Michigan dmv phone number

So my fb account was hacked last month and I was able to get back in after 30 days and submit my id. Twice now since then I’ve gotten notifications that someone was trying to get into my account and I had to submit id again. The second time just happened today and 5 minutes later I get a call from a number I don’t know. They called 3 times, on the third time I picked up and a woman answered who said she was with Facebook, she sounded foreign and I heard a bunch of people talking in the background. I immediately hung up.
Pretty sure these are the hackers trying to get me to give them new login info. Question is, after I get in again (I haven’t submitted id again yet), what should I do? Remove my phone number? Is that how they’re trying to login? I’ve changed my email and password a few times.

WILDLIFE by nickel
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Story 1- Stone and Grass
Chapter 2- Behaviors
​
Emergency rooms were trained to be ready for any arrivals at any time of the day or night, but the strange cases that were arriving had the nurse practitioners baffled. Three had arrived at a little past 2am, and a further single was arriving presently. The ambulance had pulled away seconds after they'd carefully unloaded their unconscious cargo at the emergency entrance and were wheeling them inside, keeping an eye out for any changes. The lead of the two, a fox named Maxwell Forscythe, was handing over the paperwork for the patient and pre-planning the routes for the trauma center room to park them in.
"Student, male, early 20s, comatose, irregularities in BP and bodily temperature, is that all that could be gleaned on the ride over?" asked the nurse on duty. Maxwell's partner nodded. "We checked him as much as we could without disrobing him, not a scratch, just low core temp and a weakened pulse for someone his age, possible arhythmia maybe?" "No way to be sure 'til he's seen by the staff, and have the cardiologist have a look. Wheel him into Obs G202, it should be open." "Should be, Paul?" asked Maxwell. Paul looked up, half-awake. "It's open, okay? This place is going a little bananas after the previous patients, y'know."He grimaced at him and signaled his partner so they could move the gurney. The ward was a bit of distance, but there was no immediate danger as of yet. His partner, a human woman named Grisholm, was peering closely at the inert body. "See anything?" "Look, I'm not saying we need to check the patient's neck again, but this feels--" "Good grief, Griz, we already looked, he hasn't been sucked off by a vampire." Her face went very pink. "That's not what its called, it's 'drained'! and it can be anywhere, sure, but the neck or the leg, I mean... this is exactly how it goes, unless the person is just ripped to pieces." The fox sighed, using his mag-badge to open the double doors ahead. "Well, I'm pretty sure this guy wasn't ripped to pieces, but vampires, Griz? In Canada?" "The world is a mighty strange place sometimes, and small places are just where shit like this tends to go down. I'm just saying we should keep our eyes open today, that's all." "Just in case our friend here rises in the night to suck someone else off, yeah?" he teased, knowing exactly how to needle his friend. Grisholm was at a lack for words, just making half-syllables in protest as they reached the elevator. "I read that book you lent me, y'know, I see why you like this stuff so much." Grisholm looked deflated until she caught Max's eyes, one of which was winked with a grin. "It's alright, Griz... I do it too." Her friend looked a little placated, helping to push the patient into the lift and pressing the next floor button. "Let's just not rule it out yet, okay? Now, come on, game-face time, the day's already started."
​
Hours later, after an alarm deep in the Deckard Forest Range's only unnatural home had gone off and Kari had finished washing and getting dressed, the message was finally reported over the news, which she was watching on her phone with apt attention, her pupils widened in curiosity while automatically eating her breakfast.
"Hospital authorities are preparing a statement at this time, but have denied these mysterious cases as any sign for panic over unproven conditions, Jeremy?" Jeremy Cole was the on-site reporter, who the feed switched to, the hospital in the background full of activity from police standing watch, to people showing up to mill around as they often do. "That's right, Grace, the only details being released in surety, so far, point to the victims being discovered within our local favorite, Mt. Loyal University. They began arriving as early as 2 this morning, and the scenes have been under careful scrutiny. Whether or not these are scattered cases of extreme fatigue, or the beginnings of another infection sweeping the country is still no one's guess to make. Jeremy Cole, reporting live in Calgary, BCB News." "Thank you, Cole, we intend to keep this story updated as the facts are confirmed. Follow the progress on Flitter at--" Kari backed out of the video feed, thinking on the details that took place in the classroom yesterday, and of her gruff teacher. 'He wouldn't just succumb to weariness just like that, he would've gone to the teacher's lounge and caught a nap like he does,' she thought, getting up to pace a little, 'which means it was a sneak attack, practically untraceable, and enacted on the state of being for-" Her eyes widened again as she came to a stop, putting together some details towards a possible answer. Who was a restless-looking passerby that was headed in the direction of chemicals, many of which can be used to trigger invisible manners of attack? Who was passing the scene of the incident and looking particularly smug about something? Who smelled of sharp ethanol that could've been a fumigation bomb scent? "It was HIM!" she squawked suddenly, looking around as if a timebomb had just begun to countdown, hurrying over to get her shoes and jacket on, along with the standard wallet-phone-keys trifecta being pocketed. If anything, classes would be off or postponed during this weirdness, but she'd call on the drive over just to make sure. 'He's either here to steal some expensive artifacts, or... looking for someone, and either way doesn't look good.' She thought as she got onto the road to town, rolling her window down to catch the fresh, cold air of the morning.
The small lifeform had been moving around through the garden all day before heading towards a number of weird smells nearby. A long soil path led to a burnished wooden door, which the creature easily walked under. Within was a rainbow of enticing scents, and its sensors went wild probing all over the place to find small specks of food to chew up. Gradually, it found its way up to a huge, breathing creature of some kind, heaped in a pile in the corner of the chamber. The climb all over its body was an interesting journey for the intruder, but when it stepped onto an expanse lighter gray, the giant tensed up and awoke, turning its colossal head to slowly open huge eyes like golden boulders. It froze under this monstrous gaze, trying to look uninteresting, but a huge pair of digits picked it up, and its fate was sealed as it waited for the end.
"Hey, no visitors at this hour." said Tom, licking the small beetle off his finger to munch it up and lay back down, trying to let the blessed sleep come back, but he'd looked at his phone and seen the time, too late now. With a long exhale, he got up and began looking for a clean shirt, coming up empty except for the shirt he had on, so the day's errand was clear. "Well, thank god the plants don't have any clothes to take care of, I gotta feed them and see to their good health already." he said brightly, secretly picturing what the main garden would look like with the garden-life all sporting tiny sweaters and hats with a grin. A large knapsack was full of his clothes, the shirt and Jacket from yesterday were on, his shoes were worn, and he was carefully out back into the world, locking the Door behind him with the finesse of a safecracker. He put on some earbuds and began walking towards the main street, knowing he'd seen a laundromat there the day before. It felt like a good day to get something done; the weather was the pleasant side of chilly on the cloudless day, and folks seemed to be out walking the main street. Tom was in a rather good mood, also knowing of the beers in the knapsack to help the early afternoon chore along. And so, there he was 20 minutes later at 24 Laveuse, beginning the large load of laundry and setting back on the plastic seats, moving his tail so he didn't squash it. The place was a little empty and the small fenced area on one side of the parking lot made for good hiding, so he stepped outside to carefully get down to libations to pass the time. Traffic came and went like it usually did, one car taking the nearby right turn kind of harshly but otherwise nothing else of notice. There was a wandering guy with the air of a bum about him, sort of haunting the crossroads, and Tom privately hoped he would carry on before attracting police. Strangely enough, another short parade of cars was going thru the town, looking like a gangsta's funeral procession. Tom stared vacantly until they were gone, and he was starting to wonder just what this town's deal was. It was at this moment that the hands emerged silently from behind and seized his arms tightly, hauling him back with sudden urgency before he could panic properly. "What the fuck?! You wanna... god, wha-?" he barked, only to be hauled back harder into the side alley by the building, and out of sight. "Careful, dammit, there's a beverage here-" The tall can was smacked out of his hand. "Hey! what's your damage, guy?" Tom demanded as he was turned around roughly, only to meet those same blue eyes and red hair from yesterday. "Oh, wait, it's you fro--" Kari got her best threat display face on and poked a claw to the underside of his chin, which managed to inescapably encourage his silence."Now, answers, spill 'em, what were you really up to yesterday?" she now demanded. "I don't know what you're talking about, I was just looking for my friend to return a phone charger." "You didn't say that." "You didn't ask." he replied mildly, averting his gaze in a condescending manner. Kari growled in her throat and tightened her grip on his shoulders. "Watch it, wise-ass. Did you see or hear anything before the disturbance yesterday?" "What disturbance, I was already on my way when people found him." Her face went almost sideways in an accusative scowl. "Don't play dumb, I saw your ass drifting thru that crowd, and you saw me looking at you, captain salute." Tom's face contorted in regret. "You saw that, huh." "Yeah, I did." she grunted before slamming him roughly to the wall and releasing him. Tom looked as angry as he could without looking confrontational; something about her strength and methods did not point to a fight with any outcome but a grievous loss on his side. "Alright," he said, stepping back one step to opt for a cigarette from his fresh pack and turning from her to light it, "So I was near the scene, what else have you got?" Her angered look softened a micrometer and she took a few steps, mostly to get away from the rich smoke. "The guy from yesterday, the unconscious one? He was a good man, good teacher, and now his life might be in danger. You were at least in the hallway over there, did you see or hear anything that'd help out with finding the culprit?" "Help out?" he said, plucking the cig from his lips, "Look, Ms. Conrad, I-" "Conniff." "Whatever! I was just passing thru and it just felt like you got stuck having to deal with the cops, alright? It was rude to snark you, I apologize, I thought you were just in trouble or something. Apart from my friend, there wasn't really anybody on that side of the building that wasn't behind doors." Kari looked him over, trying to get a read on his intentions, and he seemed to notice this with disdain. "What's your deal anyways, apple-polisher, you some sort of local hero or something?" Tom continued, dragging on the smoke while shooting her a look. She frowned this time, an expression without anger that was a different face entirely. "He's a friend of mine, one of the few I have. You would do the same if it was someone you cared about, wouldn't you?" Tom almost answered honestly, but he was too mad to focus on polite truths. "No, I wouldn't, and I don't think you would either." he snapped, "I'm a pragmatist, number one's the only thing I came into this world worried with, and it's the only number I'll need." "Wow, okay, I thought you were just a sneaky guy before, but now I can see you're just an asshole." "And so are you, Ms. Confit, and I can't stand people that pretend to care." "Who's pretending? Frankly, *I* can't stand little shits like you who think their lousy life is free license to take everybody down with them." Tom was really mad now, and was almost considering lighting the fire in this fulminating argument, but he just sneered and flicked his cigarette ahead, stepping bitterly on it as he left. "You don't have anything I need, nor do I have anything you need, we're even. Now leave me alone, will you?" Kari wanted to kick his ass so badly in that fury-soaked moment. "I don't think anyone needs anything you've got, Mr. Blackberry, least of all YOU.. and it's CONNIFF, you son of a bitch!" she snarled at the retreating raccoon. "Actually, I can think of something I need from someone." he said, turning suddenly. "Yeah, and what's that, a chemical shower?" "No, you owe me a beer, kitty cat!" They were easily half a foot from each other now, staring daggers into daggers. The snow leopard spat harshly on the ground and left in a weaponized huff, tail twitching madly behind her. Tom felt the heat in his ears still peaking. "I better not see you again, or it'll be too soon!" he called after her, "And I smell bad because of my dirty laundry I carried, not because- well, I meant to put this shirt in with.. ohhhh, god DAMMIT!" and he kicked at the wall of the building before stomping back to check his clothes. "Bitch..." he muttered, trying to leave the incident behind.

I recently paid a bill on the boost one app. When I was attempting to pay, it kept saying try again later. I tried a few times because it wasn't going through. I received a phone call from my step daughter whose bill I was paying saying thank you mommy for paying my bill. Only to find out later that each time I attempted to pay the bill my card was charged. Now I'm getting the run around about getting a refund for overpayment. A ticket number......refund in 72 hours....3 days later another ticket number refund in 7 to 10 business days. We have 9 phones we have through boost and haven't had problems until boost one came about. Where's my money???

Monzo is a banking app where you can spend, save and manage your money, all in one place.
You'll get £5 for joining using my referral link once you've made any payment with the card.
Monzo allows you to open a full UK bank account from your phone, for free. The app is really easy to use and is great for tracking your spending and helping you to budget. Even if you already have a bank account, you can open one with Monzo as well just to see what it's like. You'll also get a cool 'hot coral' coloured debit card!
The current referral scheme gives you £5 for joining and £5 for each friend you refer.
​
These are the simple steps:
1 - Click on this referral link - CLICK HERE. Enter your phone number on the webpage.
2 - Download the app within 30 days, apply for an account and verify with photo ID.
3 - Top up your account.
4 - Make a payment using your Monzo card within 30 days and you will then receive the £5 bonus in your account. You can top up your Amazon account with £1 if you want an easy way to fulfil this criteria.
​
I'd recommend the free card for starters, but you can pay for a higher tier card.
Once you've signed up, you can refer other people.
Terms - https://monzo.com/legal/referral-scheme/terms-and-conditions
Non-ref (no bonus) - https://monzo.com

My wife and I took a trip to Portugal early December of 2022, and we had a really solid time. The food experiences were amazing and getting to take in so much old-world architecture was awe-inspiring.
Focus: Our main focus was lazy tourism and fine dining between Porto and Lisbon. We ended the trip with a 9 hour layover in Toronto, which we used to visit friends and some of our favorite Toronto spots.
Weather: The week was mostly sunny with some rain interspersed, and average temperatures seeming to be mid-teens. Toronto at the time was cold and snow-covered.
Accomodations: We ended up doing hotels as they were rather cheap.
Some photos below, along with some detailed notes of the packing list. Photos may be missing some things due to last minute substitutions, tried to note that.
Bag of choice:

• Peak Design 30L Travel Bag - This thing felt like a black hole, and seemed to hold more than the size would indicate. This is heads above my old Bellroy Transit and I'm happy I made the switch.

Worn clothing:

• Ministry of Supply Atlas Sweater - Not pictured, pictured is a Heattech Ultrawarm sweater I didn't take. Merino blend, soft, warm. All I could ask for. I surprisingly didn't use it much more than just the flight there, but I'm happy I had it on me.
• Ministry of Supply Composite Merino tee - The cut fits me well, anti-wrinkle, and surprising resistance to smells even with only being 15% merino. I got a good 2-3 wears out of this.
• Saxx Quest 2.0 Boxer Briefs - GOAT for travel, these things wear well, hand wash well, and dry overnight.
• Smartwool full cushion crew socks - Merino socks! They were warm and wore well! Smartwool tends to be realtively affordable when on sale, and they've held up very well.
• Lululemon ABC pants skinny - Warpstreme fabric is lovely and in black looks like a pretty standard pair of pants. This is actually the only pants I wore the whole trip.
• Pontos The Pacific shoe - These have been awesome. Very comfortable to walk in, and they dress up or down really nicely. These did cobblestone, grass, rocks, sand, snow, rain, etc, and they looked great doing it. I found I needed to pull the insoles end of the day, but by morning they were dry and fresh again.
• Arcade Midnighter belt - Not pictured. Stretchy black belt!

Packed clothing:

• Seagale Action Merino Tee (2) - black tees, easy care, love the fit. They hand wash really well if necessary, but I got 3 wears out of these easily. Having this tee on for the 24+ hours of travel on the leg home was a godsend, great moisture management and incredibly soft.
• Ministry of Supply Composite Merino tee - Grey. The cut fits me well, anti-wrinkle, and surprising resistance to smells even with only being 15% merino. I got a good 2-3 wears out of this.
• Ministry of Supply Apollo Raglan Sleeve Sport Shirt - Basically a button down. This thing fits awesome and doesn’t wrinkle. Standard sleeves would be better but this dresses up well enough - I wore this out to 6 different restaurants in Portugal, and even gave it a whole day as a layer over a tee, and it was very comfortable and performant. No need to wash between wears with a tee under it.
• Ministry of Supply Pace Chinos - I didn't actually wear these, the ABCs were plenty enough for the trip.
• Lululemon T.H.E. Shorts 7” - We didn’t have access to any pools or spas while there, so these were dead weight. Considering they weigh almost nothing though, not a big loss.
  
• Saxx Quest 2.0 Boxer Briefs (3) - 1 black, 2 grey. I’ve had these for a while and they’re probably still my favorite style from Saxx. They hand wash and dry well, and they’re comfortable. All I can ask for. I washed each pair once over the trip, and they dried overnight.
  
• Uniqlo Airism Boxers (2) - Sleep shorts. Hand washed once each, and they dried overnight.
  
• Smartwool Full Cushion Crew Socks (2) - Merino socks! What’s more to say. Smartwool is affordable while on sale and has some great durability. I’ve been happy with my pairs so far. I washed each pair once over the trip, and they really just needed a one day dry. I think the number of socks packed was pretty ideal.
  
• Smartwool No Show Socks - I didn’t need or use these, but having the emergency socks was a nice include. They’re small and didn’t really add any weight.
  

Outer Layers:

• Patagonia Nano Puff Jacket - Wind proof, water resistant, very insulating. Packs down rather small. I’ve moved to synthetic insulation as it keeps warm when wet unlike down jackets. This held up well to a bit of rain while we were there and kept me warm enough most days.
• Patagonia Torrentshell 3L - Water proof. Wind proof. A bit crinkly, and didn’t really get a lot of use in Portugal due to the lack of heavy rain. Also being waterproof it tends to keep heat in just as well as it keeps water out, so combined with the nano puff it offered pretty good insulation for Toronto.
• Smartwool Glove Liners - Just some basic gloves. They work with touch screens, that’s cool I guess! Solid for Toronto.
• Merino Buff - Part neck gaiter, part sleep mask for the flight. It was awesome to have. On tour buses with an open roof it was very nice to have a bit of insulation I could throw into a sling.

Electronics:

• Tom Bihn Ghost Whale Small - This contains my charging and camera connectivity kit, and it’s a tight squeeze but everything fits.
• Mophie 6000mah universal PD battery - Not the smallest or lightest battery, but it supports lightning input, and also does passthrough charging, which makes it the centerpiece for my tiny charging empire.
• Apple SD card readers - These just work, and they work well. Both Lightning and USB-C. Once the iPhone goes to USB-C I can drop the Lightning one. Let’s me ingest RAW files onto any of my devices. I didn’t need the Lightning one, but it’s just a standard in the bag now, so along it came.
• Anker Powerport III Nano 30W - Super slim, 30w charging. It’s been a standard for me for a while.
• Anker Cables - 3ft USB-C to Lightning and 3ft USB-C to USB-C. Covers all my device charging needs.
• Fujifilm X100V - Killer camera, compact, fun to shoot with.
• Tom Bihn Utility Cloth - It’s a wool square! It’s moonlighting as a camera wrap here, but it can be anything! Neck gaiter? Check. Very small blanket? Check. Table cloth? You bet. The options are limitless for the wool square! This was actually an MVP - The tiny blanket feature came in handy on tour buses, and it worked great for wiping down wet seats on a boat tour.
• Keys - Featuring an Airtag, and the final member of the charging gang, an InchargeX. I’ve also got a Nite Ize Doohickey on there for bottles and boxes. The Doohickey is awesome as it passes through airport security without issues and does a good enough job of what it’s designed to do.
• Airpods Pro - Basically perfect headphones for short stints. Reasonable battery life, great noise cancelling, agreeable sound quality. Overall solid.
• Destination Specific adapters (2) - Two is one and one is none, or something like that.
• iPad Mini 6 - Used for editing photos, reading on the plane, larger view for maps, etc.
• iPhone 12 - Works well with everything else I own. I grabbed an eSIM from Airalo on MEO, giving me 30gb of data for 15 days.
• Sony WH-1000XM4 - Not pictured. These were great for the 6-8 hour transatlantic flights. A last minute pick but I’m glad they made it into the bag.

A quick note on my charging setup: The whole setup for charging with my InchargeX allows me to charge two devices overnight AND my battery off a single 30w slim wall adapter. This is about as close as I can get to a perfect tiny charging setup. The iPhone plus the battery is plenty enough to get me through even the heaviest of days, into a second day.
Toiletries:

• Exfoliating cloth - Nylon textured cloth that’s basically an unravelled loofah. So easy to get a lather and you feel a lot cleaner after a good exfoliating scrub. I use one of these at home now too. I’d like to find a face cloth sized one for travel.
• Unscented Company Shampoo bar and soap bar - Stored in Matador soap cases. These lather really well, clean great, and support my “all solids” agenda for travel. They work great for cleaning clothes too. I’ve been using these at home instead of liquids, and can’t complain. We were never without toiletries due to the hotels, but I prefer these.
• Philips One Toothbrush - Next time I’d probably just get a cover for the head as I think the case was a bit large. I liked having the electric function though.
• Various OTC meds - Stored in Nalgene containers, these little things are waterproof and well built.
• Lush Dirty Toothy Tabs - Toothpaste replacement and my go-to for a while. Enough for both myself and my wife.
• Hair Bands - Two is one and one is none, or something like that.
• Xiaomi Mijia S100 shaver - New to me, picked it over a Philips OneBlade. Dual rotary shaver, compact, USB-C charging. I don’t get a lot of facial hair growth but I get enough that I like touching up every couple days. This did the trick. Might try to go back to a manual razor like a mach 3.
• Native Deodorant - Been my go-to for a while. I can’t seem to find a travel size in Canada, but this would be a huge space saver if I could. I may consider melting it down and re-packing it as some enterprising individuals on the internet have before me.
• Folding brush - I’ve had this for ages, and it’s been awesome.

Everything else:

• Bellroy Lite Sling - Very flexible in load out, the 7L size made for a very good holding capacity to size ratio. This functioned as my camera bag and held essentials when transiting through airports or while on trains.
• Tom Bihn Ghost Whale Super Mini - Bag of holding for…
• Ray-Ban Folding Wayfarers - Matte black, high quality, compact. Non-polarized. Perfect fit in the ghost whale and always with me for sunny days. These were great for the trip as we had a lot of sunny days.
• Apple Magsafe Wallet - Not much to say here, standard 3 card carry - ID, debit card, credit card.
• Vapur Eclipse bottle - Didn’t actually use this, but fit in one of the mesh side pouches in my Peak Design bag handily.
• PackTowl Large - Came in handy when we were short a few towels in the hotel the first day in Porto.
• KN95 Masks (3) - Black, used on the airplanes. We didn’t get sick on the trip!
• Matador Packable Tote - Was useful for day excursions, shopping, etc. 18L packs down into a very compact size and it’s a robust bag.
• Passport - Well this is kinda needed for international travel. I also had my Presto (Toronto transit payment card) and alternate credit card in here as a just in case.

What Worked: Overall I think my packing list is cohesive enough and walked the line between casual and nice enough for a good restaurant. I've been working with a lot of this clothing for a while so it's been tested heavily through the rigors of daily wear, and I was very confident in my choices going in. The massive standout was the wool utility cloth - I think more people need these!
What could have been improved: I overpacked on a few things like pants and shorts, which really are just small things. The Pontos were awesome for the trip, but I feel like I would have done better with a pair of Blundstones or a similar Chelsea style boot. I also wish I could find a more casual looking "technical" jacket for daily wear, but the options are limited from what I can find. I think I could have dropped the iPad too, although it didn't take up a whole lot of space and was great for editing photos in downtime or reading on the plane. The Mijia shaver was okay but not amazing.

Does anyone know how I can escalate something related to marketing to Youtube? I checked their website and Google and I can't find a Youtube support email or phone number.

• If you are looking for study partners, please mention your class/branch/stream/subject/exam and other relevant details in the comments below.
• Link to all other study partner threads in this sub
• Interested people may reach out to you, do not share personal details such as email/phone numbers. How you maintain anonymity is upto you. Only chat via Reddit chat if you are not sure about the other person.
• Some links to external groups

I got laid off mid February 2023, got my severance end of Feb. My application for benefits went through okay, albeit a bit slow. I thought I was good once I got my determination of benefits and once my waiting week payment of $0 was processed in March, buuuut, there's been no activity/payments since then!
Like others I've called the available numbers daily and have had no luck getting through. I even tried the failed pin 3x "trick" when calling, but still did not get through to speak to a human.
At this point I'm going to try sending a fax and a snail mail letter... as well as sending an email under a different subject header (since when you try to actually send one under the subject of claims, it redirects you to make a phone call that does not get answered!!)
But if anyone has a tip on how to speak to a real person, or any ideas as to what may be holding up my funds... similar, recent experiences? Please share... advice and assistance is requested. Thanks in advance 😊

Not exactly a war just MS-13 being caught purging their ranks. This is a lot of what gangs like MS-13 and the Aryan Brotherhood do. Because they are always in the feds crosshairs band focused on money like a business. If you talk to the police or jeopardize their income you are enemy Number 1. They are not interested in getting rid of rivals unless it benefits them or they are threatened.
Green belt and DMV Maryland MS-13 self purge
MS-13 Weedams Locos Salvatrucha, MS-13 clique Income: Laundering money from extortion rackets in El Salvador K: 2 W: Febuary 20th 2020 WLS member Sanchez was ordered by another MS-13 clique to kill a former member who cooperated with law enforcement Sanchez and another MS member did so and Sanchez was promoted
August 8 2020 Sanchez and members called over another MS-13 member that wasn’t following the rules over to get DP’d via beating but that’s not what happened to quote the United States Attorney’s office district of Maryland “Sanchez was armed with a revolver, and Torres gave a second revolver to another MS-13 member to participate in the murder. When Victim 4 arrived, Sanchez and the other MS-13 member each fired multiple shots at Victim 4, causing Victim 4 to fall to the ground. Sanchez then pistol-whipped Victim 4 and stabbed him with a knife. Torres and other WLS members dragged Victim 4’s body to a stream and left it there.” Friday, May 19, 2023 U.S. Attorney's Office, District of Maryland
Snitching WLS K: W:
Noting that the second murder is victim 4 it’s likely that there are two more victims these could be rival gang members, witnesses, more betraying members, or those doing the gang wrong Or someone else for whatever reason. But victims 2 and three were not a part of this case and killed by other gang members than the ones charged in this case.
https://www.justice.gov/usao-md/pmaryland-ms-13-gang-member-sentenced-28-years-federal-prison-participating-racketeering

The most recent paper is from 2022 and focuses on vasectomy. The summary is available here (https://www.physiciansweekly.com/vasectomy-regret-among-men-without-children/) and the original, peer-reviewed article (pay wall for most) is available here (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0090429522009979).
The tl;dr of the 2022 study is that in the 1990s, there was a little bit of research into the percentage of people who regret having a vasectomy via survey of "childless" men, with 7.4% expressing regret over having the procedure. Some studies have used rates of vasectomy reversal as an indicator of regret (which I disagree with, but whatever). In this most recent study, ~5% of patients expressed regret immediately following the procedure, which increased to ~7% at the time the phone interview was conducted... which is in pretty good agreement with the results of the earlier study. This study focused especially on those without kids.
For those with ovaries, the paper also cites research into regret rates following tubal ligation & similar sterilization techniques. In the US and France, the regret rate for these forms of sterilization are ~4% (refs. 22 and 23 in the Urology paper). For those aged 30-34, the regret rate was ~2%. This study is a bit old (1991), but there are some hard numbers for those physicians who think they know better.
I hope this is helpful to some of you who are pursuing sterilization right now.

Obviously, spoilers on the entire game here. For context, I have been playing Zelda since 2014 with Twilight Princess as my first game. Since then I have played Skyward Sword, Breath of the Wild, Link's Awakening, and I am about halfway through Ocarina of Time. Because of my obvious bias towards more traditional 3D Zelda games (I enjoyed Skyward Sword and Twilight Princess the most) I will try to be as impartial as possible.
I tried so hard to like this game. I had my doubts at the beginning, but after watching the new trailer it sold me on the game. I didn't like some aspects of Breath of the Wild, but after seeing the new enemies and hopefully a return to a more traditional zelda game that people missed while keeping the awesome open world of Breath of the Wild I really thought it was going to be great. And some parts of it were, but some parts of it I did not like.
Firstly, I would like to congratulate Nintendo because the physics relating to the Ultrahand mechanic blew everyone away, including me, and it is clear that Tears of the Kingdom has some of the best physics and building of any video game out there. The amount of creativity that has sprung from this game is mindblowing, and I don't think any of us expected for there to be simply so much to do. Not only are there almost 30 devices you can obtain each with their own unique purpose, you can also combine them with almost anything you can find in the game. Want to make a stupidly long bridge that can get you around the temple of time at the start of the game? Why not? Want to skip the main puzzle in the shrine by haphazardly building a flying machine that just barely makes it to the end? Go right ahead. Ultrahand allows for so much creativity and makes the new shrines ten times more enjoyable than the ones in Breath of the Wild. Because of this, there is an infinite amount of replayability in this game and the community will always be finding new things to do with this. Judging from how you all pushed Breath of the Wild to its limits, I can't wait to see what will be done in this game. Ultrahand gets a 20/10.
Additionally, Fuse and Recall are also insanely fun and useful abilities that add so much to the game. While I miss the Stasis rune in particular, Recall and Ultrahand can be used in a similar way if done correctly, and it's so much more satisfying when you do it correctly. While Recall doesn't have as many uses as Fuse and Ultrahand, the game still finds great ways to use it, such as sending a Stone Talus' boulders back at it, or knocking those horrible Horriblins down from the cave ceiling. Additionally, I am extremely happy with how Nintendo fixed Durability with the Fuse mechanic. While the durability annoyed me less than some of the others who played Breath of the Wild, my main complaint was wasting several of my good weapons on an enemy like a Silver Bokoblin or Lynel that had a huge healthbar, and only getting one (or sometimes none) good weapons in return. However, with the guarantee that you will usually be able to get an equally powerful or sometimes even better weapon after killing an enemy by fusing their horns to any random "sturdy stick", I don't hesitate to fight Silver enemies or Lynels anymore and I feel much more free to do so. Both of these abilites get a 10/10.
My third compliment goes to the game's shrines. I disliked Breath of the Wild's shrines. I found them tedious and annoying to do, and often skipped them or looked up the answers online. Especially when your only reward was a piece of heart or tiny fraction of a stamina wheel, I just clicked on them to save them as a travel checkpoint and moved on. Even their design was ugly to me. However, the new shrines are much better. While they are easier than Breath of the Wild's shrines, the rewards are a little less lucrative to balance it out and they are so much more fun to do because of how they creatively use the new abilites and allow for a multitude of different ways to solve problems. Many people do not like the "Proving Grounds" shrines, but I absolutely love them because they are a real challenge and I don't have to worry about losing 50 bomb arrows or several good weapons for a "Guardian Sword ++" and some ancient screws. Even if I die five times trying to complete them, I still have fun. And aesthetically they are so much better, the look of the temple, the texture of the lights of blessing, even the music feels a lot less claustrophobic and drab like the ones in Breath of the Wild did.
Fourthly, the Great Sky Island was absolutely amazing and I loved every second of it. It felt just like it did when I played Breath of the Wild for the first time, being plunged into an unknown and untouched environment and having to learn the mechanics of this new game. The Zonai Constructs don't carry the same fear level as Guardians did, but they were still cool enemies to fight with drops that were actually helpful unlike the Ancient Screws and Springs which only became helpful late-game. I obviously can't go through every part of the island, but the parts I enjoyed the best were crossing the huge lake to the west, climbing the snowy mountain to get to a shrine where I unsuccessfully attempted to craft a hovercraft out of logs, going on Minecarts around the island, and fusing random crap to sticks to make the most ridiculous weapons possible.
My last compliment goes to the introduction of Gloom into the game. When it is first introduced, the Gloom is absolutely frightening, and plunging into the depths for the first time was beyond scary. Malice was an annoying obstacle that you just jumped across until you got to where you needed to be and ate a few foods, but you are forced to avoid the Gloom in this game because you know that it will be catastrophic if you walk in it for too long because the only cure is an extremely rare flower that can only be found in the sky. I just wish that the lightroots either weren't so common, or didn't heal your healthbar, because it kind of subtracted the fear aspect a little bit. The way it actually destroyed your heart containers in the final battle against Ganondorf instead of rendering them unusable for a little while was another surprise I did not expect, and killing the Demon Dragon with a single heart was the best moment of the game for me.
Some other minor things I liked:

• Gleeoks are amazing bosses, better than any of the bosses in Breath of the Wild OR Tears of the Kingdom apart from the Ganondorf fight, easy 10/10
• While the Wind Temple wasn't my favorite, I did enjoy the Rito Village quest in the beginning and the leadup to the Wind Temple where you flew with Tulin to the very top. 9/10.
• Pizza?! I loved the introduction of Tomatoes and Cheese into the game! Shame you couldn't do more with them. 7/10.
• The Master Kohga battles were very good. While he was still easy to kill once he was stunned, it is another instance of Ultrahand and Link's other new abilities putting a creative and spicy twist on an old fight. Autobuild was also a lifesaver. 9/10.
• The second stage of the Ganondorf bossfight was probably the most fun I've had with a boss since Twilight Princess. It felt actually challenging in a way that could only be compared to the Gleeok Battles. It was so hard to even get a single hit into his massive healthbar when he could dodge more than 90% of your shots and destroy your health bar. Probably shouldn't have gone in without upgrading any of my armor but doing that was so tedious :p 20/10.

Now that I've talked about what was great about Tears of the Kingdom, here is the stuff I disliked about the game. While I think that the people who call this game an "overpriced DLC" are not arguing in good faith, I can see their point. Much of Breath of the Wild's structure was carried over into Tears of the Kingdom and it felt like I was redoing the same things I did in the old game, just with a new texture and a slightly different story.
Because of how insanely complicated it must have been to put Ultrahand in the game, it was clear that that was what Nintendo spent most of their time on when making Tears of the Kingdom, going for a more creative approach rather than a return to the traditional like I had hoped. And while this was a perfectly valid thing to do that clearly made a lot of people happy, it just wasn't what I wanted, and the final trailers for the game feel like they were marketing a different game than they were actually selling. When they went above and beyond with Link's new abilities, it left other aspects of the game such as combat, story, gameplay, and the structure of the game itself lacking and awfully familiar, if not the same, as Breath of the Wild.
My biggest issue with this game is the story. I disliked almost every part of it. We start out with a very solid intro scene where we meet shriveled Ganondorf and Zelda disappears. Then we see her disappear as she steals our half of a master sword at the end of the Great Sky Island. However, the game then leads us into a wild goose chase to find Zelda for almost the entire game until near the end when we go inside Hyrule Castle. This was fine in Skyward Sword because Zelda was much more likable and it only took up half of the game. I felt like "I have to save Zelda. I have to." in SS and in Tears of the Kingdom I was like "Let's just get this over already." Additionally, the Upheaval which is apparently the placeholder of the Calamity in BOTW just feels like not a threat at all. The castle rose into the air and a few meteors came down and crashed into Kakariko village. The mud in the water doesn't seem to be affecting the Zora much at all, the Gerudo seem relatively unharmed by the Gibdos, only retreating into an underground bunker, and we have almost no time to see how the rock roast affects the Gorons before Yunobo is saved. The only place where I felt any sense of urgency was in Rito Village where the town was starving and abandoned the children to their fate because they're the worst parents ever or something. I enjoyed saving Rito village. The others not so much. And let's not even talk about the Sages. 3/4 of them we had already interacted with heavily in the previous games, which was another reason I liked the Rito quest so much. Yunobo is still as weak and annoying as ever, nothing has changed with Riju, and Sidon is so boring and lifeless comparing to the other game. As we go into the dungeons we have four conversations that are, quite literally, copy and pasted into each one voiced by the blandest sages ever.
"Come, Come" (Random Sage)
"Did you hear that voice?" (Yunobo, Sidon, Riju, Tulin)
and when we get to the end of the dungeon
"X, I am your ancestor from a long time ago. I was the sage of x. Descendant you make me proud. The monster you killed tried to stop you from obtaining my secret stone. Once upon a time there was a great war where the Demon King tried to kill us and Rauru gave us all secret stones but he was too strong so Rauru sacrificed himself to seal him away. And then Zelda appeared to me and told me that it was the duty of the x to aid you Link."
"So it's my duty to... help you? Now take my scary ghost form with a useless ability (besides tulin) to follow you around the rest of your journey!"
These cutscenes weren't disappointing. I hated them. As a person who loves the story so much they never skip a single cutscene these I physically couldn't watch. Everything about them was awful. The completely dry, lifeless, unneccesary sages which don't even have a name or a face and talk like NPCs or someone from an awful anime episode and say the exact same thing four times over, the empty void we are surrounded in, the cutscene we have to watch four times over, the robotic responses that come from the sages, everything about it was horrible and it feels like Nintendo was trying to reinsert the champions in the game but these are such a worse downgrade from them. At the end of the game I was like "ok... I give this a 7/10" and then the horrible after-credits scene with the four sages came in where they repeated the robotic speech from one of the memories and if that was supposed to be a meaningful scene it certainly was not.
Zelda's sacrifice probably would have meant so much more to me if the rest of the story hadn't frustrated me so much. But it feels like it meant nothing since the Demon King is such a non-threat compared to Calamity Ganon. Calamity Ganon devastated Hyrule, destroying most of the villages and probably killing half of the people there, and murdering 4 of the best characters in Zelda history who meant so much to their people that statues were built for them. In comparison, Ganondorf levitated a castle in the air and added some poo to Zora's domain. It ruins Zelda's moment so much because it would have been so beautiful if it felt like she was sacrificing herself for something meaningful. It frustrates me to no end because Ganondorf was a villain I was so hyped about and he's shriveled about 90% of the game and only appears three times, once in the beginning, once as a vision in Hyrule Castle, and once at the end, and only one of them is fully revived Ganondorf. In fact, we only see this version of Ganondorf for a third of the final bossfight. We need more Ganondorf! At least add a sixth dungeon to the game below Hyrule Castle where Ganondorf appears after, or maybe he appears before we get the Master Sword. We just needed more of Ganondorf and more of him being a threat to Hyrule.
Another complaint are the sages. I already stated that three out of the four sages had already been fleshed out in a previous game and not much was added to their personalities this time around. Why couldn't we have gotten new people? Maybe make Muzu a sage, we always like having an old man around, or give Barta/Bullaria some importance for the Gerudo and hand over the torch to one of those young Gorons that always follow Yunobo around. It would have been so much fun to have new characters. The sages add absolutely nothing to the experience of this game besides showing up in the awful cutscenes and it just feels like they're trying to repeat what they had in the last game. If they're going to do that, at least do it with someone new so it doesn't feel like I have to replay the game again. We already helped these people with their character growth in the last game. We know that Riju is insecure about her place as the Gerudo chief, and we helped her be more respected after retriveing the Thunder Helm and calming Naboris. We know that Sidon feels a sense of duty to his domain after what happened to his sister, and we spend time with him getting shock arrows, obtaining the Zora armor, and travelling around Lanayru with him until we got to Zora's domain. We helped Yunobo gain his confidence after he accompained us by firing himself at Rudania. These characters went through almost no development except for Tulin (again showing what Nintendo did right with Rito Village) because he's a new character.
Finally, the memories. Why did there have to be memories again. It would have been such an easy shift from Breath of the Wild, to give us a new main quest. While I was not a big fan of the time travel arc that Zelda went through, it was still workable, but there was no reason to have these stupid memories again. We saw so much of past Ganon and so little of present Ganon. I don't care what happened to the Goat Man and how the Kingdom of Hyrule was formed. Half of those memories were not essential to the plot and were just filler content. In particular, the one with Mineru just spoils Zelda's sacrifice altogether. Mineru as a whole just feels like such an annoying character and I would have much rathered a sheikah sage or even a korok.
While I criticize much of this game for remaining the same as BOTW, the story was one of the only aspects where it was a clear downgrade. So much of what was shown in the trailers hyped this game to be an impactful, story-filled game and many of these scenes are from memories, which I absolutely hate, and one of the scenes with Ganondorf wasn't even in the actual game, just a scene melded together from a memory and the speech at the end!
Another issue I have with this game is Ascend and how it affects our experience in the dungeons. I liked the Lightning Temple, the Fire Temple and Wind Temple were okay, and the Water Temple was just plain awful. I saw a post about someone complaining about the puzzles in TOTK being too hard and I saw someone respond "If they think these puzzles are hard, I can't imagine them playing Twilight Princess." And I wholeheartedly believe that. While I'm not trying to make this review a comparison to Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword, games which are completely different from this one, the puzzles in this game were either super easy or required us to do something that no one would have thought of. I was stuck in the Lightning Temple on two different points, one where the mirrors seemed to reflect to nothing in particular (what you had to do was grab a spare mirror from another room and fuse it to the statue so that it would face the right way which was a random solution that I didn't expect but I actually enjoyed) and another where I had no idea how to get to the last terminal and I looked around for 20 minutes until I looked it up online and found that I ascended into a place I wasn't supposed to and I actually had to teleport out of the temple to a nearby shrine, travel back to the temple on foot, go through another entrance I hadn't gone through, go through a really long tunnel to get to the terminal I should have gone to first. In a game which prioritizes open world exploration and being able to do anything you wanted, this haphazard "linearity" inside the lightning temple really ruined the experience of a dungeon I otherwise enjoyed. Which leads me to my point on Ascend. While Recall, Fuse, and Ultrahand add to this game in so many amazing and dynamic ways, Ascend just feels like something they added because they needed a fourth ability and a way to get out of caves. It allows so many dungeons to be cheesed and using it in the Lightning Temple made the experience so much more complicated than it needed to be. Apart from caves, every other place where you needed to use ascend could have been done with Revali's gale (rest in peace) or a bonfire + hylian pine cone, or any of the other devices that came with ultrahand. The uses made for it in the Great Sky Island and in other places felt forced and the developers could have easily come up with another creative way to do this without ascend. I just wish that Ascend and Autobuild were disabled inside temples because it would have made things so much better. The companions also make the temples much more annoying because half the time all you're doing is waiting for Riju or Sidon to stop standing in a random corner and walk up to you. Especially in the Water Temple where your ability was on a time limit, this was especially annoying. The Water and Wind Temples felt like big sky islands and not dungeons. The Snowpeak Ruins in Twilight Princess and the Sandship in Skyward Sword are both excellent examples about how to turn something unconventional into an excellent dungeon, but these temples fail in so many ways. Not only is it so easy to get around the entire dungeon with a paraglider and Tulin that makes it possible to complete the dungeon in under 30 minutes on your first playthrough, the puzzles were so easy and the Wind Temple's boss in particular was so easy to kill despite it looking so fearsome. The Mud Octorok was actually a great boss that I have no complaints about, but the rest of the temple was really awful, with most of the puzzles simply being chalked up to "redirect this floating water bubble somewhere else so you can get to a terminal." The terminal thing returning was also something that was a huge letdown. There was no reason to continue it from Breath of the Wild, especially when the Divine Beast dungeons were such a huge complaint, when they could have added a system of small keys, miniboss, maybe even a new ultrahand ability similar to the ones we got from the sages to replace having a companion with you that you would be able to use across the dungeon. This would have turned the Lightning Temple from a 7/10 dungeon to an easy 9/10 or even 10/10 and would have improved my outlook on the other dungeons a lot more, particularly the fire temple, which was so great aesthetically but the gameplay and puzzles simply were not. While I liked the Lightning Temple and to a lesser extent the Fire Temple and the bossfights were much better, I found myself enjoying the Divine Beasts more than the Wind and Water Temples, and many of the bosses were such pushovers. The dungeons in this game get a 4/10.
I have a number of other smaller complaints. First is that I really wished there were more food and armor options. A return to the "meat skewers" and "fried wild greens" let me down a bit as I was hoping for more variance on food, especially after they added new items like stambulbs and tomatoes that I thought would replace the existing items. I mean, we had a whole sidequest dedicated to discovering Cheese and there's only three recipes for it! (as far as I know) Additionally, I wouldn't have been upset if they gave us the same effects for armor as before, just with a new name and texture. Like maybe they could have slightly updated the look of the Hylian set like they did with the Champion's tunic, or we could have the full Sheikah uniform instead of the Stealth armor, or a Lightning Helmet that actually looked different instead of one that reused the exact same texture as the thunder helm. New monsters such as Horriblins, Aerocudas, and Boss Bokoblins added some great new fights to the game, and I wouldn't have even cared if they reused the same enemies, but the way they attack is the exact same as in Breath of the Wild, which left the combat a little predictable and I was able to kill a Gloom Lynel first try. The only battles that really challenged me were against the Gleeoks, one of the best bosses in all of Zelda history.
My last issue with this game is that I really don't understand what vibe they were going for. Majora's Mask was twisted and disturbing. Twilight Princess was dark and gloomy. Skyward Sword was bright and hopeful. Breath of the Wild was free and really emphasized nature. But with Tears of the Kingdom, they really seem to be doing five things at once and accomplishing none of them. They try to put an emphasis on the creative aspect by adding things like Zonai Tech to the beginning and adding new technologies like the batteries, factories, skyview towers, and other. Then they also try to make this game dark and scary by introducing some horrifying things like chasms, gloom hands, and underground areas. They made the game seem bright and sunny like Skyward Sword in the beginning with the Great Sky Island and the bright yellow color palette. Then they also try to keep the open-world aspect of Breath of the Wild by keeping this massive open world, but with nothing to do inside it since we've already seen most of the stuff in this game's nature areas apart from the new caves. I don't understand what the developers were trying to make this game feel like, and it feels like they tried to do too many things at once and failed to flesh out all of them. I would have loved to see a restored Hyrule that we could explore and I would have also loved to have a nature-filled world like in BOTW with new plants, foods, caves, animals, and areas to explore, but the Hyrule in TOTK seems like a haphazard mixture of both.
There's no incentive to explore this time around with only 3-4 new plants and animals in the overworld and only a few caves that only have Brightbloom seeds, bomb flowers, and bubblefrogs. I love the caves, but they seem a bit same-y over time and I have no intention to find them all. I can't even ride around Hyrule on a horse like in BOTW or in a car like the developers seem to want us to do because I run into those stupid Zonai rocks that are littered around every 5 seconds for no particular reason. All they do is make transportation annoying and I wonder why they went through the effort to put all of the sky island materials on the overworld by these ugly rocks instead of actually having more sky islands like we wanted. The Great Sky Island was undoubtedly the most solid part of Tears of the Kingdom's Hyrule, so why did they deincentivise sky exploration by having most of the sky materials on these fallen rocks?
All in all, Nintendo outdid themselves with the coding in this game, especially putting a massive title like this on the six-year-old Nintendo Switch. However, it was clear that they spent most of their time coding in these new mechanics and the writers clearly phoned in this time around with the worst story and dialogue I have seen in any Zelda game so far. Maybe putting in a completely new game on Breath of the Wild's massive world was too much to ask, but so much of Tears of the Kingdom either directly copies Breath of the Wild (four dungeons in the exact same lands, the exact same food, combat, armor, and people) or takes the same structure and retextures it (four terminals in a dungeon, memories, shrines, a quest to rebuild a village from scratch, "champions" that pass on their abilities to their successors, and those cursed Korok seeds) that I really found no reason to play this game after 100 hours because there was nothing new left to do besides a multitude of side quests that I didn't feel like doing because I had no attachment to this Hyrule like I did in Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword, Link's Awakening, and Breath of the Wild. Maybe I would have liked it more if I was a new player and hadn't played BOTW before, but the amount of content that was unnecessarily copied from the last game into this one really ruined the experience for me. All in all, this Zelda is a C+ for me, a 6.5/10. While it was more fun than the linear and small world of Link's Awakening, it couldn't compare with the story aspect of Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword or the feel of Breath of the Wild.
TLDR: While Nintendo went above and beyond with the new Ultrahand, Fuse, and Recall mechanics, it ultimately wasn't enough for me to save a game that had an extremely lacking story, underwhelming content and dungeons, and a multitude of side quests that was basically repeating everything you had done in 2017. If you're going to argue with me in the comments, please actually read the whole thing first.

TLDR: I went to HR twice over the last 2 years and now believe I may have left a negative opinion of me that is hindering me from other job opportunities within the company. Should I report it or move on?
I’ve been working at this call center for 5 years. I started at entry level and moved to a senior level my second year, and I’ve been stuck ever since. I ended up with a really good supervisor. During that time, I was on a leadership team and got a sponsor who was CFO of the company, I was also part of a work group that comes together with ideas of changes that should be made. I encountered another person in the group and there was small conflict. Shortly after, she was moved from her state and her department to become a supervisor in my department. I was placed on her team. I felt it was a conflict of interest so I went to our manager and requested to be on another team or stay on my current team and he refused.
My first 2 days into being on her team, she set a meeting with me and accused me of avoiding calls and told me I could be fired. I reached out to the manager again and he said he couldn’t just switch my team because then he would have to switch everyone that asks; I told him it should be a case by case basis and in my case, there is a clear prior conflict spilling over. He refused. The issue between her and I continued. I spoke to my sponsor and she suggested I go to HR. HR met with me, then the manager, then the supervisor; he returned to me and said it would be a great learning opportunity and that I would remain on her team.
Months later I was talking to a coworker about how depressed this supervisor was making me and I was always on edge over her micromanaging me, my numbers dropped during this time. I can only assume she went back and told my supervisor because a day later, the supervisor asked me if I would feel better on a different team. I said yes and within 2 days I was placed on a different team. It struck me as odd that when I went through the proper channels to request it, I was denied, but once I spoke to a coworker, it happened almost instantly.
Everything went well with my new supervisor & I joined another program my job offers to help advance your career and got a mentor through that. When that was over, my new supervisor suggested I apply for an internship in IT at our company. I applied and worked the internship a little under a year.
During this time, I was interning as an IT analyst and working with our developers and engineers. I was trained by our engineer. I was testing an algorithm and the algorithm was wrong. I pointed it out to our engineer and he told me that he didn’t have time to go line by line with me so find one that works and make it fit. I was uncomfortable with that (especially because working on the call center side, I see this is how defects get pushed through and impact our systems). I found one that fit and pushed it through.
A day later, someone else I was interning with asked me how I got it to work and said he wants to meet with me and the engineer. We met and basically the engineer said I was wrong and placed the blame on me for overlooking it and applauded the other intern for noticing it. I went to the supervisor for the internship to let her know what happened and that I previously pointed out the error and it was overlooked. She told me if it happens again to reach out to her, etc. but she was never around. I’d reach out to her and she wouldn’t respond for days.
HR had remained in contact with me since the prior incident. They reached out to ask how everything was going and I mentioned the issue and that I don’t want anyone that comes after me to experience the same thing. When that internship ended, the other intern was selected for the role and I was sent back to the phones.
During my internship, I started taking analyst courses and certifications online and paying out of pocket, despite the supervisor for my internship saying they would pay for it, they never did. Back on the phones, my supervisor said there is another internship I should apply for. I interviewed and got it. Again, there were 2 of us. This one went really well. I worked directly with our IT consultants, developers, and scrum master. I learned that I found passion in scrum so I would meet with our scrum master for advice and mentorship. I took more courses and ended up taking my scrum master course and becoming certified. This internship also lasted just under a year. When it was over, my job went through a hiring freeze so they couldn’t offer either of us the position. We went back to phones.
About a week later, a scrum internship opened up. I interviewed and got accepted. Then, my supervisor says my job has this new rule that if you were on am internship within the last 6 months you can’t do it again. I haven’t seen this in writing, just word of mouth. The director of talent management reached out to set up a meeting with me to pick my brain to ask why I might feel I hadn’t gotten other roles I applied for; he asked if I felt it was due to my race or gender but I said I did not want to look at it that way. He said I should apply for more roles. So I applied for a job as a scrum master, another as an analyst, and another as an IT associate. For the scrum one, the manager said that he was looking for a more mature level (senior) applicant but he would be my mentor. For the IT associate, I wasn’t selected (the recruiter also mentioned that he noticed I applied for other roles and would be in touch with those recruiters as well - is that normal or ok? I was uncomfortable with him mentioning roles I applied for that he wasn’t a recruiter on).
For the analyst role, the interview was excellent, I sent the thank you email after and never got a response. The recruiter for the analyst role set up a meeting with me to tell me I didn’t get the role but she found a course I could take to get my scrum master certification and that I should get a mentor. I told her I already have, which is indicated on my resume and which we also discussed and she praised before submitting me for the analyst interview. How could she not remember that before meeting with me?The interviewed also praised me for it.
Each interviewer expressed how they were impressed with the work I’ve done and with me. By this time I ended the meeting with the recruiter and clocked out and just cried. The recruiter mentioned that I should reach out to the manager that interviewed me for the analyst role because she likes when employees take initiative. I replied that I sent her a thank you email that she never even replied to so I feel uncomfortable reaching out again and I feel like I was interviewed just to meet a quota. The recruiter stopped replying.
I’m wondering if there is a stigma since I previously went to HR, only because I am being told that I am qualified or overqualified for these roles but I’m not being selected. I am good enough to work them as an intern, but not get paid for it. I’ve literally applied for 12 different IT roles over that last 2 years, all similar to analysis, scrum, and product analysis. Do I have a something negative following me as a result? I’ve asked my supervisor and she reassures me that she receives nothing but positive feedback for me.
Should I escalate it, be patient because of the economy, or move on with applying for other companies?

Me and my now ex were together for a bit over a year. I caught him texting another girl flirting with her and asking her to hangout in Nov 22. I honestly thought that that was cheating but he didn’t agree so I stayed with him. In feb 23 he broke up with me because he didn’t like the fact that I didn’t trust him enough. A couple weeks go by and we decided to try again and work on things slowly. We weren’t bf gf yet because he hadn’t asked me out but we were in an exclusive relationship/situation. We had both promised each other that we wouldn’t talk to anyone else and it would just be each other. He told me he loved me everyday and we hung out anytime we could. He goes to school 4 hours away from me so we were a medium long distance type thing. Once he was done his finals I decided to go see him for a couple days where he was living. One of the nights I found out that he was still on dating apps and had hooked up with girls 5 different times. All while he was saying he loved me and that he wasn’t talking to other girls. (I kept questioning him because I would get gut feelings and I was right the entire time). I was heartbroken so I went home and blocked him on almost everything except his number. A couple weeks go by and he comes back home so we start hanging out again. He asked me out about a week ago and I said yes (bad idea I know). A couple days go by and I find out that he’s still talking to other girls and that he’s still on tinder. On Saturday he had left for a trip and I guess I wanted to get back at him or something I honestly don’t know what I was thinking and I regret it so much. I went out and hooked up with someone else. Honestly I have no Idea what I was doing. It was a stupid decision and it’s been eating me alive. He quickly found out as I was going to breakup with him. The guilt was too bad that I couldn’t stand to be with him. He went all crazy on me which is understandable. But he kept blowing up my phone saying really mean things to me and body shaming me. I told him that I guess I wanted to get back at him and he insists what he did was nowhere near cheating and how I did him way worse and everything. I don’t think that’s true and keep in mind before he left he told me I was allowed to get with other guys while he was gone because of how he fucked me over before. He lied to me for months about it and would just tell me he was studying and have a girl in his bed. I don’t know what to think. Help??

My cousin recommended selling photos in a cosplay outfit online as a side hustle as they make a killing off it, but I can't remember what forum/site they said to use. I don't have their phone number (waiting on their sibling to send it me) and they've come off the platform I used to contact them on, so hoping you guys can help me!

Hi everyone,
I seemed to have lost my phone for the first time and needed help…
On 28 May 6pm, someone grabbed my phone from my front pocket when I was travelling in London. At 11pm, I marked my phone as lost. This took a while as I was all alone and attempted to make police report. Tried getting a report from the police station for insurance claims but they refused :(
The next day, I noticed that the phone pinged a location minutes before I woke up. This happened on 29 May 6:55am. Nothing happened since as I guess they turned my phone off. They even tried sending a phishing sms to my contactable number in attempt to capture my Apple ID.
Today, on 30th May, I noticed the location is back to the morning of 28th May before I lose my phone.
Any idea what they have done and any suggestions in what I can do next? Any help is appreciated thank you…

Everyone in my family has Google Voice accounts, but we currently have random freebie numbers we got from Google. I've been thinking about buying a block of sequential numbers from NumberBarn (probably 6 or 7 numbers to cover me, spouse, our kids, and our parents) to port to our respective separate Google Voice accounts. (To try to maximize the likelihood that the numbers could be ported, I'd try to find a block of numbers where the area code and first four digits--e.g., 555-345-6xxx--are the same as one of the Google Voice numbers that someone in our family already has.)
I'd like to find the cheapest way for everyone to do this and also make sure I don't run into any limits with carriers regarding number of new lines/activations, and port out requests.
First, it looks like US Mobile would probably be the cheapest option ($1.50 for the 50/text plan with no voice or data plus $1.57 Recovery Fee plus $2.00 Service Fee = $5.07 .... perhaps plus fees for SIM cards if I can't get enough free ones?). Does anyone know of a cheaper option?
Second, does US Mobile (or other cheaper carriers) impose limits on the number of times a particular phone can be activated (with different SIM cards each time) to create a new line and then port the number out? Alternatively, do they impose limits on the number of times a new line can be created and then closed (by porting out)? Our family only has two old phones (that are 4G capable) that we can use for temporarily activating service on a mobile carrier, so we'd have to port out from NumberBarn in batches of 2 numbers at a time. ... I assume there are limits on the number of free trials, so I would be paying for one month's worth of service on each line activated.
Third, since I'll be the one that has to pay for all of this (i.e., can't make the kids or the grandparents pay for their new numbers), does it matter for purposes of porting to Google Voice if the name used on the account with the mobile carrier matches the name on the Google account receiving the number? (That is, can I port the number from NumberBarn to a temporary US Mobile account setup in my name and then port the number to my mom's Google Voice account, or does that create problems or raise red flags of some kind?)
Fourth, can I use my credit card to pay the $20 fee to Google for all of the separate Google Voice accounts (e.g., use my credit card for my son's Google Voice number) even though the name on my credit card wouldn't match the name on my son's Google account? Does doing that create any issues or raise red flags for Google?
Thanks in advance for any guidance!

Jatoichi - This is a musical about a blind (more on that later) masseur. Hot chicks, a hot ladyboy, So many retards. To the left, to the right, running around in circles, bumbling in mud, hitting each other with sticks—great choreography! Hang around for the big dance number finale. And, for the last time and for crying out loud, is he blind or not???
Three Outlaw Samurai - What’s a “three outlaw”? Three strikes and you’re out? Need to make better use of commas and dashes people. Anyway, this cheeky flick tells the tale of a traveling mariachi band called The Three Amigos who find themselves in hot straits when some fooktarded Daimyo’s daughter is kidnapped and held for ransom. Hilarity ensues due to mistaken identity, shenanigans and other hi-jinx. Eventually, they’re forced to eat millet. So, they cheese it and leave the pesky villagers to fend for themselves.
Hidden Blade - Not Hidden Fortress. I won’t make that mistake again. Hot chicks? check. Retards? check. Wangs? check. Blood and guts? double check. Swords? yes. Machine guns? can’t say I like that. Japanese Hitler? WTF? 8[
Afro Samurai Resurrection - This turd of a movie will make you wish you had just stuck with the Criterion Collection. What the heck’s a Crunchyroll anyways? Sounds vaguely sexual. Sure, this flick checks all the boxes and then some (evil teddy bear, evil robots, big tiddie waifu), but him and his janky-ass sword are just way too chipper for my tastes.
Harakiri - Gaaawd damn that was hard to watch. This film was made by Alfred Hitchcock during his Blue Period when he only used black and white film with mono soundtrack. It’s the fast-paced story of a down and out Ronin and his dwindling family. The family is so small and poor that at one point they use their infant son as a piece in a Parcheesi game. The ancient Chinese pastime is symbolic here of a life without care. As in, he don’t care bout nuthin so why not just off it. Rated PG-13 for graphic scenes of disembowelment with a dull bamboo cheese spreader. (I would’ve puked if it was in full color and surround sound) Overall, I would give it 2.5 out of 5 stars, if I used stars.
7 Samurai - The timeless tale of 7 star-crossed lovers. How does that work? Well, the pesky villagers are always looking for them. What else could they be doing? Remakes include: The Magnificent Seven (twice over), Battle Beyond the Stars, Star Wars the Clone Wars episode Bounty Hunters, The Mandalorian episode Sanctuary, Samurai 7, Seven Samurai 20XX (video game). Who knows how many others credited or otherwise. My favorite scene is of them chowing on millet gruel and whinging about it. Meanwhile, other Ronin are so hungry they threaten harakiri for a few Parcheesi pieces.
Battle Beyond the Stars - This is an avant-garde movie by Akira Kurosawa consisting of 9 hours of blackness. Avant-garde is Latin for “long sad/boring.” Beyond the stars there’s nothing. No matter, therefore no way to measure distance. Without distance there’s no way to mark time. All photons are collocated. So, no film can be exposed and nothing happens. There is no “creation” event, so no God either. Joseph Campbell and George Lucas are rolling in their graves.
Oh, wait, I see the problem. I was on Peacock and the app crashed (again!). Guess I just wasted 9 hours staring at a blank screen. Anyway, the UFO (universal fix operation)—off and back on—fixed it.
Battle Beyond the Stars - After most of the retards and a couple hot chicks are killed on his planet Lil Pray’ree, John-boy (don’t mention his m-m-m-mole) takes off in his spaceship the SS Teabagger to tour the galaxy on a sex vacation. At first he’s chased by lobotomized morons but quickly escapes due to the nagging of the B-ahtch 9000 computer. On his way he meets a princess, a lizard, a hairless wookiee named Jorge and things blow up. Unfortunately, he returns with only seven ships full of dudes and chicks and… others, all of whom are virgins except one or two. I’m guessing the villagers molest all of them. I don’t know, couldn’t finish the thing due to 10 hours staring at the tiny screen on my phone.
Samurai Cheddar - Okay, I made that up. But, it seems like you can put any random words ahead or behind “Samurai” and there’s a flick by that name. Extra points for using a number—1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 13, 47, 300 and 20XX are taken.
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Growing up so disconnected from my emotions, I frequently need pieces of media to help me through my grief. I love spoken word poetry and I wanted to share two poems by Andrea Gibson. While they are both called The Call, they are very different from each other and I have related to both in different stages of my healing. I hope they help you.
​
THE CALL, OPTION 1
 
I pay seventeen dollars online to track down the phone number
of the man who sexually assaulted me, and my friend asks, "What
do you plan to say?"
 
I'll tell him I know he lost
all his money gambling
and was forced
 
to sell the building
where he did what he did.
I'll tell him karma is a hell
 
of a feminist.
I'll tell him my silence
was his worst bet.
 
I'll tell him I'm watching
him through the bullet hole
he left in my childhood,
 
and if he comes within
two hundred miles
of a child's trust, my body
 
will start bleeding his name
all over Main Street in his middle-
of-somewhere town.
 
I'll tell him
he's the middle of nowhere:
a man with no stop
 
lights, the kind of place kids grow up
desperate to escape. I'll tell him
as soon as I got out,
 
I imagined him sanding off
his fingerprints, the guilt
filing him down to half his size.
 
When I met him,
he was the biggest man
in town, had set records
 
in the deadlift, was as old
as my father. I weighed
ninety-six pounds, was still
 
spending sleepovers practicing
how to kiss. I'll tell him how big
I am now. So big
 
I could make his address
the title of my next book,
and yes, I think he asked for it.
 
Asked me to play hangman
with his name on the local news,
asked me to spray paint ME TOO
 
across his pickup truck
and say, I dare you
to compare property damage
 
with someone you made property.
With someone whose puberty
you mutilated.
 
I'll say, Trauma
is a pretty word for how to die
every day of the year,
 
but my voice is alive
and right now it is the only justice
system I trust
 
to ensure men like you
understand the law
of gravity, understand
 
you will always be held down
by what you held down.
There is no such thing as rising
 
from someone else's ashes.
No man's spirit escapes the hell
he denies putting a child through,
 
which is to say, I am the only one
out of the two of us who survived
you, and I survived you
 
so beautifully. Even on my worst days,
my scars are the backroads
where kids sneak out their windows
 
and drive through the night
to hear poetry. I am so much
of who I dreamed I'd be
 
when I grew up, and what
does the boy you once were
think of the man you became?
 
A man running
from his own name.
A man who must wake
 
fifty times a night, terrified
the truth is somewhere breaking
from its chains and racing
 
for the world's ear.
When the truth gets there, will you try
to tell your friends I wanted it?
 
Will you try to tell your wife
how old of a soul I was?
At thirteen? At thirteen,
 
I had the youngest soul
in the universe.
I was so brand new
 
I thought reincarnation
was a flower I would wear
on my wrist
 
if someday someone asked me
to the ninth-grade dance.
I'd stand in my full-length mirror
 
and practice not blushing
when a slow song came on.
That's how old I was.
 
That's the kind of man you were.
The kind of man who makes children
grow up and search
 
for your phone number,
our bodies riddled with the wish
that all the records will say:
 
No one by that name exists.
 
 
 
THE CALL, OPTION 2
 
I pay seventeen dollars online to track down the phone number of the man who sexually
assaulted me, and my friend asks, "What do you plan to say?"
 
There is a world in which you did not touch me.
A world in which you thought about touching me
and were so nightmared by your own mind
you climbed inside your skull and bloodied your knees
 
crawling across the tundra of your history,
turning over every rock to chase out every worm
that might trick you into believing anything
could be cut in half and keep living.
 
There is a world in which you saw
how easily you could become an ax
splitting the personalities of children,
so swore your fingerprints
 
would be like the rings of trees, that your growth
could be counted on. In this world you have
groomed no one, and I am made of flyaways-
gleefully unclipped, wholly uncombed through,
 
braiding myself around a song, certain
I've invented dancing. Look at me
still calling you a hero. You built my trust
and never became the quake of earth
 
that shattered my foundation. Look at you
mothering your own nature, calling yourself home
at the first sign of dark. In this world you might
still be poor but not where it counts.
 
You might have still lost all your money,
but look at what you saved: Me
and Her and Her and Her and Her and Her
and the child you once were-how proud
 
he is to see who he's become. In this world
you still have secrets, but they are like my father's
secrets. The ones he doesn't know I know.
The ones my grandma told me: how he stayed
 
home nearly every weekend of high school
to keep my grandfather's drunken fist from the glass
of her jaw, how good my father was at pretending
he didn't love the movies, hadn't saved
 
all summer to buy a secondhand suit
for his first school dance. There is a world
in which you, too, only lie to save someone's life,
a world where you still live a stone's throw
 
from Canada but walk the river's shore never plotting
how you'd swim to freedom, never practicing
the backstroke of denial, never hoping I drowned
the letters you wrote me when I was graduating
 
eighth grade and you were forty and marrying
someone you said would never be your type.
The first time I called, your wife answered
the phone. I hung up, not strong enough
 
to be like you to throw a brick through
a woman's chest and have no doubts about it
being the right move, but there is a world
in which the truth is as soft as the pillow
 
that holds your wife's head when she dreams
about the day you met. In this world you wake up
before she does, make her coffee, read her horoscope
and forget to read your own. Where you stand behind her
 
when she looks in the mirror, tell her she's grown
more gorgeous every one of her sixty-seven years,
how you feel like the richest man in town
with your hands in the silver
 
of her hair. In this world I celebrate the news
of you having a daughter, a granddaughter, a niece.
In this world I don't panic when I see a pink tricycle
in your neighbor's driveway
 
as I'm driving to meet friends at the riverfront,
my hometown still a home you never haunted.
I roll the window down, holler your name
into the autumn air. You look up
 
from raking a pile of golden leaves, smile
and wave back to me. Can you see it?
I know you can. Everyone can
see who they were supposed to be.
 
It's the readiest grief in the world.
 
 

I have been researching and think I've come up with a good/the best plan, but would like to make sure I'm understanding everything correctly for our upcoming 10-day ring road trip.
I have an unlocked Pixel 6a that supports eSIMs.
Then through Airalo: Nenna Mobile (Nova network) 10GB plan for $23, download to phone once we're in the country (and disable the US AT&T physical SIM before we leave).
If we need to make any actual voice calls, I have a US Google Voice number and will pay the two cents per minute to call over data to an Icelandic number.
Texting back to the US is not critical; we'll use FB Messenger or whatever with anyone we need to communicate with.
We could probably get away with less data considering we'll have wifi pretty much every night and will pre-download all the driving and hiking maps, but it's cheap enough that over-buying data seems worthwhile so I never have to worry about scrimping.
Does anyone see any issue or have any notes on that plan?
Thank you!

Hi everyone! I posted earlier about my decision to buy a Toyota Tacoma to replace my S (I have not traded the S in, I got the Tacoma yesterday and I'm currently waiting on repairs from Tesla before I sell the S).
I suggested in the comment thread that I'd do a post about EVERYTHING that went wrong with that car. So let's buckle up because here we go.
I bought the car CPO from Tesla in June of 2019, it is a 2016 75D/"Standard Range" S. The car is a relatively rare build because Tesla upgraded to Autopilot 2 hardware in October of '16 and removed the free unlimited supercharging perk in January of '17 (or roughly around that time). My car came down the line in November of '16 so it's one of very few Ses that has both these features. The first time I took it into the Service Center I was told by a technician (who does not drive a Tesla as his personal vehicle) that this particular run of Ses was one of the best batch he'd ever seen. Oh boy let's see how great this batch is.

Heated steering wheel

The first thing that went wrong with the car was actually broken from the time I bought it, but I didn't notice for a few months because it was the heated steering wheel. Winter '19/'20 set in and I realized the steering wheel wasn't warming up. I took it in for warranty repair and they found it was simply unplugged, this was free.

Trunk latch

In the summer of 2020, amid the COVID lockdowns, one day the trunk failed to latch and was stuck open. I tried pulling the emergency release but that did nothing. I scheduled a mobile appointment (which I will give Tesla credit for, very few car companies make housecalls), and the technician was also unable to get the trunk to latch. So I scheduled a service center appointment and had to drive with the trunk open for a couple weeks, this made an annoying beeping noise and prevented me from using ANY cruise control, let alone "Autopilot" (or "Full-Self Driving", I actually got grandfathered into the offer to upgrade from EAP to FSD for $3000 so I pulled the trigger on that, I have not requested the FSD Beta because it looks like a death machine to me).
Amazingly during my drive to the service center the trunk magically fixed itself. I wasn't about to turn around and go home since I figured the part could still be faulty, so I asked them to look at it anyway. Since they didn't see anything wrong they charged me over $500 to replace the components. This was my first repair bill.

First collision repair

A couple months later I was rear-ended by a teenager and she did a bunch of damage to the back of the car, this was one of my most seamless issues with the car, I took it to a local collision repair shop and they had it back to me within 3 days, all of these costs were paid by insurance.

MCU2 Upgrade

At some point I took the car in for them to replace the MCU (the 17" touchscreen) with the newer one so I could get Netflix and YouTube on my center screen. This was an optional service center visit, though the original MCU was REALLY starting to chug on newer Tesla software. The replacement cost $1600 and they did not put in a new AM/FM radio (that would have been an additional $500 and I don't listen to the radio much anyway). I was actually kind of happy that I could have the option to upgrade this tech, but if MCU2 winds up being as sluggish as MCU1 was when it was just 4-5 years old this seems like an extra non-optional cost.

12V Battery Replacement

In the summer of 2021 I got the error "12V BATTERY LOW SCHEDULE SERVICE NOW". That seemed really urgent, so I went on YouTube and searched for this error and found out that James May got the same issue. TL;DW the 12V system is powered primarily by a DC-to-DC converter from the main battery, but when the main battery disconnects there's a small 12V (like one you'd use in a motorcycle) that is needed to power on the actuators that connect the main battery. If the 12V goes flat the car is bricked and, because the 12V is under the frunk and the frunk is electronically actuated, the only way to get to the 12V to trickle charge it is to partially dismantle the car.
In fact, I was lucky to get a warning at all some Teslas have had this happen with no warning and in fact it was a software update that even added the warning. And in fact a lot of early Teslas failed within a year because for some reason they charge and discharge the 12V like mad. I hope they've improved this since this blog post, but anyway this is a serious design defect.
Tesla did the right thing here and got me into service the next day AND I got the car back within 90 minutes. This is the fastest turnaround time I've ever seen from them, however I'm fairly certain that if my car was no longer under warranty (meaning they would not be responsible for paying to tow it to the service center) I would not have gotten such white glove treatment.

Suspension issue

In 2022 I read the book Ludicrous: The Unvarnished Story of Tesla Motors by Ed Niedermeyer. From this book I learned about whompy wheels and learned a rumor that many Teslas were built with cheap aluminum suspensions that tend to fail. China forced Tesla to do a recall on cars built in the US and exported to China.
I frantically drove to my local tire shop and asked them to look at the suspension, they reported that it looked to be in good condition but that there was a leak in the hydraulic fluid that Tesla should repair under warranty. I took the car to Tesla and they had it for SIX DAYS during which I had to rely on their Uber vouchers (Tesla only recently started doing loaners in my area, it might be because I live in a very obscure remote place called New York City /s). They reported to me that nothing was wrong with the suspension and returned the car, completely filthy since they'd left it parked under a tree.

Windshield replacement

In late 2022 I decided to save some money by replacing my wiper blades myself. While the blade arms were out one of the springs came loose and smashed into the windshield. It took me about a week to get the wiper back on, I tried every tool in my toolbox and eventually just took it to the tire shop where they put in a vice and got it to reconnect. They did this for free. Over the winter of '22/'23 however the damage to the windshield escalated into a crack. This is mostly my own stupid fault, I probably could have prevented this crack from growing with a cheapo Amazon glass repair kit, but none of the other cars I've ever driven have had something this nuts happen.
I took the car to a local glass repair shop and the owner told me I needed a full new windshield. He called Tesla to confirm the part number and order it, they did not pick up the phone. I was out of the country for about a month so I left this to pick up when I returned. I just went to SafeLite since I assumed they had more staff to pester Tesla to send them the windshield. Dropped off my car, they called me and said they had to wait a couple weeks for the windshield to ship. About a week later I dropped off the car AGAIN and they replaced the windshield.
This cost me another $500 out of pocket and the rest (about $700) was covered by insurance.

Door replacement collision repair

On March 7th 2023 a kid jumped a stop sign and crashed into my driver's side door, he put a huge dent in it and the door handle got stuck in the presenting position. Because he was not the policyholder* his insurance could not establish that he had permission to drive the vehicle and said they would not pay for the repair, so I again had to go through my insurance meaning I couldn't get a loaner.
It took Tesla TWO WEEKS to ship a new door to the only local Tesla-certified collision repair center in my area (this was about a 30 minute drive and I had to Uber both ways since there was no nearby public transit). When I got the car back there was an obnoxious amount of wind noise, I found they had misaligned the new window with the weather stripping. I brought the car back to them and they tooled around enough to get the wind noise down to a lower level, but it is still not gone. I did find I could jam some paper into the weather stripping and shim it up to prevent a little bit of noise.
This was a $500 out of pocket cost (which I may get back through insurance arbitration) and the cost to the insurance was a whopping $4700!

The HVAC filter, radars, and AC

Now we come to the straw that broke the camel's back. I noticed in the manual recently that my car is due for a replacement of the HVAC filter. They're fairly cheap on Amazon, so I figured I'd try doing it myself again. My wife talked me out of this due to what happened with the wiper blades. Additionally the HVAC system has a desicant bag that needs to be replaced periodically (like one of those sillica gel packets), and that requires a special machine.
So I scheduled a service center visit, they informed me my car was also eligible for a free upgrade to the autopilot cameras. I dropped off the car and for the first time in FOUR YEARS they gave me a loaner, a lease-return Model Y that presumably they couldn't find a buyer for (this car was a complete shitbox but that's a whole other story).
They said they would take FIVE DAYS to do this quick 30 minute job of replacing the HVAC filters. I also tried phoning them to ask if they could take a look at the wind noise from the previous repair, there was a message on the phone that told me I need to do all communication with them through the app. I messaged in the app, they did not respond.
Amazingly I got the car back after just FOUR days, but I was informed they did not look at the wind noise because it wasn't on the original list of things, and I would need to book ANOTHER appointment and wait ANOTHER two weeks for that. Replacing a $30 HVAC filter and a dessicant bag cost me a whopping $460!
After I got the car back, however, I realized that they did not merely "upgrade" the Autopilot cameras. They removed the Autopilot radar. I know they did it because now my follow distance bottoms out at 2 and I now have an 85mi/hr Autosteer speed limit. By the way, unlike the 3 and Y the Autopilot follow distance control in the S is a physical click-knob. So I can click it to 7,6,5,4,3,2 and 2. Like they replaced the bottom position with a second "2".
BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!
The HVAC is now blowing hot air. Every time I turn on the AC the car blasts me in the face with hot air and the compressor goes nuts. I assume this means the coolant is low (since it seems to have some ability to cool but is struggling a LOT).
So that's the end of our story. That's everything that's happened to this car so far. And where are we now? I have an appointment with service to fix the remaining problems and YESTERDAY I bought a 2020 Toyota Tacoma which GET THIS has a radar adaptive cruise control! No fancy "Autopilot" or "Autosteer", but it has lane departure warning which is enough to keep me awake on a long nighttime drive.
The biggest open secret about "Autopilot" and "FSD" is that they're mostly off-the-shelf components. Rather than building a self-driving car what Tesla actually did was take standard driver-assistance cruise control features and mash them together pretending they're something magical.
*This was a frankly ridiculous claim on the part of his insurance since his mother was the policyholder and the police report documents that she was sitting in the passenger's seat at the time of the collision. So I guess their position is that she was in the process of being kidnapped.
If you ever get into a crash like this make sure to take out your phone, take a video, and say "Do you have his/her permission to drive this vehicle?" If they say no just turn to the police and say it's a stolen vehicle and it needs to be impounded.

Throwaway account.
So, I broke rule number one of hiring a local contractor, in the Norfolk, VA area. I paid more money up front than I should have, roughly 2k. I realize how dumb I am, but that’s what I get for putting any faith in humanity.
Anyways, they came to do a landscaping job, gave me a reasonable quote and said they only required a small down payment to begin. I got a signed quote on paper with the itemized list of things to be done. They began work and knocked off a couple things from the list. Then they left for some more materials and to rent equipment. They asked me to pay the couple hundred-dollar deposit for the equipment, saying the one they had couldn’t fit in my yard. I was skeptical and asked a couple questions and got some pretty dumb answers, but I just assumed they were trying to get their local business up and running and needed a little help so I gave it to them. First big mistake. Because then the person continued to make excuses for other things and tacking on additional money. This whole time he was polite and professional, even calling me to give updates and all that. But it was starting to become more and more bullshit.
So I did what I should have done before even contacting the person to begin with, I looked them up. I had the person’s phone number saved as a contact in my phone, so some social media apps automatically ask you to add them. I’d noticed this person pop up once so I decided to check. The name on the account was different then the name he’s provided me and on his flyers/email. So I was like huh that’s strange, so I looked up the name and sure enough it was him.
Then I looked up their company name. They made it very similar to another bigger company in the area, which had many reviews on google, just to trick people. But I eventually found their reviews on local review sites, and then some scam tracking sites. That’s when I saw multiple people say they’ve done this exact same thing multiple times in the same area in the recent past. For very similar amounts of money. Now what little sympathy I had remaining is all out the door. I called and filed a police report, but the officer said at this point it’s not a criminal offense so they couldn’t do anything. Basically, because they started the work, now they’re just technically "working slow". But then he gave some examples of what I could do next based off some people he knew went through a similar situation. Including small claims court.
The information I know:
- Person used a fake name. Found them on social media
- Business is actually not a licensed business
- Lied about being BBB licensed and insured. Looked it up on their site.
- Found multiple people in same situation online
So my questions are:
- If I take this person to small claims court and win, I’ve seen sometimes that the defendant can literally just say they’re not going to pay up even right in front of the judge. So what’s the point?
- Am I allowed to reach out to the other people who got scammed, and see if they are interested in doing a combined lawsuit? And do the total damages accrue, causing the case to actually go to the district court if they are high enough? I saw somewhere small claims is only up to $5,000 in Virginia but correct me if I’m wrong please.
At the end of the day I’d much rather the person just finish the work, or pay me back. But if not, I would like to know what options I have. Thanks in advance!