2019 Honda CRV. 56k miles.
Hello everyone. As the title says, All of my dashboard lights are on.
Last weekend all of my dashboard lights popped up. I went to auto zone to get it diagnosed. It came back as a piston one misfire code. I brought it to the mechanic. Mechanic replaced all of my spark plugs and the ignition coil. Lights go off, car runs fine.
The next morning I remote start the car. It goes, but then shuts off a minute into it. All of the lights return. I bring it back to the mechanic. He looks at it, hooks it up to the computer, road tests it, everything is fine. Doesn't charge me for the follow up. Says if it comes back on to bring it back monday. Lights go off. I did a decent amount of driving for a few days, everything is fine.
This morning I turn on the car, the lights come back on. I go back to autozone for a diagnostic...it comes back as a piston one misfire. I explain I had it repaired. Autozone guy asked if it is a duralast engine coil. Turns out that it was indeed a duralast one. He says that may be the issue as they had people bring those back. He listed some OEM parts (don't know what this means) but said not to use after market parts. He suggested I go to the dealership to purchase an ignition coil, go back to my mechanic, and have him put it in.

1. Does this make sense?
2. Do I have to go to the dealer? They are closed today?
3. Can I purchase another type of coil and if so what would be a good one/where can I get it?

TYIA
EDIT: Autozone said they have Hitachi OEM rated ignition coils

Hey everyone, this will be my first attempt at a serious post on this sub. I’m not exactly practiced in articulating my thoughts (I’m more of a fiction writer) so please bear bull with any mistakes and please correct me if I’m wrong. The last thing I want to do is spread misinformation, I’m not an expert (or a financial advisor) on any of this. I'm here to learn, not to teach.
This post will be the first in a series of me reading through the entire Diamond Handbook (2nd) and just commentating on points I find interesting or discussion worthy. I will be asking questions as well as giving my own personal thoughts based on my understanding of the events that have transpired. I became an ape right after the sneeze, and followed a lot of the discussions back then, but have been zen for a while so I haven't fully kept up with a lot of the new developments.
I haven't actually sat down and read DD in a long time, so I decided to give myself a refresher and actually look at the Diamond Handbook (2nd) for the first time. I had read a lot of these posts as they had come out, so I had never felt the need to look at the full PDF before. For the apes that haven’t read it either, I recommend giving it a read. You can find the full DD library in the pinned post of this sub, and the Diamond Handbook is the first one there.
As I have been reading it, I’ve quickly realized that some of the stuff is a little outdated. That can’t really be helped since so much DD has been done between then and now, but this brings me to the two reasons for this post. The Diamond Handbook is likely the first piece of DD a new ape will be recommended; I want to spark discussion to clear up some things that are misguided or outdated in this handbook. The second reason is more of a personal challenge. Whenever someone denies the legitimacy of the DD, an ape usually responds by saying something like “Well, read the DD and prove it wrong”. The average MOASS denier won’t do this though, in my experience they just think it’s ridiculous on a conceptual level, and won’t take the time to actually look through all the DD available and construct a proper debate. I can’t really blame them for this though, spending so much time on something you have no interest in doesn’t sound like a fun time.
But I have a lot of interest in this, and I am an aspiring author who writes 400K word fanfictions for fun. I’ve got the time and the writing willpower. I am very big into trying to understand how a reader will interpret a piece of my writing, so I’ll be looking through that lens and will be writing this with the assumption that you have already read the Diamond Handbook (2nd). Please take the time to respond/correct what I say here, I want to learn.
With all that out of the way, let’s get started.
​
The Mother of All Short Squeezes (MOASS) Thesis, Published on May 26, 2021, by u(slash)HCMF_MACEFACE
Before we even get into the meat of this section I already see a bit of an issue. A lot of the language implies that MOASS is imminent, take this section for example:

*“If you don't believe me, just look at the chart of GME which our DD (Due Diligence/research/analysis) has been forecasting for a while now. The below pattern has only preceded massive spikes in price, but this time, those on the other side of the trade are going to have a much harder time suppressing the price like they did in January and March. Thanks to the activity on 5/25, we have entered the end-game. The MOASS is beginning.”* 

I think most new apes will look at this, then look at the date of posting (three years ago), and think this is delusional thinking. They will say that MOASS did not ‘begin’ because it hasn’t happened yet. This would be pretty short sighted though, GME has always been a Deep Value investment, long positions are called long for a reason. ‘Buy and HODL’ is such a repeated mantra because that is the investment strategy most apes employ. Like most investments, it takes a long time to realize gains. Your retirement account will be growing for 40+ years before you cash that thing out, GME is my retirement plan so I don’t expect it to be much different.
Just because the sneeze happened in a week doesn’t mean MOASS will, in theory it should be a very long event as both the shorts and longs have a test of wills to see who caves first. However, the sneeze was the ‘beginning’ because it was exposed a lot of the fuckery that is going on in the market right now, I think that is the message that should be taken from this section.

*“These terms are key to understanding the theory and speculated value of a GME investment. Hyperlinks to Investopedia, "the world's leading source of financial content on the web", have been included for most market terms and concepts and it is recommended to check them out if they are not clear. We will be breaking down some of the more complex terms and concepts within the post and framing them within the context of GME.”* 

After the introduction, this post does a great job of explaining all the concepts of the stock market that are relevant to the MOASS thesis. However, I do wish it mentioned some other stock terms for the sake of new investors. Since none of the DD is supposed to be financial advice, I can’t really blame them for these omissions, but at the beginning the OP does say they wanted the post to be good for newer investors, so I think some more pointing in the right direction should’ve been provided. I do appreciate the link to Investopedia, but this DD is already a novel, and the average reader might forget about that link by the time they finish it. So an additional link should’ve been provided at the end.
The two big concepts I see missing are Options and Wash Sales/Stop-Losses.
Options are interesting because they create a different type of buying/selling pressure compared to just buying/selling stocks regularly. There are concepts like gamma ramps and stuff that can be relevant when discussing catalysts for price movement. However, options are pretty scary for most investors, I’ve only ever bought one, and forgot about it so it auto-exercised for me (lol), so it’s not a concept I would call essential. I just think it’s better to be educated than not.
The much more egregious omission is that of Wash Sales and Stop-Losses. Wash Sales are extremely dangerous to new investors who still make decisions based on emotions and are not used to the volatility that comes with GME.
If you are unfamiliar, a Wash Sale is when a person sells a stock at a loss, then buys the stock again within a short period of time. As an example, let’s say you bought a stock at $50, then the stock goes down to $40.00 and you no longer feel comfortable with your investment. You sell the stock at a loss. You lost $10.00 on this transaction, but it’s not all bad. When you go to do your taxes, you can report this $10.00 loss to the IRS. This is good because if you make a $10.00 profit off another trade, you now don’t have to take taxes out of that profit, since the IRS will see this as you breaking even in the grand scheme of your portfolio. You didn’t actually make any money, so they aren’t going to tax you for it.
A Wash Sale is triggered when you buy back the stock you sold in a short period of time, this can even apply if you buy a stock in the same sector. So if you buy a stock at $50.00, sell it at $40.00 then buy it again. That $10.00 loss you took can no longer be reported to the IRS as an actual loss. So when you make $10.00 on some other trade, the IRS won’t see you as breaking even, they will tax you on that $10.00.
For a stock as volatile as GME this can be very dangerous, I know people who brought in the peak, then as the price went back down they triggered a Stop-Loss (auto-sale you can program to trigger when a price falls), only to then buy back in when the stock dropped even lower, creating a wash sale that fucked their taxes.
We say “Buy and HODL” a lot, but I think the ‘why’ of it has been lost in the meme. I personally buy and HODL because averaging down is a lot better for me than accidently triggering a Wash Sale. I fucking hate the IRS and don’t want any of that smoke.

*“SPOILER: GME and \[Popcorn\] have tons of FTDs reported.”* 

I just kinda don’t like the mention of the Popcorn stock here, it has never been a deep value investment. If you are unfamiliar with the Deep Value investment strategy, please take a look at the old Roaring Kitty livestreams. In summary, Deep Value investing is defined by looking for stocks that are extremely undervalued and unpopular due to no fault of the company. These external factors that are making the stock undervalued can be anything, shorting, COVID, stuff like that. But what makes it a Deep Value investment is always strong management within the company. If the company is not mismanaged in any way, then it is very unlikely to go bankrupt, and will have opportunities to make a comeback. GME has Ryan Cohen leading, a proven successful businessman that has already taken precautions to ensure GameStop never goes bankrupt. Popcorn just doesn’t have that. It is very short-squeezable, but it’s not deep fucking value.

*“Short sellers must eventually close, or cover, their short position.”* 

Ok, but why ‘must’ they? This is another point I think has been lost in the memes. There are two problems with just saying ‘shorts must close’ without providing context. The first is the simple fact that there isn’t a due date. Unlike a common car loan or mortgage, a short position doesn’t operate on a time table. They can wait forever to close, unless they get margin called.
This next part I’m a little shaky on, I’m probably getting some things wrong here:
Ok, well how are they going to get margin called? The problem I see is that these Short Hedge Funds (SHF) are making a lot of money by selling naked shorts. It’s really hard to get margin called when they are literally printing money, and since they don’t have to report these their books just look to be filled with an infinite amount of cash.
So, there are a couple solutions to this:
1, Government regulation. If the SEC puts a stop to naked shorting, these SHF can’t print money anymore. Eventually the interest from their positions will eat them alive, and they will get margin called. Unfortunately, MOASS has the potential to destroy the economy like in 2008, so they probably aren’t too keen on just doing this without creating some kind of safety net. So I can’t really count on them to help, because the government has a vested interest in keeping MOASS from happening. It’s just not something I believe will be the catalyst. Although they might just do it on purpose given the right reason, like pinning the economic collapse on a scapegoat, or by GameStop forcing their hand by exposing the fraud somehow. I’ve seen a lot of apes hoping for one of these reasons to come to pass, but for me, I don’t see enough motivation from the participating parties.
2, A price run-up. If the price of the stock can unbalance the books of the SHF enough then they could also get margin called. I’m not counting on this either, since the price is manipulated by the process of naked shorting. Sure, they are digging a bigger grave when they suppress the price like this, but it can also help smaller SHFs with exiting their positions with OTC stuff. Over-The-Counter trades are trades made off the lit exchanges, historically it was intended to kind of simulate a transaction between two individuals, like buying a video game from a buddy off the books, no taxes, no regulation. Unfortunately, this is abused by institutions and can’t even be used by individuals, making dark pools of trades full of fraud and undermines the free market. Smaller SHFs that are more at risk of getting Margin Called due to their lack of collateral, can make OTC trades with the big naked-shorting market makers to ‘close’ their positions using fake shares. Of course, this only passes the buck so to speak, but it’s a viable strategy for them since the big SHFs that take on these ‘bucks’ are less likely to get margin called. A lot of historic short squeezes happen because a small SHF gets margin called, then drives the price up and causes a bigger SHF to get called, and so on until they’re all in the grave. This is why I don’t really give a shit if the price goes up to $80 in a week, it’s not enough, the buck has been passed. (To be clear, I don’t have proof that this is the reason for the uptick in OTC transactions, it’s just a theory. If a smarter ape than I can get on this that would be great.) But, even if a price run-up itself doesn’t cause MOASS, it may give motivation for the true trigger:
3, Interest Rates. Here is the big one that I look at, that I believe will be the true cause of MOASS. Now please, correct me if I’m wrong again, I am just an ape who dropped out of college. So, from what I understand a Short institution has to pay a certain amount of interest to the people they borrow the stocks from. This is the cost of borrowing and is how these Lenders make money. For a long time, the interest rate was at like 1%, this means that selling one naked short could cover the cost of the interest 100 times over. However, let’s say that the interest rate becomes 110%, sounds crazy, but this would mean that borrowing the share would cost more than the share. This would destroy the balances of the SHFs and ensure they get margin called. Why would this ever happen though? Because these lenders want to make money. These lenders are the real winners of MOASS, and they aren’t talked about enough in my opinion. Lenders can’t sell the shares they’ve lent out, their income is in the interest rates, there has to be a balance here between it being more profitable to lend the shares or to sell them. If Lenders start to think that lending their shares aren’t making them more money than the alternative, they will raise interest rates to make these profits until SHFs can’t pay them, then the SHFs have to return the shares, causing MOASS with the massive buyback, then lenders can just sell the shares on the way down. Lenders have a monetary business interest in causing MOASS, so they are the most likely cause of it in my opinion.

*“This is the GME MOASS thesis. GME is a stock that stands to hit an unprecedented price point due to the fact that manipulators of the market have failed to bankrupt GameStop thanks in huge part to the Legendary Keith Gill AKA* u(slash)DeepFuckingValue*, Ryan Cohen, and all of the GME investors who took part in this saga. It may not be today, this week, or even this month, but one day soon, these toxic participants have no choice but to buy the stock to close out their short positions.”* 

I don’t think this is necessarily inaccurate, but I think it’s misguided, and the language here is a bit to emotive for my taste. I think the reason the company didn’t go bankrupt is because of the strategic share offering made by Ryan Cohen to build up more cash than the company’s valuation (at the time). All the other stuff was just dressing, DFV and retail did not make RC do this, this move by RC is what ensured the company literally can’t go bankrupt, until then (and at the time this was posted) it was still a risk in my opinion. So this huge thanks feels kinda like a pre-cum celebration, and I've never really liked putting Keith on a pedestal, he's just an individual investor, just like the rest of us.
​
FAQ, Published April 12, 2021, by u(slash)BYE_TRIANGLE

*“Why does Holding do anything?”* *“They need your shares to cover their short positions! They got greedy. Thinking GameStop would fail, the short sellers started Naked Shorting the stock. Long story short they created synthetic stocks with their special privileges as Market Makers. But they can’t cover a short with a synthetic share. So because of the Naked Shorting, the Short Sellers, multiple large greedy money managers, and Hedge Funds need a total number of shares greater than the number available to purchase. THEY NEED EVERY SHARE, EVEN YOURS CONAN!”* *“aRe YoU GuYs MaNipuLatIng THe MaRKeT?!”* 

Holding does something else that I think is really important. It proves that retail is not responsible for the manipulation of the price. You see it in the mainstream media every time the price fluctuates, they say that retail and Roaring Kitty is driving the price up for the memes, and that the ‘meme stock craze is dead’ whenever the price falls, claiming that retail is selling. However, it quickly becomes clear to anyone with the willingness to research that retail holds. Holding doesn’t move the price at all, so they literally can’t blame this sub for the fuckery that happens.
Now, on the flip side, I know people on the old sub to buy and sell with these fluctuations, they did it during the sneeze and I’ve seen comments claiming to do it last week. I think this is why Roaring Kitty really had to speak to congress about this, because a legitimate-seeming argument could be made that retail was buying and selling at high volumes. The loss and gain porn on the old sub could be presented as evidence. Here though, apes hold, we glaze purple doughnuts.
So when MOASS does happen, the massive price increase will be only due to buying pressure from SHFs, so they are the only ones that can take the blame for what happens next.

*“No one knows how high the squeeze could take the stock price. The best rational reasoning says that these numbers \[500k per share\] are possible through the laws of supply and demand. Furthermore, it is likely that the Short Percentage is a lot higher than reported, with many suggesting that the short-sellers, cumulatively, need more than 100% of the float to cover.”* 

A lot of naysayers will claim people are insane for thinking that phone number prices are possible. They will cite that it would make the company’s valuation higher than the amount of money in the world, which is true. However, with the nature of fraudulent naked shorts being fake, the price is fake too, and the valuation of the company doesn’t necessarily mean that the whole float will be sold at those prices. Yes, it shouldn’t be possible, by all accounts it wouldn’t make sense, but it is possible due to the naked shorting. Also, institutions that own shares likely won’t HODL out for the phone number prices, they will sell when they think it’s safe, and when they won’t get in trouble with the SEC for destroying the economy. The infinity pool (the shares that will be sold at these prices) will be a small fraction of the total amount even among retail investors. So the argument that I see against the possibility of this doesn’t hold a lot of weight.
Keep in mind that even though ‘buying pressure’ moves the price up, someone has to be willing to sell in order for someone to buy. So as the price creeps up from $100 to $1000 to $100000 to $8675309 someone will be selling on the way up to get there.

*“Synthetic long positions could be used to disguise their short positions as well, the mechanisms behind this practice utilize the options markets and could explain some of the crazy options activity that we have seen in GameStop the last few months.”* 

So uhm… I don’t understand ‘Synthetic Longs’ at all. Could an ape with more wrinkles elaborate on this? From what I can extrapolate, this may refer to an institution purchasing a naked shorted share from someone else?

*“While at the same time they employed the use of social engineering to slowly depress the positive sentiment for the stock on Reddit and elsewhere.”* *“You may have been called a Shill for one of a number of reasons. This community is very inclusive and open to everyone, but because of the blatant attacks this forum has suffered a lot of people are understandably paranoid. (Myself included). Please, unless you really are a shill, don’t take it personally.”* 

I want to address this, because there is a lot of misconception about SuperStonk. A lot of people will claim that this sub is just an echo chamber cult that can’t handle anyone questioning the narrative. This may seem true on the surface, but I think the reality is just that we’ve become hyper sensitive to the social engineering the old sub fell victim to, and I remember this sub being attacked with that as well. So whenever we see a post that has extremely emotive language, we become skeptical and down vote it. Emotions have no place in investing, that is a common rule touted in even the oldest investing books, so posts that try to incite an emotional response are shot down. Apes aren’t about to be manipulated again. That being said there are emotive posts that still get upvoted, ones with positive hype-filled narratives. Since these get upvoted and the negative ones don’t that sometimes gives the impression of an echo chamber. This is because the facts do support the MOASS thesis, so a hype title and opening paragraph is just more agreeable with the facts-based narrative. Some people are just scrolling on their phone and don’t have time to read the whole post.
However, if you go into the comments of these posts, there are apes investigating the profile history to determine if posters are bots, regardless of the pushed narrative. If you look past the upvote counter, apes are very skeptical of any post that isn’t based in fact or harmless memes. The comments rule the post, and I have to say I’ve very proud of this sub for staying vigilant in the wake of Reddit restricting moderation tools.

*“Ryan Cohen clearly believes in Gamestop, to the point of announcing that he will be taking equity as compensation. In fact, as of writing this all of the new Gamestop board members are going to be taking equity as compensation. This is seen as an incredibly bullish sign of the company's future success.”* 

This is one of the principles of Deep Value investing, I wish this was elaborated on more of why this is bullish. This means that the board, and more importantly Ryan Cohen, is tying their individual self-worth to the company. Due to this tie, they will essentially ‘go down with the ship’ if the company goes down. This means that the board and Ryan actually have an interest in the company doing well, instead of having an interest in making money off the company. You may think this sounds like the same thing, but it’s not. If RC cared more about money than the company, then he could destroy the company to make money (this is what’s happening to popcorn), but by tying his worth to the shares, the only way for him to become richer is for the company to flourish.
I don’t really like the language being used here, stuff like ‘clearly believes’ ‘seen as incredibly bullish’ are all pretty emotive and doesn’t actually explain why these are positive growth signs for the company, they are just saying it is ‘bullish’, the average new investor isn’t even going to know what that really means. Even though GME is extremely manipulated, causing Technical Analysis to become increasingly difficult to depend on, the investment is still rooted in fundamentals of deep value.

*“Below is a shortlist of some of the potential catalysts people are speculating about:* 

-A Stock Split, or some similar move from Gamestop that recalls shares
-Gamma Squeeze
-Gamestop’s Q1 Earnings Call
-Some speculate Gary Gensler (Newly appointed head of the SEC), may make some move that sets things in motion
-DTCC rule changes taking effect
-Appointment of a new CEO”
Yeah… this feels bad man. I’ve talked about this already, but we can rapid fire down this list.
The stock split didn’t work out, since those in charge of distributing the splits did it fraudulently. Gamma Squeeze is the kind of thing that could trigger a smaller hedge fund to get margin called and cause a domino effect, but I’ve shared my theory of the OTC action. Earnings are nice, but public sentiment has always been more tied to the media manipulation than actual facts. Fucking Gary.
On the subject of bringing in new talent, I do feel like a big move will happen soon. We’ve already seen a lot of job offerings from the Corporate side of GameStop so this could be the next phase of the plan. I really think that RC has spent these last few years taking precautions to make sure the company can’t go bankrupt, the last thing he wants is to turn out like Toys-R-Us. A lot of downsizing happened, so now he can start thinking about upsizing again.
I’m not necessarily saying that these things can’t trigger the squeeze, but I am saying that depending on something to start it is just inviting disappointment. I think the ‘no dates’ rule has been sorely forgotten lately with all the hype and speculation around Roaring Kitty’s tweets and stuff. I am a zen ape, it happens when it happens.

*“First of all, it is incredibly important to note your potential biases when determining if someone is just a shill trying to spread FUD. Not all FUD is invalid, someone may bring up a solid point against an otherwise great DD, and that could scare you. Remember that just because you do not like what someone is saying, doesn’t make it invalid. It is important users here work with constructive criticism to refine their theories.”* 

Damn, wasn’t I just talking about this? This critique isn’t going to just be wagging fingers, this is really good stuff that still applies today, and from what I’ve seen apes are doing a great job of distinguishing between FUD and legitimate criticism. I also want to take a second to thank the mod team, especially after their tools were restricted, they’ve been a great help.

*“…but since then retail investors have been buying on every single dip in the price… That's more than two whole months of buying-the-dip. Now, I will not speculate on numbers here, if you want to know more you will have to read the DDs on that.”* 

This is pretty outdated now. Apes have been buying for three years now, and with the advent of Direct Registering we have a much better idea of how much apes hold. I can say with confidence now that retail owns a floats worth of shares. Since there is so much naked shorting, a lot of institutions probably own their own floats too.
I glaze those purple doughnuts, yum.
​
Citadel Has No Clothes, Published March 14, 2021, by u(slash)ATOBITT
Ohhhh, this one is special to me, I read it when it first came out, first time I was there on release night. Let’s see how it hodls up.

*“TL;DR - Citadel Securities has been fined 58 times for violating FINRA, REGSHO & SEC regulations. Several instances are documented as 'willful' naked shorting. In Dec 2020 they reported an increase in their short position of 127.57% YOY, and I'm calling bullsh\*t on their shenanigans.”* 

58 times. I don’t actually know how much that number has gone up, but I’m sure it has. I am reminded of an old saying, that if the punishment for a crime is a fine, then it only a crime for the poor. The crime being done to GME is class warfare, it’s nothing less.

*“$295,347,948,000 of that is split into options (calls & puts), while $78,979,887,238 (20.52%) is allocated to actual, physical, shares (or so they say). The rest is convertible debt securities.”* 

This is why I’m skeptical that it’s even possible for Citadel to get margin called by a normal price run-up. Let’s do some math here. GME’s float is at 232 million-ish shares, let’s say they shorted 300% of that, just to be conservative (lmao), so that’s 696 million. To take what the first post said, Margins don’t get called unless an entities’ collateral becomes less than 80% of what they’ve borrowed. If they use their entire $384,926,232,238 portfolio as collateral, then GME would have to soar to a price of… divide by 4, multiply by 5… $691.32 per share. That may sound relatively reasonable, but I don’t think a normal catalyst would be enough for that. I really think interest rates are the key, think about it, if they have to pay like 30% interest on all of those shares, their portfolio will be reduced by that much (kinda) and we can find a much more reasonable midpoint. Now brace yourselves, I’m about to spend an unreasonable amount of effort on something that is probably wrong because I don’t know shit about fuck about margins or getting called (I have a cash account and I lack rizz).
In order to calculate that we gotta do one of those double equation variable bullshit things we all hated in school, I forgot what they were called but I remember how to do them.
So, we have a few variables:
C = Citadel’s Portfolio = $384,926,232,238
S = Shorted Shares = 696,000,000
I = Intrest = 0.30
X = Price Per Share
Y = Citadel’s new portfolio amount after paying interest
So, X and Y are undetermined, but we have two equations to work with
C – I(X*S) = Y
This one calculates how much money is going to be in citadels new portfolio after paying interest, we calculate the interest by multiplying the cost per share, by the amount of shorted shares, and multiplying that by the interest rate, then subtracting it from their total portfolio.
Y * 1.25 = X * S
This one calculates the total amount those shorted shares have to be in order for Citadel to get margin called, by multiplying their new portfolio by 5/4 and calculating the total cost of the shares.
X * S has a direct value; we can plug the left side of the second equation into the first to get
C – I(Y*1.25) = Y
Now we just gotta isolate Y on one side of the equation.
C = Y + 0.3(Y*1.25)
C = 1.3Y * 0.375
C= 0.4875Y
C * 0.4875 = Y
Y = $187,651,538,216.03
Now we gotta find X, we can just plug in the other stuff.
(Y* 1.25)/ 696,000,000 = X
X = $337.02 per share for shitadel to get margin called on 30% interest.
Holy shit, now that’s what I call reasonable. See how much interest can completely fuck a portfolio? They lost almost half of their portfolio value to a 30% interest to this. This is why the whole market will bleed red on the run up to MOASS, they will have to sell half of their portfolio just to pay the interest.
Citadel is probably not a good example of this, since they print the naked shorts themselves... so they would be paying interest to... themselves... when they borrow them? Citadel is so fucked up, I don't have enough wrinkles for this.
But hey, I think the concept of what I said is fine. High interest rates can reduce collateral and cause margin calls. Hey, just out of curiosity, how much is the borrowing interest rate looking now?
16.5%
SHF are fucked.
​
Anyway, I’m writing this on a Wordpad document so I’m not sure if I’ve come up on the character limit, but I think I’m getting close so I’ll end this part here. Please let me know what I’ve got wrong or any insights you want to share, I’ll be sure to talk about any interesting comments when I do a part 2!
TLDR: I am reviewing the Diamond Handbook (2nd) and seeing what has changed in the three years since it’s been compiled. I have a bias in thinking that high borrowing interest rates are what will cause MOASS, and that is shown here. This is not meant to be an impartial analysis, just my thoughts. Not financial advice.

I bought an Inspiron 3650 without an internal optical drive, and I would like to add one. Could someone point me to the exact part that I would need? An example eBay auction, for instance.

Hi was buying a few items on bricklink and I was wondering if when I'm buying through bricklink and I click "auto-select" if I can have my favourite stores be the only ones auto-selected. The stores I have favourited are ones I'm going to order from already and there is just a few parts (200parts in about 80lots) I want to get but want to maximise on the shipping cost I'm already paying for the 10 other stores I'm buying from. Thanks for your help

Located in midwest. What is this tiger head rug's fair market auction range value, and is it legal to sell by auction in the same state it's located in? The tiger rug is about 5' long and 2.5' wide (that is the body and doesn't include the parts that stick out like the head and the legs and tail. It's been in one family for over 50 years...

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Race information

• What? 3 Days at the Fair 50K
• When? May 18, 2024 ‡
• How far? 31.1mi
• Where? Augusta, NJ
• Website: https://sites.google.com/site/njtrailseries/fair
• Strava activity: https://www.strava.com/activities/11441314526
• Finish time: 4:40:46

Goals

Goal	Description	Completed?
A	4:30:00	No
B	< 5 hours	Yes

Splits

Mile	Time
1	0:39 *
2	7:33
3	7:31
4	8:01
5	7:45
6	7:56
7	8:08
8	8:00
9	8:00
10	8:27
11	8:04
12	8:11
13	8:08
14	8:10
15	8:06
16	8:10
17	8:43
18	8:09
19	8:40
20	8:21
21	8:38
22	8:39
23	9:06
24	9:05
25	9:56
26	9:45
27	9:40
28	10:16
29	11:07
30	10:20
31	11:46
32	11:00
33	6:30 **

• "Lap 1" was from the 50K start to the timing mat. ** "Lap 33" was the remainder from my GPS watch auto-split to the end of the lap/race. ‡ "3 Days at the Fair" went from 13 May to 19 May 2024 (yep!). I was there 18 May.

Training

This was a spring full of sharp turns and hard knocks. The original training went towards the Cheap Marathon in Derry, NH. (That race was reported upon by flocculus here.) Training then consisted of maintaining 30-40 weekly miles, with a weekly long run adding two miles from the prior week, with some fluctuation. My hometown is quite hilly, so I foregone specific hill training as all of my runs were not near flat. My final long run was 21.5 miles March 6 before tapering down my weekly long runs.
A freak snowstorm delayed the Cheap Marathon from 4/6 to 4/20, however on 4/9 I fell in my gym shower. Either a rib contusion or hairline fracture paused any running or training for nearly two weeks. Scrambling for some sort of race to scratch the itch and not toss away months of prior training, I found 3 Days at the Fair online – a six day affair featuring ultramarathon categories from 50K to 144H races. They offered a marathon category, with an alluring 50K at similar start times. Naturally, I signed up for shy of 5 more miles than a marathon. One of my running mates gave me the best advice that "ultra running is more of an eating contest than anything else." Considering that during prior marathons I had salt tabs and 3 or 4 GU packets, I thought more about this statement. Hoping my ribs and legs would stand up, I went for the race.
Note: If registering for this race, you can choose the specific date and time you wish to start it. Just stick to that time. I would end up toeing the line with three other 50K runners who opted for the Saturday 9AM start. One could have theoretically started their run any day between Monday and Saturday, at 9AM or 6PM.

Pre-race

The Sussex County NJ fairgrounds were easy enough for me to get to. Those who were not running longer ultra races had plenty of parking mere steps from the registration/food/starting line. (Those running longer races have opportunities to park campers, tents, and so forth.) Weather was gray and cool, at 58˚F/14˚C -ish. I ended up playing with how I'd pack for the run, before noticing racks set up after the start line into which you could place your water bottle so as to not hold it the entire time.

Race

For check-in, I picked up my swag (a plush bathrobe) and timing ankle chip. No bibs here! At 8:50, marathoners and 50K'ers were brought to the respective start lines, 0.1 and 0.2 miles after the timing mat. At 9AM, we would run against the sea of all other runners back to the starting mat, turn around, and continue in the anti-clockwise 1 mile loop course. This is why marathons are 27 laps and 50K is 32 laps – that quarter lap registered as "lap 1 completed," so 31.1 miles registers as 32 at the end. I'm getting ahead of myself!
I found the course compelling enough to follow. After the timing mat, there is a short uphill that weaves past the toilet and shower area, and toward a hairpin. While the 'pin itself was set wide, most of the time I would walk it because of traffic or weakening knees. This continued straight past a Camper's Row of sorts with mild downhill. The second half runs a long arch around the grounds, with a gradual gentle uphill. The course is paved except for a 200m segment of packed gravel – if it had rained, this part could've been muddy. The course completed after a shot down a causeway, and left turning back to the mat. It's this area where registration, fuel/food/catering, and timing is displayed. Overall, no real potholes to be concerned about, just 31 total laps of this!
Hydration and food – tons of everything including Impossible Burgers, PB&J, cola, and sports vitamins – was supplied after the timing mat. I kept track of which lap I was on with a big-screen projection. My name, lap number, prior lap time, and total time appeared. Every 30 minutes or so I decided to take in calories. This included GU Rocktane, GU Vanilla (sooooo good), two stroopwaffels, two ice pops, and a few salt tabs. It was roughly 400 or so more calories than I would have consumed during a race. Hydration was also a factor, that the course was completely uncovered made me feel hotter and "drier" than normal. I might have taken on about 50 fl oz / 1.5 liters of water. My stomach tolerated this!
The main causeway/timing mat area is where I stopped for water and stowed my foods so I didn't have to carry it around. Early on, I didn't understand where the timing screen was, so took minor detours in the registration area. These factors are why my paces seem inconsistent by 30-odd seconds per mile at points.
The people here are amazing! Other runners were highly supportive, chatty, upbeat. One person was dressed up like a chicken (the race logo featured one), and another person blasted some pretty appropriate and popular tunes. It would be a game for me to guess the artist or song on every lap – we had a great banter going! Another group had a dry-erase board and changed it every few minutes or so with a new dad joke. Naturally, I had to stop to retort with another. For example, they wrote, "3.14% of sailors are pi-rates!" I replied, "if it's $4.50 in Jamaica for a beef patty, $3.50 in DR, and $2 in Trinidad, are those the pie rates of the Caribbean?" Sorry, not sorry.
The lack of proper training began to present itself around mile 22. Pacing was targeted at 8:00-8:15 per mile, with goal half-marathon splits at 1h45m or so. After mile 26, I was 3h40m44s, ten minutes off goal pace. Around that point I slowed, taking more walk breaks but promising myself to run at least half every lap. Landmarks were mentally set to designate where walking and running would occur. When I crossed the line I was done.

Post-race

From a mental standpoint, the concept of so many laps did not bother me. My daily runs more often than not are laps in my parking lot, and I've completed a few half marathons on traditional 400m tracks a few times prior – especially during the Global Pandemilovato of '20. Physically, my legs did not feel any worse than they would have after 26.2 miles. My stomach was actually doing quite alright – nausea and headache would set in within a few minutes of finishing other marathons, but not today. My buddy's advice is making me rethink my marathon strategy.
As the event is ultra-marathon focused, finishers of marathon and 50K received a coin. The longer the distance, the larger the coin, with special awards for those who have invested 100+ miles with the organization. (A paver brick [!] stamped with the runner's name is awarded after 1,500 miles with the organization.) Either way, I circled back to the registration area to press my luck at burger availability. Unfortunately they were out, yet making more. While at the beginning of the race the smell of bacon and pancakes wafted onto the line, the sweet smell of success – naturally, manifest as deliciously greasy burgers – greeted us at the end.
Post-race nutriton in my car included Gatorlyte electrolytes, SiS Rego Rapid recovery, and 1.5 liters of water. I opted against the on-site showers and made the long ride home for one which was far more satisfying.
EDIT: Added info about registration. EDIT 2: Grammar.

for the attention of BSG,
I would like to give you an overview of the PVE experience as a player.
I will list the PVE gameplay improvement points. Already, we can understand that Escape From Tarkov was not designed basically for PVE only. On the other hand, Escape From Tarkov has the potential to be excellent in PVE. You will tell me, What is missing? A greater potential of PVE, so a less predictable experience, less boring: I explain myself.
First of all, PMCs are on certain points of interest, and that’s it. They’re stationary all the time and they’re waiting. Now, what makes Tarkov so unique in multiplayer is that it may not happen like amazing things happen. You can cross anyone anywhere and in multiple ways. They should be able to move on the map at certain times for a certain purpose (round in the woods, taking information on the rocks, attacking or defending a point of interest, loot, extracts, clear the pieces in CQB) as in the modding world... Some say that they aim too well. I think that they should not come worse, except for remote full auto. They are easier than real experienced players, let’s be honest. And the relationship between PMC ia and scav... And what? They fight once in 10 times?
The equipment of the PMCs is logical, but the USECs could have weapons without or with little attachment. For the durability of the weapons, I understand the logic...
Let’s talk about the positives, the USECs work together, they use the VOICES lines and this part puts more in the game atmosphere. Sometimes they have good reactions. The scavs are better in PVE, I do not know if it is only an impression, but I have the impression that they are more upset, it is an impression and they are many. All quests and especially persistent progression. Hoping that my current opinion is useful to you. Thank you.

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Premetto che nel (lontano) 2022 io ho votato Meloni. Qualcuno potrà pensare che con quello che sto per scrivere, io mi sia bevuto il cervello (alcuni lo pensano a prescindere, ma tant'è). Ed invece è la dimostrazione che io non sono ciecamente fedele ad un’ideologia o ad un partito: io voto sui programmi e sulle azioni concrete. Oggi vorrei togliermi un paio di sassolini dalla scarpa su alcune proposte fatte circolare dal governo italiano in merito alle auto elettriche: “Tecnici del Mef al lavoro per una strategia destinata a traslare la tassazione dai carburanti ambientalmente dannosi ai nuovi propulsori green”. Ma come, invece che seguire l’esempio cinese, che da decenni pompa sussidi statali per incentivare la transizione ecologica, l’occidente studia modi per spremere gli acquirenti di queste tecnologie come un limone?
Ma scusate, allora a che cavolo servono i grandi proclami fatti dai parrucconi di tutto il mondo alle riunioni della COP? (che non è il supermercato sotto casa) Per carità, anche il Paese a stelle e strisce soffre di memoria corta: quando Trump, da presidente, impose pesanti dazi alle auto elettriche cinesi, eravamo tutti a strapparci i capelli per questa decisione scellerata. Ora Biden fa pure di peggio (dazi del 100%, una cosa assurda) ed i giornali neppure ne parlano, e le promesse alla COP sono solo un lontano ricordo, tutto in nome del solito portafogli.
Vorrei solo ricordare che Giorgia nel 2019 fece questo video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6UfnnyJ3lw
Beh? Non solo le accise non sono state tolte, ma se ne studiano di nuove per colpire le tecnologie più ecologiche. Certo, non si tratta di una novità: qui in America, molti stati hanno da tempo messo in campo imposte sui veicoli elettrici, che a loro dire, sono un segno di equità fiscale. Tutti i veicoli usano le strade, stando ai promotori di queste iniziative, però solo quelli a benzina pagano il costo della manutenzione, tramite le accise sui carburanti. Vero. Però allora si potrebbe dire che il costo sociale delle malattie causate dall’anidride carbonica emessa dalle auto a combustione viene anche pagato dai proprietari di auto elettriche, che di anidride carbonica durante la guida non ne producono.
Insomma, ci lamentiamo sempre di più di come la Cina stia superando l’occidente, grazie ad una campagna strategica messa in campo negli ultimi 30 anni, eppure non facciamo nulla per creare condizioni di mercato serie che consentano di recuperare, almeno in parte, il terreno perduto. Poi ci si mette anche l’Europa, con i suoi diktat secchi secondo cui bisognerà per forza passare tutti all’elettrico entro il 2035, e la frittata è fatta. Già, perché mentre l’abitante di Oslo ha uno stipendio che gli consente di permettersi di acquistare l’auto elettrica e paga la corrente pochi centesimi, l’abitante di Siracusa non può dire la stessa cosa, e non dispone di una rete capillare di colonnine che rendono l’elettrico possibile e conveniente. Per fortuna, almeno questo, la Meloni l’ha capito.

Payment demands from a freelance worker who has left to go to work elsewhere
Hey all so a situation has arisen with a former work colleague that I'm unsure how to handle from this point.
I'm in the motor trade and source vehicles and have trade accounts for parts and such things and have done for many many years, at the time we worked in a workshop employed for a company in England for years and i still did freelance stuff aside from my main job.
The company rented a work bay to a previous employee to do work in and that was separate from work as for years he'd previously worked for the company. He approached me asking me to source bid and collect 2 vehicles for him which I did do as I have trade accounts with auction houses and not the company, once back at the workshop he then wanted a list of parts ordering as he has no contacts or trade accounts anywhere so I wrote a list of parts he wanted worked out some pricing and told him the figures which he was fine with and he bank transfered me the money and I then ordered the parts.
After a weekend I came into the workshop about a month ago and found that over the weekend he'd emptied his bay and took his vehicles and basically left to go elsewhere, fair enough his decision. I get a message a few days ago from him demanding almost a full refund of monies as he hadn't had all of his parts (which turned up a day or so after he left). He's told me what he 'wants' in return as he's worked out I put a markup on the parts I got for him which I'm entitled to do so which I've told him they were my accounts and my time etc.
Where do I stand from here? I've also yet to bill him for the vehicles I sourced and collected but I can see that's a road to a dead end but. I charged him for parts he doesn't like the fact I've made some money off him which was still cheaper than retail as he's a profiteering business at the end of the day. He's got the rest of the parts from elsewhere so he wants a refund for what he hasn't had from me even though the parts are here, so basically where do I stand as this guy is being flat out unreasonable and insinuating threats torwards me now - other than money being sent to my account there's no paperchain of any sort I've done what hes asked so i don't feel he has any grounds for anything especially as a lot of this was done as a favour to him and knows that. I'm not that way inclined but I feel I'm within my right to tell him to jog on and leave me alone as clearly he's in over his head or short of cash, either way thr situation is not cool and not OK.

What I have: AA25aim90 HF AA2515vc Fixer Aristo2525 Hunting Rifle B4040 Ripper B15ap25 HM BE250 Submachine Gun BEmovement Western Revolver B2525 EPR prime,flamer,forceful,reflex + align auto boxmod E2525 50cal J2525 50cal J2590 Cryo J4040 Drill MSSS Super Sledge Q2550DR TSE50DR Combat Rifle VE25 LMG OE/stSent Raider Power LA OE/FireJWR USA RL Uny/peAWR Marine LL USA/FSA Mask Flux, Caps T51b parts Im looking for: OE/?/AWR Arms + Left leg. Forest Scout Armor parts Im looking for: Uny/?/AWR Chest and Right leg. (FSA only please)

🪞
Welcome back to the Asylum write-up, where we explore the decade-long slow-motion car crash that is the Emilie Autumn fandom.
Sorry this installment took so long to upload! Just a heads-up, I may take some time to deliver the last one too – these posts take forever to format on Reddit's finicky-ass editor, and my dumb real life is currently keeping me from precious Internet time. Thank you for your patience! You have my word that everyone who pre-ordered the final installment will receive a PERSONAL, HANDWRITTEN letter autographed and illustrated by me, a list of the snacks I consumed while composing this write-up, some exclusive behind-the-scenes secrets, and a pony.
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4.1 – Part 4.2 Part 5

Places, everyone This is a test Throw your stones Do your damage Your worst, and your best (...) And if I had a dollar For every time I repented the sin And commit the same crime I'd be sitting on top of the world today (“God Help Me”, 2006🎵)

Quick recap of where we left off. First, there were five to ten halcyon years of pleasant and meaningful interactions between EA and her blossoming fanbase, prominently by way of her official forum. Then, circa 2009-2010, EA's online presence shifted towards sudden anger outbursts, ban-hammering, and an increasingly top-down communication style.
This created a sort of primordial rift within the fanbase, between those who supported EA's right to speak her mind and regulate her own fan spaces however she pleased – and those who thought that her reactions were rude and inappropriate (at best), and that even fan spaces should allow for reasonable, non-abusive criticism of the artist.
Between a poorly-handled book release (see Part 3), the controversial (Part 2) or dubiously true (Part 4) contents of said book, and serious shade from various former collaborators (Part 5), more and more fans had pressing thoughts about EA's work ethic and choices. EA attempted damage control through drastic forum rules that made it virtually impossible to voice any “serious” critical opinion. It didn't work, of course: instead of squashing the mutiny, she created a schism.
Critical fans and active haters started congregating on unofficial platforms.

“WITH MUFFINS LIKE THIS, WHO NEEDS ENEMIES?”: TROLL LIKE A GIRL

So here we were, the early 2010s. The official forum (which had about 700 members in 2006, if you recall) was now thousands-strong, reaching just over 12,000 registered users in 2012 – not all of them active, but still. In terms of sheer numbers and content creation, the party was POPPIN'... but increasingly in parts of the Asylum that escaped EA's jurisdiction, such as Tumblr, where they could speak their mind freely.

You play the victim very well You've built your self-indulgent hell You wanted someone to understand you Well, be careful what you wish for, because I do (“I Know Where You Sleep”, 2006🎵)

In one wing of Asylum Tumblr, a smattering of call-out blogs emerged, which laid out EA's various lies, faux pas, shitty takes, and general deep-seated terribleness in detailed timelines and screenshots (or, short of that, long-winded bullet points). While many such blogs framed it as “serious” whistleblowing and did their best to remain as fact-based and neutral as they could, there was some genuine disgust, animosity and creepiness towards EA on that side of Tumblr; for some ex-fans, “exposing the truth” was mostly justify obsessive hatred, prying and verbal abuse. Some, for instance, felt the bizarre need to side with EA's mother in their estrangement. (One user, with the URL “emilyautumnfischkopf”, argued in a serious and down-to-earth tone - but with zero sources - that EA's upbringing had been nothing but peaceful and supportive until she ungratefully kicked her loving family to the curb for no reason at all. They were later revealed 🔍 to have an alternate handle as “eaisalyingcunt”.)
Either way, through these blogs, a number of potential drama bombs that had mostly flown under the radar were dredged up from over the years – some of which were hard to ignore, even for supportive fans. Where to begin?
There was that nonsense in-joke song, captured twice on camera during the 2009 tour (to very little outrage, at the time), crassly called “Manatee Retard”📺. Or EA's scathing response, in print, to a wheelchair user who found it insensitive that she used a bedazzled wheelchair as a prop to do sexy acrobatics on stage. (“Your offence taken at my hard-won self-acceptance proves that I indeed have something to fight against”, she wrote). Spoken word tracks where she made trivializing knock-knock jokes about serious mental illnesses she didn't have, like schizophrenia and OCD. Multiple instances of calling Britney Spears a “bimbo” and a “Hollywood fucked-up”, resentfully claiming that she only shaved her head because she was “hopped up on drugs” and certainly not because she was “bipolar”, a word the press liked to wield as an insult anyway. (“That's almost like calling someone a retard!” Yeah, heaven forbid.) The meanest, most distasteful paragraphs in the book. Basically everything problematic EA had ever said or written.📝 In retrospect, it had been a long time coming, but it was a lot to take in – and certainly more off-putting, even to less emotionally invested fans, than silly lies about her age and last name.
In another wing of Asylum Tumblr, some fans had had it up to here and just wanted to have fun. 🎵 If Plague Rats had learned one valuable lesson from EA, it was how to crack a joke in the face of absurd tragedy – and the general state of the EA fandom certainly warranted a few.
In 2012, Fight Like a Girl was released. After six long years, three of which had been peaceful, the Opheliac era was officially over. The new album and ensuing tour confirmed that the Asylum had entered a process of glamorous Broadway-style militarization. 🎵📺
The mood board was “Roman general meets Vegas showgirl meets Victorian street urchin”.🪞 The color palette was, to naysayers, “musty pink and rotten, stale piss yellow”. 🐀 The keyword was “REVENGE” (through the power of... self-expression! sorority! brutal assault with rusty medical implements!). The chorus of the title song had an intriguing run-on line about getting “revenge on the world, or at least 49% of the people in it” 🎵 – which seemed like an awful lot, and was widely interpreted (to cheers, boos, or uncomfortable sighs) as a misandrist jab at literally all men on Earth.
The show was essentially a demo version of the musical, in that the setlist vaguely reflected the order of events in the story – but prior reading was essential in order to get what the hell was going on on stage. This one Broadway reviewer had not perused the literature before seeing the show 🔍, and hated: the set, the choreography, the skits, the plot, the lyrics, the music, the concept. (Seriously, you should read the review. It's not even my show and I feel like quitting show business.)
Pre-show VIP encounters, now violin-free, were lorded over by EA's new manager🐀, whose official title was “Asylum Headmistress”. (Interesting choice – she sounds fun!) The swag bags were less substantial than before, and the “greet” part of the meet-and-greet was rarely more than a quick hug and photo op.
On Twitter, EA continued to embrace her “I am very badass” fronting attitude...

Often wonder if cyberbullies r aware they’re fucking w/ a girl who’s BFs w/ maker of the SAW films & is marrying a knife-throwing scorpion. (🐀📝)

...and her taste for needlessly inflammatory statements. About an aisle sign in a supermarket:

If this does not infuriate you, then you're a fucking potato.

(Again with the confounding crypto-ableism, EA! 🔍) She also went through a phase of raging against Lady Gaga 📝, who had stolen her idea of using a wheelchair on stage as an able-bodied woman. 🔍 That failed to convince anyone that she wasn't the histrionic diva that haters made her out to be.
Spurred on by EA's rallying cries and “us vs them” mentality, loyalists turned the white-knighting up to 11. On Twitter, some Plague Rats got into cat fights with Lady Gaga's Little Monsters (what a time to be alive). Others tried to balance out the Tumblr negativity with initiatives like “Spreading a Plague of Love” – a “positive-only” confession blog, whose extreme fangirling, comically drastic rules and hyper-defensive tone📝 did not debunk the increasingly popular notion that “true Plague Rats” were a bunch of authoritarian and hopelessly brainwashed fanatics.
EA truthers and other anti-fans started lashing out at anyone who dared express any positive opinion of EA, solidifying claims that the backlash against EA was just a conspiracy of bitter, hysterical bullies.
All this to say: every passing day brought new reasons for fans to get mad at EA and each other, and everyone in the Asylum was in need of a laugh. It's not easy having a good time.🦠
Leading up to Fight Like a Girl and in the years that followed, user-submission-based meme blogs took off, most notably “Spreading a Plague of Lulz / Troll Like a Girl”. A lot of the early submissions were absurdist humor and toothless, cheezburger-Impact memes (a style that was, oddly, already dated at the time). Those often originated in good fun, and from loyal fans, on the official forum. But there was also true snark, satirizing EA's questionable ethics, outrageous claims, and easily spoofed artistic gimmicks. A new slang of Asylumspeak emerged: Glittertits (slight NSFW), GAGA!!, EA Gusta and all its memeface variants, Get outta mah house!, Are You Suffering?, Fight Like A Goat, [Random celebrity] copied EA (a subgenre in its own right), ...
Most of the “trolling” was directed at unrepentant bootlickers and, to a lesser extent, red-in-the-face haters and creeps. Meme blogs would post joke comments under “serious” or gushing submissions on Wayward Victorian Confessions, and taunt loyalist accounts by tagging them in their posts. When a few people complained on WVC that almost all of the Bloody Crumpets to date had been thin white able-bodied women, and a few fans responded by sharing their dream-casts for a more diverse line-up, the blog was flooded for days with confessions that “X should be a Crumpet” (candidates included RuPaul, Mitt Romney, Nicki Minaj, EA's therapist, and the WVC admins). Farcical shenanigans like that.
Ah, but some people will always cross the line, won't they. EA threads popped up on merciless, bully-friendly snark platforms like Lolcow, Pretty Ugly Little Liar, and Encyclopedia Dramatica. Snarkers with a mean streak and obsessive haters mingled in some of the more aggressive, 4-chan-spirited retaliation against EA – which would be called “brigading” in modern parlance. This included flooding EA's Goodreads page with one-star reviews (see part 4), repeatedly editing her Wikipedia page to include her legal name and birth year, and ensuring that Googling said name would bring up current pictures of her.
All of this compounded agitation fragmented the once-united fandom beyond recognition.🦠 Through substantial disagreements among fans, personal bickerings, layers upon layers of inscrutable in-jokes, and cross-platform telephone games, the Asylum morphed into a booby-trapped Escher room.
Satire blogs were taken in earnest. Earnest fan blogs scanned as satire. Memes would get called out as abuse. Appreciation without attached criticism would get mocked as bootlicking. Obvious jokes made by EA would be taken at face value. One divisive confession could trigger days and days of debate, to the point that WVC eventually banned confessions in response to other confessions. New waves of infighting created a confusing web of rival sub-factions🐀, each accusing the others of being toxic, cliquish, and delusional.
The shared fantasy was broken, the collective vision had crumbled, no onez was speaking the same language anymore. Fans would jump down the throat of other fans who held almost identical views about EA, except for that one thing she said or did that one time. Everyone had differing thoughts on what should or shouldn't acceptable to discuss, question, excuse, make fun of.
War is hell.

SCORCHED EARTH SHENANIGANS: HONEY, I SHRUNK THE ASYLUM

Would you tear my castle down Stone by stone And let the wind run through my windows Till there was nothing left But a battered rose? (“Castle Down”, 2003🎵)

Haters vs sycophants is not really the kind of conflict where one side can come out on top (if you're participating, you've already lost). But in the long tug-of-war between “grassroots” and “EA-sponsored” fan spaces, the ultimate winner is obvious – in that the former is gasping in agony, a shriveled husk of its former glory, while the latter... is non-existent. This is due in no small part to EA's tendency, like the Czars of old, to settle conflicts by setting Moscow on fire.🔍)
That's not entirely fair: unlike EA, the czar only did it that once.
By early 2013, as EA was gearing up for her third Fight Like a Girl tour at the end of the year, the official forum was... not as lively as it once had been. Not just because of the stifling rules and disgruntlement towards EA, or because EA herself hadn't really posted anything on there in years; the Internet was also changing, and forums in general were fast becoming passé.
This made it difficult for EA to create a safe space where she could talk to fans, and fans could talk to and about her, in a way she deemed suitable (ie, a space she could gate-keep and regulate enough to keep it completely free from negative criticism). Social media was a minefield; she still posted regularly, but didn't interact very much. So EA and the Headmistress came up with a way to filter out the unbelievers: an official fan club📝, aptly called the “Asylum Army”, with a $100 entry price.
Joining the AA came with a dog tag, a sew-on patch, and a lifetime membership certificate signed by EA and – for some reason – the Headmistress. (Unlike EA's best friend and sound engineer back in the forum's heyday, I don't think fans ever really embraced the FLAG-era manager as part of the Asylum in-group. She came across more as a coordinator / businessperson / adult chaperone, at best.🐀) So, slightly better goodies than you'd get by joining the other AA 🔍 ... but not by much. The main appeal was that members would have access to exclusive content, special merch, giveaways, early bird tickets for future shows, and regular video chats with EA.
The concept itself drew a fair amount of criticism, as you can imagine. Between the name🐀, the price, and the inherent gatekeeping of a pay-to-join fanclub, many balked at the monetizing of a concept that had once (like, three years back) been significantly more DIY, grassroots, and inclusive. 📝🐀
Then again, many also longed for a positive, drama-free space where fans could just be fans. And while the creation of the AA was generally recognized as a quick cashgrab, a lot of people were surprisingly cool with it. EA was trying to finance her dream musical, after all – although a number of fans wished she had gone about raising funds in a less sketchy way.
So around 400 fans shelled out (which, according to the Headmistress📝, “basically cover[ed] the cost of running the fanclub itself – keeping the database up, website, etc.”). Enough for a close-knit, but sizable community. But already, there was a conflict of interest: a high fanclub entry fee essentially demands that you pledge loyalty to the artist over loyalty to your fellow fans, who wish to join but can't afford to. Sharing, caring, and ensuring no one felt left out were some of the more positive values cultivated in the fandom... but leaking exclusive content would surely piss off other paying members🐀, and make EA feel betrayed all over again. (And she had barely just started to mellow out on social media!)
...But then again, this is the internet. After the first month of secret AA drops (lyric sheets, some photoshoot outtakes – nothing too juicy, really), there were, yes, some leaks. EA was predictably miffed, and retaliated by... ghosting the fanclub for weeks at a time in its first few months of existence (great look!). She eventually found the “solution” to her problem, by providing something you couldn't right-click-save (and which had been part of the promised perks to begin with): live interaction.
Over webcam, she was her usual in-person bubbly, charming, funny self. Everyone seemingly had a good time during the fanclub video chat, and this gave people faith and hope.
There were a few more events, giveaways, etc. As promised, ahead of the fall 2013 tour (the last one to date, it would turn out), AA members got priority access to show tickets and VIP bundles. The latter were much pricier than before, and only included soundcheck, a photo-op, and three goodies: a tin of loose-leaf tea, a signed printer-paper setlist, and a small flag that said “F.L.A.G.”.🔍 Some stuff continued to leak – but, as some of the outlaws pointed out (scroll down to the Disqus comments), they were mostly relaying information that was relevant to the entire fanbase, such as updates about ongoing projects (the dragged-out recording of the audiobook, for one).
In early 2014, lifetime memberships were closed, and replaced with monthly, quarterly and yearly subscription tiers. Bizarrely, you ended up paying $3 more per month if you bought a $99 yearly subscription📝 – but it did include the patch, dog tag, and piece of paper!

Sometimes I kind of want to be part of the cool kids and register to the Asylum Army. Then I remember how it came about, what you could get for the same price a couple years ago, how the whole thing was and is handled, and that I won’t support any of this bullshit. (And then I roll around naked in all the money I’m saving.) (🐀)

Still, a number of fans rejoiced at the affordable monthly option, and joined – if not for the exclusive content and merch (which were... okay, but not much to write home about), then for the friendly, drama-free exchanges with an artist they actually did love, in spite of all the frustration.
For the still-too-poor or still-undecided, there was always the forum! It wasn't as active as it used to be, but a few die-hards still managed to keep the lights on... until, inevitably, Someone Did Something and Ruined Everything. (Once again: EA's wrath is spectacular, but rarely completely unprovoked.) The incident features one notable figure in the Asylum community. Let's call him the Collector.
OK, so maybe you remember the meme I linked to in Part 4, with Christian Grey and the ginormous EA hoard. Well, that's the Collector's collection. The “Violin” promo that I called the "Holy Grail of the fandom" in the same paragraph? Also his. The handwritten lyrics that went for $940? Guess who won that auction. Over the years, the Collector had probably spent five figures on EA merch and shows, and although that fact was a little unsettling, he was a very active, easy-going, and generally well-liked fixture of the fandom.
One day in 2012, shortly after the Headmistress had replaced EA's old Chicago BFF as main forum admin, the Collector's account got banned or restricted over something dumb. When the ban wasn't lifted as quickly as he hoped, he took it... the way one takes things when one is unhealthily invested: he started spamming Headmistress and the mod team with increasingly rambling and abusive emails (lost to time, probably for the best). When that didn't work quickly enough, he tried a different route.
One of the many auctions that the Collector had won, some years prior, was EA's old iPod Touch📝 – which contained all of her favorite tunes and, buried somewhere in the data cache... a phone number. Which the Collector tried calling. And wouldn't you know it: EA picked up. She congratulated him on his sleuthing skills, listened patiently as he made his case, apologized for any distress caused by the unfair account restriction, and then they got married.
Kidding! She freaked the fuck out, hung up, and banned him for life from the forum and all EA shows and events.
After his ban, the Collector allegedly still tried to attend at least one VIP pre-show (one source in the comments says he was allowed to buy some merch, refunded for his ticket, and escorted out). He joined the Reform forum to bitch about EA and try to rally people to his cause, possibly made revenge posts about her on darker snark forums, and continued to hound the Asylum mod team. So in June 2014, EA came up with a radical and unexpected fix to the Collector problem.

The official Asylum Fan Forum has been shut down permanently. I have personally paid thousands of dollars each year to keep the forum safe and secure for you ... Unfortunately, the forum has not been kept safe and secure for me, a truth which disappoints me greatly, instead becoming a place where people who have physically threatened myself and my staff prey upon forum members, pressuring them to contact me and my staff on their behalf. If the gullible wish to humor my stalkers (who live in their parent’s basement at age 30 something) and thus put me in danger, they may do it on their own dime. They may also fuck off, because stupidity can kill, and I won’t be your victim. To those who enjoyed the forum, you know who to thank for its closure. (“On the closing of the Asylum Forum”)

Voilà! This is how a decade-long archive of shared history ends: not with a bang, but with a dirty delete and a sod-off communiqué.
The obliteration of the forum took everyone by surprise...

I was actually on the forum when it was taken down. I was navigating between posts and when I went to click on a different board, an error message came up. I honestly cried a little, I'm not ashamed to say. (WVC admin on Reddit, 2024)

...and I do mean everyone:

Chicago BFF / ex-admin, the next morning: Whoa, EA forum shut down? Ex-mod: It turns out that if someone spends enough years actively “waging war” to destroy what they can’t have, eventually they’ll be successful. * eye roll * Not even mods got prior warning. Just all the sudden, poof, gone. BFF: Really? She did not let the moderators know?! This is sounding worse and worse. Uggh. I’m so sorry. Such a loss. (...) Ok, threats are serious, but why not just put it in archive mode so no one can post? (...) Sad. I shall light a candle in the forum's honor. (Facebook posts; scroll down for screenshots)

It was a gut punch, especially for people who had poured countless hours into the community, or could have used some prior warning to save years of their own writing from the role-playing threads. One last chance to take a look around the place that had meant so much to so many.

From the wording of the announcement of closing the forum and a number of other things, it sometimes seems like EA doesn't like her fans much. :/ (🐀)

Three months after the forum was nuked, Battered Rose (a venerable EA fansite, which had been around since the Enchant era and had one of the most complete EA galleries online) announced that it was shutting down too.📝 The admin, who had also been a long-time forum mod, cited a lack of “time, energy, passion, or money” to keep the website going... and being upset at the sudden disappearance of the forum. It was, truly, the end of an era for the Asylum.
...Well, no point in living in the past. For those who could afford it, and still wanted to talk to/about EA after that (not everyone did 🐀), there was always the Asylum Army fanclub!
Over the summer of 2014, EA held regular live chats and Q&A's, and... many attendees really enjoyed them, and thought the AA was well worth the money after all. She also quietly parted ways with the much poo-pooed Headmistress around that time.

Just spent over 4 hours giggling, drinking tea and playing guessing games in chat with EA and other Asylum Army members ... No griping, no downers, just lots of fun. I think I like the way the ‘new fandom’ is going and now I’m really glad I finally decided to join the Army. (September 4, 2014🐀; Battered Rose had closed the day before)

The forum was lost forever, but perhaps that was a chance for a fresh start. Could this fanclub thing really be the Asylum Renaissance that fans had been longing for?

...I have come today to a very difficult but necessary decision, and that is to discontinue the Emilie Autumn Official Fanclub. The site itself, and the community chatroom, will remain open to you indefinitely, but I will no longer be making updates to the site. (Newsletter, September 8, 2014📝)

...Never mind, then.
Turns out the fanclub had been the Headmistress' idea all along. EA had been reluctant from the start, and although she really enjoyed the live chats with a safe community of people “who are there for the right reasons”, she couldn't overcome her fundamental discomfort with the concept. Lifetime and regular members would receive a bunch of digital downloads and a -35% coupon on the Asylum Emporium for their troubles. EA said she would definitely pop back once in a while for live chats, for free, just for fun, but to my knowledge, she never did.
And so the most devoted fans were left standing in the rain...

She is happy, she made it. She is fulfilling her dreams, found love and happiness after all the pain. I understand that she now doesn’t need “us” anymore ... That doesn’t change the fact she broke my heart with taking the Asylum Army and the forum from me. Yet, I am happy for her. (🐀)

...while naysayers pointed and laughed, Nelson-style.🦠

I don’t feel sorry at all for the people that paid for the Asylum Army fan club. Most of them knew that EA is an atrocious business woman and has broken many promises before. In fact, I laugh at them. They seriously thought that EA would actually stay consistent with this? (🐀)

EVERYTHING MUST GO: THE ASYLUM WHOLESALE

EA fans were left without an “official” home for about three years. This gave them plenty of time to be annoyed at EA for: not releasing the audiobook on time, not materializing any new project for a while... and the new sin of peddling random, ridiculously marked-up AliBaba jewelry as “merch” on her official store. Think faux-antique cameo pendants and $30 Big Ben rings (...because the Asylum story is set in London, get it?).

The whole accessories section looks like a tacky overpriced English souvenir shop. (🐀)

The fanbase lost a lost of steam in those in-between years, because there wasn't much to stick around for. As evidenced by the positive reception of the AA live chats, even in the midst of unresolved drama, out-loud interactions in a friendly environment have always been EA's saving grace. Considering the amount of online hate, there are shockingly few accounts of bad IRL encounters with EA: most people say that in live conversation, she comes across as a fun, warm, and genuinely sweet person. Some report that their negative opinion shifted after meeting her.
But there were no chats or live shows anymore. There was only social media, where she ignored questions and vague-posted about overdue projects – and the newsletter📝, which was all saccharine love-bombing to promote bland dropshipped trinkets. For fans who remembered the handcrafted merch (and two-way communication) of the early years, it was a bitter pill to swallow.

CONTINUED IN COMMENTS

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On April 9, the driver's door window on my car started moving in a weird way and got stuck part way down, conveniently while I was in the parking lot of a tire and auto shop that I have used for years while I had an appointment to get tires changed and an oil change. I asked them if they could take a look at the window while it was there and they said they would if there was time.
When I returned to pick the car up, they said they didn't have time to fix the window, but they managed to get it up some(although it was now sitting in the weatherstripping in a weird way). The paperwork has a note that the window doesn't go up and they have suggested work on the back for a new window motor and to open the door to diagnose the problem, but I wasn't charged for any window work.
I took the car to a dealer the next day and it turned out that the door was completely destroyed inside, with several bolts ripped out of the steel and the motor moving freely. The dealer said that the window motor cannot do this kind of damage by itself, that it looked like someone tried to pull down the door(and signed a statement to this effect) as well as providing a video of the damage.
It ended up requiring a new door, costing $2,183 in total. I called the complaint number it says on the paperwork from the tire and auto place but I never received a call back. I have a friend who recently convinced me it might be a good idea to sue them in small claims, but I am concerned and was originally not going to sue because it's basically a he said/they said situation and the shop could claim that I did the damage or it was always like that.
Specifically, I would like advice on 2 things:
What things are important to say or not say to the company when I call to complain? Is it illegal to record the call since PA is a 2 party consent state?
Is it wise to try to sue in small claims with limited proof that they caused the damage to the door? My friend suggests that they probably won't show up and I could win a default judgment, but I am skeptical and afraid of turning a $2200 loss into a much larger one, although I would also obviously like restitution as this was a large amount of money to lose and the shop is in the wrong.
Thanks in advance for any advice.

Hi all, always been into cars growing up and finally at a place in my life where I can afford to buy fun things. One of my all time dream cars is a E46 M3 coupe, I fell in love with it when I was a young kid playing NFS:MW on my PS2. However, definitely can’t justify spending so much on a M3 and instead looking to buy a cheaper E46 coupe as a project car, but I don’t even know where to even start looking.
Ideally I would want to pick something up for $5k and put $5k of parts into it to be a respectable weekend car for a start. I have a reliable daily driver already, so this would purely be a car that is fun to drive and at least has some decent acceleration.
I’ve narrowed it down to either a manual 325ci or 330ci, but they so widely differ in price depending on condition and transmission.
Looking at running 330ci’s they go for $10k for autos and $15k for manuals, but yet to see one that is not running and cheaper, so they seem out of my price range.
Plenty more 325ci around, can find some for as cheap as $3k for auto and $5k for manuals that would need work done to get them RWCed.
Any recommendations? Is the 330ci really worth paying 2-3x the price of a 325ci? Is it worth paying that bit more of a premium for a factory manual? Where would I even start looking for a car like this (other than the obvious FB marketplace, carsales, etc)? Is this not a great idea and should I get something that is a bit more reliable/easy as a first project car?
Any advice appreciated!

Sooo I'm not a pro at this, but I will try to explain my problem the best I can.
I have my pc connected to a denon 1600 av receiver for a few years now, and I guess everything worked just fine without me having to do anything I think. This receiver has a few "Sound Mode" buttons on the bottom part of the remote, one for movies, one for music, one for games, each one where I can choose between stereo, dts neural, etc... and a last one called "pure", which obviously sets the AVR to auto mode. I don't really use these a lot, because I just forget about them, and it was set for "DTS NEU:X" for a while now, probably in movies button.
My problem is, I installed windows 11 recently, and a few days ago I remembered this for some reason and clicked on "auto", and i noticed it wasn't decoding the atmos sound from my movie, as it should and as always did before when I was watching a movie with atmos audio - in displays "stereo" on the avr, even tho I'm watching Atmos movies (yes I'm 100% sure).
A quick google search led me to installing Atmos and DTS apps for windows, but this didn't solve the issue. I then tried to mess with the windows audio settings, speaker settings, etc, and this only made it worse, as when I set it to audio, my AVR decoded it as "Multi IN", and when I pressed the other buttons on the remote all the options were gone except for stereo and multi ch stereo I think.
So my question is, how do I set this right again? I'm happy with windows 11 and didn't want to go back to the previous one.