“The line between gambling and investing is artificial and thin. Maybe the best definition of ‘investing’ is ‘gambling with the odds in your favor.’” –Michael Lewis

People think poker is exciting. For guys like me, it’s not. It’s a job. We play methodically, make as few mistakes as possible, and clock the fish most every time. Today, soon after waking up and giving my girlfriend a kiss, I logged on, bought in, and promptly lost $30,000. This happened as she was sitting at my side, staring at the computer screen, asking me to teach her how to play poker, wondering why I was doing what I was doing. The questions intensified as things turned around, I erased my losses, and finished $40,000 in the black.

Not to sound cocky or anything, but, for me, that $70,000 swing was about as exciting as finding a penny on Las Vegas Boulevard and as a predictable as a Spearmint Rhino stripper asking me if I want a lapdance. It’s definitely not gambling. By Michael Lewis’s definition, it’s more like investing.

This brings us to what really got me going today: The Big Short, a terrific new book by Michael Lewis (he’s a former Wall Street guy who wrote Liar’s Poker and Moneyball; he talks about The Big Short on 60 Minuteshttp://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6298082n&tag=related;photovideo). Basically, it tells the story of the recent economic collapse, focusing on an all too complicated scam that began with banks issuing mortgages to people who couldn’t afford them. Wall Street firms bought these grade-z mortgages and packaged them up into indecipherable bonds that looked like risk free investments. Fund managers were seduced into buying the bonds, and they, in turn, convinced individuals, pension funds, investment banks, and insurance companies to ante up for the pretty looking investments.

Ultimately, money was made at every turn — until the investors were left holding what were basically fancily wrapped bags of shit. The bankers and professional traders bought in as well, taking wild chances because they got compensated hugely if their bets paid off and got compensated less hugely if they didn’t. But none of their own money was at risk, so they took absurd gambits with other people’s finances.

What makes the book interesting is that it centers on really smart guys who were the first ones to recognize these bonds for the worthless garbage they were. The smart guys shorted the bonds; the dumb guys happily allowed them to. In the end, the smart guys made hundreds of millions, Wall Street firms got clobbered, and the government bailed out the Merrill Lynches of the world – where executives’ seven -, eight-, and nine-figure bonuses remained intact. The public got doubly screwed, first losing on their investments and later losing on their tax dollars that went to save the Wall Street companies.

I don’t care what anybody says, I think that bailing out the system is absurd. Wall Street isn’t being made to pay a price for its recklessness. It would be like a stranger giving me $5-million as a bankroll with which to play poker for a month. If I win, we split the profits. If I lose, there are no hard feelings and no payback. Of course I’d take the biggest risks for the biggest returns. I’d be freerolling like some MBA suit on the Street!

Reading the book got me to thinking about all the people who give me advice on what to do with my poker winnings. Nine out of 10 times I’m told to buy stocks, buy bonds, buy real estate, buy mutual funds, do anything but leave it in my box at Bellagio. I’ve never listened. I always had a suspicion that investing in anything I didn’t understand makes me a sucker. I’ve spent a lot of hours at poker tables and I’ve seen countless fish who think they know what they’re doing, only to go busto by trying to beat games they don’t understand. This book makes me more comfortable than ever with the decisions that I’ve made on what to do with my money.

At the risk of sounding arrogant, I’ve long thought of the average person as being stupid or at least not smart enough to recognize what he doesn’t understand. Poker is a game that provides quick, empirical, largely irrefutable evidence about how good, how smart, and how skilled you really are. The game has shaped the way I think about money and people and investing. I’ll argue that I’m a better person for it.