Chapter 0,5: The Luck Pool Theory

Magic players, we have a theory. It’s called The Luck Pool Theory and I will explain it to you. Every game of Magic is influenced by two factors, the player’s skill and luck. There is an eternal discussion how much each of the factors influence the game, but this is not a topic now. The Luck Pool Theory says that every player has an imaginary pool where luck is stored like gasoline. During every game that player plays, he is either filling the pool by having bad luck in the game or emptying the pool by having good luck. If there is a serie of games where that player is having bad luck, his pool is filled up to the edge and in the next games he will have good luck because the pool cannot be filled more. And on the other hand after a set of lucky games, the pool will be empty, so he will have bad luck in the next ones because he cannot draw more from the pool. I think this is a very wise principal and works also in the real life and I will show you how.

I can say that I’ve been flying a lot during last years. To USA, Barcelona, San Jose de Costa Rica, Las Palmas, Madrid and I don’t know where else. One would say that is a lot of kilometers for some trouble to happen during the flights. Lost baggage, missed planes, natural disasters, etc. But no. Not a single problem during all of them.

Until this July when I flew to Dubai for a first time. I didn’t tell you the story, but the essential visa to UAE I got not until Istanbul, where I was changing planes. If I got it one hour later I would have missed the plane and stayed with nothing in Turkey. I got it in time so nothing happened at all, but I should have remembered this theory and it would have been more than clear to me that my luck pool was empty and something bad was about to happen.

And it did, when I canceled my first flight to Dubai, because of the visa. It continued by canceled flight to Gothenburg due to fog. Nevertheless I made it with the second, which was nothing more than emptying the pool to the bottom again. So with the empty luck pool I boarded the flight to Vienna. I landed in Vienna without any complications. So far, so good. In a good mood I spend eight hours waiting at the airport, happy that my wireless card worked again. About 10:30pm I said “See you tomorrow in Arabia” to my friends on ICQ and headed to the gate.

“Where is your visa sir?” asked me the guy at the check desk. “I have it at the Dubai airport” I replied with confidence. Then like an ice cold shower hit me his answer “You need to have a copy of your visa or you cannot go!!”.

And because I didn’t and the guy was relentless, I am writing this from the Airport Hotel in Vienna, drinking beer from the minibar, waiting for the visa copy to arrive  at the morning and with the luck pool already half full hoping, that the next flight to Dubai tomorrow at the same time will take me finally there.