My better-half has recently adopted the word 'YOLO' (You Only Live Once), which is overly-used by the younger generation doing dumb stuff. So with this in mind, the girlfriend and I 'YOLO'd' by spontaneously taking a trip to Atlantic City for the weekend.

My girlfriend, for someone that didn't know the difference between blackjack and craps, was $70 up by the end of it all. Her justification for winning so much was put down to 'pure luck'... which got be thinking about the idea of 'luck'.

I personally believe there's no such thing as luck. It's an excuse to apply meaning without it's true understanding.

Every object in this universe is tangible or holds meaning and purpose whether you understand it or not. 'Luck' cannot be measured. What can be measured is the % of winning and the % of losing... totally up to 100%... no room for luck.

It's OK for some people not understand something though this isn't agreed by everyone. Instead, people demand answers like following religion or saying that was 'luck'

How good and bad thing happen are based on your surrounding society and culture influences. Take a trip to the Maddison Square Gardens and you'll find a sworn of homelss New Yorkers begging for $1. Take a trip to the financial district and you'll find, what I like to call, 'white person' problems. Corporate barons like Bernie Madoff's losing $$$ millions in a single day though to them it's just another day.

So based on these 2 vague situations, who has more bad luck?

After blowing around $1000 whilst in Vegas, I decided to give my remaining $5 cash to the nearest homeless guy. This ended up becoming an incredible story on how he's been homeless for only a matter of weeks because he was simply stuck in the desert without help. A man in his 50's took a contracted job to demolish the Taj Mahal casino down the lower end of the Vegas strip. He led an old-school lifestyle, noting everything down in a binder and using a mobile more sophisticated than a Casino calculator though not as powerful as a Nokia 3210. His van was stolen shortly after leaving it parked up. Within his van was his binder and his shitty mobile.

He owned a house in portland and was divorced with no children. He only knew his house number though no one was there to answer along with no other addresses. He was left in Vegas with no money at hand and no one to help. For someone that didn't use the Internet, I thought to myself, 'how would I cope' in his shoes.

He finally managed to contact his elderly mother by post (because she didn't have a phone) regarding his issue. he was describing a time whee someone helped him by using the Internet to visually see where his mother lived (assume he meant google earth), and managed to contact her via postal service. She believed it was him and sent a bus ticket to the nearest location that was willing to take post. He showed me the one way ticket with the specific date departing the next day.

I spent the last few hours with him talking about his situation and how people would not help him whilst he was homeless. No one believed him that he owned a house in Portland though needed a bus fair ticket back to repay them. We used the $5 to buy a subway and shared it amongst his friends. Before we departed ways, he gave me this card that he used as trust and belief that he could get back home. Even though I'm an atheist, I always carry it around with me.

You may believe it's a compelling agreement to believe that this guy was socker-punched by bad luck though I would disagree.

His life was constructed with choices. He choose the steps before this horrific situation even though he couldn't imagine he'd be in that situation. He did however gain some valued knowledge, that one of lives importance survival techniques is to try and remain sane.

He did however 'choose' (not luck) to pick himself up with his swollen balls and survived for those days. He learnt how to get food from the garbage bins, find safe locations to sleep, stay close to other homeless friends which he could trust. These were the factors he learnt through his life. He wasn't 'lucky' to find fresh food that was thrown out to be scavenged from the bins, he knew from choices in the past how, at what time, to dig through the bins at what restaurants to be successful - no luck involved.

When he located that food with his newly friend, that must of been a good day. Good days and bad days are dependant on the situations in hand. Someone from wall street may put their noses up at the idea to scrummage through bins and instead look for alternatives. If someone gave the homeless guy $5, that's good. Someone gave Bernie $5 in 2008 and he wouldn't care one bit.

What people call 'luck' is just a by-product of life that people label something against their misunderstanding. Though the idea of luck is different from everyone. People would say the homeless guy finally received good luck and Bernie is now unlucky...

I'd say they both had it coming

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