03-21-2016, 01:42 PM
![[Image: Los_Angeles_Venice_beach.jpg]](http://www.platinumtravel.ie/admin/shop/Los_Angeles_Venice_beach.jpg)
I think it´s time for me to share something that has been on my mind for a while now. I´m not the best person when it comes down to handling money and unfortunately that has led to my bank account going to red for the first time in a long time. I have never been someone who saves up some money for the rainy day.If I got money, I will spend it. Not all at once of course,but at the end of the month, my monthly salary is pretty much gone.
I think it all comes down to me being a nice guy who just wants to have fun, living in LA does not help that much. The team is full of playboys who like to party like rock stars. I try to keep up with everything they do since I think the more time you spend with your teammates, the better the results on ice will be. Spending time together creates chemistry and the overall atmosphere in the locker room is better when everybody gets along.
You can always have fun and be together without the need to spend a lot of money.That used to be the case when I first arrived into LA . We did not do anything that special usually, movies and few drinks was enough back then. Basically just group of guys having fun in the beautiful LA. I guess the older guys in the team wanted to protect me since I was a rookie and living on my own for the first time in my life. Slowly the things we used to do together got wilder and wilder. We were rich and living in a place where you can do everything you want, especially if you got money. I don´t want to open that subject anymore than that since I don´t want anybody to get into trouble, but I will say this, it was crazy how well we managed to play as a team when you think about what some of the guys were doing on a regular basis.
![[Image: ci-la-avalon.jpg]](http://www.residentadvisor.net/images/features/2012/ci-la-avalon.jpg)
I was perhaps the one who spent the most money when we were together and having fun. Or at least I don´t have anything left nowadays. Somebody might be wondering why didn´t nobody in LA do anything about the money spending and partying? Well, everybody in the team have to go through ´How to control your money´ class when they sign a contract here. On top of that, we actually have a person here who you can talk to about money whenever you want to. The partying was not perhaps as wild as I make it sound, I was the one who partied the hardest and usually passed out first. I´m not even sure if the other guys passed out ever when we were out together. I guess the coaching staff just did not notice a massive drop in our performance on ice to say something. Or maybe they did, but just did not want to make it public. I remember skating extra laps after each practice when everybody else was gone for solid three weeks. At the moment I thought they wanted me to work on my skating bit more and that was the reason I was skating extra. Now that I think about it, they more than likely knew what I was doing back then.Not sure if other guys had to go through something similar.
Partying was not the only thing that led to me losing all of my money. I used to spend a lot of money to clothes and various things you can find from internet. Games, music, HD porn and of course gambling. I used to be almost addicted to sport betting. I mostly betted on hockey and on games from other leagues since I did not want to get into trouble if I place bets on LA´s games or SHL games in general. I didn´t win that much and end of the day, I spent more money than managed to win.
![[Image: hermosa-beach-sunset-pier-0.jpg]](http://dtfjihky7xwic.cloudfront.net/sites/default/files/poi_images/hermosa-beach-sunset-pier-0.jpg)
Perhaps the worst purchase I have ever made was few years ago when I ordered 50 custom sticks from Italy. Handmade from the finest materials out there. Not 100% what kind of materials they used, but I spent 1k on each stick so in total over 50k on sticks. Perhaps not that bad, but I could not even use them since they were not made by all the regulations. They are still sitting in my garage with few other terrible things that I bought over the years. Another memorable one is a painting that I got from a friend. He asked if I would like to be a model for him so he could paint me? I of course went with it and agreed to model for him. Never done anything like that. I was quite shocked when he told me to get naked, but hanging in the LA locker room where nudity is full frontal and something you see every day, I did not have to think about it for too long. We did the whole thing during few weekends so it was not even that bad of a experience overall. My friend offered me a chance to buy the painting for 10k after it was done, I did not hesitate, I bought it.Now I have a massive nude painting of myself hanging in my garage.
I had to remove the painting from my living room since the painting was getting too much attention every time I had someone coming over. It´s a shame really, the whole painting fitted nicely into my living room.
Those are just few of the examples on what I was doing with my money. Looking back to that time, I wish I would have saved up some money. It´s easy to say that now when all the money is gone. Everything is not all bad though, I might not have any money to spend at the moment, but I don´t have any debts either. That is something that makes me feel bit proud. I used money like a crazy person, but managed to only spend the money I have. Did not get any loans or anything. I´m still a fairly young guy, got multiple seasons left of my career so I can potentially earn a lot of money and if I have learned anything from the past, I can save up some money for the future.
That is basically it, I have made some not so wise decisions with money in my past, but there is always hope about better future. I have weekly meetings with the financial instructor of LAP so I think its safe to say that my spending days are over.
(ready to be graded)
(1120ish words)
![[Image: this-detroit-neighborhood-is-so-bad-that...ip-off.jpg]](http://static6.businessinsider.com/image/52e2ab74ecad04343936f63f/this-detroit-neighborhood-is-so-bad-that-1-homes-could-be-a-rip-off.jpg)