For those who don't remember (or weren't around), here's what the 3 headed monster era referenced.
Since Chandler left after the 2011 title, the Mavericks have a massive weakness at the 5. This year is the first year since then (other than 2015, where they got an older Chandler back for a season) where the big man rotation feels solid (if not great).
Let's list some of the bigs the Mavericks had in the era between:
Brandan Wright, Brandan Haywood, Ian Mahinmi, Chris Kaman, Eddy Curry that one game he punked the Dwight / Kobe Lakers, Samuel Dalembert, Tyson Chandler (an older and worse version than 2011), Salah Mejri, Bernard James, Zaza Pachulia (who was almost an All Star with Dallas due to fan votes), DeAndre Jordan (who was dropping off quickly), Porzingis (oft-injured but gave rays of hope, especialy in the bubble), and the longest lasting member of the group, Dwight Powell

Has anybody had the idea to put a different engine in an all-wheel-drive Q 60 like a VK 56 or 37 I feel like this card should’ve came with a V8 vk56
but anyways, what parts would you need specifically what’s the budget? You could probably get a salvage title q50 3.7 auction for like 5000 and swap over the entire radiator support engine and engine control module My question is, would I be able to keep the electric steering or would I have to switch over to the pump system? I know it’s cheaper to just buy a 3.7 Q 50 but I they never made a 3.7 q60

Kind of funny how three out of five number one seeds in the West since 2020 turned out to be paper tigers. I’ll be ranking them by how fraudulent they turned out to be.

1. 2022 Suns. 64 wins in the West, by far the best record in the league. A clutch machine, top 5 in both offense and defense. A well-oiled win machine. Booker 5th in MVP and First Team All NBA, CP3 Third Team All NBA, Bridges First Team All Defense, Ayton, one of the better centers in the league, Monty COTY. The only team that was supposed to rival them in the West was Warriors, that’s it. Their opponent?

52-win four-seeded Mavs team that traded Porzingis at the deadline for Dinwiddie and Bertans. Luka was Luka, Brunson and Dinwiddie high level guards who could shoot and handle the ball, DFS, Kleber and Bullock really good 3 and D guys. All those guys were in their primes other than Brunson who turned into an All Star-ish player that postseason. Luka missed a few games of that Jazz series in the first round, and they still won in 6. The concept was: surround Luka with guys who can space the floor, can execute on defense and handle the ball when needed. It totally worked. Let’s be clear though: this team was still a level below the Suns. Dallas was a tier 2 contender in the West. Phoenix was a title favorite basically. Suns in 6 was probably the most popular pick.
We all know what happened. They went up 2-0 and 3-2. They layed a giant egg in Game 7 at home. It was over in the second quarter. No real excuse. Their greatness in the regular season, strong contender status, an embarrassing fashion in which they went out and the fact that they lost to a really good not great team that lost in 3 to the Warriors in the next round makes them an easy number one.

1. OKC 2024. Just hear me out. 57 wins in an absolutely brutal West. The toughest conference of the 2020s for sure. Top 5 in offense and defense. Excellent halfcourt offense. Second best net rating in the league only behind Boston. Great record against good teams. SGA second in MVP, Chet a DPOY candidate by all the metrics, Dort an All Defense candidate, Daigneault COTY, Jalen Williams played like an All Star for a while (Bill Simmons said J-Dub reminded him of Kawhi, so that’s almost like an award). Were they considered the best team? No, the Nuggets were, but they were certainly in that second tier with Minnesota. There were concerns about their youth. Yet this team had all the regular season metrics in their favor, they had talent, depth, youth, athleticism, two-way play and excellent coaching. Their opponent?

A 50-win five-seeded Dallas. No refreshers needed for them. OKC lost in 6 as a favorite. And here’s why I ultimately have them at two on this list: what advantage did Dallas have over them before the series?
Home court advantage? No.
Rest advantage? No, they went six with the Clippers, while OKC swept the Pels.
Coaching advantage? No, Daigneault is one of the most esteemed coaches in the league, while Kidd is probably not even in the Top 10 for most people.
Injury advantage? No, Luka was not at 100% the whole series. He was pretty bad for half the games, just like he was the previous round. Plus, they lost Kleber who is one of their few two-way players. The Mavs were the most successful with Kleber on the court vs the Clippers. He was more important for them than Gafford, Lively less so, but Kidd was most comfortable having Maxi out there. OKC was fully healthy.
Talent advantage? If we include the first eight players in the rotation, then 100% no. You would predict Dallas to have two of the three best players in the series (Luka and Kyrie vs SGA).
Matchup advantage? Not really, because even though we knew Dallas was gonna have size and good rim protection for 48 minutes, we also knew that OKC has two shooting bigs and they play five out most of the time, so it was possible they would just kill them from the outside, so I wouldn’t say Dallas had an obvious matchup advantage going into the series.
We know what happened next. In three of the four Dallas wins, they led the whole fourth quarter. Game 4 it was the same story, but SGA got hot, Mavs missed a ton of FTs and somehow choked that game. Now, obviously they didn’t go out in an embarassing fashion (17 point blown lead in Game 6 is bad, but it was a close game in the end), but I will say that they were certainly outplayed in Games 2 through 5. It probably should’ve been over quicker. They had OKC’s offense in the mud (it was SGA or bust for them the whole series, which is what the Mavs wanted), overpowered them in the paint and on the glass, and they scored just enough to win four out of six. Almost the entire time Dallas was in control. OKC didn’t even choke away a series lead (1-0 doesn’t count). They were just completely outplayed by a team that wasn’t supposed to outplay them (unless Luka and Kyrie went supernova which is maybe the opposite of what happened). In the words of Bill, that felt pretty paper tiger-y to me.

1. Jazz 2021. 59 win pace, best record and net rating in the league, top 5 in both offense and defense, three All Stars, DPOY and All NBA guy (Mitchell, Conley, Gobert). Everything was great in the regular season. Now, they went out way more sad than OKC. Choked a 2-0 lead, lost the last two games against Kawhi-less Clippers, blowing a 25-point lead in Game 6. The reason I have them behind OKC is that they definitely had the most excuses out of all these teams.

First, no one actually took them seriously as the number one seed. OKC was definitely behind the Nuggets this year, but no one else in the West. In 2021, people would take the Lakers, Clippers and post-deadline Nuggets over them in an instant. Wasn’t close. Lakers had the eight best record in the West that year, and everyone would still take the Lakers going into the playoffs. So, they were already known to be paper tigers.
Second, they lost against the Clippers who had more talent, a better coach and were a bad matchup for them. They were second in Net Rating that year too. The last two games against Dallas in the first round they looked like a bona fide title contender. Prime Kawhi, PG, two forwards/small-ball fives who shot 40%+ from three in Batum and Morris who could space out Gobert. They went down 0-2 and then blew Jazz out at home in Games 3 and 4. They were easily the better team, and I don’t know who would suggest they weren’t before the series.
Third, the Kawhi thing was a big break for them, but they were unlucky themselves. Mitchell missed the last 16 games of the season with an ankle injury, missed Game 1 of the first round and hurt it again in Game 2 against the Clippers. Conley missed every game of that series but the last one, came back and was awful. We’re seeing three years later how good Conley is. Terance Mann also went for 39 points in that Game 6, which was pretty fluky. No wonder they lost.

So, here is part 2 of my entitled employee story. We left off with discovering Sally’s retaliation of giving me trash as a Christmas gift after her latest write-up.
So, the next several weeks, I am noticing more problems, but here’s some of the highlights.

1. Ever since we had issues of the office’s checks going randomly missing, Sally had apparently decided to just stop throwing any envelope away when opening the mail. She would supposedly search the envelopes/paperwork & then keep the envelopes with the paperwork. So, instead of doing her job better, she would decide to just stop doing the job at all. After all, you can’t get in trouble for screwing it up if you aren’t doing it, right? However, this resulted in items getting left with the paperwork (which sometimes wouldn’t get touched for several weeks due to being busy) that had needed to be collected or addressed right away.
   
2. Sally’s careless mistakes continued at about the same rate (average of 2 to 3 a week). She would put deposit slips/emails with the wrong office’s report, put one office’s mail in another office’s bin, put one office’s funding papers in another office’s bin, put one office’s bills in the folder for their correspondence & vice versa, put one office’s bills in the folder for another office’s bills, put the new month’s bills in the folder without taking out the old month’s bills so they would get mixed up. I could go on & on.
   
3. Sally would still ask for help on things she shouldn’t need help on anymore, ‘cause I had helped her many times on items exactly like it in the 2 years she’s worked here. I mean, the whole point of asking for help when learning new things on a job is so you can take the input you’re given & use it to get better at the job so you don’t have to ask for help anymore. I mean, what kind of office works by their employees constantly needing to be walked through everything every day? Sally would even ask for help on things no one would need to ask for help on. For example, she asked me, “An office took a deposit to the bank without showing it on their report. How do I write that up in the letter to fax to them?” Um, exactly what you just said to me. Or another time, she asks how long she should wait before calling an office back. Well, how long do you think you should give them? Just use your good judgment. You don’t need help with that! Again, you’ve been here 2 years!
   

On Jan 26, I take the Dec bills, correspondence faxes, & timesheets out of their folders to scan them into the computer. Now, one thing the bills should always have on them are the check number used to pay for this purchase & the date it was paid. The offices themselves are supposed to write this on there, but they don’t always, which is why it is our job to write it on there if it’s missing. I had noticed when I scanned Nov’s bills around Nov 30 that a lot of Sally’s offices don’t have that info written on them. So, I explained to her what needed to be written on every bill/receipt. I now flip through the Dec & Jan bills of her offices really quick to check them. There are quite a few of them with no info written down on them. There’s strike one for noncompliance.
Another task we would do several days a week (that’s Sally’s responsibility) is to check the bank accounts online. She is to look at the bank balances & report any low balances to Greg (or me if Greg isn’t there). She is then to look at the transactions in order to see if anything looks fraudulent. Since we are a loan company, check fraud is very common for us. So, we look at the checks for anything funny-looking, & we look to see if there are any auto debits (like when you use your bank account online to pay for a bill) that would tell us if someone got hold of our bank account info.
On Jan 30, at 1:15 p.m., I asked if any of the bank balances were low (Greg was out of town for a few days). Sally said she had forgotten to check the bank accounts that morning. Weird, ‘cause you had to check the Dallas office to make sure the money we sent them had shown up. How did you get the login sheet out to look in their bank account but then forget about checking all the bank accounts? This just further cemented in my mind that she was NOT checking these bank accounts the way she should. I was 100% positive that all she does when logging into these bank accounts is checking the balances to give to Greg but then never checks the transactions. I know this ‘cause, 1) I’ve observed Sally only logging in to write down the balances & then logging back out (she had some flimsy excuse ready when I asked her about it), 2) there have been auto debits that appeared in bank accounts that we didn’t find for weeks until I happened to see it for some reason & guess what? She never pointed those out to us, & 3) Sally hadn’t bothered to check the bank account balances since Greg was out of town, so clearly she only felt the need to check the balances. There’s strike two for noncompliance.
& even more bad mistakes or decisions:

1. At the end of Jan, we discovered that Sally had mailed the employees’ W2s to the managers’ home addresses instead of to the offices to distribute to their employees!
   
2. We had an office that moved locations to right across the street, so the only thing that changed in their address was their street number (12 Main Street instead of 11 Main Street). I explained this to Sally & gave her an updated list of the office’s addresses. 3 weeks later, we get a call from that office saying that mail we send to them keeps going to their landlord’s house. I check the address labels Sally had created for herself. Sure enough, it had the wrong address on them. I go to grab the lease, & at the top is where the tenant’s new address is listed. & all the way at the bottom of the page in the paragraph titled “RENT” where it lists where to send the rent is the landlord’s home address. & that’s the address Sally had chosen to be the new office’s address on her address labels.
   
3. Sally hadn’t been faxing the offices to ask for bills/receipts that never made it to us.
   
4. I used the last towel on a roll of paper towels, so I went to the cabinets to grab another. We were out. Sally is in charge of keeping track of supplies that need ordering, so I go to Sally & say we’re completely out of paper towels, we need to order some. Sally response: “No one ever tells me when they grab the last roll so I know when to order them.” Um, excuse me, since when is it our job to tell you to do your job? It’s your responsibility to keep track of supplies. You should be checking the level of paper towels, toilet paper, Kleenex, etc., to see when you need to order them.
   

So, I knew she needed a second warning write up for carelessness cause of the numerous mistakes since the first warning write up in the middle of Dec, & I would be giving Sally a first warning write up for negligence cause of her not asking the offices for missing bills & not writing the info on the bills I had told her to do at the end of Nov. However, it was only a few days from Feb, which was the time for performance reviews. So, rather than doing a write up now & then in a week or so doing a performance review that was one of the worst performance reviews I’ve ever heard of, I decided to just do it in one fell swoop. You know, just get it all out of the way with one bad conversation, one bad day, & then both of us can hopefully put it behind us & move on.
I decided to do the performance review & write ups on Feb 5 (Monday). It went much smoother ‘cause Greg was there, so Sally couldn’t really give me lip or lash out by showing attitude & anger like she had previously.
On Feb 7 (Wednesday), I log in to get the transactions for an office who is switching banks. I wanted to get an updated list of outstanding checks so they know how many checks are left before they can close the old bank account. & what do I see? Someone had used the bank account to pay $100 on their AT&T bill. I call the office & find out it was actually them, so no fraud there. But I then ask Sally if she had seen that when checking the bank accounts. She said she didn’t remember. Obviously, I have found my proof that she is either not checking them or isn’t paying attention when she does. I have a discussion with Greg about it, & we decide I need to have a sit down with her about her not doing her job. She is sick on Thursday, so I plan to talk with her the next day she comes in.
On Feb 9 (Friday), I begin the conversation about checking the bank accounts & how important it is. I am planning to say things like, we expect you to do this job, you’ve been told multiple times to do this task, if you’re not going to do the job, then you’re welcome to go find another one, etc. But she cuts me off at the beginning with an excuse of, “Well, I didn’t know what I should be looking for, now I know.” & it broke me. She does this exact thing every time I have to have a conversation with her. She has an excuse ready to go on the tip of her tongue, always spins it around so it’s not actually her fault. It’s always, “Well, I didn’t know that, but now, I do.” & I was just done. I didn’t continue the conversation, even though I needed to, ‘cause I just broke down in tears from the stress of having to discipline her & knowing that nothing will ever come of it, but having our hands legally tied to be able to fire her right now. I cried nonstop for over 4 hours.
On Feb 12 (Monday), I sat down to continue the conversation, this time with a written statement for her to sign.
Me: You respond a lot of the time that you don’t know how to do things, which is very frustrating, ‘cause you’ve been shown multiple times how to do these tasks. It’s very inefficient & wasteful that I have to constantly check all of your work & retrain you on the same thing over & over again. This needs to change. This job is about accuracy & accountability.
Sally: You’re not giving me a chance to improve. I never hear “Good job,” from you. All I ever hear is, “You’re doing a bad job, sign this paper.” I get in trouble every time I ask for help, so I guess I’ll just follow the instructions & hope I’m doing it right.
The problems with that response:

1. You’ve worked here for 2 years, Sally. You’ve had plenty of time to improve.
   
2. The reason you never hear “Good job” is ‘cause you’re not doing a good job. How am I supposed to tell you “Good job,” but also need to give you a write up for doing a bad job? If you’re getting multiple write ups for doing a bad job, don’t you think that’s a sign that something is wrong? I mean, she thinks that managers should be telling their employees good job on everything they do right. No, you’re expected to do these tasks. We’re not going to congratulate you every time you do your basic job requirements like some toddler that needs constant positive reinforcement so they know that doing something right is a good thing! You will hear “Good job” when you are doing a really good job on something, when you go above & beyond!! I mean, do you think Greg tells me “Good job” when I’m just doing my job as expected?!! NO!!! I’ve never had a manager constantly tell me “Good job” all the time!!!! (Whew. Sorry about that. Kinda went on a crazy rant there. I’m good now.)
   
3. Here’s another example of her mentality of “if I don’t do the job, I can’t get in trouble for doing it wrong.” She’s going to stop asking for help instead of using the help I’ve given her to do better. I mean, if you’re making these mistakes when you ARE asking for help, how many more are you going to make when you stop asking for help? How does this make any logical sense?!
   

Well, here’s another chance for some malicious compliance. She claimed she didn’t know how to check the bank accounts, right? Well, my job as the manager is to make sure my employees know how to do their job. So, I need to sit down with her & train her how to check the bank accounts. Again. Even though I know she already knows how to do it. So, every time you tell me that the reason why you didn’t do a job is ‘cause you didn’t know how to do it right, well, we’re going to sit down & waste both our times & annoy you having to be retrained on something you do, in fact, know how to do.
Sally continues making careless mistakes & not doing stuff she doesn’t think she should have to do. Like answering the phones. It’s her job to answer the phones; that’s something I as the manager should be delegating to her. However, she never answers the phone unless I literally can’t. So, I had asked her to start answering the phone more. She will wait until the last possible second before answering the phone. By that time, it’s already rung twice, so I have to answer it before it goes on any longer or they hang up. One time, we were both away from our desks when the phone rang. We both went to answer it, but she was closer & got to her desk before me, put her hand on the phone, & watched me until I got to my desk before she picked it up. With a comment of, “Oh, (laughs) I didn’t want to make you walk all the way to your desk.” Well, you did, anyway, you little jerk.
On Feb 27, Sally asks for help on a report. She says that my note stating the office is over-deposited $28 on report 1 but fixed on report 2 by being $28 under-deposited didn’t work out. She says that they were never over by $28 in the first place. I take the report to look it over. Her calculator tape adding up the deposits shows the bank is in balance, but I don’t see deposit slips.
Me: Where are the deposit slips?
Sally: I haven’t gotten them yet.
Me: (trying to comprehend her logic) Then how do you have the deposit amounts added on this tape?
Sally: I got the amounts from the report.
Me: You…(my brain trying not to implode at this point) you can’t add up amounts to see if the bank has too much or too little money in it without knowing what was actually taken to the bank. The amounts on the report don’t always equal what was taken to the bank.
I log into the bank account & discover just that: the report says they took $500 to the bank, but their deposit says $528. They were indeed $28 over-deposited. I then lecture her (for the second time in a few months) on the correct way to account for the deposits at the bank, that we are only to use the dollar amounts on the bank’s deposit receipt. (The first time was her getting the deposit amount from what was written on the deposit slip instead of what the bank gave us credit for on their printed receipt. The bank had shorted us $500, & we never knew until her deposits didn’t work out when reconciling the bank statement at the end of the month. We were missing $500 for 4 weeks! It’s a miracle we didn’t overdraw the account.)
Another task that we do several days a week is checking the CFPB website. This is a government website that uses federal regulations to monitor financial institutions. It’s like the Better Business Bureau, but more official. Customers can make complaints through them, prompting an investigation to make sure we’re following the federal guidelines. We have 2 weeks to respond to a complaint before it is past due.
On Feb 29, Greg just happens to be looking at an email inbox that he never checks, ‘cause after all, we’re checking the CFPB website, so he doesn’t have to look there, right? There is a complaint in 2 of the portals that have been in there since Jan 22. He immediately marches out & tells Sally about them.
Greg: Aren’t you checking the CFPB sites?
Sally: Yeah, I am.
Really? Then how come you didn’t print this complaint off to give to Greg in the last 6 weeks? She came back from lunch to a second warning write up given by me for negligence.
On Mar 5 (Tuesday), we are working on reconciling the bank statements so we can close the month of Feb. Sally brings me a Jan bank statement for an office.
Sally: This never cleared in Feb.
I look at the bank statement. It’s an electronic deposit of $254 on Jan 31. I remember this. She had asked me at the beginning of Feb why this deposit wasn’t recorded on the office’s report. I explained that since it didn’t show up in the bank account until the last day of Jan, they might not have known about it before the end of the month & so recorded it on the first of Feb. We will wait until the first report of Feb. If it’s still not recorded, then we’ll bring that to the office’s attention. & here she is, clearly telling me she hadn’t brought it to anyone’s attention all month long.
Me: (staring at the bank statement as I try to prevent my autistic brain from exploding at her while also trying to prevent a spontaneous stroke) You didn’t keep track of this all month?
Sally: Well, I didn’t know if it was treated differently ‘cause it was OTBP (One Time Bill Pay, which is the electronic deposit). (Oh, what a shocker, she once again didn’t know how to do something.)
Me: But we talked about this. If it wasn’t on the first of the month, we needed to address it.
Sally: Okay, well, now I know that we treat this the same as other deposits. (goes nonchalantly back to her desk like it was no big deal, like she hadn’t just revealed she had once again disobeyed my detailed instructions)
Me: (seeing her flagrant disregard for the seriousness of the situation & wondering just how on earth she could once again think that not doing her job would have no consequences) This is exactly what Greg talks about over & over, about how we can’t leave errors like this to sit for weeks & weeks, that these need to be dealt with as they happen.
Sally: (still as easy-going as if she had simply used the wrong color highlighter) Okay, I’ll make note of that.
Now, I am getting really pissed off. She keeps saying, “Oh, now I know that OTBP is treated the same as everything else.” That doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter that you didn’t know it’s treated the same! I specifically told you to take care of it if it didn’t appear on the first of Feb! It didn’t matter what kind of deposit it was! I said to tell me if it wasn’t on the first of Feb!
Now, this was right before she leaves at 3:30, so by the time I’m finished with my text conversation with Greg (‘cause he isn’t there that afternoon), she has already left. But I’m telling Greg that I have once again caught her being negligent, & she’s already had 2 written warnings about this, which means our next step is letting her go. Not to mention, her carelessness is still continuing. He said that he supports my decision to let her go. By the way, the final decision happened an hour after she left. If I had known before she left that we were indeed going to fire her, I would have done it before she left so she didn’t have to come all the way to work in the morning just to leave again.
So, on Mar 6 (Wednesday), I arrive early to work so I can be prepared. I am standing at my desk, watching her come in. This is unusual, so she frowns as she approaches me.
Me: Sally, we need to talk.
Sally: (still frowns at me)
Me: (handing her the typed up notice) We are going to read this together. “When reconciling the month of Jan, around Feb 5, it was brought to my attention that we had a deposit that hadn’t been reconciled. I gave you instructions to wait a report to see if it works out. If not, you would need to bring it to mine & the office’s attention for further instructions. This wasn’t done. It wasn’t until Mar 5 that you brought this to my attention again. You have been told many times the importance of reconciling the financials of the office. You have been warned several times of negligence. This is another example of negligence with respect to your job. All you had to do was follow my instructions. It is for this reason that it is now time to terminate your employment.”
Sally: When did you tell me to do this?
Me: (thinking, “Um, I kinda just told you when I told you do that, but, okay.”) When you showed me the Jan bank statement—
Sally: Yesterday?!
Me: You showed me the Jan bank statement a month ago when you were reconciling Jan. I told you to wait for the first of Feb & then—
Sally: You did no such thing!
Me: Yes, I did, Sally.
Sally: When does Greg get here?
Me: Around 9, like usual.
Sally: I’m calling him, ‘cause this is ridiculous. You’ve had it out for me from the very beginning.
Me: No, I haven’t.
Sally: Yeah, you have. Just like the other 2. (sets her bags at the front door, goes outside, & calls Greg)

1. How could I have had it out for you from the very beginning when we didn’t have problems for the first year & a half you worked here? If I’d had it out for you from the beginning, you wouldn’t have had a job the past 6 months. Need I remind you what Greg told you about the timesheet thing being something we fire someone for on the spot, but that Molly had gone to bat for you & gave you a second chance? Why would I have done that if I had wanted you gone from the start?
   
2. “Just like the other 2.” She’s talking about Irene (who had left in Feb 2023) & another employee (who we’ll call Phil). Phil had been fired (by Greg, by the way) for continuing to watch movies on his phone at his desk despite being told multiple times by Greg to not do that. & Irene? She wasn’t fired. She gave her 2 weeks’ notice. & we then discovered when going through the work she’s been doing as we started taking over her tasks that she didn’t just not do jobs. She would actually forge the work so she wouldn’t have to work. “A bank imbalance of $2.65? Well, I’ll just add it to the imbalance that’s been building up for who knows how many months & just label it as an over-deposit from the end of the month. That way, I don’t have to look into why the bank isn’t balancing.” But no, I had it out for them, apparently.
   
3. Does she really think that calling Greg was gonna reverse my firing her? Does she really think I would do something as drastic as writing her up or firing her without discussing it with my supervisor first? Did she really think I would do this behind his back?
   

Apparently, she did, ‘cause Greg confirmed that Sally tried telling him about all the stuff I’ve been doing to her as if he didn’t know. She hung up on him when he explained that he’s been told everything as it happens & he supports this decision.
Sally: (storming back into the office & towards her desk) I’m not signing anything.
Me: Ok.
Sally begins packing up her desk. I had known she kept a lot of personal items at the office, so I had gotten a big box or 2 out & placed them nearby for her to use to pack up her desk.
Me: We can give you a box if you need it.
Sally: I don’t need sh** from you guys.
Me: The only thing we’ll need is your office key.
Sally: You’ll get it when you get it. I’m packing my desk.
Me: Ok.
I go back to work, keeping an eye on her as she packs to make sure she doesn’t take anything she’s not supposed to or damage any company property. Sally at some point decides to use the boxes she didn’t want from us to pack up her many items. She takes both boxes to the front door where her bags are & sets them down to put the last of her things in. She picks up one box to take outside.
Sally: You are the worst manager ever. (goes out the door)
Me: (shrug)
Sally: (comes back in for the final box) Seriously, you’re the most evil person I’ve ever met. (leaves)
Really? I rank worse than the guy that beat you up? I’m worse than him?
I continued watching her to see if she’s going to come back to give up her office key. As she packed up her car, another employee had arrived (we’ll call him Randy). He had run into her on the way in & asks me if Sally quit. I explained, no, she was let go. I then see that Sally has gotten behind the wheel of her car without coming back to give us the office key.
Me: Well, I guess we’ll just change the locks.
Randy then takes it upon himself to go out to her car. He phrased it very gently by saying he wanted to spare her having to come back in to turn the key in.
Sally: I guess Molly didn’t have the balls to do it herself. (hands the key over)
& then…she was gone. Despite having to do the entire corporate office’s work all by myself & falling steadily behind little by little, I have never been more happy. I had forgotten how much I loved my job & how much I couldn’t wait to get to work. I haven’t been this stress-free in 6 months, & it feels fantastic! & the great part is, I’m not really falling as far behind as I expected to without her. Having to do 2 people’s jobs by myself is only affecting me a little. Really goes to show you how bad she was for the company & for my job when she disrupted everything that much. For example, me & her would get through maybe 5 to 6 offices’ reports between us in a single day when playing catch up after closing the previous month. One day? I caught up on 10 offices’ reports in a single day. By myself.
Oh, did I mention she smoked marijuana most days on her way to work or while on her lunch break? We could never actually prove it. But, come on, you don’t smell that strongly of marijuana on only select days if you aren’t smoking it recently. If it was leftover from the smell of your house or car, you would smell like that every day. But it was only some days she would come into work or back from lunch smelling like that. Obviously, smoking on the job. So very glad to be rid of her & her awful skunk smell. Although, I do wish her well on a new job search. I don’t wish ill on anyone, ever. But I am just glad she’s no longer my problem to deal with.
(Added 2 months after she was fired): By the way, I am actually gaining on my work. I’m not only not behind on my work, I’m actually getting it done soon enough to work on extra stuff. Also, out of the blue, we’ve started getting about 3 to 4 sales & scam calls every day since Sally left (for things like better Medicare benefits, better retirement benefits, & even one time recently where “Walgreens” was calling to ask if I still had diabetes). I’m convinced Sally signed us up for calls as retaliation. I hope they die down soon, especially as they are starting to get rude. (Our response to every one of these is “Sorry, this is a business.” This one guy responded to me with, “This is my job.” I said, “I understand this is your job, but this is a business. I am not allowed to take personal calls.” He said, “Why?” I said very slowly & firmly, “Because I’m working!” He started to say, “Can you explain to me why—” I hung up. Jerk.)

So, here is part 2 of my entitled employee story. We left off with discovering Sally’s retaliation of giving me trash as a Christmas gift after her latest write-up.
So, the next several weeks, I am noticing more problems, but here’s some of the highlights.

1. Ever since we had issues of the office’s checks going randomly missing, Sally had apparently decided to just stop throwing any envelope away when opening the mail. She would supposedly search the envelopes/paperwork & then keep the envelopes with the paperwork. So, instead of doing her job better, she would decide to just stop doing the job at all. After all, you can’t get in trouble for screwing it up if you aren’t doing it, right? However, this resulted in items getting left with the paperwork (which sometimes wouldn’t get touched for several weeks due to being busy) that had needed to be collected or addressed right away.
   
2. Sally’s careless mistakes continued at about the same rate (average of 2 to 3 a week). She would put deposit slips/emails with the wrong office’s report, put one office’s mail in another office’s bin, put one office’s funding papers in another office’s bin, put one office’s bills in the folder for their correspondence & vice versa, put one office’s bills in the folder for another office’s bills, put the new month’s bills in the folder without taking out the old month’s bills so they would get mixed up. I could go on & on.
   
3. Sally would still ask for help on things she shouldn’t need help on anymore, ‘cause I had helped her many times on items exactly like it in the 2 years she’s worked here. I mean, the whole point of asking for help when learning new things on a job is so you can take the input you’re given & use it to get better at the job so you don’t have to ask for help anymore. I mean, what kind of office works by their employees constantly needing to be walked through everything every day? Sally would even ask for help on things no one would need to ask for help on. For example, she asked me, “An office took a deposit to the bank without showing it on their report. How do I write that up in the letter to fax to them?” Um, exactly what you just said to me. Or another time, she asks how long she should wait before calling an office back. Well, how long do you think you should give them? Just use your good judgment. You don’t need help with that! Again, you’ve been here 2 years!
   

On Jan 26, I take the Dec bills, correspondence faxes, & timesheets out of their folders to scan them into the computer. Now, one thing the bills should always have on them are the check number used to pay for this purchase & the date it was paid. The offices themselves are supposed to write this on there, but they don’t always, which is why it is our job to write it on there if it’s missing. I had noticed when I scanned Nov’s bills around Nov 30 that a lot of Sally’s offices don’t have that info written on them. So, I explained to her what needed to be written on every bill/receipt. I now flip through the Dec & Jan bills of her offices really quick to check them. There are quite a few of them with no info written down on them. There’s strike one for noncompliance.
Another task we would do several days a week (that’s Sally’s responsibility) is to check the bank accounts online. She is to look at the bank balances & report any low balances to Greg (or me if Greg isn’t there). She is then to look at the transactions in order to see if anything looks fraudulent. Since we are a loan company, check fraud is very common for us. So, we look at the checks for anything funny-looking, & we look to see if there are any auto debits (like when you use your bank account online to pay for a bill) that would tell us if someone got hold of our bank account info.
On Jan 30, at 1:15 p.m., I asked if any of the bank balances were low (Greg was out of town for a few days). Sally said she had forgotten to check the bank accounts that morning. Weird, ‘cause you had to check the Dallas office to make sure the money we sent them had shown up. How did you get the login sheet out to look in their bank account but then forget about checking all the bank accounts? This just further cemented in my mind that she was NOT checking these bank accounts the way she should. I was 100% positive that all she does when logging into these bank accounts is checking the balances to give to Greg but then never checks the transactions. I know this ‘cause, 1) I’ve observed Sally only logging in to write down the balances & then logging back out (she had some flimsy excuse ready when I asked her about it), 2) there have been auto debits that appeared in bank accounts that we didn’t find for weeks until I happened to see it for some reason & guess what? She never pointed those out to us, & 3) Sally hadn’t bothered to check the bank account balances since Greg was out of town, so clearly she only felt the need to check the balances. There’s strike two for noncompliance.
& even more bad mistakes or decisions:

1. At the end of Jan, we discovered that Sally had mailed the employees’ W2s to the managers’ home addresses instead of to the offices to distribute to their employees!
   
2. We had an office that moved locations to right across the street, so the only thing that changed in their address was their street number (12 Main Street instead of 11 Main Street). I explained this to Sally & gave her an updated list of the office’s addresses. 3 weeks later, we get a call from that office saying that mail we send to them keeps going to their landlord’s house. I check the address labels Sally had created for herself. Sure enough, it had the wrong address on them. I go to grab the lease, & at the top is where the tenant’s new address is listed. & all the way at the bottom of the page in the paragraph titled “RENT” where it lists where to send the rent is the landlord’s home address. & that’s the address Sally had chosen to be the new office’s address on her address labels.
   
3. Sally hadn’t been faxing the offices to ask for bills/receipts that never made it to us.
   
4. I used the last towel on a roll of paper towels, so I went to the cabinets to grab another. We were out. Sally is in charge of keeping track of supplies that need ordering, so I go to Sally & say we’re completely out of paper towels, we need to order some. Sally response: “No one ever tells me when they grab the last roll so I know when to order them.” Um, excuse me, since when is it our job to tell you to do your job? It’s your responsibility to keep track of supplies. You should be checking the level of paper towels, toilet paper, Kleenex, etc., to see when you need to order them.
   

So, I knew she needed a second warning write up for carelessness cause of the numerous mistakes since the first warning write up in the middle of Dec, & I would be giving Sally a first warning write up for negligence cause of her not asking the offices for missing bills & not writing the info on the bills I had told her to do at the end of Nov. However, it was only a few days from Feb, which was the time for performance reviews. So, rather than doing a write up now & then in a week or so doing a performance review that was one of the worst performance reviews I’ve ever heard of, I decided to just do it in one fell swoop. You know, just get it all out of the way with one bad conversation, one bad day, & then both of us can hopefully put it behind us & move on.
I decided to do the performance review & write ups on Feb 5 (Monday). It went much smoother ‘cause Greg was there, so Sally couldn’t really give me lip or lash out by showing attitude & anger like she had previously.
On Feb 7 (Wednesday), I log in to get the transactions for an office who is switching banks. I wanted to get an updated list of outstanding checks so they know how many checks are left before they can close the old bank account. & what do I see? Someone had used the bank account to pay $100 on their AT&T bill. I call the office & find out it was actually them, so no fraud there. But I then ask Sally if she had seen that when checking the bank accounts. She said she didn’t remember. Obviously, I have found my proof that she is either not checking them or isn’t paying attention when she does. I have a discussion with Greg about it, & we decide I need to have a sit down with her about her not doing her job. She is sick on Thursday, so I plan to talk with her the next day she comes in.
On Feb 9 (Friday), I begin the conversation about checking the bank accounts & how important it is. I am planning to say things like, we expect you to do this job, you’ve been told multiple times to do this task, if you’re not going to do the job, then you’re welcome to go find another one, etc. But she cuts me off at the beginning with an excuse of, “Well, I didn’t know what I should be looking for, now I know.” & it broke me. She does this exact thing every time I have to have a conversation with her. She has an excuse ready to go on the tip of her tongue, always spins it around so it’s not actually her fault. It’s always, “Well, I didn’t know that, but now, I do.” & I was just done. I didn’t continue the conversation, even though I needed to, ‘cause I just broke down in tears from the stress of having to discipline her & knowing that nothing will ever come of it, but having our hands legally tied to be able to fire her right now. I cried nonstop for over 4 hours.
On Feb 12 (Monday), I sat down to continue the conversation, this time with a written statement for her to sign.
Me: You respond a lot of the time that you don’t know how to do things, which is very frustrating, ‘cause you’ve been shown multiple times how to do these tasks. It’s very inefficient & wasteful that I have to constantly check all of your work & retrain you on the same thing over & over again. This needs to change. This job is about accuracy & accountability.
Sally: You’re not giving me a chance to improve. I never hear “Good job,” from you. All I ever hear is, “You’re doing a bad job, sign this paper.” I get in trouble every time I ask for help, so I guess I’ll just follow the instructions & hope I’m doing it right.
The problems with that response:

1. You’ve worked here for 2 years, Sally. You’ve had plenty of time to improve.
   
2. The reason you never hear “Good job” is ‘cause you’re not doing a good job. How am I supposed to tell you “Good job,” but also need to give you a write up for doing a bad job? If you’re getting multiple write ups for doing a bad job, don’t you think that’s a sign that something is wrong? I mean, she thinks that managers should be telling their employees good job on everything they do right. No, you’re expected to do these tasks. We’re not going to congratulate you every time you do your basic job requirements like some toddler that needs constant positive reinforcement so they know that doing something right is a good thing! You will hear “Good job” when you are doing a really good job on something, when you go above & beyond!! I mean, do you think Greg tells me “Good job” when I’m just doing my job as expected?!! NO!!! I’ve never had a manager constantly tell me “Good job” all the time!!!! (Whew. Sorry about that. Kinda went on a crazy rant there. I’m good now.)
   
3. Here’s another example of her mentality of “if I don’t do the job, I can’t get in trouble for doing it wrong.” She’s going to stop asking for help instead of using the help I’ve given her to do better. I mean, if you’re making these mistakes when you ARE asking for help, how many more are you going to make when you stop asking for help? How does this make any logical sense?!
   

Well, here’s another chance for some malicious compliance. She claimed she didn’t know how to check the bank accounts, right? Well, my job as the manager is to make sure my employees know how to do their job. So, I need to sit down with her & train her how to check the bank accounts. Again. Even though I know she already knows how to do it. So, every time you tell me that the reason why you didn’t do a job is ‘cause you didn’t know how to do it right, well, we’re going to sit down & waste both our times & annoy you having to be retrained on something you do, in fact, know how to do.
Sally continues making careless mistakes & not doing stuff she doesn’t think she should have to do. Like answering the phones. It’s her job to answer the phones; that’s something I as the manager should be delegating to her. However, she never answers the phone unless I literally can’t. So, I had asked her to start answering the phone more. She will wait until the last possible second before answering the phone. By that time, it’s already rung twice, so I have to answer it before it goes on any longer or they hang up. One time, we were both away from our desks when the phone rang. We both went to answer it, but she was closer & got to her desk before me, put her hand on the phone, & watched me until I got to my desk before she picked it up. With a comment of, “Oh, (laughs) I didn’t want to make you walk all the way to your desk.” Well, you did, anyway, you little jerk.
On Feb 27, Sally asks for help on a report. She says that my note stating the office is over-deposited $28 on report 1 but fixed on report 2 by being $28 under-deposited didn’t work out. She says that they were never over by $28 in the first place. I take the report to look it over. Her calculator tape adding up the deposits shows the bank is in balance, but I don’t see deposit slips.
Me: Where are the deposit slips?
Sally: I haven’t gotten them yet.
Me: (trying to comprehend her logic) Then how do you have the deposit amounts added on this tape?
Sally: I got the amounts from the report.
Me: You…(my brain trying not to implode at this point) you can’t add up amounts to see if the bank has too much or too little money in it without knowing what was actually taken to the bank. The amounts on the report don’t always equal what was taken to the bank.
I log into the bank account & discover just that: the report says they took $500 to the bank, but their deposit says $528. They were indeed $28 over-deposited. I then lecture her (for the second time in a few months) on the correct way to account for the deposits at the bank, that we are only to use the dollar amounts on the bank’s deposit receipt. (The first time was her getting the deposit amount from what was written on the deposit slip instead of what the bank gave us credit for on their printed receipt. The bank had shorted us $500, & we never knew until her deposits didn’t work out when reconciling the bank statement at the end of the month. We were missing $500 for 4 weeks! It’s a miracle we didn’t overdraw the account.)
Another task that we do several days a week is checking the CFPB website. This is a government website that uses federal regulations to monitor financial institutions. It’s like the Better Business Bureau, but more official. Customers can make complaints through them, prompting an investigation to make sure we’re following the federal guidelines. We have 2 weeks to respond to a complaint before it is past due.
On Feb 29, Greg just happens to be looking at an email inbox that he never checks, ‘cause after all, we’re checking the CFPB website, so he doesn’t have to look there, right? There is a complaint in 2 of the portals that have been in there since Jan 22. He immediately marches out & tells Sally about them.
Greg: Aren’t you checking the CFPB sites?
Sally: Yeah, I am.
Really? Then how come you didn’t print this complaint off to give to Greg in the last 6 weeks? She came back from lunch to a second warning write up given by me for negligence.
On Mar 5 (Tuesday), we are working on reconciling the bank statements so we can close the month of Feb. Sally brings me a Jan bank statement for an office.
Sally: This never cleared in Feb.
I look at the bank statement. It’s an electronic deposit of $254 on Jan 31. I remember this. She had asked me at the beginning of Feb why this deposit wasn’t recorded on the office’s report. I explained that since it didn’t show up in the bank account until the last day of Jan, they might not have known about it before the end of the month & so recorded it on the first of Feb. We will wait until the first report of Feb. If it’s still not recorded, then we’ll bring that to the office’s attention. & here she is, clearly telling me she hadn’t brought it to anyone’s attention all month long.
Me: (staring at the bank statement as I try to prevent my autistic brain from exploding at her while also trying to prevent a spontaneous stroke) You didn’t keep track of this all month?
Sally: Well, I didn’t know if it was treated differently ‘cause it was OTBP (One Time Bill Pay, which is the electronic deposit). (Oh, what a shocker, she once again didn’t know how to do something.)
Me: But we talked about this. If it wasn’t on the first of the month, we needed to address it.
Sally: Okay, well, now I know that we treat this the same as other deposits. (goes nonchalantly back to her desk like it was no big deal, like she hadn’t just revealed she had once again disobeyed my detailed instructions)
Me: (seeing her flagrant disregard for the seriousness of the situation & wondering just how on earth she could once again think that not doing her job would have no consequences) This is exactly what Greg talks about over & over, about how we can’t leave errors like this to sit for weeks & weeks, that these need to be dealt with as they happen.
Sally: (still as easy-going as if she had simply used the wrong color highlighter) Okay, I’ll make note of that.
Now, I am getting really pissed off. She keeps saying, “Oh, now I know that OTBP is treated the same as everything else.” That doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter that you didn’t know it’s treated the same! I specifically told you to take care of it if it didn’t appear on the first of Feb! It didn’t matter what kind of deposit it was! I said to tell me if it wasn’t on the first of Feb!
Now, this was right before she leaves at 3:30, so by the time I’m finished with my text conversation with Greg (‘cause he isn’t there that afternoon), she has already left. But I’m telling Greg that I have once again caught her being negligent, & she’s already had 2 written warnings about this, which means our next step is letting her go. Not to mention, her carelessness is still continuing. He said that he supports my decision to let her go. By the way, the final decision happened an hour after she left. If I had known before she left that we were indeed going to fire her, I would have done it before she left so she didn’t have to come all the way to work in the morning just to leave again.
So, on Mar 6 (Wednesday), I arrive early to work so I can be prepared. I am standing at my desk, watching her come in. This is unusual, so she frowns as she approaches me.
Me: Sally, we need to talk.
Sally: (still frowns at me)
Me: (handing her the typed up notice) We are going to read this together. “When reconciling the month of Jan, around Feb 5, it was brought to my attention that we had a deposit that hadn’t been reconciled. I gave you instructions to wait a report to see if it works out. If not, you would need to bring it to mine & the office’s attention for further instructions. This wasn’t done. It wasn’t until Mar 5 that you brought this to my attention again. You have been told many times the importance of reconciling the financials of the office. You have been warned several times of negligence. This is another example of negligence with respect to your job. All you had to do was follow my instructions. It is for this reason that it is now time to terminate your employment.”
Sally: When did you tell me to do this?
Me: (thinking, “Um, I kinda just told you when I told you do that, but, okay.”) When you showed me the Jan bank statement—
Sally: Yesterday?!
Me: You showed me the Jan bank statement a month ago when you were reconciling Jan. I told you to wait for the first of Feb & then—
Sally: You did no such thing!
Me: Yes, I did, Sally.
Sally: When does Greg get here?
Me: Around 9, like usual.
Sally: I’m calling him, ‘cause this is ridiculous. You’ve had it out for me from the very beginning.
Me: No, I haven’t.
Sally: Yeah, you have. Just like the other 2. (sets her bags at the front door, goes outside, & calls Greg)

1. How could I have had it out for you from the very beginning when we didn’t have problems for the first year & a half you worked here? If I’d had it out for you from the beginning, you wouldn’t have had a job the past 6 months. Need I remind you what Greg told you about the timesheet thing being something we fire someone for on the spot, but that Molly had gone to bat for you & gave you a second chance? Why would I have done that if I had wanted you gone from the start?
   
2. “Just like the other 2.” She’s talking about Irene (who had left in Feb 2023) & another employee (who we’ll call Phil). Phil had been fired (by Greg, by the way) for continuing to watch movies on his phone at his desk despite being told multiple times by Greg to not do that. & Irene? She wasn’t fired. She gave her 2 weeks’ notice. & we then discovered when going through the work she’s been doing as we started taking over her tasks that she didn’t just not do jobs. She would actually forge the work so she wouldn’t have to work. “A bank imbalance of $2.65? Well, I’ll just add it to the imbalance that’s been building up for who knows how many months & just label it as an over-deposit from the end of the month. That way, I don’t have to look into why the bank isn’t balancing.” But no, I had it out for them, apparently.
   
3. Does she really think that calling Greg was gonna reverse my firing her? Does she really think I would do something as drastic as writing her up or firing her without discussing it with my supervisor first? Did she really think I would do this behind his back?
   

Apparently, she did, ‘cause Greg confirmed that Sally tried telling him about all the stuff I’ve been doing to her as if he didn’t know. She hung up on him when he explained that he’s been told everything as it happens & he supports this decision.
Sally: (storming back into the office & towards her desk) I’m not signing anything.
Me: Ok.
Sally begins packing up her desk. I had known she kept a lot of personal items at the office, so I had gotten a big box or 2 out & placed them nearby for her to use to pack up her desk.
Me: We can give you a box if you need it.
Sally: I don’t need sh** from you guys.
Me: The only thing we’ll need is your office key.
Sally: You’ll get it when you get it. I’m packing my desk.
Me: Ok.
I go back to work, keeping an eye on her as she packs to make sure she doesn’t take anything she’s not supposed to or damage any company property. Sally at some point decides to use the boxes she didn’t want from us to pack up her many items. She takes both boxes to the front door where her bags are & sets them down to put the last of her things in. She picks up one box to take outside.
Sally: You are the worst manager ever. (goes out the door)
Me: (shrug)
Sally: (comes back in for the final box) Seriously, you’re the most evil person I’ve ever met. (leaves)
Really? I rank worse than the guy that beat you up? I’m worse than him?
I continued watching her to see if she’s going to come back to give up her office key. As she packed up her car, another employee had arrived (we’ll call him Randy). He had run into her on the way in & asks me if Sally quit. I explained, no, she was let go. I then see that Sally has gotten behind the wheel of her car without coming back to give us the office key.
Me: Well, I guess we’ll just change the locks.
Randy then takes it upon himself to go out to her car. He phrased it very gently by saying he wanted to spare her having to come back in to turn the key in.
Sally: I guess Molly didn’t have the balls to do it herself. (hands the key over)
& then…she was gone. Despite having to do the entire corporate office’s work all by myself & falling steadily behind little by little, I have never been more happy. I had forgotten how much I loved my job & how much I couldn’t wait to get to work. I haven’t been this stress-free in 6 months, & it feels fantastic! & the great part is, I’m not really falling as far behind as I expected to without her. Having to do 2 people’s jobs by myself is only affecting me a little. Really goes to show you how bad she was for the company & for my job when she disrupted everything that much. For example, me & her would get through maybe 5 to 6 offices’ reports between us in a single day when playing catch up after closing the previous month. One day? I caught up on 10 offices’ reports in a single day. By myself.
Oh, did I mention she smoked marijuana most days on her way to work or while on her lunch break? We could never actually prove it. But, come on, you don’t smell that strongly of marijuana on only select days if you aren’t smoking it recently. If it was leftover from the smell of your house or car, you would smell like that every day. But it was only some days she would come into work or back from lunch smelling like that. Obviously, smoking on the job. So very glad to be rid of her & her awful skunk smell. Although, I do wish her well on a new job search. I don’t wish ill on anyone, ever. But I am just glad she’s no longer my problem to deal with.
(Added 2 months after she was fired): By the way, I am actually gaining on my work. I’m not only not behind on my work, I’m actually getting it done soon enough to work on extra stuff. Also, out of the blue, we’ve started getting about 3 to 4 sales & scam calls every day since Sally left (for things like better Medicare benefits, better retirement benefits, & even one time recently where “Walgreens” was calling to ask if I still had diabetes). I’m convinced Sally signed us up for calls as retaliation. I hope they die down soon, especially as they are starting to get rude. (Our response to every one of these is “Sorry, this is a business.” This one guy responded to me with, “This is my job.” I said, “I understand this is your job, but this is a business. I am not allowed to take personal calls.” He said, “Why?” I said very slowly & firmly, “Because I’m working!” He started to say, “Can you explain to me why—” I hung up. Jerk.)

As the title says there isn't going to be a (Kurosanji deleted post May 14, 2024 to May 20, 2024) update since things were busy this week and I wasn't able to keep track of all the posts for this in the last few days and I missed too much to try and salvage it. Hopefully next week will be calmer so I can make sure everything is up to date without missing alot of posts.
Sorry if anyone were expecting a weekly update for Tuesday.

The title says it all. Took me 25hours to get from philadelphia to dallas. Canceled flight after canceled flight. Switched me to flights to Denver spent the night in Denver. No apology nothing. Asked them to atleast book a hotel for the night since well I didn't intent to spend 25 hours at the airport. Anyways recieved a big fat no to that request. I didn't even bring up the money I spent on food during that time. Ya I'm done with them don't be like me. Don't fly frontier

So back in april the differential on my car blew up along with the drive shaft and i lost my car and ended up loosing my job. This was in texas and me and my family were facing eviction. We decided to move in wife my wife’s family in California. I got a used 2015 chevy equinox from a dealer called byrider in desoto and we used that to move everything. I ended up getting a 1999 crv too that we also used for the move. We moved closer to family cause we didnt have no help in dallas. Well i ended up getting a job within a couple weeks but my phone got shut off on my first day and i keep getting debt collector calls but i cant make calls or receive them from my wife or anyone. My chevy also got repod on my first day and i had to walk home. Checked the cameras at work to see who took it and it was an unmarked car. They took my car seats, all my work uniforms, some of my childs things, and the title to my crv that i need to do the registration. I never got the chance to grab my things and i called the dealership today and they said its being shipped back. How do i go about getting my stuff? Do i really have to drive back to dallas to get my stuff? At work there is a sign that says private property and you need permission from the owner (my boss) to take any property located on the property. Thanks in advance like i don’t even have money for diapers and now i gotta go back i might just move back anyway cali sucks

I've been using an iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, Late 2014) for just under a decade now, and I've never had any issues until today. I was using it like I always have this evening, and suddenly experienced slowdowns, and eventually a forced logout. Logging in, the issue persisted, and eventually crashed the entire computer into a restart.
After restarting, it wasn't able to handle anything, not even the Force Quit menu. Everything was slow to load, and I could barely do a thing. I forced a restart with the power button and it showed a screen of a grey circle with a slash through it, and began flashing back and forth between this and the regular loading screen with the white Apple logo. It got stuck flashing between the two screens, making zero progress.
Following some information on google, I restarted again and entered Recovery Mode to access the Disk Utility. That's where I discovered that the Fusion Drive had split. I have absolutely no idea how this happened. I'm so uninvolved with computer tech, I didn't even know what a Fusion Drive was or that I was even using one.
This is where the biggest problem comes in. The support guide I followed mentioned it being possible to fix the issue by sinply re-fusing the drive... but it didn't specify the full outcome of this action. I, already being in a bit of a panic, clicked on the button to re-fuse and repair the Fusion Drive, not knowing that it would do a clean wipe of the data on it. Now I'm stuck with seemingly nothing on the drive, and no backups...
For context regarding backups, I had been using Time Machine previously, but it wasn't able to locate anything when scanning for sources. On top of this, I wasn't using iCloud for many of my files as I had multiple bad experiences losing files through iCloud shenanigans in the past, so that isn't an option either... And because I've never had a large scale data loss before, I've never had an external drive either... Goes to show how much investment or even knowledge I have of the tech I'm using beyond simply using it.
So, that brings me to the question in my title. After many google searches, all I can find is that my data is fucked and it's gone forever. Is this true? Am I totally screwed beyond saving? If not, does anyone know what I can possibly do to salvage this? I had over 15 years of memories on there, transferred from multiple older devices, and I don't want to just accept that it might all be gone forever.
Also apologies if I'm using the wrong flair, I've never had to do this kind of thing before, and I'm sort of desperate for any help I can get

Hello everyone, I'm gonna start this off by saying thanks to anybody who will read this as it will be a long one, and anybody willing to offer me any advice.
PS. This post started as a post where I was asking for college advice, but as I wrote more I realized any advice would be really helpful so I changed the title a bit, Thanks in advance again!
[[ Beware: My whole lifestory coming up combined with tired midnight grammar 😅 ]]
To get to the point, I currently live in Croatia and just turned 19 a couple of months ago and a time has come when I am again thinking about college. Some background on me, from when I was very little I was always interested in engineering and art, it all started when a teacher of mine in the 5th grade of primary school introduced me to programming and robotics. From then on I was in love with everything to do with electronics, robotics, mechanics programming, and fundamental sciences, maybe even math itself, but that's beside the point. During those years the passion for all of that really grew. I went to countless robotics competitions during my time at school there and even won lots of prizes. One time I almost came to world-level competitions but sadly missed the first place by a point. When I was home I sadly didn't have much equipment for any of these interests except a computer. It seemed limitless what I could do with it, whatever I wanted to do I could make it. It's not like electronics where as a kid getting parts was difficult except from old salvaged electronic devices. I could learn and make whatever I wanted, as long as the old family computer could run it. So I started learning a lot about computers during these times like basic algorithms and some basic games random Python scripts etc. In terms of computers, I was no genius, but for the age, I'm grateful I took the time to learn even the basics of it. Other than that I was a somewhat weird kid because I couldn't really take picking off some classmates as a joke and got annoyed at it quickly when they started interrupting me while I was drawing ( My dad was an artist in his youth so I picked that up from him, been scribbling every day in primary school when class was either boring or some kind of recess ) but even though they were picking on me, I to this day still really don't mind them, we were a pretty close class at the end of the day. And that's how most of my primary school went by, me being social with only a few friends and my informatics teacher as well. Other than that I was pretty sad during those years, I couldn't understand people and was contemplating the meaning of life as well, and that combined with me inheriting some stubbornness from mom, she and I were always fighting for homework, screentime, etc. Right now we are in a very good relationship so I'm greatful for that aswell. Seeing how I didnt really talk outside of school to many people expect a few friends ( I do live in a small village so if they were the same age as me they were in my class ) i basicly spent most of my time while not staying after school in a computer club we had for few hours every couple of days a week, i was cooped upped inside my house, playing with legos, being with grandparents or my cousins or being on computer and doing some programing, scripting, photoshoping and other things you can reasonably excect a child to do. And so passed most of my primary school.
When time came to plan for highschool, I originaly wanted to go to art school, but was quickly turned down by my mother because she thought it wasnt a smart idea. Personaly didn't like it at first, but she is a smart woman so in time i understood. Basicly other then liking to draw and paint, I wanted to go there bacause my best friend from class was going there and he also wanted me to come along. ( Funny how me the least popular guy and the youngest guy in class and he the most popular guy in class while also being the oldest were best friends, but thats a story for another day ) As my mom turned down my suggestion for art school she suggested I go to a school for a Mechatronics Technician. I didnt not like the idea as well I loved everything related to it. Other than that another option was Computer Technician ( basicly a programming oriented path ) but I decided mechatronics because i said to myself i can learn programing at home because the only tools i need are a computer, and mechanics, electronics and robotics is something I dont have at home so it will be really cool to learn all of that here and so, highschool started.
Oh how fast has the reality come crashing down as I understood what the whole mess of the education system actualy was. Most of the classes didnt have any equipment to actualy do anything practical, the other small portion that did the rest lf the 95% of class didnt understand anything so we couldnt do much or what was the more often scenario is that the proffesors just didnt really care at all so we would come to class and do absolutly nothing, like literaly nothing except waiting for the bell to ring. After i realised that I just started not coming to school most quite a bit. Mostly was not comming on fridays, some wednesdays etc most of the times I was actualy abit sick, but every time i was sick i exadurated it so my mom would let me stay home. Even though i was missing quite a bit of classes, if a class had something to do with math or logical thinking ( which most were ) i would usualy either be best at it in the class or almost the best for the pure reason I was actualy really interested and loved all the cool engineering stuff. On the other side if a subject was about 0 logic, full random name memorisation like the croatian literature class, I was almost if not the worst in class managing just barely to scrape by. Other than that there was one proffesor who I admired so much for his style of teaching, as he tought me so much during the only 2 years he lectured me ( my fourth year of highschool he was out because pention ). In simply half a year we went from 0 knowledge to designing, printing, creating and soldering a whole circuit on a pcb, I was always there for his classes. On the other time we were doing something else, he always had some cool stuff prepared when i was finished with work early, he was a great guy and still respect him alot. Other than that i was really disapointed how there existed zero after school activities that i could do that had to do anything with electronic, mechanics, robotics or programing.
On the side of my social life, the summer just before starting highschool I realised this was a great opportunity to redeem myself as i really didnt want to get picked on like in primary school. So what other kind of persona would somebody come up in this situation than one being supported by my pride itself, other than that i was basicly a "chameleon" aka adapting to every person around me which was probably the reason i made some friends but it usualy tired me out completly. And so it started really great actualy, nobody was picking on me, i was socialising ( only inside of my class usualy, other than the people who went to this town from my village that i already knew, but it was a big step up for me ) and learned how to shrug of others banter by pretending it didnt effect me. It was definitly in a better possition then primary school alright, but i did realise alot of people just moving away sometimes because of how i just increased pridefulness as i got more vulnerable. I think i was able to keep my pride to just below some overflowing point as i still managed to make a few friends.
And so some time passed, at home watching more videos about everything to do with engineering, getting a 3d printer and messing with it, programing some more and even trying to learn some business, economy and more about money. I even developed a game for the school as some special thing I got by talking to a teacher of mine. Other than that at the third year, thanks to a profesor i was able to get in touch with a software development company and was able to secure an internship for basicly the whole summer, which was a blast. I learned so much new things that opened doors to alot more things. After that i focused my random "Jack of all trades" learning to be mostly focused on modern used technologies, and the needs of possible job recruiters, and well it in general. That is the point i feel i truly started learning proper programing.
More on my development of pride, in highschool and in primary school i was actualy praised quite alot and being actualy abit good at something maybe was the thing that allowed me to get even some friends by being prideful. We can call that being lucky as the stars alligned, but anyways. During those years i also had two experiences with me falling in love for the first time. The first one didnt last more than a 4ish months maybe, it was basicly a crush thing that ended in a broken heart, but o boy it was a good waking called. I wonder what would happen to me without this realisation. Then the next one lasted basicly 7-8ish months in the 4th year of highschool, and this one was much more complicated and longer, but after it i learned quite a new few things. These two things really awoken me to who i am today, as i try to live each day with as much virtue as I can. I threw out the pride out of the window, and dont really care too much of somebodies bad opinions on me, if there are currently any. I came to terms with alot of things and am just able to accept things for what they are, without judgment.
As im writing this its quite late and am tired so sorry for bad grammar i want to shorten this abit. Basicly my whole life i loved scientists, engineers and the idea of colledge. Was always dreaming of becomingba "great scientist" like albert einstein or nikola tesla but the older i got, the more things i learned, the more that dream of going to colledge got shattered by reality. As i realised the giant flaws in the education system, after learning about money and realising colledges are just big businesses trying to earn alot of money, and that that is their main motivation, combines with seeing that scientists basicly to get any money and recognition these days need to literaly hop from trend to trend, research what is "in" currently or well no bread on the table just made the academia route of my life shatter before my eyes. Seeing how i knew quite abit computers i thought i could atleast land something, but after seeing people who were much longer in the industry praise me for a impressive knowledge on alot of fields and my ability to almost instantly grasp any concept thrown at me, i actualy got a job. Well this was how I decided to start working immediatly instead of going to colledge. After weighing the options combined with the additional knowledge i got about the job market, this was an obvious choice. I believe that my key to being objective is me being realistic, so sadly i know am not some do it all genious and know i need to rely on whatever i have to use as leverage to enhance my life, so learning from Warren Buffet that out of everything I got, my time was my biggest asset. Simply being young with the above average skills i have, I believe i have a reasonably good chance to have a virtous and fulfiling life.
But i still have that burning flame in my chest, i still love the idea i had of colledge, of becoming a scientist, an engineer. I tried looking for ways to convince myself otherwise and see that i was actualy wrong about it all, but each time i look, more and more i realise my initial assumptions were right. The world is slowly moving away from official education like colledges as everything can be learnt online, because of ai the next few years are going to be revolutionary in all of these fields so either the colledge courses are going to be very outdated or just some concept of a job will not simply be needed as a diffrent one apears. The posibilities and their volatility is just so high that i dont feel even 1% safe actualy going to colledge, seeing how devoting like 5 years to it will mean loosing the onlx advantage i can use, and that is me starting out young. And as a bonus because i have a job i actualy have more time than colledge to persume my other interest like mechanics and electronics as well as actualy funds.
Thanks for reading all of this, I can trust it was quite a journey reading everything i written basicly half asleep but i hope you were able to understand everything. Im really confused what to do, as I love both options but knowing that one has a much better chance of being useful to me than the other. Any advice you can give me will be greatly appriciated, be it about college like is there an actualy good colledge in europe thats is worth it in my place, or general life stuff, about work etc. Once again I cannot thank you enough for reading this and helping me. Thanks!
Edit: I havent said much about my job because this is more of a general reddit but for people who are in the field I am a backend developer, with some freelancing and opensource contributions on the side

1330 Terran Front Fleet Time
On the Turinika homeworld, the first signs of unrest began to manifest like a wave, The broadcast of the most esteemed Tizikikoonazikiakakiatkata, Taratanti of the roost Kazatalak, openly performing the act of Kavsa had been met with shock. The last Taratanti who had voluntarily performed Kavsa had done so in protest of the treatment of the Kulorn caste, nearly two thousand years prior. It was an ancient rite, one that signified rejection of the greatest shame. Even more shocking than the act itself was the evidence that had followed it. Visuals of species, brought into the Conclave, not as migrant workers as had been believed, but as slaves, was met with an almost immediate attempt at censorship. This attempt failed spectacularly, mostly due to those who had been tasked to censor the information not only refusing to follow the command, but openly declaring that they had been ordered to do so. A situation that was already, as the humans would say, out of hand, spiraled completely out of control. Within only twenty minutes of the ending of Tizikikoonazikiakakiatkata’s broadcast entire cities entered a state of absolute anarchy. Two planetary capitals were stormed and taken by the furious civilian population, demanding the location of those who had been enslaved. The Turinika Armada, which even then was in the middle of a training session meant to prepare the fleet to withstand the Terran Front’s assault, began to cease operations. Within the hour, the entire armada would be recalled to the turnika homeworld. Those who did not take to the streets simply stopped whatever work they were doing and went to their homes to be around their brood. Images of Tizikikoonazikiakakiatkata with his stripped wings spread wide in front of the human fleet commander were on every news fed of the Conclave, as was the sound of his thunderous voice, and the wails of despair from a turinika female that couldn’t be seen. Close ups of the human fleet commander’s face were shown, with analysts remarking on the shock, horror, and sympathy. Since the outbreak of the Seventh Orion War, the female human known as Simmons had been reported to have made several threats towards the turinika, she had quickly become seen as a warmonger, ready to take revenge against the turinika for refusing to go to war and violate their principles of pacifism. Now the images of her lunging forward to stop the violation of Tizikikoonazikiakakiatkata’s plumage, the agonized expression of her face, and the true reason for her threats against the turinika were rapidly reversing her image. On far flung deep core mining stations and agricultural stations, on deep space stations dedicated to material processing, and in other areas hidden from the sight of the normal turinikan population, overseers and taskmasters felt their hearts run cold at the knowledge that very soon, their part to play in the willful enslavement of another species would be known to the wider Conclave. As the data package transmitted alongside the broadcast were fully decompressed and the scale of the Conclave’s government’s involvement was revealed, the entirety of the Conclave itself was teetering on the verge of absolute pandemonium. The image of a member of the kolra species, from the look of it barely a hatchling, quickly was becoming the face of the entire incident. The picture was absolutely damning, and the sight of the image had sent any who saw it instantly into contorting and painful displays of shame. The young kolra was sprawled on it’s stomach, looking to the one taking it’s picture with eyes that had no life in them. It’s shell covered it’s back, and despite the age of the kolra it was already dulled and scuffed. The foot pressing down on the shell was unmistakably familiar to those who saw it, the clawed feet of a turinika. Within the hour, billions of winged figures stood in streets, the normally soft spoken and passive species demanding action, demanding justice, on the hundred worlds of the Turinika Conclave. The bulk of the Taratanti caste, most of whom had been left in the dark of the truth of the situation, quickly went public with their own declaration of outrage, and the eyes of the entire species turned inwards to the mountainous homeworld of their species.
Hakuri Watanabe looked down at his helmet before putting it on his bed, the stylized SEVEN seeming to stare at him. He sat down in his chair and picked up a small cloth from his buffing kit. No one knocked on his door, in fact, mostly he and the rest of his squad were left alone before a major operation. They were just given their time, time to mentally prepare. Some of his squad would go over their mission briefing, some, like him, would spend their time doing something to relax themselves. Hakuri always found that taking care of his suit calmed him considerably. Granted he could simply turn it over to the squads armorers to be tended to and they would do as good of a job as he could, but he preferred it to be done by his own hand. The symbol of a triangle was on his form fitting shirt, the symbol of his special operations command unit. He was known as a Myrmidon, but the official title of his unit was Section Three. He knew this, his superiors knew this, and as far as Hakuri knew, most of the Terran Front was aware of his unit’s existence, but past that, they knew very little about what he actually did. As far as his mother knew, Hakuri was a pencil pusher onboard the TFS Berlin, the troop mothership that all of his letters were sent from. He thought about writing her, but then again, he only liked to do that when he returned from a mission, not when he was expecting to go to one. If he tried to write her when he was waiting, he would just get anxious, and homesick. That wouldn’t do when he was dropping into a combat zone. That wouldn’t do at all. Hakuri instead started to buff his helmet, waiting for the word to come down which meant they were prepared to jump. A glance at the clock made him pause in his circular rotations. The clock said 1330. Operation Naked Sun was about to begin.
Tika was on his side, Kzia standing at the end of the medical bed that had been adjusted for his turinikan physiology. He felt cold in more ways than one. For his people, clothing was more of a decoration than a necessity, but without his protective plumage he felt the cold stabbing him through to his hollow bones. His diplomatic access was already gone, his privilege access revoked. He heard the broadcast for a preparation to jump, but he wasn’t truly listening. There was no question in his mind he had made the right decision. There was no question at all. One of the humans, a nurse, came to his side and gently laid a heavy blanket over him. The human’s hand lingered on his trembling body for a few moments before it was removed, and Tika glanced in their direction. The female was one of the ones who had responded first to the call for medical service for him, had heard what had happened and why. Tika had gotten very used to being glared at on this ship. He was hated, and he knew it. He knew he had deserved it. He was a party to the vral’s enslavement of the humans, the chua, and far too many others. When he had come to Thermopylae station, he had not even given that fact a single thought. He was born into power, being of the Taratanti. He belonged to the most powerful species and government in the entire quadrant of the galaxy. His people, while mighty, did not seek to use it. To him, they had simply been above it all. When the vral had approached him with the offer to sell captured species at first TIka had wanted to reject it out of hand, but a few had told him to go through with the sale. Such was the nature of this galaxy, or so he had believed. The weak were at the whims of the strong, and one’s place in the galaxy was determined only by the power they could wield. The turinika were not nearly the first to have taken a species and used it for slave labor, and while Tika did not approve of the deal, he had not fought it either. As he looked back to the wall, he remembered what the humans had taught him these last days. When he had arrived in Thermopylae he had assumed he would find the chua species to have been at the very least regulated to a subservient role, if not outright enslaved. Finding them sharing power was a curiosity. He had expected to be treated with all the honor and dignity that his station demanded, that the power of his government demanded. Fleet Marshal Simmons had disabused him of that, and had left him humiliated and shamed. As he had laid in the dark as Simmons had declared the Seventh Orion War, covered in his own filth, feeling as if at any moment he was going to be killed he knew true fear and horrific uncertainty for the first time in his life. He had never faced these emotions, these sensations before. He had always been in power. He had stood with the full might of the Turinika Conclave behind him. He had never known anything other than the superior position. Now, as he lay in the hospital bed, staring at the wall, he was ashamed of how arrogant, how blind, and how short sighted he had been. After he had risen from his own filth, he had desperately tried to convince his leadership of the strength of the Terran Front, how it matched or eclipsed their own. The Conclave was not the unchallenged power in the quadrant anymore. The terrans, the human and chua, had somehow defied fate. They had not fallen to the vral after ninety years of near constant conflict, and now if Tika was right they had come out of it nightmarishly stronger than before. Tika had actually begged to be heard by his superiors, and he had never come close to that once in his life. The chua homeworld however, had fully broken him. If he had not been on the Antares, had not been humbled beforehand, he knew that he would have just clapped his hands together and said that it was delightful. As the transmission from the chua homeworld had come in, and the rescue effort had begun, he could only wallow in his own shame. He had profited directly from the chua’s suffering, the human’s suffering. Again he had tried, and failed, to convince his people, and again he had failed. Being on the Antares, for him, was torture. The lights were too dim, every human and chua looked at him with nothing more than loathing and contempt, his entire worldview had been shattered from the way he viewed the galaxy to his own place in it. Every time he closed his eyes he saw the shadow of Simmons standing over him, her voice cold with a lethal rage, hearing her voice echo in his mind, seeing the glint from flashes of light shining in her eyes. ‘We Know.’ echoed in his mind in his sleep, the voice of the terrifying Fleet Marshal transforming into the sound of a vengeful god demanding compliance and promising retribution. Then he had watched the humans and chua, who he knew were preparing to go to war with his people, celebrating the return of the shesvie. Once more he had expected them to be integrated into the Terran Front, but as soon as he learned Simmons offer to them, and what it had entailed, he had been called to his room to answer the latest message from his people. Once again, his people had doubled down, the knowledge of the enslavement of the humans had been suppressed, and once more Tika found himself, and his people, standing against a Terran Front that had every justification to declare war, to right the wrongs that had been done to them. All the while, he knew something else. He knew that, after everything he had seen, that his people would lose. The turinika had not been to war for nearly two thousand years. His people were not ready for what the Terran Front could do, and after seeing what they had done to the vral so far, he knew his people were not ready for what the Terran Front would do. He was afraid of the dark. Tika was absolutely terrified of it now, because now he knew the monsters were real. Simmons had shown him that, but the humans, the chua, they were not the monsters. He was. He had refused to be one any more. He had announced his intentions to his staff, who had squalled in rejection, all but three. Kzia was the first to step to his side, Kikumot and Tziki had stepped forward as well. Never, in his most nightmarish dreams, did he ever think that he would stand in front of Simmons and voluntarily have his plumage stripped from him, performing the act of Kasva. He never thought that his staff would have ever compiled and transmitted the data package they had sent. He had never thought that he would betray his people, if only to save them. Simmons had changed that, the humans had changed that. He knew the terror of the dark, he knew fear for his people’s safety, he understood the horror of war, and for the first time in his long life he could truly look back at every interaction he had had, with every species, that had asked for help in their struggle for survival against the vral and truly understand their fear and desperation. Now he lay, his plumage stripped from him, his station revoked, his status removed, surrounded by a people who despised him. He wouldn’t have it any other way now. He knew that they would listen now, if not to him, then to the civilian masses of the Conclave that would not stand for what they had done. He prayed to the Great Mother often now, shivering in the dim light, hoping that it would be enough. He had been wrong, and in his error he had sullied his own people. He had made them complicit. Even now, he did not know how they would ever be forgiven, because right now he wasn’t quite sure he could ever forgive himself. As he heard the broadcast calling out on the ship, announcing one minute to jump, he felt a hand on his side, and looked up to the human nurse. She was smiling at him. Not a smile born of malice, or anger, but a genuine smile. She patted his side lightly, then turned to walk out of the room. For not even the twentieth time since he had come onboard Thermopylae, he was mystified by these people.
The bridge of the Dhampir was thrumming with music and the vibrations of the reactor and Conrad leaned forward in his chair mount, his eyes almost feral as he looked at the empty space that was the mandeville point. He was positively chomping at the bit. Batz was positively roaring the lyrics to the song that was blaring over the ships speakers. Rev and Dev sat side by side in their mounts, throwing their hands up in time with the pounding bass beat of the sound. Towns was the only one besides Conrad that was quiet, both of them looking towards the mandeville point with complete impatience. Conrad felt like jumping from his skin. Fidget, well, fidgetted, holding his hands over his headset and listening as if he were trying to hear secret messages in the music. They were ready, their pulses were racing. The crew of the Dhampir was positively vibrating. Conrad looked to the shipboard clock, seeing 1330 displayed, and his head snapped to Fidget, waiting for the word. They were going to run, they were going to chase, they were going to hunt.
Vicky sat back, looking towards Jess and Kukat as they slept. Jess was in her chair, Kukat in her medical bed. Vicky glanced back at the block print on the paper and read it for the fifth time. She read the individual lines, one at a time, cursing their existence. After reading through the message printed she let her hand hang again. Kukat would be released from medical tomorrow, and both her and Jess still thought they would be boarding the Thumper to join the Vellacore once more. Jess had talked non-stop about her quarters on the Vellacore the past few days, how she just wanted to be back in her room. Kukat was equally excited. Only Vicky didn’t share their excitement. They didn’t know yet. They didn’t know about their battlefield promotions, they didn’t know about their reassignments, they didn’t know the days of them working together were functionally over. Vicky looked down at her hand holding the paper again, and felt like crumpling it. She had lost her crew. She had lost them not due to negligence, or time, she had lost them to fame. Kukat was to be promoted to ensign, and was to be the sensor officer on the destroyer Hadrian, Jess was getting the same promotion, her station on the cruiser Victorious. Vicky? She was the sparkling new commanding officer of a destroyer that was arriving at Thermopylae in two days, the Quarrel. She never wanted this. She had turned down promotion after promotion that would take her from the cockpit of the Thumper, away from Kukat, away from Jess. She wanted to serve in this war in her own way, as a pilot, with the two who had made her life so enjoyable. Now though, they were to be split up, and there was nothing she could do about it. These promotions hadn’t come from simple seniority, they had come from High Command, as had the orders. Tomorrow, when Kukat was released, they would be ushered into the hanger bay of the Barrowmore. They would all three be awarded the Star of Terra, then they would be reassigned. Tonight was the last night they would all be together. Vicky wanted to wake them up, she wanted to tell them, to give them a chance to process it. As she looked to Kukat and Jess she couldn’t bring herself to do it. She held up the letter again, reading the first few lines, then she felt the sting of tears in the corners of her eyes. She looked away, her heart panging with sadness, and stared at the wall. The clock read 1330.
Corporal Brandy was sitting on the small rack, with Janet Shippen sitting between his legs using his thighs as armrests. They were both dressed for the first time in the last few hours, both of them staring at the clock. This close to the reactors they could feel them beginning to spool up for the trip through hyperspace. When the news of the operation had come down they had elected to spend as much time together as possible, which Brandy had enjoyed to no end, and he had made sure Janet had as well. Brandy had even taken some time to reach out to his sister Victoria, a rarity for them both, as since they were children they were often barely able to speak to each other simply due to schedules. He had even told her about Janet, and although he hadn’t gotten a response from his sister yet he already knew what she would say. Janet nestled back against him, but he could feel her body was stiff. Neither of them knew what the next few months were going to hold. Their time together might be constricted, in fact, this might be the last few moments they were together for quite awhile. Brandy’s Ghouls were specialists, ship boarders. Chances are he was going to be extremely busy, as was she. He didn’t quite know how he felt about Janet, but he did know that beyond a shadow of a doubt he didn’t want to be away from her. Judging from how she was acting, she felt the same as him, conflicted about her relationship with him, but not wanting to be apart. He knew what he needed to tell her, that he had to get up, that he had to leave. The Ghouls were going to be assembled at 1345, ready to board. Her unit was going to be prepared at the same time, to begin taking on salvage. Her hands were like clamps on his legs, and from how tense she was, he wasn’t going to get up until she was good and ready. The clock on the wall switched to 1330. He stared at the clock, feeling like the clock was mocking him, when suddenly Janet leaned up and turned. Her hands took hold of his shoulders and she threw her body against his, her lips finding his own. Her arms wrapped around her frame and he tightened his grasp on her.
Simmons spread her hands over the panel in front of her, looking at the table. Seven points connected the recently reclaimed chua space to what was former Shesvie territory, and beyond that, the heart of the Vral Empire. Her lip curled in a wicked smile, On the digital display of the table the hyperspace lanes, and more importantly, the avenues of attack her fleet was preparing to take. She held out her hand, all five fingers splayed over the lanes, envisioning the war as it stood now. The war to come. Seven hyperspace lanes, seven systems, branching out into sixteen, branching out again to another twenty. The Antares herself was going to link up with the Barraki, and was set to simply plough through the next five systems to do so. Slowly she tightened her hand into a fist as she looked along the hyperspace lanes, seeing task forces lined up and ready to jump. Drones had already been sent through. The vral had forces along the border, but nothing that could withstand what was to come. Her fleet was ready. She was ready. The Seventh Orion War was at the end of it’s first month, and had taken back six systems. The first moves of Operation Naked Sun would double that and exceed it, then double it again. She had already given her speech, her task force commanders were ready. High Command had taken it’s time making this decision, and while she had railed against the delay that didn’t matter now. All along the front, individual task forces were joined into larger fleets, ready to jump into the next system and eliminate any vral defenses, but unlike now, they simply would not wait. Naked Sun was to be a lightning strike to cut off as much of the Vral Empire as possible, to deny them their own space, to imprison them on their own worlds. Task Forces were designed around three types of vessels combinations, Lighthammer Task Forces were comprised of corvettes and fast destroyers, the fastest vessels in the fleet, meant to take systems quickly, to devastate unprotected infrastructure, and to eliminate light resistance. Simply put, they were going to swarm into vral space, determine pockets of resistance, and move on. They were going to rip entire sections of vral space from them, calling in other task groups if needed. Thunder task groups were the primary capital fleets, meant to be sent into those pockets of resistance, and neutralizing them, joining with the Lighthammer groups if needed. The cruisers, carriers, battleships, they all belonged to these task forces. Her own task force was called the Nova task force, and it comprised only the Antares and it’s sizable fleet escort. Simmons glanced up at the clock, the time was 1329. She breathed in slowly, then unbidden the thought came to her head and she looked to the report from the two habitable planets that had been scanned by the drone cutters, the information having been relayed to her almost twenty minutes prior. She was not worried about the ground campaign, in fact a reserve fleet from Thermopylae would be the ones to escort the landing ships from planet to planet that her fleet left behind in it’s wake, isolated and defenseless from the wider Vral Empire. Fleet escorting was no longer her job, protecting ground invasions were no longer her job. Simmons was positively growling now, as her only job was to take her fleet and use it to rip the vral out of the stars. Still, the thought nagged at her. On both of the planets that her fleet was set to overrun, there were Vral ships in orbit. On the first, there was evidence that the Vral had been bombarding a small area of the surface, extremely similar in size to the hole that now existed on Zvitia, the planet that even now was being integrated into the Terran Front. In the second system it showed Vral ships in orbit, but whatever they were doing during the time they had taken the scans, whatever they were covering up, they didn’t seem to have gotten to it yet. On the radiological scan of the planet a massive bloom of electromagnetic energy painted a broad region of the planet blistering white. She had sent the images back to Earth, back to High Command, but no one seemed to know what was happening. The one thing that every analyst agreed on so far that was that whatever the blooms represented, it meant nothing good. She took another long look at the radiological scan, seeing the intensity of the radiation, and her lip curled in a snarl. She couldn’t think about that right now, but orders had already been given to notify her the moment that they had taken a planet that still bore the radiation signal. The vral were being damned fastidious about it though. She pulled her thoughts away from it, looking back to the hyperspace lanes. The slow grin entered her features again. She glanced at the clock. 1330. Her hand took hold of the receiver next to her station and she pressed the transmission stud, knowing that Hazard had already opened a channel to the wider fleet.
“Commence.”

I was driving south on Highway 5 in California the afternoon of 17 May 2024. The date on my dashcam in the link below is wrong. I was in a line of cars in the left lane as we are passing vehicles on the right. I have plenty of room in the cars in front of me. As you can see in the dashcam clip linked below, I am driving in my lane for some time when all of a sudden this blacked out Jetta swerves towards me and attempts to collide with me, as can be seen at the end of the video clip. I never crossed paths with this VW Jetta until this point. I looked up the license plate for this Jetta and it seems like it has been involved in many accidents in the past and has a salvaged title. I was wondering if this was an attempt at insurance fraud. When I watch the dashcam footage, it doesn't seem as drastic as it felt in reality. I felt my truck was swaying left and right from the evasive maneuver.
https://streamable.com/50xk07

The LA Galaxy is the winningest team in MLS, along with the attraction of star international players and bold roster moves, which earned them the title of being the first marquee team in MLS. However, following the recent trend of low performing seasons over the past six years, would you consider the Galaxy to still be a marquee team, while attention has shifted to other teams, such as Inter Miami, Seattle Sounders, and LAFC? Just looking to hear your opinions on the matter.
In my personal opinion, I believe they still are, but they're a lot like the Dallas Cowboys, or Green Bay Packers, Manchester United, or the NY Yankees: no recent run of overly dynastic form, yet with national and international recognition of the brand.
I will say, media will always cover what a marquee team is doing, and MLS pundits have been doing a poor job of covering their marquee teams, even when they fail, to put pressure on those brands/organizations to improve. They only cover teams, it seems, in good form, and dismiss the rest.
What's your take?

Hey everybody! I just started a dealership in California and wanted some advice. It’s just me, myself and I at the moment, but I have my office, my business license, and am waiting for the DMV to sign off on my dealers license. Any advice or pitfalls to avoid would be a huge help! Specific questions like: A) what DMS (Dealer Management System) software do y’all have experience with, and which one(s) would you say are the best? B) easiest way to streamline paperwork? C) I’m trying to link up with banks to offer financing to clients, but no banks want to touch used cars. I figured I’d be easiest to deal with just one bank, but should I try another route? Any advice there? D) If y’all get inventory from auctions, do they typically run an inspection and (if in California) smog as part of it? Do I have to get that done myself? Do they typically disclose if the title is salvage or any known issues or is it like a find out for yourself kind of thing? E) I don’t have a service department, but I’d still like to offer warranties. Should I go to the auto manufacturer for a used car warranty? What’s the process look like for that? F) If I hire a salesperson, what does a fair package look like? If I do hire I want someone with some real talent, so I’m willing to pay above average, but when I try to find out what an average package looks like I get a ton of different answers. G) I’m open to really any advice, so if there’s anything you feel like earning a random gent that just started in the industry recently, let me know. If you can save me some heartache I’d really appreciate your help! 🤗

Also im only using title contenders not like the Detroit Pistons and ect(with only one exception)
Midorima- most obviously I would say Golden state. You could just bench Klay for Mido and have him move off ball and he would fit in the system perfectly.
Akashi- probable Denver cause I can just see him and Jokic literally setting the floor to perfection and having akashi handle the ball and move murray to the 2 will make it easier for both to maximize their capabilities. And dont get started on a akashi jokic p and r.
Kise- If I have to pick I would say the knicks for that real superstar talent and I think the offensive power you get from jalen brunson and kise plus what kise can provide defensively just works.
Murasakibara- The dallas mavericks. With the offensive power the mavs already have if they acquire murasakibara and his defensive abilities they are looking dangerous with the big 3 of murasakibara, Kyrie and Luka.
Aomine- The Minnesota Timberwolves. They could have Aomines at the 2 and have ant be the pg and while his playmaking isnt that that good with Aomines presence on the floor it would open things up so much and this prevents teams from doubling ant because Aomine is going to fry his matchup and Aomine currently is much more willing to pass which is helpful considering his tendency to draw double teams.
Kuroko- this is the exception but the spurs. If the spurs have kuroko to constantly get the ball to 7’4 Wemby kuroko would end every game with 20+ assist and Wemby wouldn’t have any trouble scoring. Plus his misdirection abilities would be useful getting attention off of wemby and forcing players to make difficult decisions.
Kagami- my best pick is the LA lakers because having him and bron high flying just fits plus he can lock down all the best guards and play-make so kagami can essentially do alittle of everything.

​The draft is coming up and even though this is a perceived weak class there are some scenarios of players we can get that I'm very excited about and I'm curious what you guys think.
Tier 1A: Reed Sheppard
I'm heads over heels in love with the idea of Sheppard in Charlotte. I think our two biggest needs as a team right now first and foremost a point-of-attack/off-ball guard defender and not close behind that in second a guard that has some explosive ability on offense to both play next to and takes on ball handling duties without LaMelo. I feel that Reed was borderline made in a lab to address those needs.
Let's start on offense. Sheppard is a marksman. The guy shot above 50% from three for the duration of the season on 4 attempts a game. He also has a smooth quick release that will allow him to be able to get his shot off against NBA-level defense in my opinion.
He also showed the ability to play both on and off the ball and thrive with a number of different guards with different skill sets at Kentucky.
He also showed extremely highly basketball character in accepting an extremely underserved bench role without ever complaining at Kentucky when frankly he was the best player on the team. He shows some juice as a playmaker he averaged 4.5 assists per game in just 29 minutes off the bench with a lot of those minutes being spent off the ball.
Multiple guard lineups are all the rage these days but it's a lot more complicated than just sticking two guys together and saying you can never have enough playmaking See Garland and Mitchell in Cleveland and Young and Murray in Atlanta.
Reed I feel fits seamlessly in the best-case scenario of LaMelo being a healthy ball-dominant All-Star and also provides nice insurance for the scenario where LaMelo remains unhealthy.
Now for defense, this is an interesting discussion.
From appearances alone, Sheppard looks like a nightmare on defense. He is only 6'3" with a 6'3" wingspan. He is not a very explosive athlete laterally (we will get to his vertical later). But simply writing off Reed based on that is a mistake.
The guy is maybe the best hustle defensive stat player I have ever seen. He averaged 2.5 steals per game off the bench at his size and even more absurdly averaged nearly one block per game at .7.
That's where that 42-inch vertical comes into play. He had 2 fewer blocks on the season than Kentucky's starting center. Sheppard hustles like hell off of the ball and reads passing lanes exceptionally.
He can be exposed in 1 on 1 situations by size and speed to such an extent that he will never make an all-defense team but he's far from a liability in total on defense and is any many ways an asset. He brings an effort and intensity to that side that we really lack.
While he does lack the elite physical traits of a plus defender, he certainly punches above his weight and is an upgrade to anything that we have had at the position in quite some time.
As far as making a comparison, I think Fred VanVellet on the Raptors is a similar mold to what I think Reed can be here.
FVV started off as a UDFA who slowly made his way up the Raptors rotation.
FVV is even smaller than Sheppard at 6'0". But, he also is a player that punches above his weight defensively.
While he was their backup point guard behind their All-Star in Kyle Lowry, FVV also became an excellent off-the-ball player there, especially during their title run.
Sadly, I think there is a good chance Sheppard is off of the board by the time we get to pick 6.
There is some downside of him being a tweener who is neither a truly explosive player at the point guard position and too small to be a high impact at the 2. In that scenario, I think his career could follow somewhat of a Luke Kennard, Grayson Allen arc.
But I absolutely love this pick and am rushing it in if I am Jeff Peterson and he's on the board at 6.
Tier 1: Stephon Castle
Not gonna lie, I came into this wanting to hate Castle. I looked at him as a non-shooter, who was riding the hype of a UConn team that won the title and thought that his desire of being a more ball dominant player was unfounded.
But as I've looked into him I've gotten really comfortable with him being the guy at 6.
Starting with the positives, as I said earlier, the Hornets' biggest need to me is a point-of-attack defender at the guard position and Stephon Castle is that guy.
He showed amazing defensive chops at UConn and was trusted with some of the toughest assignments in major games. He's 6'6" got good size for his age at 19 in 210 pounds and a 6'9" wingspan.
To have the defensive presence and acumen he did for a team more focused on winning the title than it was at developing NBA talent at his age was highly impressive.
I think he can guard both guards and wings at his size and do both at a higher level than Sheppard approaching that all-defense ceiling.
The offense is where his age did show he very much looked like a freshman at times with just inconsistencies throughout his game.
His jump shooting was sporadic at best and more often than not just poor. He only shot 26.7% from 3.
He did get hot at times and is a decent free throw shooter at 75% so while hope is not lost on that end. Banking on him being a good shooter in the next 2-3 years is far from a guarantee.
Castle is adamant that he has more juice with the ball in his hands than he showed at UConn and wants more opportunities to play the 1 in the NBA.
While his offensive profile would concern me greatly if I were a team building around him as my lead guard. I do think that playing with LaMelo and Brandon will give him the space to add a little more juice to his game while not having too much creation responsibility.
This comparison is a lot more friendly than it sounds but I think a possible deluxe version of Nickeil Alexander-Walker for the Timberwolves could be the mold for Castle. Great defender that has more guard skills on offense than you typically get from someone who can defend 1-3 but not enough guard skill to really be happy if he was ever your lead guard.
If LaMelo can stay healthy, I do really like the idea of him coming along slowly as the defensive connective tissue and connector on offense in between LaMelo and Bradon.
Tier 2: Donavan Clingan, Nikola Topic
I am decidedly less excited about both of these options than the first two but there are some things to like.
Clingan could come in immediately and I feel replicate the role that Brook Lopez and Kristaps Porzingis played as drop coverage rim protectors for Charles Lee in Milwaukee and Boston.
He also shows some nice traits as a passer which could carry over from the things Boston's does with KP and Al Horford.
I think Clingan could be worth it even if we have confidence that Mark Williams' back injury will be fine in the long term. Look at Dallas with Gafford and Livley; their ability to have that caliber of center play at all times is a huge asset.
Downside for Clingan is he's a very poor free throw shooter and will be a hack-a-shaq target more than likely/
His upside on offense really isn't there, it's really a what you see is what you get proposition.
Topic, if we take him it's really getting into a best player available proposition because I really do not love the fit here.
He's a very high IQ player, and shows some really nice crafty traits and tricks of the trade. He's played at a high level professionally as a teen all of which are great.
However, I think he really does lack zip and explosiveness with the ball in his hands, he's a pretty stiff and rigid mover that kinda plays like he's stuck in one gear on offense. He struggled to shoot the ball only making 26 threes in 22 games.
That lack of explosiveness shows on defense as well where I found him be pretty poor.
He is a good free throw shooter so there is possibly some upside to the jump shot. He's a very smart player who I do think takes good angles and does crafty things to get to the rim and get downhill and playmaker for others so I do see how he can at least develop that out to the mid-range area.
He reminds me a lot of Josh Giddey, who is currently a bad fit with SGA and Jalen Williams, two players that I view as a very good blueprint of how I would like to see the team be built around LaMelo and Brandon.
On the high side of outcomes for Topic, I could see Goran Dragic on the Heat and possibly even a little bit of Franz Wagner, and I do think he is the best choice if the first three choices are off the board.

I recently purchased a rebuilt salvage title from someone in NY. I had the bill of sale & title signed over no issues. I was told at the VA DMV that since it’s a rebuilt salvage title that it has to be inspected after I mail in the original docs to the DMV Salvage branch in Richmond. USPS lost the envelope I mailed and I attempted to have a replacement title from NY sent to the prev owner, BUT he hasn’t received it yet (it’s been 2 weeks) and I need plates on my car so I can drive to work. I still have a scanned signed title and original bill of sale- but does anyone have advice on how to get this car registered with only these docs without having to wait for the original copy from NY which might not come?
Thanks!

Hello Canucks family. Like the title states, I’m a broken hearted Avs fan who is looking for a new team to cheer on and hope for them to destroy Dallas. Since I’m from Latvia and both Arty and Teddy are from there (our national heroes), I’ve followed the Canucks throughout the season and playoffs already. I humbly ask you to accept me in your ranks. Fuck Oilers. Fuck Dallas.