 4-6 months, bank around 50K, and then head back to Baja Mexico to grind Stars in a beachfront condo pounding tequila, and not giving a fuck
If I go broke again...
rinse and repeat
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Originally Posted by Draymond
