Sometimes, I like to step back from things and consider them in historical context. We truly live in a fantastic world of wonders. I’ll explain after this story, from KeralaNext.com:
A mathematics graduate from Belfast, Northern Ireland, who snubbed a 40,000 pound a year banking job to earn a mere 4,500 a week playing internet poker, is all set to earn 234,000 pounds a year as earnings.
According to The Sun, Lee-Anne Smyth began playing at university and in the process made so much money, that she refused a banking job
“Who needs a proper job when I can make what most people earn in a month in a couple of hours?” the paper quoted her as saying.
Lee who logs on to Ladbrokespoker.com and plays for five hours against other gamblers, betting by credit card says, that her 2.2 honours degree in pure and applied mathematics helps her to calculate the odds regarding the number of cards left in the pack.
Lee whose favourite variety happens to be the Texas Hold ‘Em, where players make up their hands from dealt cards and communal ones which are left face up, has reportedly won as much as 7,600 pounds on one single day.
Maybe she plays against Nicholas Leeson, the banker who single-handedly brought down Barings bank. In a Casino [ptz] post last month, I discussed his presence at celebpoker.com.
The dubious part of this story is the idea that gambling is an easy road to quick wealth, something that, a a historian of gambling (though not a gambling historian) I have to dispute. I’m glad that Lee-Anne is proficient at “the Texas Hold Em,” but I’d hardly recommend professional poker as a career path for most graduates.
The fantastic part of this story is something I never cease to wonder at; how borders have completely collpased. A guy in Las Vegas using the Internet to quote an Indian news article about an Irish woman who plays online poker is about as much proof of this as you need.