Poll: Are you lucky?

[sammyc]

I don't mean did you win the lottery on the first go, or you have nine lives, but in day-to-day, 'does the universe like or hate you' matters.

My timing & is permanently 'off'. I unerringly hit red lights [edit: speaking as a non-driver, so when in others' vehicles; not the best example] run into people I don't want to see by milliseconds, miss people I do want to see by the same. If I delay buying something it goes out of stock - if I buy it then & there the price drops the next day.

And so forth. I'm the kind of person who if I moved house to get away from nightmare neighbours, my new ones would immediately croak and be replaced by the Klopeks, whereupon orig lot would sell up to Mr & Mrs Lovely People.

Just me? Are you all out there with the Gods smiling upon your every move, or anyone else that never gets life's cosmic Pass the Parcel? Post me your unlucky/lucky stories. I'm dealing with a sucky Firefox upgrade, take pity & distract me, people.

[Sam__]

I feel that you make your own luck. A wise man once said "The harder I practice, the luckier I get."

[sammyc]

Actual good luck/good fortune I would agree with you to a point, but odd bits of timing I'm not sure you can do much about - say if I make a purchase, and get a money off voucher right after unrelated to my making the purchase - is that something I can influence with a positive outlook or whatevs?

btw if you feel the middle option should more accurately be neither/nor, feel free to qualify your answer.

[stevie lee]

was all ready to go ahead and purchase a r5-1600 system for a friend a week or so ago. sent him email saying 'ready when you are'. then the price dropped to £136 on amazon/ebuyer. so thought 'lucky him'
then get email back saying 'can we wait a bit'
day or so later the offer expires and goes back to full price.
then I find that asus rog reloaded offer.

so hes now getting the system he wanted at a price he was happy with, but i'll be getting the free games that come with it, of which there are a lot.
except scan haven't replied to the thread yet too see if I can get 2 free Assasins creed.


so who's the lucky one in this case?


in other news. my motherboard doesn't work anymore with 4 sticks of ram in it, so was down to 4GB which is very very laggy in the games I play (witcher 3, war for overworld) 5 minutes to exit the game isn't right. network also keeps dropping out (physical damage to port somehow) it just lost connection so I had to replug it a few time a week.
nearly made it to 9 years with the same computer.
probably see if its any good at being a media PC, the onboard radeon 3300 does play crysis , so movies will be easy.

luckily, my sister upgraded few month ago to a r5-1600 system. so i've got her old one (updated 'my system' listing on left) its the same 1090t that I was going to try in my AM2+ motherboard but it didn't have enough power phases to support it.
she also got a bunch of free games with it (well a steam voucher).

so a bit of bad luck bit of good luck.

[scaryjim]

tbh a surprising number of things do seem to fall out my way. To the extent that it's a trope within my that Jim falls in the jam. I always try to make sure I splash the jam about in those circumstances though - eventually I'll fall in something thatisn't jam, so the social capital's good to stock up

[peterb]

Is it perception? “Lucky” people tend to remember good things that happen, “unlucky” remember the bad, so feeding their own perception of lucky or not.

That said, one of my uni friends seemed to win when playing slot machines more often than he lost - but again, that might just be a perception in that I remember him winning, I don’t remember him losing.

[TeePee]

'You make your own luck', as the saying goes. But you also make your own Karma.

[Spreadie]

Is it perception? “Lucky” people tend to remember good things that happen, “unlucky” remember the bad, so feeding their own perception of lucky or not.

My view, exactly.

[Zak33]

'You make your own luck', as the saying goes. But you also make your own Karma.

this is it.... making your own Karma

I don't believe in God....any of them.

But there's a thing that happens.... a balance...I cant explain it better but you make your own luck and karma

[sammyc]

Will come back to this shortly but just to say (again), not really talking about THAT kind of luck. Shoulda called it "how is your timing" I guess. Even karma I'd only go so far along with you on, and actually not that far tbh; but self-determining if traffic lights go green for you - nah.

Also: have no idea why I felt the need to call my poll, Poll. Never called a thread Thread before

[virtuo]

I'm alive, reasonably healthy, good job, house, car and stunning good looks*. In that sense I am very lucky (and grateful).

But, my timing is terrible, I probably pay more for stuff than I should, get in trouble for things that aren't my fault, miss out on fun stuff and never win anything (other than the odd chassis on lovely Hexus). But none of that is really important.

[DanceswithUnix]

Even karma I'd only go so far along with you on, and actually not that far tbh; but self-determining if traffic lights go green for you - nah.

In a phased taffic management area, hitting red lights just mean to tend to speed (or drive like a snail).

Many years ago I heard of someone driving through Slough at 90mph wth green lights all the way, using the third harmonic of the traffic system that is tuned to keep people flowing at 30mph, but I don't believe it I presume these days it would be crawling with cameras to discourage that sort of shenanigans.

[sammyc]

was all ready to go ahead and purchase a r5-1600 system for a friend a week or so ago. sent him email saying 'ready when you are'. then the price dropped to £136 on amazon/ebuyer. so thought 'lucky him'
then get email back saying 'can we wait a bit'
day or so later the offer expires and goes back to full price.
then I find that asus rog reloaded offer.

so hes now getting the system he wanted at a price he was happy with, but i'll be getting the free games that come with it, of which there are a lot.
except scan haven't replied to the thread yet too see if I can get 2 free Assasins creed.


so who's the lucky one in this case?

Ah, that's one of them good thing/bad thing/who knows things. Yes, I will admit to instances where I have gotten in a froth about something similar and it has later turned vaguely to my advantage. Then you have a do a somewhat sheepish climbdown from your meltdown. Hope the new system is running at warp speed for you daresay the old one's innards have joined their fellow dismembered pc parts in the stevie shed. Mouseproofed hopefully.

Is it perception? “Lucky” people tend to remember good things that happen, “unlucky” remember the bad, so feeding their own perception of lucky or not.

That said, one of my uni friends seemed to win when playing slot machines more often than he lost - but again, that might just be a perception in that I remember him winning, I don’t remember him losing.

Again, I'll go along with that to a point. Certainly I agree you remember the times something went wrong more than the comparable ones that went right - getting outbid on ebay for example, always seems to be for the thing you really, really wanted, because not getting it adds that extra life or death desirability. But continuing with that example; there are countless times I've looked for an item and found that one had sold for opening bid, unusually cheaply, one day or even just hours before - yet I know for a sworn fact there are NO instances of the opposite, my finding a bargain, with no other bidders, and minutes to go.

[sammyc]

In a phased taffic management area, hitting red lights just mean to tend to speed (or drive like a snail).

Many years ago I heard of someone driving through Slough at 90mph wth green lights all the way, using the third harmonic of the traffic system that is tuned to keep people flowing at 30mph, but I don't believe it I presume these days it would be crawling with cameras to discourage that sort of shenanigans.

Ah, good point, should've specified this is from my non-driving standpoint, so I'm talking taxis/buses/others' cars. I occasionally forget all you top-dog driving sorts are of course the majority.

[Spud1]

Generally, yes I am one of those lucky ones everyone hates

Got a job that pays well and I also really enjoy - that magical combination. Own a house in a nice estate, and luckily have nice, quiet neighbors. In a nice stable long term relationship with no pressure on marriage/kids etc. Only a few friends but they are not backstabbers. Never been robbed/mugged. I've won loads of competitions in the past - a couple here on hexus, and even got through and won prize money on those old Quiz TV channels back when I was a student. Nearly always get a seat on trains, and don't usually get the overweight person next to me on budget airline flights.

Life isn't perfect but thats of my own making. When it comes down to things that you could assign to random chance/being the right place/right time..I seem to do pretty well out of it.

[MrComputerSaint]

I think you make your own opportunities, I like to think of this instead of making your own luck. You can work hard at whatever you do and make a lot of opportunities and this will create some things that succeed and some that fail.
If you sit on your arse and do nothing, you'll never be "lucky" because you don't have the opportunity to be lucky.