Hey everyone, I am a former Wall Street trader and quant researcher. When I was preparing for my own interviews, I have noticed the lack of accurate information and so I will be providing my own perspectives. One common pattern I see is people building their own algorithm by blindly fitting statistical methods such as moving averages onto data.
I have published this elsewhere, but have copy pasted it entirely below for you to read to keep it in the spirit of the sub rules. Edit: Removed link.

What it was like trading on Wall Street

Right out of college, I began my trading career at an electronic hedge fund on Wall Street. Several friends pitched trading to me as being a more disciplined version of wallstreetbets that actually made money. After flopping several initial interviews, I was fortunate to land a job at a top-tier firm of the likes of Jane Street, SIG, Optiver and IMC.
On my first day, I was instantly hooked.
My primary role there was to be a market maker. To explain this, imagine that you are a merchant. Suppose you wanted to purchase a commodity such as an apple. You would need to locate an apple seller and agree on a fair price. Market makers are the middle-men that cuts out this interaction by being always willing to buy or sell at a given price.
In finance lingo, this is called providing liquidity to financial exchanges. At any given moment, you should be confident to liquidate your position for cash. To give a sense of scale, tens of trillions in dollars are processed through these firms every year.
My time trading has been one of the most transformative periods of my life. It not only taught me a lot of technical knowledge, but it also moulded me to be a self-starter, independent thinker, and hard worker. I strongly recommend anyone that loves problem solving to give trading a shot. You do not need a mathematics or finance background to get in.
The trading culture is analogous to professional sports. It is a zero sum game where there is a clear defined winner and loser — you either make or lose money. This means that both your compensation and job security is highly dependent on your performance. For those that are curious, the rough distribution of a trader’s compensation based on performance is a tenth of the annual NBA salary.
There is a mystique about trading in popular media due to the abstraction of complicated quantitative models. I will shed light on some of the fundamental principles rooted in all trading strategies, and how they might apply to you.

Arbitrage

One way traders make money is through an arbitrage or a risk free trade. Suppose you could buy an apple from Sam for $1, and then sell an apple to Megan at $3. A rational person would orchestrate both legs of these trades to gain $2 risk free.
Arbitrages are not only found in financial markets. The popular e-commerce strategy of drop-shipping is a form of arbitrage. Suppose you find a tripod selling on AliExpress at $10. You could list the same tripod on Amazon for $20. If someone buys from you, then you could simply purchase the tripod off AliExpress and take home a neat $10 profit.
The same could be applied to garage sales. If you find a baseball card for $2 that has a last sold price on EBay for $100, you have the potential to make $98. Of course this is not a perfect arbitrage as you face the risk of finding a buyer, but the upside makes this worthwhile.

Positive expected value bets

Another way traders make money is similar to the way a casino stacks the odds in their favour. Imagine you flip a fair coin. If it lands on heads you win $3, and if it lands on tails you lose $1. If you flip the coin only once, you may be unlucky and lose the dollar. However in the long run, you are expected to make a positive profit of $1 per coin flip. This is referred to as a positive expected value bet. Over the span of millions of transactions, you are almost guaranteed to make a profit.
This exact principle is why you should never gamble in casino games such as roulette. These games are all negative expected value bets, which guarantees you to lose money over the long run. Of course there are exceptions to this, such as poker or card counting in black jack.
The next time you walk into a casino, make a mental note to observe the ways it is designed to keep you there for as long as possible. Note the lack of windows and the maze like configurations. Even the free drinks and the cheap accommodation are all a farce to keep you there.

Relative Pricing

Relative pricing is a great strategy to use when there are two products that have clear causal relationships. Let us consider an apple and a carton of apple juice. Suppose there have a causal relationship where the carton is always $9 more expensive than the apple. The apple and the carton is currently trading at $1 and $10 respectively.
If the price of the apple goes up to $2, the price is not immediately reflected on the carton. There will always be a time lag. It is also important to note that there is no way we can determine if the apple is trading at fair value or if its overpriced. So how do we take advantage of this situation?
If we buy the carton for $10 and sell the apple for $2, we have essentially bought the ‘spread’ for $8. The spread is fairly valued at $9 due to the causal relationship, meaning we have made $1. The reason high frequency trading firms focus so much on latency in the nanoseconds is to be the first to scoop up these relative mispricing.
This is the backbone for delta one strategies. Common pairs that are traded against each other includes ETFs and their inverse counterpart, a particular stock against an ETF that contains the stock, or synthetic option structures.

Correlations

Correlations are mutual connections between two things. When they trend in the same direction they are said to have a positive correlation, and the vice versa is true for negative correlations. A popular example of positive correlation is the number of shark attacks with the number of ice-cream sales. It is important to note that shark attacks do not cause ice-cream sales.
Often times there are no intuitive reason for certain correlations, but they still work. The legendary Renaissance Technologies sifted through petabytes of historical data to find profitable signals. For instance, good morning weather in a city tended to predict an upward movement in its stock exchange. One could theoretically buy stock on the opening and sell at noon to make a profit.
One important piece of advice is to disregard any retail trader selling a course to you, claiming that they have a system. These are all scams. At best, these are bottom of the mill signals that are hardly profitable after transaction costs. It is also unlikely that you have the system latency, trading experience or research capabilities to do this on your own. It is possible, but very difficult.

Mean reversions

Another common strategy traders rely on is mean reversion trends. In the options world the primary focus is purchasing volatility when it is cheap compared to historical values, and vice versa. Buying options is essentially synonymous with buying volatility. Of course, it is not as simple as this so don’t go punting your savings on Robinhood using this strategy.
For most people, the most applicable mean reversion trend is interest rates. These tend to fluctuate up and down depending on if the central banks want to stimulate saving or spending. As global interest rates are next to zero or negative, it may be a good idea to lock in this low rate for your mortgages. Again, consult with a financial advisor before you do anything.

Part 43 is here
Listen up. Do you have a gnawing feeling that something isn't right? A gut instinct? Is your intuition leaving you in a state of vigilance? Is your spidey sense tingling? Do you feel like the truth is hidden in plain sight, but you can't quite see it?
You're not alone.
So what is the truth and why won't they just tell us? They aren't going to tell us the truth because most of us can't handle the truth. They experiment on live subjects in the past, but suddenly they've seen the light? Suddenly they've found morality and embraced truth and ethical behavior?

The Stateville Penitentiary Malaria Study was a controlled study of the effects of malaria on the prisoners of Stateville Penitentiary near Joliet, Illinois, beginning in the 1940s. The study was conducted by the Department of Medicine at the University of Chicago in conjunction with the United States Army and the State Department. At the Nuremberg trials, Nazi doctors cited the precedent of the malaria experiments as part of their defense. Link Here

Any day that Nazi Doctors use your experiment as a defense for Nazi medical experiments is not a good day.
Let me show you one other part of the puzzle that you need to read. Let me show you that at some point the money, power, or even the scientific research can detach some individuals from reality.
"A number of years ago, we talked about, 'What if there wasn't clean water? What if there wasn't enough food?" she said on the radio show. "Where might we go? What might we do as a family?' So, I think we should leave those preparations to ourselves." The only thing they did not prepare, however, was the vaccine or a treatment for the virus that would cause a pandemic, though she acknowledged how "lucky" she and her family are to be in a position of privilege when it comes to dealing with COVID-19. "What we mostly talk about now in our home every night is how lucky we are," she continued. "We understand our privilege. When we say our grace at night, what we're thankful for around the table, is that we aren't struggling to put a meal on the table as so many families around the world are." Link Here
Yep. Sure thing Melinda. You guys just sit around the dinner table (like us normal plebs) and talk about how lucky you are to have food. Then you went out and stocked up your basement. Maybe they hoarded all the toilet paper because they're so full of crap they can use TP to wipe their mouths with after they speak. And what a minute, isn’t hoarding food bad? And aren't billionaires just hoarding cash? Different rules for different people, and it makes no difference what they say publicly when it's still just the same crap.
August 7, 2019 | Many of the world's elite, including hedge fund managers, sports stars and tech executives (Bill Gates is rumored to have bunkers at all his properties) have chosen to design their own secret shelters to house their families and staff. Gary Lynch, general manager of Texas-based Rising S Company, says 2016 sales for their custom high-end underground bunkers grew 700% compared to 2015, while overall sales have grown 300% since the November US presidential election alone. Link Here
So which basements were you stocking Bill? I'm betting you stocked all of them. But that article really made it sound like you personally went grocery shopping, didn't it?
And there's that year again, 2015. The same year as the Bird Man plauge doctor video, coronavirus and bats possible pandemic discovered, CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing went mainstream, and the Billy Boy pandemic warnings started with a Ted Talk, then the Doomsday Bunkers elite MKultra wealthy segment jumped by 700%.
That's not a good sign.
It's all connected. All of it. We might not know how. Or who's doing what. Or how bad our current ELE events will become, but we need to at least get an outline of the big picture, before the big picture turns into the Main Event.
As far as I'm concerned, there is no possible way our present unexplained mysteries aren't prognosticators of upcoming calamities.
No. Way. At. All.
Let's throw the spotlight back onto our pandemic. It's all plain and simple when you accept the government's and the medical community's word at Face(book) value. Our leaders tell us to Keep Calm and Carry On. Just take two official narrative pills and wait for the vaccine. It's all good. Honestly. Listen. Trust. Obey.

1913 to 1951: Dr. Leo Stanley, chief surgeon at the San Quentin Prison, performed a wide variety of experiments on hundreds of prisoners at San Quentin. Many of the experiments involved testicular implants, where Stanley would take the testicles out of executed prisoners and surgically implant them into living prisoners. In other experiments, he attempted to implant the testicles of rams, goats, and boars into living prisoners. Stanley also performed various eugenics experiments, and forced sterilizations on San Quentin prisoners.[13] Stanley believed that his experiments would rejuvenate old men, control crime (which he believed had biological causes), and prevent the "unfit" from reproducing.

Whelp, at least you could say that Dr. Stanley had the balls to carry out his experiments.
Tuberculosis. Syphilis. Herpes. Influenza. Malaria. The medical society treated us to a rolodex of experiments.

In 1941, at the University of Michigan, virologists Thomas Francis, Jonas Salk and other researchers deliberately infected patients at several Michigan mental institutions with the influenza virus by spraying the virus into their nasal passages.[24] Francis Peyton Rous, based at the Rockefeller Institute and editor of the Journal of Experimental Medicine, wrote the following to Francis regarding the experiments:

It may save you much trouble if you publish your paper... elsewhere than in the Journal of Experimental Medicine. The Journal is under constant scrutiny by the anti-vivisectionists who would not hesitate to play up the fact that you used for your tests human beings of a state institution. That the tests were wholly justified goes without saying.

Wholy justified. Goes without saying. But we would never be so reckless with experiments today, no matter how justified, would we?
NY MAG. March 20

On January 13, less than a week after COVID-19 was identified as the virus behind the outbreak in Wuhan, researchers at Cambridge-based biotech company Moderna proposed a vaccine to fight it. A little over two months later, on Monday morning, a pharmacist in Seattle injected Rebecca Sirull with that vaccine, making her the third person to be injected in a 45-person clinical trial, the first human trial in the country. To rush the vaccine to clinical trial, Moderna skipped animal testing, a somewhat extraordinary measure. Sirull, a healthy 25-year-old editorial coordinator at a research institute, will receive a second injection in a month and have her blood drawn regularly for more than a year. Should the test be successful, the more optimistic estimates suggest that a vaccine could be available in 12 to 18 months. Intelligencer spoke with Sirull about her decision to take part.

Oh. Uhm. OK.

Jill Horowitz stood outside the Quaker Ridge Shopping Center in New Rochelle, N.Y.—an early COVID-19 hotspot—in March, stopping shoppers as they walked into the grocery store. She handed them blue pamphlets soliciting volunteers for a Rockefeller University antibody research study. “I would say, ‘Would you like to help us find a cure?’” says Horowitz, executive director of strategic operations at Rockefeller’s Laboratory of Molecular Immunology. “I didn’t even have to mention coronavirus. This neighborhood was completely subsumed.”

Yessiree ladies and gentlemen, step right up, roll up that sleeve, and get a poke to save all the good folks out there from the pandemic. The one that contaminates surfaces, but now doesn't spread through surfaces. The virus that you don’t need a mask for because a mask will make it worse. The virus you might need a mask for because it wouldn't hurt, but it's not airborne. Put on a darn mask because the virus is airborne. Maybe. But air-conditioning makes COVID-19 worse. So only wear a mask inside. The virus that worsens with pollution, but don't worry about putting on the mask outside. Because if you wear a mask you'll stop the second wave. But there might not be a second wave, it might just be one long continuous wave.
Is anyone else getting the impression that they don't have enough information about the virus to be issuing guidelines yet?
But I'm just being paranoid. I'm sure of it. That was then, and this is now.

Then: In a 1946 to 1948 study in Guatemala, U.S. researchers used prostitutes to infect prison inmates, insane asylum patients, and Guatemalan soldiers with syphilis and other sexually transmitted diseases in order to test the effectiveness of penicillin in treating the STDs. They later tried infecting people with "direct inoculations made from syphilis bacteria poured into the men's penises and on forearms and faces that were slightly abraded . . . or in a few cases through spinal punctures". Approximately 700 people were infected as part of the study (including orphan children). The study was sponsored by the Public Health Service, the National Institutes of Health, the Pan American Health Sanitary Bureau (now the World Health Organization's Pan American Health Organization) and the Guatemalan government. The team was led by John Charles Cutler, who later participated in the Tuskegee syphilis experiments. Cutler chose to do the study in Guatemala because he would not have been permitted to do it in the United States. In 2010 when the research was revealed, the U.S. officially apologized to Guatemala for the studies. A lawsuit has been launched against Johns Hopkins University, Bristol-Myers Squibb and the Rockefeller Foundation for alleged involvement in the study.

That is so reassuring as we move forward, isn’t it? And don't give me any that was back then we've changed arguments. We haven't changed at all. Proof? Ok. Let's go.
This is a link to an LA Times article that talks about Bill Gates and his AIDS fight in Africa. You go Bill. Get them vaccines out to the people. You're such a good guy! That's what a New Normal article would say. This isn’t a New Normal article. It's scathing in it's judgment. They may not be dying of AIDS, or just living longer with AIDS, but they are dying due to other factors, which should be easily acquirable with the wealth at Bill's disposal to prevent.
But there was one item that caught my eye. It talked about a Paper Mill that was in a country in Africa, that Bill owned a substantial amount of stock in. This company owned paper mills in North America. Those paper mills were environmentally friendly with little emissions. But not the one in the African Country. Nope. Not at all. That one didn't bother with environmentally friendly processes.
The story goes on to discuss how one of Bill's AIDS treatment recipients lived downwind from this plant and how the fumes we're probably killing him. And what were the fumes?
Hydrogen Sulfide. (Read more at Flatten the Curve) - Part 13
Yes seriously. Treating them for AIDS while downwind from Hydrogen Sulfide. I'm not sure about you, but that sounds like a medical experiment to me. Seriously, the guy that wants to stop climate-change by geo-engineering the planet doesn't use his clout to stop the pollution from a paper plant that he owns stock in. OK. Makes perfect sense, doesn't it?
Yet actually it might. No, seriously, it really might. I've already stated that the virus seems to be activated with environmental toxins. And here we have an ultimate real life laboratory. And what does this real life laboratory research?
Why maybe it researchers Miasma theory? Huh? Yep. Here we go.

The miasma theory is an obsolete medical theory that held that diseases—such as cholera, chlamydia, or the Black Death—were caused by a miasma, a noxious form of "bad air", also known as night air. The theory held that epidemics were caused by miasma, emanating from rotting organic matter.

Rotting organic matter, like at meat plants?
May 7, 2020: www.wired.com | Why Meatpacking Plants Have Become Covid-19 Hot Spots.
June 23, 2020: https://www.bbc.com | Coronavirus: Why have there been so many outbreaks in meat processing plants?
And do you know what else was associated with Miasma Theory? The Bird Man plauge doctor, just like the 2015 "you're all dead" video.
The word miasma comes from ancient Greek and means "pollution". And then we have Covid-19 and pollution.
The idea also gave rise to the name malaria (literally "bad air") through medieval Italian.
Malaria? What? Crazy? Aren't there debunked studies about Malaria drugs working on COVID-19? Nah. Must be fake news. Right? Or fake facts. Or is it fake news reporting fake facts? I'm just so confused.
Does the strangeness end there? Sadly, it doesn't folks. Not at all. Not in this New Normal.
Because Mr. Bill Gates is trying to eradicate tuberculosis.
And, Hydrogen sulfide stimulates Mycobacterium tuberculosis respiration, growth
Back when I looked for information about the pandemic, I noticed something odd, the mortality rate for Covid-19 fluctuated depending on the region. Now I'm not a doctor, but you don’t have to be to read, do you? So I kept looking at the data for similarities. And they were there. Hypoxic or polluted water like lakes or coastlines. Cities with factory polluting emissions. They all led to outbrakes and higher mortality rates.
And then it changed. I saw ourbreak regions with low mortality rates. It didn't make sense, but there had to be a reason. There's always a reason. And as I kept looking at the similarities of low mortality rates something jumped out, a lot of them were still vaccinated for Mycobacterium Tuberculosis.
Yep.
But this is crazy talk Greek! You're just looking for dots and finding a way to connect them. It's just a coincidence that Bill Gates is funding AIDS prevention, an article exists that points out a therapy participant is close to a source of hydrogen sulfide emissions from a company that Billy has stock investments in, and that Billy also has a program to eradicate tuberculosis. Stop seeing patterns where they don't exist. You're freaking people out.
Crap. Perhaps you're right. Maybe I am freaking people out. But let me show you something else. It's something that I noticed about a month after this pandemic was shutting us down. And it didn't make any sense to me at the time. Ready?
www.pnas.org | BCG vaccine protection from severe coronavirus disease 2019 COVID-19.
BCG? What's that?
www.sciencedaily.com | Preliminary study suggests tuberculosis vaccine may be limiting COVID-19 deaths.
And then the studies started backing it up. Even betteworse, they linked it to Hydrogen Sulfide, endogenous not exogenous, but Hydrogen Sulfide is the same no matter if you breathe it in or produce it biologically.
So, yeah. Let's dig.

Endogenous Hydrogen Sulfide stimulates Mycobacterium Tuberculosis respiration, growth, and pathogenesis.

In mammals, H2S elicits a biphasic, concentration-dependent mitochondrial response14, which can be cytotoxic or cytoprotective. For example, at high concentrations H2S reversibly inhibits cytochrome c oxidase (Complex IV)15–17. In contrast, at low concentrations H2S can serve as bioenergetic fuel to stimulate mitochondrial respiration without uncoupling of respiration. Link here

At high concentrations Hydrogen Sulfide can be cytotoxic and reversibly inhibit cytochrome c oxidase. We've followed the White Rabbit and now we're digging. Can't stop now. Won't stop now.

Defects involving genetic mutations altering cytochrome c oxidase (COX) functionality or structure can result in severe, often fatal metabolic disorders.

Disorders involving dysfunctional COX assembly via gene mutations include Leigh syndrome, cardiomyopathy, leukodystrophy, anemia, and sensorineural deafness**.Link here.

Anemia? Like, the Momento movie? Do I have amnesia now and I have to live my life backwards?
Hold on, don't freak out. You don't have amnesia. Self inflicted amnesia induced systemically via behaviorally manipulated echo chambers introduced systemically through social media electronic pathways? Possibly. But this is anemia, and that's another story.

Current management of COVID-19 is based on the premise that respiratory failure is the leading cause of fatalities (Zhou et al., 2020). Nevertheless, mounting evidence points to drastic systemic events taking place that contribute to accelerated COVID-19 pathogenesis. The “cytokine storm” is a notion that is reportedly hailed as the hallmark of the COVID-19 hyper-inflammatory state (Mehta et al., 2020). Consecutive studies linked COVID-19 related hyper-inflammation to systemic events including hypercoagulability, oxidative stress and altered iron metabolism. Mehta et al., 2020, Phua et al., 2020

Hyperinflammatory and altered iron metabolism. Following? Good.

Coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) has been regarded as an infective-inflammatory disease, which affects mainly lungs. More recently, a multi-organ involvement has been highlighted, with different pathways of injury. A hemoglobinopathy, hypoxia and cell iron overload might have a possible additional role. Scientific literature has pointed out two potential pathophysiological mechanisms: i) severe acute respiratory syndrome-coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV- 2) interaction with hemoglobin molecule, through CD147, CD26 and other receptors located on erythrocyte and/or blood cell precursors; ii) hepcidin-mimetic action of a viral spike protein, inducing ferroportin blockage. Link Here.

Hypoxia? Where have I heard that before?

A dangerous symptom of the coronavirus that can cause a patient to fall unconscious or even die is known as hypoxia — when the body’s tissues do not receive enough oxygen. Dr. Richard Levitan, an emergency doctor working in New York City, wrote for the New York Times at the end of April that he has seen COVID-19 patients with “alarmingly low” oxygen levels, but no shortness of breath. He describes this as “silent hypoxia”. These patients had oxygen saturation levels as low as 50 per cent when normal levels are usually at 94 to 100 per cent at sea level, Levitan explained. These patients had oxygen saturation levels as low as 50 per cent when normal levels are usually at 94 to 100 per cent at sea level, Levitan explained.

Low oxygen levels. Dysregulates immune system. Are your They Live sunglasses on? Are plugged into the Matrix or hacking the Matrix?
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov | Hydrogen sulfide stimulates Mycobacterium tuberculosis respiration + growth.

Tuberculosis (TB) is responsible for millions of deaths each year and several billion people are latently infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb). Mtb modulates host factors, such as endogenous gaseous signalling molecules, to persist in humans for decades. H2S has diverse biological functions, including modulation of immunity and cellular respiration. However, the role of H2S in TB is unclear. We found that mice deficient in H2S production are more resistant to Mtb infection than WT mice. Upon infection, Mtb increases host H2S, which suppresses central carbon metabolism and increases inflammation. Distribution of H2S-producing enzymes in human TB lungs showed that H2S is produced at the site of infection. These findings identify glycolysis and H2S-producing enzymes as targets for TB host-directed therapies.

Don't Freak Out like LeChic, but I don't think we're in Kansas anymore Dorothy.
Speaking of Kansas, do you remember the dust storm as the tornado blew in and swept Dorthy to Oz?
The “Godzilla” Saharan dust cloud over the US, explained:

Dust clouds originate in the Sahara, the largest desert in the world outside the poles, and the Sahel, just south of the Sahara. Much of the dust originates in the Bodélé Depression in Chad, an ancient dry lake bed at the threshold of the Sahara and the Sahel. There, convective storms in the early summer whip the dry ground and loft particles of silica, iron, and phosphorous as high as 20,000 feet into the sky. Link Here

And then we have this:

Residents wear face masks to protect themselves from the Saharan dust clouds covering Dakar, Senegal. N95 masks and even surgical masks can help protect people from getting sick from the dust. Breathing dust can trigger problems like asthma attacks and worsen conditions like heart disease. But particles from natural sources can pose some unique threats. “Desert soil can also be contaminated with bacteria and fungal spores or with toxic heavy metal,” Achakulwisut said. “For example, in the US Southwest, dust episodes there have been linked to outbreaks of Valley Fever and arsenic poisoning.” Link Here

Contaminated with bacteria. Guaranteed Anaerobic bacteria. And it carries along metallic compounds. Like this:

**A 2001 study in Limnology and Oceanography suggested that the seasonal windfalls of iron-rich Saharan dust become a banquet for red tides, blooms of algae that spill into the ocean like dye, deplete it of oxygen, and release toxins. Dust clouds can also host unwelcome stowaways. Jun 24, 2020 Link Here.

Red tides. Blooms of algae. Or rather perhaps, Cyanobacteria blooms? All in a dust storm. Maybe we should start wearing masks, right? Don't want to breathe in toxic dust, do we?

But Snake Park is no paradise. For decades the residents have lived with the mine, which they say blows clouds of dust into their homes. Now Snake Park, formally known as Doornkop, is in the sub-district with the highest number of Covid-19 infections in Gauteng. Last week, Gauteng Premier David Makhura linked “cluster outbreaks” on mines, and people moving between them and where they live, to the Covid-19 infections in the western part of Soweto. In 2017, the Bench Marks Foundation, a nonprofit that monitors multinational corporations, released the results of a survey of household health in four mine-affected areas in Soweto. Mine tailings contain heavy metals and chemicals and cause various illnesses, including mental health issues and Down’s Syndrome. The report found that more than two thirds of the respondents in Snake Park complained about respiratory problems, including persistent coughs, sinus issues, asthma and tuberculosis. This year, the August dust storms in Snake Park will coincide with the expected peak of Covid-19 infections in Gauteng.

“We can’t breathe well. This mine is very dangerous. It’s toxic,” Phongoma says, adjusting his bright blue mask. Looking at the mine dump, now glistening in the afternoon sun, he adds: “It’s a bomb. It’s a nuclear weapon — and with this Covid-19 thing, it’s going to explode.” Link Here

Stranger and stranger, isn’t it? So strange that I would venture to say, Stranger Things haven't happened. You might want to read Flatten the Curve Part 39, and what I wrote about Turkmenistan and wearing masks for toxic dust. Link Here
So where are we now? Knowwhere or nowhere? Are you a nobody or a knowbody? Is this picture that I'm painting connecting enough dots for everyone? Does anticipating mass riots in protest of the upcoming environmental collapse, and the wars for natural resources along with it, make the centralization of the economy plus the mass surveillance system make more sense? The masks and facial detection AI improvements? Does ID2020, another Billy Boy project make more sense? The upcoming robotic automation of the workforce? The curtailing of civil rights? Heck, what about the Bill Gates endorsement of impossible meats and the sudden push to vegetarianism? Remember the meat plant shutdowns? Rotting organic matter and Hydrogen Sulfide?
Please remember, Hydrogen Sulfide outgassing is pretty consistent across past Extinction Level Events. Does this mean that all hope is lost? Puhlease. Hope flows abundant. We shut Pandora's Box before hope could escape, remember?
Let me leave you with one final thought. Words matter. Look them up. They know what's happening. They know all of this. The words they use hide it in plain sight.
I've written about Bill's fortuitous investment strategy. How he seemed to hit all the right stocks as the pandemic and environmental collapse strikes. It's mostly hidden in shell companies after shell companies, but it has to start somewhere. And it does. He owns Cascade Investment L.L.C. Link Here
Which: Oct. 22, 2014 · A subsidiary of Cascade Investments LLC, which oversees the Gates fortune, is buying thousands of acres of land in north Florida. Link Here
And what does Cascade mean? Let's look?
cascade (n.)

"a fall or flow of water over a cliff, a waterfall," 1640s, from French cascade (17c.), from Italian cascata "waterfall," from cascare "to fall," from Vulgar Latin casicare, frequentative of Latin casum, casus, past participle of cadere "to fall" (from PIE root kad- "to fall"). cascade (n.) a succession of stages or operations or processes or units;

To prepare. To fall. Interesting choice for a name.

Meteor showers occur when the earth bowls through a dense stream of debris left in the wake of a comet, asteroid, or other space-borne object. Depending on where you look, you may encounter fewer meteors, however. Viewers in the Northern Hemisphere will see shooting stars emanate from the shower’s “radiant” point in the southern sky, meaning the best meteors with the longest tails will be most readily visible in the east and west. A much more spectacular meteor shower — among the year’s most prolific — will pepper the skies with a spattering of bright shooting stars and “fireballs” come mid-August. The Perseid meteor shower peaks the night of Tuesday, Aug. 11. Dozens of shooting stars could be visible beneath a clear sky every hour. Perseid meteors zip across the sky at 37 miles per second. Their diaphanous tails can appear white, orange, yellow, pink, turquoise and even violet, lingering in the sky for a few seconds. The rainbow spectrum of colors come from the combustion of magnesium, sodium and iron. Link Here

Pepper the skies with fireballs. Fall from the skies.

Comet 67P's rotten-egg smell comes from hydrogen sulfide, and the horse-stable odor comes from ammonia. These scents are blended with the fainter almond smell of hydrogen cyanide, the vinegarlike odor of sulphur dioxide and the sweet-smelling scent of carbon disulphide, researchers said. Link Here

Hnmm. It definitely sounds like Bill was getting ahead of the curve before we started to Flatten the Curve, by being a good student and getting prepared before the hoarders bought up all the toilet paper for the upcoming SHTF event.
Wouldn't you agree? Are these all coincidence, or should we pay more attention?
They want us to Keep Calm and Carry On. When do people tell you to remain calm? When you start to panic. So do you really think they would tell us the truth and deal with panicking masses? Or do you think they would hide it?
Hide it in plain sight?
Keep your head up and eyes open. Talk soon.

TLDR: Back in December I learned there can be enormous consequences to my lifestyle, started to decrease calories intake, built up new social group, months later I was working out regularly. Then I lose my job and most of social group in a week, was devestated, backslid, but my newly formed habits still held somewhat firm and even after a month of neglecting my health I hadn't gained any new weight, just slowed my weight loss. Never give up you beautiful Redditors! Long post, but a story I bet many of you can appreciate or relate to.
...
December 2019: I started to take my weight loss 'seriously' which mostly meant I'd stop ordering deep dish pizza's at 10 pm after already downing a 6 pack of beer on a weekday. I wasn't weighing myself then, but I did know I was around 400 lbs from a recent doctor's visit about 2 months prior (and if anything I gained weight in those 2 months). Why'd I start losing weight? well, there had been a lot of thing's I'd already 'lost' to obesity; sitting comfortably in the stands at sporting events, going to plays/movies comfortably, some chairs I had to stop sitting on, roller coasters, most sports, hiking with friends....so what tipped the scale finally? What did it? My neighbor's ultra rare disease and her alcoholism.
Nothing against this woman, she was honestly a total sweetheart, she once got me a 6 pack of my favorite beer for helping her back in the apartment building one night when she was blackout. But one day we run into each other while I'm out at the dumpster having a smoke, she's in a sling so I ask what happened. Apparently, she went out to the bars and blacked out, came home and fell down the stairs breaking her arm and pinching a bunch of nerves. Due to a previously unknown/untested disease she has, her arm will never fully heal, for the rest of her life she will be unable to write with that hand, her dominant hand. This. Terrified. Me. I was already killing myself through obesity, but I figured "it's not permanent, just a phase" .... but now if my drinking and weight cause a broken limb, maybe I'll suddenly have this permanent, life changing disability and I'll 100% be at fault of.
January: So less drinking, still drinking, still smoking (only when drinking, but still bad), but a lot less than before. Weight gets a bit better, but I'm still anxious about working out in public and I was too broke (at the time) for a regular gym membership, so no real working out, just more dog walking.
February: I see Covid popping up in China and fringe articles talking about it's quick spread and how contagious it is, I decide there is no way I'm quarantine-ing alone. I move back with the folks and my brother, who's in town from LA as their office closed down due to covid about 2 weeks after I moved back home. Now I'm not ordering $60 deep dish meals at 10 pm because my brother sleeps 10 ft from me with only a curtain seperating us, and my shame at binge eating outweighs my need to binge eat. So less calories, this is the first time I start noticing my breathing becoming easier and my joints in less pain.
March: I start playing Dungeons and Dragons for the first time in my life, and it turns out I'm actually really good at running games, like people are SHOCKED it's my first time doing it. I build a new social network online and have regular games/social events with this new group, mood increased, binge eating goes WAY down. Still drinking, but never on game nights, so that's (at least) 3 days a week I no longer drink.
April: Intervention time, Mom is angry I'm antisocial and in my room all day. Completely fair point and I'm not mad at her about it, I explain how my new social group works and where it exists online, she sort of gets it but not really. So I ask, what can I do to make her happy? because we are in lockdown so it's not like I can go out and make friends. She asks me to bike. So I bike. Maybe 2x a week max, but I'm biking.
May: Biking is no longer painful! I got a better seat, bike lights, I'm stretching daily so my limbs don't hurt, oh yea, and my limbs no longer hurt, fucking awesome! My hands stop hurting too, which means I can go back to writing stories and do more work on the computer without pain, fantastic! I buy a scale, May 1st I'm at 376 lbs. Games are going great, working remote, saving money, getting out of debt, life is sweet!
Not only this, but I start to plan out my future for the first time in 4 years, I now have a plan to create an online community/entertainment conglomorate to propel me to a future career in entertainment post quarantine! I just need to keep making cash while working in my free time!
June: OH FUCK I LOST MY JOB! OH FUCK MY GAMES ARE ENDING BECAUSE QUARANTINE IS LIFTING! WHAT JOBS DO I EVEN APPLY FOR?!? I kept biking, occasionally, but I'm still slow, also I'm drinking more than before, like almost as bad as it was before December 2020. Last measured weight was the day I lost my job, at 359 lbs.
July: okay, calm yourself, apply to some jobs, do some writing, some video making, some D&D occasionally, but I just can't bring myself to run games, I just lost everything so quickly I feel like a piece of garbage, I'm worthless, I can't even bring myself to apply for a new job :( I keep biking, eat out less because no income, but ugh, not in the best place. Too ashamed to weigh myself.
August: Total mental breakdown first week of the month when I'm denied a job at trader joes. a grocery store. I was an IT data analyst before covid, now I'm not qualified for this job???? Fall into depression. Working out barely helps, but it helps a bit. Regularly logging weight, but missed goal weight in July so I must be failing right? Weigh myself for the first time in 2 weeks...358 lbs...I'm not backsliding?...?????? Wait....this is working?????
Now today, I've been under 350 lbs for the last 3 days, so I'm no longer fluctuating on the low side, I've officially reached my weight goal of 350! I'm still looking for work, but I've got enough $ to make it through September, with my renewed energy I'm sure I'll get back into a healthy schedule/swing of things!
Never give up guys. You may feel like your failing for months at a time, if you keep up the workouts, keep up calorie control, keep up even one or two aspects of your weight loss journey, you won't backslide nearly as badly as previous attempts. I'm down 50 lbs and I'm not stopping. May of this year I could barely bike 3.8 miles at a pace of 6 min miles, today I just completed 9 mile bike ride with an average mile pace of 4:36. And I can run up stairs without getting winded! It's the small stuff I'm learning to celebrate, love yourself, you will get over your hump, just keep fighting, because it's up to you to make tomorrow a better day than today!

Another tournament another app to download. Goot-bye US Open app. Another week of typing F into google chrome before realizing the site starts with an R. The French are classy. But who was Roland Garros? Was he, a fictitious dragon who ruled over the Alps and the Bay of Biscay and all that lay in between? Or was he a French aviator and pilot during World War I? Over the next two weeks, we’ll get to the bottom of this. I know which way I’m leaning.
PS that is Querrey in the photo if you're on mobile, not me
Djokovic Ymer : Novak’s biggest win at the French Open is having Thiem and Nadal on the opposite side of the draw. A healthy reward for the #1 player in the world, and one that will mean a very wide open draw and a very enjoyable snackathon while he watches the other semifinal. Novak, or Snack Attack as he’s known to his close friends and family, will be hungies for this one after a very odd day of frustration against Carreño Busta at the US Open led to a disqualification. Novak won the Rome event with relative ease and is as close to a frontrunner as someone other than Nadal can be at this event.
Ymer has been steadily improving but is still at the top of the challenger level when it comes to clay. This won’t be close, but it’s good to see Ymer stringing together a few seasons of appearances in the majors. Djokovic in 3.
Berankas Dellien : Ricardas Berankas may be closer than he appears. After a good hardcourt mini-swing, Berankas has been absent from the clay warmups. He’s never really been the best on clay although he plays a solid baseline game, and this mostly because while he’s consistent, he struggles to hit through the court on slower surfaces. Dellien on the other hand, does his best work on clay. He’s been losing matches you’d expect him to have a better chance in and hasn’t had many bright points leading up to the break. With Djokovic in the next round and Berankis on his worst surface with minimal warmup, this is a must-win for Dellien. He’s struggled to find the finish line but he’ll have ample chances here, and his defending is similar to Munar’s in terms of lockdown baselining Dellien in 4 or he is likely headed off the tour.
Galan Norrie : This is a brilliant opportunity for Daniel. He’s been hinting at a big run on clay and overcoming a lot of the gatekeepers of the challenger tour, but a lot of third set losses have plagued him, and while it’s considered a short stretch of tour, the clay events are deep with talent. Norrie has ventured to the South American swing once or twice, with relatively poor results. He can be a frustrating opponents at his peak, but his backhand doesn’t get through the court well and he’s just a bit inconsistent with results. He’ll still be a favorite here because playing in the spotlight in a major is something that takes time to adjust to, but Galan will make it close and could eke out a win since he’s still a developing player. Galan in 5.
Sandgren Hurkacz : Sandgren hasn’t had a terrible time on the dirt this year, qualifying for events the last two weeks and unfortunately running into guys who are simply better than him. Almost beating Caruso is a great step, and a year ago that would make him a bit of a favorite to beat Hurkacz. Those of us who watched his matches with Rublev and Schwartzman saw a different Hurkacz from the inconsistent but promising server that’s been exhausting bettors while losing after winning the first set time and time again. Hurkacz was hitting very clean and generating winners relatively easily, and while his serve left him late against Diego, playing a returner like that in a long match will do that to you.
Sandgren and Hurkacz will both be hitting a heavy ball here and looking to hold behind big serves, but one of them has had higher level success in the past few weeks, and I think Hubert, or “Hubert”, as he’s known down at the ‘ol library, has the better serve and bigger groundstrokes. Hurkacz in 3-4, and please when you look at Hurkacz picture him wearing glasses and looking up from his wooden table anytime someone coughs across the room.
Garin Kohlschreiber : This is a good start for Garin, whose physical state is somewhat dependent on Tsitspas. A finals appearance on Saturday will make for a tough turnaround, but I don’t think he’ll withdraw from a major, and given Kohl’s loss to a super-hampered Fognini last week a little bit of fatigue won’t be too much of an issue. That being said, Garin’s game is largely dependent on physical effort and being a ball machine. I would say it’s split 95% that, and 5% having elegant hair. Kohlschreiber won’t just disappear and if Garin is a ghost of himself, he’ll lose, but that’ll be a big dip in level in a short period of time, and the fatigue I expect to hurt Garin’s run at the French is more of a 3rd-4th round type of struggle. Garin in 4.
Humbert Polmans : Polmans name backwards is Snamlop, and that’s important because it’s now the second thing you know about his clay game. Polmans wears a hunting cap and plays a very energetic and consistent game. In normal circumstances he’d have a puncher’s chance, and the lucky losers in tour events are classic for pulling a number of upsets (like Bublik this week) but this is not the spot. Humbert played great in Hamburg and lost early enough that he’ll have a few days to travel and get ready for RG. Humbert in 3.
Vesely Broady : These two will be very happy to play each other first round. Vesely has only just started to eke out wins on this clay swing and Broady has just qualified for the first time, beating Polmans and Kuhn along the way. These aren’t the type of wins that suggest he’ll beat Vesely, but Vesely’s struggles are the kind of thing that could see lower-tier players reel him in. I expect Broady’s timing to be a bit better than Vesely’s to start as he’s had a few matches on these courts, but Vesely really is a tour level player at the end of the day, so I believe both players will have some difficulty pulling away here. Someone in 5. The Vesely that lost to Vukic in a challenger loses. The Vesely that played a decent match against Humbert wins.
Majchrzak Khachanov : If you got into a car accident with a basket full of the alphabet, you miiiiiiiiight get this combination of letters. Kamil just won a challenger in Prostejov, beating some quality players and Andujar in the finals. Everyone who knows Andujar knows he was raised with jaguars, and wins two titles in a row every year then disappears. Majchrzak interrupting this is a very brave feat, but also one that means this isn’t the one-way traffic that a Khachanov Majchrzak match normal would be. The problem for Kamil has been distancing himself against mid-tier opponents, and that is exactly what Khachanov big hitting and aggressive serving have done. Karen struggled against Lajovic last week, but that’s a puzzle he hasn’t solved yet, and likely won’t impact his performance here. He’s got a better shot at excelling in the big moments, and outlasting Kamil’s steady play. Khachanov in 4-5.
Baustista Agut Gasquet : This is a sleeper of a great match. The way Gasquet moves around the court in between points is deceptive given how well he covers the court, and his game looks a bit more devoted to flair than it is to hitting winners. Still, his results over the past decade have been brilliant and his serving is sneaky good at times. Zero warmup matches leading into this is the polar opposite of RBA’s commitment to getting in hard yards on the surface, and that’ll be a big edge for RBA. Not his best surface (I’ll stop harping on this eventually), but RBA is playing some good ball and Gasquet is half a question mark heading into this week. Playing at home and not sporting any visual injury means Gasquet won’t just disappear, but I think rust will be a factor. RBA in 4-5.
Uchiyama Balasz : Uchiyama is most famous for being the inspiration for that Nas song, but his second claim to fame is being a helluva tennis player. Many bettors had genuine panic attacks in his first round loss to PCB in last month’s US Open, and having that fresh in their minds could lead them astray here. Attila Balasz is one of the pure clay specialists on tour, and plays a very unique style of tennis. Tons of dropshots, a strangely effective but flailing backhand, and an affinity for hitting forehand winners from 10 feet behind the baseline are on display from him, as well as one of the best kick serves you’ll see. Given Uchiyama got the business from Duckworth last week, this should be a W for Balasz, who can trouble the winner of RBA/Gasquet but likely can’t win. Balasz in 3.
Pella Caruso : Pella has allegedly been diagnosed with Morton’s neuroma, which is an inflamed nerve in the metatarsal region of the foot. I’ve dealt with nerve issues in the metatarsals after breaking a toe recently, and it is the strangest thing. It’s nonstop pain, even when you’re sitting down, but you can still train. Your foot feels like it’s on fire, but you can still walk and you know nothing is wrong. I’m not sure what treatment he’s getting for it, but the stop and start aspect of tennis is going to really preclude him from doing much on tour while this is an issue, and I believe that’s what is leading to his subpar results since the restart.
Caruso on the other hand has become a household name lately, and although he’s done better on hardcourt than clay in the restart, this is a winnable match for him. I’m just not sold on Pella’s physical ability, and Caruso has the power to break down what is normally a rock-solid defense. Caruso in 3. Disclaimer : There’s a big tendency amongst gamblers to jump on lines because they think they have some injury info. Just keep in mind, the information the general public has is always less than what the books have. If anything, a question mark about an injury is a good reason to avoid betting on a match at all.
Millman Carreño Busta : For a while I thought Millman had a knack for drawing guys he’d have a real war with, but it’s just his style. He doesn’t serve aces but he has a decent serve. He doesn’t hit winners but he swings for the fences on the forehand. He doesn’t have much of a backhand but he puts it in play in decent spots. It’s just very difficult for Millman to overwhelm anyone, and very difficult for players to create offense against what he offers. PCB didn’t look great against Nadal, but two weeks of rest will have him in good shape to compete here. I do expect him to make a decent run at this event, and this is a good test to see where his game is at after a huge payday in the USO. PCB is a professional, but I don’t put it past him to struggle to find form/motivation for a while. PCB in 4-5.
Struff Tiafoe : This is the first line I’ll mention. Tiafoe comes in at +170 for this match, which is much closer than I’d set it. Tiafoe isn’t really a productive player on clay, and lost to local hero Musetti in a challenger last week. Struff blew up with a big lead in the third against Khachanov, and lost quickly in Rome as well, but he’s had some great clay results, and I expect him to come through very well here. The Tiafoe we saw at the USO may be a repeat appearance, but this would be the best win of his career on the dirt, so the line (especially after his loss to Musetti) makes me wary. Struff in 4.
Altmaier Lopez : Altmeir is a challenger level player with a big claycourt game. He plays pretty exclusively on the dirt, and while Lopez is a great server, he may take an L here. Altmaier came through qualifying fairly easily, and Lopez is a wildcard for his effort level and service efficiency, but I’d rather back a qualifier in-form than a maybe of an offensive veteran on a slow surface. Altmaier in 4.
Harris Popyrin : This is a nice matchup, as both of these guys wouldn’t be expect to make the 2nd round at RG very often. I’ve been big on Popyrin’s game in the past, but Harris has had the better win in recent times on clay, beating Caruso in two straight. This will largely be decided by serves, and in the interest of honesty, I haven’t watched many of their recent matches. Popyrin was better for a time, but that seems to have flipped. Someone with their hat backwards in 4.
Pospisil Berretini : Oddsmakers have set the games total for this at 32, which given Pospisil’s serve is a bit low. Vasek is by no means a great clay player, and Berretini is going to make quick work of this, but I do think Pospisil will keep him on court for at least two hours. Berretini in 3.
Medvedev Fucsovics : Spooky line for this one, with Medvedev (who regularly comes in at -1000 against solid opponents) only a 4 to 1 favorite here. Fucsovics hasn’t played any clay warmups and although Med lost to Humbert it was a side event and Humbert played lights out tennis. I guess the premise we’re going with here is that Medvedev’s style isn’t great on clay, but I think he’ll have a good event here as he was a bit more impatient than usual against Humbert. Medvedev in 4.
Mannarino Ramos-Vinolas : If you like lefties who’ve been on tour forever and never change their game, this is the match for you. Local robot ARV has had a disappointing start to his clay season, courtesy of an unexplainably good Bublik. He’s the type of player who generally needs a bit more time to work the point, and doesn’t go for clean winners very often. A bit like a more defensive version of Delbonis, ARV will have a good chance here to get a win. Mannarino has potential to make this close because ARV hasn’t been winning and that mental state is sometimes a difficult hurdle. He’ll also be playing at home which has historically been a huge boost for French players. It’ll depend largely on the condition of ARV’s game, but it will be difficult given Mannarino’s controlled game and ARV’s defense for either player to pull away. ARV in 5.
Halys Giron : These guys just aren’t that good, but they’re in a great section of the draw. Halys has been hanging around the challenger tour, but hasn’t made a great deal of impact. Giron has had a more impressive stretch of wins on tour, but none of them have come on clay. The crowd will help Halys, and I think he’s a bit more comfortable on clay, but Giron is the better player at the end of the day. Not a lot to separate these two. Giron in 5.
Querrey Rublev : I don’t want you to get the wrong idea about Querrey. It’s easy to say he’s washed up or he doesn’t care or he’s only good on grass and fast hardcourt. What’s difficult to do though is to remember that he did this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4ICHm96chw&ab_channel=TennisWizard
That is all. Rublev might be coming off a title win, and the courts will be slower, but Querrey’s work on this planet is already complete. Rublev in 4. PS an anonymous source has recently informed me that Rublev’s house in Russia is actually structured like a hamster emporium and he wears a cape and refers to himself only as Tubelev. Vetting my source now.
Monteiro Basilashvili : Monteiro is somewhere fancy winning a challenger as we speak. I love this guy’s work ethic and he plays like he’s Nadal’s wild cousin who mountain climbs and just plays tennis when he’s in town. The forehand is big and he’s going against a guy who hasn’t notched a win since he came back to the tour. Commenting on legal issues isn’t great, but Basilashvili is facing some domestic assault charges back in his home country and there’s some notion that this is not great for his mental state. If they were both at their peak Nikoloz wins, but he’s in the doldrums and Monteiro is winning tons of matches. Monteiro in 3.
Lajovic Mager : Another tough draw for Mager. After getting a motivated Dimitrov he goes up against Lajovic who found his chops last week in a major way in Hamburg. Mager can absolutely crush the ball but he needs some times to find these shots, and Lajovic moves his opponents exceptionally well. A few missed opportunities against Tsitsipas have afforded Lajovic a few days of rest, and he should be good to roll through this one. Lajovic in 3-4.
Djere Anderson : This one of my favorite matchups in the first round. Djere is a great claycourter and plays harder than most when he gets in a rhythm, but he’s been struggling to win matches lately. Anderson’s return from injury has been similar to Nishikori’s as far as results, but not style. Nishikori has struggled to keep the ball in the court. Anderson seems to be able to play his normal game in stretches, but is hesitant to do so. It’s like watching a baby deer test it’s legs out. In a 2/3 format I think Anderson might sprint away, but here I like Djere to make this match physical and beat Anderson, who’ll be happy to go into the indoor season where things are a bit easier on the ol deer bits. Djere in 4-5.
Mayot Davidovich Fokina : Mayot is not the worst, but he’s not the best. Rublev vs Fokina is probably the best 2nd round we’re going to see in this event, and barring injury we’ll get a look at it. Fokina’s loss against Lajovic looked bad since Dusan was slumping, but looking at his form the next few rounds it makes sense. It’s like playing Paire on a day where he makes no errors and serves 16 aces. You come off the court like wait, where’s christmas? ADF in 3.
Shapovalov Simon : Shap had some clay wins that he hasn’t in the past. It’s nice to see the slower surface giving him time to really craft some winners. There aren’t many holes in his game, and he seems to only struggle once opponents settle onto his patterns since he tries to hit through the court on so many shots. When you see the guy shifting to where you’re going there’s a tendency to try to add some juice. Simon’s physical struggles aren’t public, but there’s something off about him. Age/fatigue/injury. I don’t know. The backhand is still beautiful and he’s still a great player, but he just can’t win lately, and this is the wrong opponent to be moving poorly against. Shap in 3. PS if you haven’t seen Shap’s rap video yet don’t see it. It’s not to be seen, like a rare butterfly or a peanut butter jelly sandwich your child hid in their closet for some reason 4 years ago.
Johnson Carballes Baena : Another match I feel good about. RCB is the RBA of ARV. His ability to push the pace without really hitting for winners is a quality the best claycourters all possess. Johnson can play some clay, but usually only in the USA event that consists of hardcourt players playing each other. This will be somewhat close as Johnson is decent on serve and RCB retired from his last match. The appeal of a big check at a major is such that people will make the trip even if they’re not at their best, and this one is RCB’s if he’s healthy, but Johnson’s if he isn’t. No way to pick, but I’m pulling for RCB, as he’ll be the better round 2 against Shap.
Martin Sousa : The hits keep coming. Sousa simply can’t win a match. He doesn’t seem to be playing terribly, just dealing with a huge slump. Martin will know how that feels, as he’s been taking first round losses when he finally makes his way into main tour events for a while. That changed at the start of this year though, and Martin has been a difficult out on clay in recent months. That likely will give him an edge here, and the confidence being based in results rather than in coaches puffery is likely to keep him pushing where Sousa will have doubts creeping in. Martin in 5.
Barrere Dimitrov : Barrere looked like he’d be making a big impact on tour this year before the break. There are some winners and some losers in any sporting revolution, and halting his progress seems to put him in the loser category. Draws are important, and while the solid hitter could have a chance against the new Kanye, this seems to be the old Kanye. Dimitrov tried exceptionally hard to beat Shapovalov in their Rome test, and it was good to see him playing well against even if the overarching idea is that the pinnacle of the tour has kinda passed him by. Dimitrov in 4-5.
Krajinovic Milojevic : Tough pull for Milojevic, who plays excellent dirt and worked very hard to qualify, notching wins against Leo Mayer and Yannick Maden. Kraj is pretty solid on clay and playing his best tennis the past few weeks. He’ll have to work hard to put Milojevic away, but he should do so. Krajinovic in 4.
Bedene Rinderknech : Strasbourg is in France, and Rinderknech is French. I like it. The 25 year old has been doing excellent recently on clay, and it’s nice to see him get a wildcard. Bedene isn’t the type of player who’s unbeatable, and Rinder’s win against Marc-Andrea Huesler (who should be in this event) shows he’s able to compete at tour level. The “home crowd” issue is probably getting annoying to read about now, but there’s some real comfort zone issues with the French players that lets them play comfortably there. Bedene is still a step above, but this could be close. Bedene in 5.
Laaksonen Cuevas : Henri never blinked in the qualifying, and this is a guy who does way more with way less. He trains his fitness at least as hard as anyone on tour, and while his game is pretty one-dimensional, he gets a lot out of it. He reminds me a bit of a local club champion who plays a tour pro and doesn’t just fold up and hope for their adulation. The serve is big and that’s the main weapon, and he’ll need it against Cuevas. Cuevas doesn’t give up much in the way of rallies and uses his variety to expose his opponents. Laaksonen won’t get tired, but he will have difficult ending baseline rallies, and his somewhat predictable approach is something that Cuevas is well suited to defend against. Cuevas in 4.
Munar Tsitsipas : This is a sleeper for an upset, especially with Tsitsipas playing for a title tomorrow. Munar hasn’t shown the type of world-beating dominance I expected him to on clay, because frankly he is a bit small for the tour, but he has a Nadal-level (RIP my inbox) effort on the court. He is rock-solid from the baseline and has a great attitude. Some injuries have hampered his development but even with Tsitsipas playing his best tennis this won’t be a walkover. The huge edge in serving for Tsitsipas means it’ll be tough for Munar to really apply pressure, but I think it’ll be a similar affair as his match with Garin where he seems in control until he begins making errors. Tsitsipas is still prone to shanking random rally balls and returning poorly. After talking up Munar’s chances I still think Tsitsipas may win in straight sets, but it’s one of those matches where I’d never give the spread. Tsitsipas in 3 difficult sets. PS Munar, or Lil Buttons as he’s known in the tennis rap community, buttons all the buttons on his shirt and that’s cute.
Monfils Bublik : Tough draw for both. Monfils has looked half motivated, as if he wants to play but can’t bring himself to until the pressure’s off or it would be an amazing comeback. It’s time to stop looking at these moments as a slump as this is pretty much how he has spent his whole career. When conditions are perfect, he thrives. These are outliers though, not his real level. Bublik won a bunch of sets of tennis this past week and had his chances against Garin. My initial thought looking at this match was that the games total of 35 seemed low. Bublik is likely to hold serve moderately well, and Monfils is likely to get drawn into the skill contest that Bublik represents with his dropshots/serve and volleys/underhand serves. I think this has potential to be the most entertaining match, and while Bublik is looking very good, Monfils has a lot of time here to play himself into a mental state where he can fight. Monfils in 5.
Gomez Sonego : Gomez and Sonego will both like their chances here. Sonego’s been losing, but to quality opponents like FAA and Ruud. Gomez qualified and got a nice article written about him, but his game has been legit and he’s been right around tour level for 2-3 seasons now. Gomez actually beat Seyboth Wild in the qualifiers, which is a huge win. Sonego really hasn’t won many matches, and that’ll be in his head a bit against a qualifier who is hungry to prove himself. Gomez in 5.
Thompson Albot : Our boy Radu hasn’t really been winning much since the tour’s return, which I think puts an asterisk next to the entire sport. It’s bad form for Radu not to get wins, and I believe that’s what Pospisil’s union is mainly focused on. Thompson was awfully disappointing against Coric in the USO, and is pretty bad on clay, but this again is a nice section of the draw with Fritz waiting in round two (I say that now but by the next paragraph I’ll convince myself he’s going to lose). Thompson in 4.
Machac Fritz : Is it legal to cheer? Machac’s recent results don’t say he can beat a player like Fritz, but he has beaten some players who can beat some players who can beat a player like Fritz. Fritz did well against Travaglia, and likely has the edge here. Some home-cooking for the 19 year old will be a factor if he manages to grab a set, but he’ll have to get there on his own and Fritz’ hitting may be a big factor in this one. Fritz in 3-4 but I’ll be crossin my fingas.
Coric Gombos : I see some people on twitter disrespecting my man Gombos. I’m lying, I don’t go near twitter, and only made an account so I can post a portrait of myself. You can view it here :
https://twitter.com/blurryturtle/header_photo
Gombos probably can’t win this, but he is the Gombosiest. Coric in fouric.
Rodionov Chardy : Is Chardy really tryna play tennis anymore? It seems like he’d have been making a retirement announcement this year but the pandemic ruined it. Rodionov did great in the qualifiers and winning is a habit. Chardy has the skill and serving to outclass Rodionov but he just hasn’t been doing the work lately. The upset is somewhat likely in my mind. Rodionov in 4-5.
Moutet Giustino : Local rapgod Corentin Moutet is a tiny little nugget of a player, who plays a big big game. Both have been winning matches lately, and this will be a tight contest. If this gets deep, I like Moutet as his experience winning 5-set matches is a big factor and his game is better after some miles are on both opponents since he thrives on his speed but plays a bit too far behind the baseline. Giustino in 4 or Moutet in 5.
Kecmanovic Schwartzman : We all know Kecmanovic is a great baseliner. He’s one of the tours more competent pushers, but Diego is just a better version of him. Diego was at his best in Rome, and I expect a good run here. Schwartzman in fourtzman.
I feel like there are more matches than usual. Also always nice when they don’t release the qualifier matchups until the day before the tournament. Thus ends my gripes.
Wawrinka Murray : Is it okay if I think they’ll both lose? Wawrinka played one of the funnier challenger events, losing the first set in almost every single round then winning the match and the title. Murray has hinted at the old Murray at times, but fans have grown a bit sadpants when watching him struggle with mid-level tour players. Murray hasn’t played, and Wawrinka looks like he hasn’t wanted to. The edge here goes to Wawrinka, but I expect a great contest as Murray has no quit in him and Stan has shown a prolific ability to find struggle where there is none. Wawrinka in 5.
Koepfer Hoang : Tough wildcard draw for Hoang, though a year ago he’d have been ecstatic. Hoang’s been winning locally, and I wouldn’t sleep on him here. He has a great serve, a big backhand, and is still developing. Home court advantage adds another wrinkle, but Koepfer will likely be physically recovered from his runs in Rome/Hamburg, and he really showed he can elevate his game and cover the court remarkably during that period. Koepfer in 4, and hopefully he’ll be the wakeup call Wawrinka needs in round 2.
Gaston Janvier : Two wildcards playing each other. Good for them. Probably Gaston in 4 (he has the much cooler name/hits a bit bigger)
Nishioka Auger-Alliassime : This one is interesting given FAA’s struggle to find his serving last week. Squishioka can be very frustrating in rallies, but he just hasn’t been able to win matches on clay. Clay is more of a big hitters surface, even though it’s slow. The work ethic is there, but not the offense. A disaster of a day for FAA if he loses this one; I don’t rule it out but it’s unlikely, and Bublik was in great form which explains half the loss. FAA in 3-4.
Ruud Sugita : Ruud has been excellent for years, and now he is looking like a real threat against anyone outside the top ten, and a big hurdle for those inside it. Sugita is a nice guy, but Ruud in 3.
Paul Duckworth : Tommy Paul’s best surface is clay? He really has shown an ability to perform and Duckworth just enjoyed a zipping in his last outing. One way trafffic, and Paul/Ruud in the second round is a great matchup. Paul in 3.
Opelka Sock : Say no to Jack Sock. It is addictive when this half boy/half potato starts winning matches. I think it continues here. Opelka has played no warmups, and moving on clay for such a tall fellow is really tough. He’ll have a tough time hanging with Sock’s pace, and the easier opponent (defensively) is likely to make Sock really focus on hitting to the open court. Sock in 4.
Honestly you’d tell me if there’s extra matches right? I feel like some guys are playing twice.
Cilic Thiem : Cilic is going to be sick of Thiem by the end of this one, but as a fan this is the perfect early round for Thiem. After playing no warmup matches the concern is rust, and so I’m excited to see Thiem have a match where he has to work right away. Typing that makes me a bit scared, as Cilic has played some ok tennis in the warmup, beating Goffin 2, 2. Still, this sub’s affinity for Thiem’s tumbly bum won’t let him lose in the first round, and as he gets going I think we’ll see him kinda shape into a threat for the title. Thiem in 4.
Zverev Novak : Novak isn’t great on clay. Trouble is, neither is Zverev. After a major finals, I don’t picture a guy like Zverev coming in with a smaller ego. I think there will be some harrowing moments in this, and if Herbert plays well in round one I like him to take at least two sets off Zverev. Zverev in 4-5, and I’m interested to see if he’s on the “slow start gradual turnup” path again, as that’s a terrible plan on clay for a guy who’s prone to frustration.
Mmoh Herbert : Mmoh did well to qualify, besting Renzo Olivo. Add in that Hyeon Chung was in their draw, and you really have a lack of offense in that section. Herbert has been bad recently, losing to a number of players he’d normally beat. His game depends largely on his serving, and while he’s one of the best players at net outside the big 3 (I’d put him first/Sock second) he needs to get there to be effective. Mmoh is a defensive test, but Herbert likely won’t want to get dragged into extended rallies, so this will look a bit like a low-rent version of Garin vs Bublik. I think Herbert at home gets the job done, but it may take some patches of trial and error to crack Mmoh’s defense. Herbert in 4-5.
Delbonis Londero : I was initially excited to back Londero a bunch after his USO run, as I know his best surface is clay. This is his second match against his countryman though, and it is a poor matchup for him as Delbonis has been playing decent. Delbonis his big and segments the game nicely, so the pace of the ball is fast, but the progression of rallies is slow. I don’t expect Londero to lose in straight sets, but it’s hard to back him after losing to Delbonis a few weeks ago. Delbonis in 4-5, but for betting porpoises I’d recommend avoiding this altogether.
Cecchinato De Minaur : Hehe. Finally stringing wins together, Cecchinato’s reward is a maindraw against a guy who is a nightmare matchup. Cecchinato plays a classic claycourt game. Big power and deft dropshots. He needs time to produce the first of those, and De Minaur takes that away. The dropshots are cute, but De Minaur covers the net better than most on tour. He lost to Koepfer in his only warmup on clay, and Cecchinato has won a bunch of matches recently, but this is a fairly even matchup. Both are excellent frontrunners, and I think the first few sets will be very competitive. Hard to pick against De Minaur in a long contest early in the event, and Cecchinato’s defense will likely be an issue if ADM is serving well. De Minaur in 4.
Paire Kwon : Paire still avoiding multiple matches, which is an excellent strategy for his longevity as a pro athlete. He basically could lose to anyone at this point, and his retirement in Hamburg appeared to be “I’m tired”. This is a bad sign, and worse still, Kwon is not a player who’ll beat him quick or represent a dominant opponent he can just tank against. This is one I’d advise listening to rather than watching, as Paire’s outbursts will be better than his play. I’m somewhat expecting Kwon to win, although this is similar to Nishioka/FAA where the more stable player lacks the weapons to just win in dominant fashion. Kwon via retirement.
Coria Jung : Coria is a wall. Jung is not a wall. Why not be a wall? Coria in 4.
Bonzi Ruusuvuori : Bonzi beat Karlovic which makes me sad, but I’m happy to see the challenger journeyman get a shot in a grandslam. Ruusuvuori is slowly becoming a household name, and his clay game isn’t adept but it’s a notch better than Bonzi. Fatigue may be a factor here not in hampering Bonzi’s game, but in Ruusuuvuori’s being more crisp. Ruu-uuu-u—- in 4.
Sinner Goffin : One of the sketchier first round matchups, what with wildcards playing each other and Coria and Jung going at it. This happens though, and it’s our gift to watch it. Sinner is one of the more promising prospects on the tour in a long time, and with the next gen guys finally starting to come through with big results and solid play, seeing a guy who seems more mentally stable than they were early on in their career is even better. Goffin losing quickly to Cilic isn’t a great sign, and he’s always a threat to go elfmode and stifle his opponents ability to play offense, but I think Jannik’s serving will give him a small edge here. Sinner in 4.
Fognini Kukushkin : Fognini had ankle surgeries, or else his recent string of poor performances and losses would be his normal string of poor performances and losses. He doesn’t seem willing to press himself yet, and this is another Paire/Kwon style matchup. Kukushkin will take any victory he gets a look at, but isn’t going to overwhelm his opponent. Fognini’s impatiance against Ruud did include a number of shots that missed by very little, and on the slower courts in Paris he may land a greater percentage of these. I expect Fognini to play a bit better, and this will be about optics. If Fognini feels like he looks bad or is in a spot where him trying would risk his ego, he’ll fold, and Kukushkin will win. This is sad to say about a professional athlete, but Fognini has the ankle situation to fall back on, so if he can’t win,he’ll just swing for the fences and inspect his racquet until it’s over. He’s very pretty tho. Kukushkin in 4, hopefully.
Martinez Vukic : Martinez was the best in the qualifying, and Vukic was in the qualifying. Martinez in 3.
Korda Seppi : Korda is becoming a sleeper pick on tour, and Seppi is notoriously at his worst on clay since he hits such a flat ball. I think this will stretch deep, and I am tempted to give the edge to Korda given Seppi’s recent loss to Klahn and Musetti and Korda’s win against Karatsev, who has been one of the best players in the past month on clay on the challenger tour. Korda in 4.
Benchetrit Isner : Benchetrit can make this close since it’s on clay, but Isner should be able to get into tiebreakers, which makes predicting this almost as annoying as Isner bouncing the ball between his legs. The dude’s a muppet. Someone in 4 tiebreakers.
Evans Nishikori : Evans hasn’t been great, and Nishikori has been worse. Nishikori has looked like he was gaining control of rallies and immediately making errors for a few weeks now, and it’s frustrating to predict his matches because there’s that sense that he will find form at some point. Evans likely gets the W here but it will take a lot of work. Evans in 4-5.
Andujar Travaglia : “BEGONE,” commanded Andujar. I stood there speechless. “YOU ARE AN ILLUSION!” he bellowed, waking several colorful parrots who sat atop his head. I was not there. What he saw was only his vision of me, which had come to him in a dream commanded by the vines and souls of tropical frogs. Confident that I had gone, he hopped off his perch on the mountain peak, and began descending. Not in the usual way via legs and feet, but on the breeze of a thousand moths, while nearby shamans began making a thousand broths. Andujar is back, and I hate this matchup. Travaglia was brilliant on serve leading up to RG, and Andujar was a breath of fresh air on the challenger tour, notching win after win after win and rarely dropping a set. This is one I expect to go deep, as both players are at their best. Who will win? A man does not summon the future, lest it become the present. Shamans in 3.
Diez McDonald : idc
Gerasimov Nadal : So we all know what will happen if I suggest Nadal will struggle in a match. Luckily, I won’t have to here. Gerasimov’s movement isn’t good enough to trouble many players on clay, and Nadal is probably the most dominant single-surface player that tennis has ever seen. He looked pretty human last week against Diego, and his muscles were muscley, but not as muscley as usual. Where is his massive crab-arm? The winner of Travaglia/Andujar will be his first real test. Nadal in 2 somehow.
PS User Kuklachert runs a very fun picking contest if you're interested in discord ... check it out here https://www.reddit.com/tennis/comments/izhabroland_garros_tipping_competition/

Growing up, I was always told to avoid addictive substances, because alcoholism ran rampant in my family.
Unfortunately, I married an alcoholic and my wife died as a result of a DUI.
I have two daughters. They are fraternal twins and are middle school aged. I have no other family besides my twins.
I worked as a laboratory technician in a hospital and the day to day grind was starting to get to me.
My kids transitioning into teenagers just made everything worse.
I needed an outlet. I started to contemplate the idea of sports gambling. I played sports my whole life and I felt like I could predict the outcome of most games.
I decided to reach out to this guy, who I went to high school with, who ran numbers for the mob.
He was fine with taking my bets, but warned me to do it just for fun and to only bet within my means. He said it was a win win scenario for him and his associates and they would allow me to bet as much as I wanted.
However, if I was to lose be prepared to pay up any cost and he reiterated to do it just for fun.
I nodded and agreed and decided to put $25 dollars on this weekend’s football game.
Surely enough I won and I decided to double down. I kept on winning and now I was up to $1,000.
I got such a rush off of gambling and it seemed to be a great distraction from my day to day worries.
Then something fell into my lap, the lab where I work received a spinal tap specimen from the quarterback of the Eagles.
This information wasn’t decimated to the public and I knew I had inside knowledge, that no one knew besides a small handful of people affiliated with the Eagles.
I knew this was a once in a lifetime opportunity.
I knew the Eagles were playing a team with the best defense in the league and if the Eagles quarterback had a serious back injury then the defense would pummel him.
I decided to bet one million dollars against the Eagles. I called my mob friend and he reiterated the same warning as he stated before I started betting, that he would allow any bet that I wanted, but I was expected to pay regardless and if I couldn’t then the consequences could include death.
I had to take this bet because this was going to be my ticket to quit my job and just be happy. I had enough and I was ready for whatever happened.
I was ready on game day and the usually predictable Eagles weren’t predictable this game and they actually pulled off a miracle, despite the Eagles quarterback barely being able to throw the ball.
The second the game ended my bookie called and said he would be over in five minutes to collect the money.
I told my kids to go to their room’s and I had to accept my fate.
There’s a knock on the door and as I open the door he says “give me my money.”
I tell him straight out that I can’t pay that and he responds “I have to pay my bosses ... I’m going to have to kill you and one of your kid’s.”
I said “what!”
He replied what he said and took a handgun out.
Then, I said “you said nothing about harming my kid”
He replied “I also didn’t tell you who the president of Italy was!”
I said “I will do anything you ask please don’t harm my kid”.
He then said “You work in a hospital?”
I said “Yeah”.
Then, he said “are you willing to kill six people?”
I said “I’ll do whatever it takes to save my daughter”.
He explained that I needed to access hospital records so I could find suitable organ donors to sell to wealthy people who were looking for heart transplants. I would need to access the hospital systems medical records database and find six candidates spread out throughout the country.
Basically anyone who came into the ED with a minor injury, but was otherwise healthy. The six people needed to be spread out, that way it wouldn’t cause a red flag of missing people in a small geographical area.
Once, I found the six candidates, then I would need to have the mob’s former licensed surgeon approve the candidates. I would then have to kidnap each victim, once a month, then drive them back to a cabin in Pennsylvania, where their heart’s would be harvested.
It was the only way, I could ensure my daughters safety.
I agreed and I was given six people’s blood type, sex, and the desired focal age. Basically, five people in their early twenties and one six year old.
Also, they brought the surgeon to my house and implanted a tracking device into both of my daughters. I told my daughters I did it to track them in case they ever got kidnapped, but it was really for the mob to find them in case I didn’t follow through with the agreement.
I was given six cities that were given to me by the mob to find heart donor. Then, I knew I had a very limited amount of time to access my hospital’s national medical record database, before their online security system would catch me for accessing private information.
Picking potential victims made me gag, these poor people who came into the ED, with nothing more than a sprained ankle, are now going to be kidnapped and literally have their hearts ripped out.
So, I scoured the ED records for the specified genders, blood type, medical history, current location, and their ages, and saved the information to a Zip drive.
The mob’s heart surgeon reviewed my information and told me which one to kidnap first.
I had to travel to Cincinnati which was around a seven hour drive.
I had to quit my job and potentially leave my kids for a few days by themselves.
I ditched my EZ-Pass so I wouldn’t leave a trail.
My plan was to scope out where my first victim, a 22 year old female, resided and then quickly get her into my car somehow.
I drove to her address and I had her ED picture with me to help identify her. I arrived at her address at about 2:00 pm. I waited outside for about three hours and I finally observe her leaving her house to take hee dog for a walk.
Prior to leaving, I had picked up a revolver handgun from a pawn shop that I was quite certain was stolen. I also bought six pairs of handcuffs from the same store. I had my car windows tinted and would utilize the car’s child safety locks.
I never shot a gun before and I hadn’t been in a fight since elementary school.
My plan was to meet her about 30 yards from her house, say her name and tell her there is someone who wants to talk to her, while I point my partially concealed gun at her three my sweatshirt.
I knew if I failed then at least one of my kids was going to be killed .
I had to sound forceful and intimidating, but I couldn’t have every neighbor hear what’s going on and then potentially rescue her.
I see her coming back from her walk with her dog and I’m pretending to be playing on my phone.
As she comes next to me I say “Julie O’Brien” and she acknowledges her name, then I point my concealed gun at her and say “you need to come with me because someone wants to speak with you.”
She seems like she was completely taken off guard and perhaps my nice guy demeanor didn’t overly scare her.
I guided her into the front passenger seat, then I closed the door and I ran around to the driver seat.
I instructed her to put the handcuffs on as I drove away.
I had to drive her to a remote cabin in Berks county Pa, where the surgeon, the heart recipient, and members of the mob would be.
I’m guessing the heart recipient easily paid over a million dollars for the operation.
I had to text “I’m a gambler” on the burner phone, when I had the unwilling donor in the car, so everyone could gather at the cabin.
Driving back to Berks county, I felt like the biggest scumbag. I made up a story and told her that “someone who had money from your past hired me so they could talk to you”.
I had filled up the car with gas, right before getting to Cincinnati, so I should have just enough gas to make it to the cabin with my small four cylinder car.
She was crying and she kept on asking me, where we were going. I had to block Julie out and focus on my daughter’s survival.
This girl was less than 10 years older than my daughters. She seemed like she was just so innocent. I thought to myself “Why didn’t she put up more of a fight when she got into the car?”
I started talking to her and she told me she was in her last year of nursing school. Her dad died of cancer. It was just her and her mother.
I thought to myself why cause this young girl any more grief. I might as well keep her calm and let her think everything was OK.
She asked about her dog and I assured her that her dog was going to be ok.
I kept on talking to her and we were now about 10 minutes away from the cabin.
The area was really undeveloped with next to no houses.
I could tell that Julie was getting more and more nervous. She kept asking me “where are you taking me?”
Finally, I pull into the long driveway at 11:00 pm. .
It’s a dimly lit one story cabin. There are two cars parked in the driveway.
There are two mob looking guys waiting for me and I assume that the surgeon and the heart recipient are in the cabin.
The mobsters open the passenger door and forcefully take Julie out of the car. She is now crying hysterically.
I then slowly drive away and let off a sigh of relief that they didn’t kill me.
I get about 100 yards away and I then stop the car. I say to myself “I just killed that girl” and decide that I can’t let them rip her heart out.
I figured I had bullets in the gun and I had to use them. The gun was a revolver and the guy at the pawnshop showed me how to release the safety to shoot the gun.
I stopped the car and walked up the driveway. I peaked in through the cabin’s window and I saw Julie strapped to a table crying hysterically. Also I see the surgeon, the female recipient, and the two mobsters.
I decide to set the mobsters car alarm off and when they come outside I would shoot them.
I attempt to open the mobster’s car door which would set the alarm off then I would crouch down next to the car so they can’t see me, when they come out of the cabin.
I hear them come out of the cabin and walk towards their car. As I hear them get closer, I dart up and point the revolver at their chests and fire all of the rounds in the revolver. I hit both of them in the chest and there both still alive. I quickly reload the gun and shoot each one of the mobsters in the head.
I then head towards the cabin and release Julie from the gurney.
I tell Julie to take the surgeons car and drive back home or go to the police. I give her cash for for gas.
I leave the woman who thought she was getting a new heart to her own demise.
I then told the surgeon to come with me. I handcuffed the surgeon and forced him to my car.
Then, I drove to my house with the surgeon. I made him remove the tracking device from my daughters.
After he successfully removed the tracking devices, I then handcuffed him to the refrigerator door handle.
It was late at night, but I hurried my daughters to pack up their belongings. I packed the car up and had the kids wait in the car.
I then went back into the house and shot the “surgeon” in the thigh.
I then drove across the whole state to Utah and decided to a new life in Utah.

Edit: There's obviously big money at stake as I started receiving death threats the moment this post hit the front page on hot. Be careful with your personal info and probably best to avoid commenting here if you have doxxable details on your reddit account. Stay safe, it's just a game and not worth it.
TL;DR:

1. Tarkov is a crazy wild game with a bunch of people running around trying to do weird things. Remember that bizarre outcomes are just as likely (if not more) to be happenstance than suspicious behavior. Don't let others gaslight you into thinking every encounter is a hacker or cheater.
2. Cheat sellers, RMT vendors, and their customers, all want to push the narrative that rule-breaking is far more common than it actually is, and that the game developers are ruining the game so you may as well just hack/cheat yourself to level the playing field. It's great for business as a seller, and it helps rationalize malicious actions as a customer. Spreading paranoia, mass outrage, and undermining the developers are CIA-level tactics to sow chaos and anarchy that benefits bad actors at the cost of everyone else.
3. The best thing we can do is silence attempts by bad actors and focus on productive, positive discussions in Tarkov and let BSG (who are the only people who can do anything) do their jobs. They spend 65% of their resources on crushing bad actors and their profit margins, so this isn't an issue that's flying under their radar. As a community, the best voice we have against malicious behavior is deafening silence to starve it of attention and free publicity, minimizing the chances that they can sow enough fear and angst to radicalize players to get more customers.

---
First off, the point of this discussion is not to debate how prevalent cheating in Tarkov is. This sub already has more than enough speculation on that topic and as you read further along you'll see that letting fear and paranoia fester is exactly what bad faith agents in Tarkov want.
Wherever you have competition, you're going to have cheating. Whether it's Tarkov, Olympic sports, or the stock market. As long as there is competition, there will always be someone who looks to gain an unfair edge, and it doesn't even matter if it's something as mundane and trivial as online chess, there's always going to be that guy who runs their opponents moves into a grandmaster-level AI because their enjoyment comes from that win at any cost.
However, despite the fact that bad faith competition exists in nearly every facet of life, it seems like the Tarkov community is far more paralyzed by fear, anger, and suspicion than any other competitive forum. Why is this?
​

1. The game design makes it exceedingly difficult to discern bad faith actions from legitimate play. A naked level 1 with a TT pistol can accidentally get a lucky hipfire shot that instantly kills a fully kitted veteran who is highly skilled in the game. The incredibly punishing nature of the game also makes it so that deaths are highly impactful, which makes it difficult to "let go" of trying to figure out what went wrong. All put together, it means that players are forced to simply accept highly punishing deaths without being given any insight or explanation on how they were killed. 20 headshots with an R99 SMG in Apex Legends is incredibly obvious aimbotting. But in Tarkov, the fight is over with just 1, which leaves a lot of unanswered questions with no satisfying answers.
2. Because the shared raid map system that Tarkov uses, players have a wide variety of objectives that lead to very differing goals, resulting in bizarre interactions where the original intentions of other other players is unclear. Someone who's hiding in a raid to wait for the violence to die down could be stumbled upon by some other person who is completely lost trying to find a quest objective, or wandering around exploring an obscure area trying to find easter eggs. From the vantage point of the hider, it seems suspicious they were hunted down by someone who had no reason to legitimately to hunt in the location that they were. In other words, players will frequently run into other players acting in inexplicable ways that can be easily misattributed to malice when it was just as likely to be happenstance.
3. The lack of SBMM (skills-based matchmaking) means that all players are drawn from the same pool when forming raids. This means a complete new player to FPS genre entirely could be running face first into the most skilled players in the entire game. When the competition spans the entirety of the skill curve, it's incredibly difficult to know what is going on because player actions are often contrary to expectations of others. Chaos makes it easy to be suspicious about bad faith play because nobody is acting "logically" from each perspective. Naive players may charge in aggressively in silly ways that end up working by sheer luck that more experienced players will assume would only be as a result of unfair information. A very high skill player can take fights that they win with superior mechanics that most would assume you would only engage because of unfair aim.

The point is, this game is designed to breed suspicion, paranoia, and fear. Which is great in one way, because it's what makes it so exciting and fun to play. However, when channeled in the wrong way, is a serious problem because it's exactly what bad faith actors want.
Let's think about various actors in Tarkov, and ask the question, "do they want people to believe that rule breaking is more or less prevalent than it actually is?"

CHEAT SELLERS: MORE

Because the narrative is, everyone is cheating, the game is unfair no matter what, every raid you load into has someone that is map-hacking, every fight you take is against someone who is aim-botting. Therefore, you should consider picking up some little helpers yourself to make it fair again, or be a naive idiot that willingly plays at a disadvantage while everyone else is using hacks.
The idea that literally cheaters and hackers are infesting every single raid is probably the best possible sales pitch a cheat seller could have. The few instances of cheating leads to fear and paranoia festering, prompting more people on the fringe to consider cheating themselves, leading to more cheating, more fear, more paranoia, more business.

RMT VENDORS: MORE

Because the narrative is, this game is filled with cheaters anyway, half the lobby is people who bought stuff with mom's credit card, and Nikita is setting out to personally reduce your happiness in life and the game is unrewarding and unplayable for a normal legitimate player that doesn't hack or make a full-time job out of Tarkov. Why bother doing all the pointless stupid grinds while you're dying 50 raids in a row to hackers or someone who bought all their gear with their credit card, when you can just buy a few little cheeki Roubles from the side and get to having fun in the game?
Negativity and toxicity toward both the existence of other bad faith players, as well as toward the game design itself, is inherently the best possible environment for a thriving RMT system. This is especially perfect for Tarkov because unlike other MMORPGs, it's much more likely that incremental changes will be more brutal rather than having power creep / loot creep / money creep, which fuels despair and more interest in RMT.

CHEAT/RMT USERS: MORE

This one is simple. If they can convince everyone that it's more common than it actually is, the more they can rationalize their own behavior. It's not that bad, everyone else is doing it anyway! Besides, it's not even that big of an advantage, some other cheaters cheat even harder! Some of you may have seen a recent thread where one individual texted "lmao I'm gonna turn off cheats for this group though, cuz these guys play legit."
As if playing legit was actually the minority situation for a massively mainstream FPS game.
Zzz.

THE AVERAGE PLAYER LIKE YOU AND ME: ?

It is human nature to rationalize defeat. When you face down failure with no explanation on why like in Tarkov, it's tempting to blame cheaters, hackers, etc. Different games often have different ways of rationalizing defeat. In team games like Overwatch or League of Legends, teammate-blaming is common to offload the burden onto random strangers. In solo matchup games like Starcraft II, race balance is often used by players who are frustrated that they lost. What's even more, these other games do an excellent job of explaining where you could have done better, but players will still look for ways to blame someone other than themselves. It's no surprise that in Tarkov, fear and suspicion of bad faith gameplay exists.
The problem is, if we allow ourselves to be tempted to err toward the side of suspicion, to blame negative outcomes on the belief in rampant cheaters, hackers, etc., then we are aligning ourselves to the same narrative that bad faith actors like cheat sellers and RMT vendors want to push. We allow ourselves to be corrupted with the idea of "this game is bullshit, everyone else in the game is not playing fairly, why do I even bother trying?"
This is a dangerous mindset because it fuels a toxic narrative that "this game is never going to be fair to me, the devs don't care, the game is becoming less and less fun for me, I should just quit if I'm not going to cheat myself."
Let me be clear, I'm not saying that toxicity itself will convert an entire playerbase into cheaters. In fact, I think it has a minimal impact at a high level perspective because there just aren't that many people that are willing to traverse to the disreputable ends of the internet and take risks just to gain some internet points. However, even a 1% cheating rate to 3% cheating rate is a 300% proportional magnitude in the profitability of selling cheats or RMT vending. And more importantly, it significantly damages the enjoyment and integrity of the community at large.
You can see clear evidence of bad faith actors in this subreddit. There have been several threads in this subreddit just in the past few days that have reached the front page claiming 1) false bans are rampant, Nikita should just let RMT be 2) hello I am bob, I am hacker all day, you should hack too because literally it's everywhere you don't even KNOW, btw PM me for cheap hacks 3) xyz devs are ruining the game, why stop RMT/hacks, just let it go, you're DESTROYING THE GAME, STOP DOING THAT BSG!.
I'm not going to say any individual thread (even though many examples have been debunked) are complete bullshit. I'm just going to say that the narrative of these threads is completely aligned with individuals who are lobbying to protect their interests in making a profit out of bad faith play.

What can you do to stop this?

It starts with the self.

• When you get an incredibly lucky clutch/kill, remember it for yourself, and use it as a reminder as to how fickle this game can be. Think about how your opponent must be so confused/suspicious about what you got away with.
• When you yourself are on the receiving end of that ridiculous death, remind yourself of all the times where you were on the other side. Make your default reaction be "damn, Tarkov is crazy" rather than "I bet that was hacking 100%." Remember how easily flukes can occur, and how easily luck could be conflated with cheating.
• Focus on learning and improving in a game where there is endless room to get better, something that is irrelevant to whether some minority of players chooses to play unfairly.

Encourage productive discussions, positive mentalities, and discourage DESTRUCTIVE SPECULATION and toxic attitudes.

• Upvote threads that discuss legitimate aspects of the game, whether it's discussions on strategies, advice on how to get better, or general productive discussions that are within our control as regular players.
• Downvote threads that revolve around discussing cheating, hacking, or a bullshit "Reddit expert panel" of trying to speculate whether gameplay footage was legitimate or not, especially when there is a lack of context on user lag/latency, frames, system specs, server issues, date stamps, etc.
• Upvote threads that explain technical nuances known to impact Tarkov gameplay, e.g. desync bullets resulting in apparently unkillable players, etc.
• Downvote threads that attempt to sow paranoia in masses of players that have nothing to do with anti-cheating efforts. At best, they are attention-seeking threads made by users to profit infamy at the cost of community integrity. At worst, they are propagandized pieces designed to undermine faith in the developers and increase the temptation to use black market cheats/services and perpetuate a death spiral.
• Downvote threads that attempt to induct mass outrage against developers. When someone says "they nerfed X, this is bullshit, we should all just RMT now," it could be from legitimate upset players, but keep in mind that it's also perfectly aligned with exactly the type of agenda that bad faith actors have. Remember that the best thing that malicious actors can do is to pit the player base against the developers so they can create a lawless wasteland to do business undisturbed.

BSG has shown an exemplary degree of interaction with this community. Always wait for an official response before jumping to conclusions.

• Go try making a thread about cheating/hacking/boosting in Overwatch or Apex Legends and see how much official response you ever get from developers. This subreddit has been gifted with probably one of the best levels of community engagement from devs you could ask for.
• When someone tries to hit the front page with a thread like "I've been falsely banned," track that thread carefully and wait 3-4 days for the official response. If it's anything like 90% of the threads we've seen in the past few days, you're going to see the truth hammer get dropped, providing the poster doesn't delete their own threads/accounts when they're exposed to be full of lies.
• Upvote threads that make grandiose claims that are worthwhile for an official response. Then mercilessly scrutinize how events unfold, because 99% of the time, it's always liars that are hoping they can incite a riot as "punishment" for the developers interfering with them than anything else. This is a common occurrence in other communities that have high developer interaction like Old School Runescape, where banned players are known to make top-page threads about being falsely banned, before evidence is provided showing that they are completely full of shit and memes ensue when the truth hammer is dropped.

--
BSG spends 65% of its resources fighting cheaters and RMT and is a developer that has shown endless passion and commitment to its install base. As beta players that are trying to help them develop the best possible game, the best voice we have against bad faith actors in the Tarkov community is deafening silence. Starve them of attention, free marketing, free publicity. Demonstrate that just because they can infect one player, that will not tilt the hundreds of legitimate players into letting themselves surrender and be infected themselves.

The results are in for Match 1.
The match had proven to be very aerial, both performers very quickly finding ways to fulfill the letter of the ‘try and stay on the ropes’ directive Conqueror Worm had left for them while literally and figuratively flying in the face of its spirit. Alexis Williams needed to very frequently replenish her balloon armor as she bounced around, opportunities to actually get as close to Wrenn Aflight as she’d needed to being very difficult to come by.
Though with her Stand acting as it was, perhaps she didn’t mind such a thing. There was something about the quiet resolve of Kingdom of Desire, even as it wore a certain familiar ring, that was making her almost afraid of what this extension of herself, her traumas, her memories of her, might do. In the meantime, this guy who had agreed to be her opponent had been trying to sing, hiding his pain and his vitriol under his own sort of strong face and performing for the crowd. A tornado of dust had begun to engulf the arena, courtesy of his efforts, and the Vegas-veteran knew a dramatic, flaming ring when she saw one.
As it was, a swing and a near miss had placed her positionally several meters underneath the performer, her own form having been harmed on occasion by the influx of particulate-based chip damage, sweating from the mounting heat in the room, and unable to see many of the balloons she’d left in the fog of smoke as the performer covered the arena; she could barely see the walls, or the windows, let alone any of those.
Alexis needed to put literally everything she had into one final balloon dash. If she could close the distance between herself and Wrenn, she could certainly end this match in close quarters, and if he closed that cyclone of his in on her before she could get out of it, she would be burned badly by the glowing singer.
It was a quick-draw, then.
“Hmm?” Wrenn seemed to register something, his eyes facing her yet not seeming to be focusing on her at all - had something she’d set up earned the attention of that eye-dust he’d scattered about?
Already, the burning dust storm was starting to lower, extremely slowly and not seeming to constrict yet to Alexis’ surprise. Hell, she could even see the balloons she’d left nearby the windows now in one of the points she’d flown towards them, tried to catch Wrenn offguard. Why was he drawing it out when he’d seen what she could do? Why would he waste time on that? This place could catch alight!
“Hey!” The boy clinging to his umbrella above her called down. “These people want their finale! You’re on the same stage as me, so make it grand!”
That was all Alexis needed to hear, even bringing a smile to her face where she was expecting misery. Willing blast after blast of the amassed balloons, she sent all that she could utterly flying.
The tinted windows, which had started off so durable, had not only already begun to crack, but melt under the intense heat, and the balloons close to them blew them open on all sides, filling the previously quieter air with the shocked swears and calls for security of their small audience.
“Wrenn, you changed your mind?!” She wanted to cry for a different reason, but knew now wasn’t the time. That move would likely have only startled them, with holes in the glass of that size (a move by design for Alexis), so the pair would need to think fast in order to avoid being put down for this.
“You’ve been my LEAST favorite kind of audience!” He called eagerly, the flaming cyclone rising again and quickly funneling through the various windows, its burning intensity turned away from Alexis and towards the occupants of each of the viewing boxes. “If you’re putting people in shows like these, then *you have this coming!”***
The screams of the few watchers intensified.
With players’ scores matching at 69 (Nice), you could say the real winner was teamwork… Probably.

Category	Winner	Point Totals	Comments
Popularity	Judecca Highrollers	10-19	With a three-vote lead, once again, popularity resolved in a way where the thirtieth point is burned away by a spinning cyclone and balloon blast after blast.
Quality	Masters of Funky Action	22-21	Reasoning
JoJolity	Masters of Funky Action	27-19	Reasoning
Conduct	Tie	10-10

“C’mon, Alexis, don’t choke now! Get us out of here, that guy probably protected himself, and Worm guy definitely has!”
Truthfully, Wrenn had meant to finish her off as the show demanded, secure his own safety, but when his eye-dust had noticed the window-damage, seen that past its cracks there were Fox and the other watchers on all sides, and from there little stairways up into the abandoned stations above and from there, up to the city.
For now, trying not to flinch from the sights of people in pain, he used his spread-out eye-property dust to look into all four sides he could leave from, trying to quickly assess all information. In one room, Conqueror Worm stood, looking extremely amused at this turn of events and doing little to help those trying to get to safety before hopping up into the ceiling and vanishing.
In the second, easily the most burning avenue of escape, a strange fellow in a maroon turban and face coverings stood right by the edge of the destroyed window, not at all minding the flames even as they caught the outfit alike, beginning to lift it up to remove with unsettling fearlessness; the only thing Wrenn saw as flames overtook the area and made its ceiling collapse was this figure grinning widely at him, accentuating a jagged-looking scar along the revealed lower half of their face.
The third side, he could see Fox quickly transform a rock sculpture of an annoying-looking dog into a makeshift shield, protecting himself, that golden-suited Tigran Sins guy, and a shocked looking Metra Doria from the initial, less lethal glass blasts as if he’d seen the flames coming, the structure seeming highly heat resistant and similar in makeup to the balloon armor as it hurried away.
The fourth was mostly just filled with screaming guys, and the stairs still looked accessible.
“Holy hell, are you crazy? Look, uh… Don’t worry about me!” The voice of Metra amplified and pleaded, resonating loudly and clearly in the heads of both fighters, even through the crackling and pain. “I’ll be fine, just… Just escape! I agreed to this because I wanted to ensure you three would survive!”
Well, that settled the guilt on that dilemma. Wrenn quickly pointed to the safest bet. “Blast us that way before we burn up and die! You can’t get cold feet in a place like this!”
Alexis was taken aback, but KoD knew not to let them die for this. Quickly, audible pops! blasted the replenished flying gymnast up towards the singer, right as his umbrella caught alight and he began to fall. He dropped into Alexis’ grasp, and from there in seconds flat they were up and blasting through the direction Wrenn had pointed out, landing safely in the stairways and very quickly making their ways up.
“What… What the hell did you need to go that far for?” Alexis asked, still rattled as the pair caught their breaths.
“Sorry for-” Wrenn coughed a lot, then spoke in a less affected tone. “Sorry for doing what you asked, and trusting you in the end! ‘Put our minds together,’ ‘don’t get caught off-guard,’ ‘get out of here…’” He looked away towards the sound of approaching sirens, voice sounding even heavier, as if a massive weight were on his lithe shoulders. “What did you think that would mean?”
Alexis’ lip trembled, and she hugged herself, finding her stand’s arms around her doing the same thing after a moment. She couldn’t rebut. This was Wrenn trusting in her, wanting her help in escaping these death games, but to do that..! To leave people in such a state, and that the worst perpetrators clearly survived anyway, and that Metra was still stuck with that guy..!
“They’re not going to chase us like this,” he continued, as much trying to convince himself not to break down as he put on his hardest ‘strong face,’ different from that which Alexis had seen before. “So many of those guys probably killed people like us, innocents, too… This is a blow to a whole crime ring.”
Not far from the site of the fire, authorities would find remains of a John Doe later identified as local entertainment industry manager Thutmose. Despite the incident earlier that day, authorities deemed it extremely unlikely these events were connected.
The final toll of the fires were seven dead, three missing, fifteen in critical condition, all of whom accounted for a majority of the audience of the match. Though many suspected members of Sound’s Garden’s criminal underground were lost to the flames, with many other regulars having tuned in through dark web streaming, operations on the blood sports were able to continue.
What a first match to open up the round on! Obviously, results are already in, so there won’t be results announced with M3 going up, but at this point, until the very tail-end of the round the typical posting schedule should be in full swing.
Scenario:
A scrapyard on the northwestern edge of Los Fortuna’s slums, 7:46 PM
Ace High was getting tired of having to move around so much, and for this long. Tailing this “Modern Holiday” man was starting to get on his nerves - despite being a detective, he preferred to deal with these kinds of situations in more direct ways, and passing through desolate streets and heaps of junk didn’t exactly fit his definition of “a good time”, even if his stand helped streamline the process a bit.
He’d been following Holiday at the request of Vitus Calamai, a man who SKADE had worked alongside before in an attempt to get in the good graces of ODIN. Furthermore, he’d already done the same to Holiday’s coworker, a woman by the name of Peres Straviat. Unlike before, however, Ace was alone - Kisa had opted to investigate his own leads, leaving the Sharp Lookers behind, and every other member of the team was occupied with their own tasks.
It seemed as if Holiday had something in mind that he wanted to do in the slums, as he’d supposedly been wandering around the area quite a bit recently, for some reason that neither Ace nor Vitus were aware of. However, Ace did hear that Holiday had some history with a few shady gangs and groups in the area, and considering the man’s track record, it was clear that an investigation was warranted.
As the man moved along, and entered a decrepit scrapyard by the edge of the district, Ace began to notice it - a burning stench that pervaded through the massive scrapyard, and a billowing cloud of smoke rising in the distance. The visibility wasn’t very good - smog filled the air, making it harder to discern what he was actually looking at. Furthermore, his vision was already occupied by the massive mounds of scrap around him, and couldn’t make out much of the area due to needing to remain hidden from Holiday.
Holiday’s path seemed to lead him closer and closer to the source of the smoke, and eventually, he seemed to stop and began looking around. He’d almost spotted Ace, who’d just barely dived behind a pile of scrap in time before Holiday spotted him. He could just barely overhear Holiday saying something, though he couldn’t make out exactly what it was. He had to get closer in order to get within earshot of him.
Moving forwards and peeking up from underneath the pile of scrap, Ace could see it - Holiday and a brown haired man wearing a red leather jacket, standing on the edge of a large crater, from which the smoke seemed to be emerging. Ace raised his head up further, getting a better look of what exactly was within the crater, and spotting the source of the smoke - multiple fires seemed to be burning from within, and some sort of figure stood from within, facing in the pair’s direction. Was that a stand?
Before he could think further about what exactly that was, Ace heard a rustling from behind him. Quickly turning around, he saw it - a stand, rising from the smog behind him, reaching out towards him.“Shit!” Ace quickly began scrambling backwards, up the pile of scrap. “Gangster’s-” Before Ace could finish calling for his Gangster’s Paradise to help him, the mysterious stand firmly grabbed his leg and pulled him back into its reach, and Ace lost consciousness.
An alley on the south side of Los Fortuna’s slums, the day prior to Ace’s investigation, 8:32 PM
Maxwell “Ten-Ten” Tenet sat on the ground, back against a graffiti-filled wall, breathing heavily while clutching his side. Bruises and cuts peppered his body, small droplets of blood falling onto the dirty floor beneath him. He wasn’t in the best shape. Still, the passed out body of the man by him was clearly far worse off than Max himself was.
“...heh. Who'd've thought that mugger would be a stand user as well?” Max idly mused to himself. This wasn’t the first time it had happened, and it probably wasn’t going to be the last. “Well, whatever. Just gotta hope this place calms down eventually...” With a pained grunt, he slowly got up.
He was just on his way over to the Elephant Bones, wanting to surprise London with a visit, when he got sidetracked after hearing the faint noises of some sort of altercation happening far away from him. Quickly checking it out, he quickly realized that it was a mugging, and stepped into the scene to stop it without hesitation. Things quickly spiraled out of control when the mugger tried to fight back against Max with his own stand, but the outcome was inevitable from the very beginning - Max came out on top, albeit having sustained a few wounds here and there.
Beginning to make his way out of the alley, Max sighed. The slums weren’t very peaceful during the best of times, but recently, these kinds of things seemed to have been happening more and more in there. He knew why as well - with the incarceration of “The Gambler”, things were somewhat of a mess for many of the residents of the slums. He didn’t live there himself, but his boyfriend did, and Max came over and patrolled them often enough that he couldn’t help but notice it.
“Sucks, doesn’t it?” Max was taken aback, hearing an unfamiliar voice come from behind him. Turning, he took a look at the person in front of him - a man with a young-looking face, blonde hair, and a wide grin on his face. “It’s just like six years ago, huh? Total chaos. Try as they might, I guess the Temple of Syrinx and the Bakkers aren’t doing a very good job keeping the criminals in check, haha! And just when it seemed like things were improving for the slums!” Despite the man’s dour words, his tone of voice was upbeat and casual.
“And who’re you?” Max tilted his head, curious about who exactly the odd man was. “Oh, I guess I forgot to introduce myself, haha! The name’s Modern Holiday, but you can just call me ‘Holiday’!”
“Holiday..? Hm..” The name sounded familiar to Max. “What’re you here for, Holiday?”
Holiday seemed to pause for a bit, his smile briefly fading away before he took a deep breath and began speaking. “Well, I’m glad you asked! Actually, I’m here because-” “Oh! I remember! London mentioned that one of his coworkers met someone called ‘Holiday’! Her name was Glitch, d’you know her?” Though he was slightly taken aback, Holiday seemed to lighten up at the mention of Glitch. “Oh, Glitch! Yeah, I know her! She’s a fun person, haha! She makes good food!”
“Anyways… The reason I’m here because I need your help! Or rather, I suppose I’ve got something in mind that I think you’d want to help me out with, since you seem to be the crime fighting type! Well, you aren’t really going to be fighting ‘crime’, but... well… uh...” Holiday stumbled over his own words, unsure of how to to word what he was going to say.
“Hey, just tell me what you want and we’ll see if I can help, yeah?” Max said nonchalantly. “Yeah, you’re right… Sheesh, this isn’t like me...” Holiday said with a sigh. “Well… I want you to kill a stand.”
“A stand?” Max’s raised a brow, a slight frown finding its way onto his face. “So... wouldn’t that mean killing the user as well? If that’s what you’re asking, then I’m not interested.” If that was what this ‘Holiday’ really wanted, then this was just a waste of time.
“Wh- no, no! God no, that’s… Yeah, no, I won’t- that’s not what I’m asking!” Holiday said loudly. “This stand’s user… well, she’s…” Holiday sighed and looked down, scratching his head. “She’s already dead. Has been for a while. It’s just… her stand isn’t dead. It’s still out there.”
Oh. “It didn’t disappear after she died?”
“Yeah… Los Fortuna has a weird effect on stands like that sometimes. The stand, Gasoline Family, just… stayed. Ever since then, it’s been mindlessly rampaging around the spot of her death, attacking anyone that gets nearby and making a mess. They say stands are manifestations of our ‘fighting spirit’ or our ‘souls’ or something like that, yeah? Knowing that, and seeing the only remnant of her act like that, it’s not a very nice sight to look at. No one’s really done anything about it until now since it’s so far out of the way of most people, but I want to… to free what remains of her, you know? If that makes sense. I don’t think she’d have wanted this to be what remained of her. And at the very least, I don’t want any unprepared person who goes there to find themselves killed by it.”
There was a moment of silence as Max took in Holiday’s words. “Did you know her? Gasoline Family’s user, I mean.” Max asked, his voice more quiet than before. In response, Holiday chuckled. “Yeah, I guess that was pretty obvious, huh? You could say we were friends back then.” A far cry from his previous demeanor, Holiday was somber. It made sense, considering the subject matter at hand, but it was an odd sight nonetheless.
“My stand, Sleep Apnea, can help protect you in the fight against Gasoline Family, but it’s not really suited for direct combat. I can’t do this without your help. I saw you fight that mugger - your stand is strong.”
Max thought back to his own past friendships and relationships, then to the people he knew in Los Fortuna. Were a similar situation to happen to someone he knew, he’d… he didn’t want to think much about that. “Well, sure. I’ll help you out.” Max said with a smile, to which Holiday responded with a slight grin as well. “... Yeah. Thank you.”
“So - when are we doing this, and what can this ‘Gasoline Family’ even do?”
Back in the scrapyard, 7:55 PM
The first thing Ace noticed when he woke up was the splitting headache he had, and that he was lying on the ground. The second thing he noticed was the pissed-off face of Modern Holiday, staring right at him. He quickly turned away, looking at his surroundings. He’d been dragged closer to the decrepit, smoke-filled crater, and was right by its edge.
Despite his best efforts, he’d gotten caught, somehow. Was the stand that attacked him Holiday’s? It just popped out of the smog behind him, and the moment it grabbed Ace, he passed out. Did it activate its ability on him? Other than the headache, he felt normal, for the most part. Slightly cold, which was weird, considering how close he was to the fires.
“So, you’re awake. Care to explain why exactly you were following me?” Holiday said with a scowl. Ace wasn’t entirely sure how to respond. There was silence for a few seconds, where nothing but the crackling of the fires within the crater could be heard as Ace thought to himself about his next move. From what he’d heard, Holiday was quite a sociable person, and one who was liable to slip up every once in a while, occasionally revealing some useful and sensitive information. Then again, Vitus also said that he was pretty good at catching on to others’ motives and giving people the slip when he didn’t want to converse with them, so it would be tricky, but if Ace could gather some information from Holiday, then that’d be very good.
Of course, Holiday did seem pretty pissed right now, which was somewhat understandable considering that Ace had been tailing him for quite a while. “Well, you know… I was curious about what you were up to, yeah? Walking around the slums so much, almost makes me think you’ve got something in mind~”
“And what if I do? I’m- Ugh. Look. I know that you’re with SKADE, and that Vitus probably put you up to this. This isn’t related to the Ocean Soul, and it isn’t anything that you should be concerned about or that you need to snoop around for.” Seemed like Holiday wasn’t really in the mood for a conversation, like he was on edge for some reason.
Even if what Holiday said was true, Ace’s own curiosity had been piqued at this point, and furthermore, he needed more information. “Well, I’m still quite curious - what’s it about, then?”
“You want to know? Fine. Get up.” Holiday turned away from Ace and pointed down at something within the crater. Ace took a closer look at it. Within it, he saw piles of scrap and debris tossed about haphazardly, a few of them the sources of raging fires, emitting pillars of smoke into the air.
By the border of the crater was the man that Holiday talked to before, and within it was what seemed to be a stand of some kind, the same figure that he’d seen there before. “You see that figure over there? That’s Gasoline Family, a stand. Its user is already dead, but it’s stayed here for a couple of years by now, making a mess of the area and attacking anyone that gets close enough. I’m getting help from someone in order to destroy it. Not a fan of seeing the only thing that remains from an old friend of mine do… this.” Holiday said, waving his hands to direct Ace’s attention to the chaos within the crater.
“A stand, huh? I see… What’s it do? Something related to fire, I assume.” So that was the reason for the disarray of the area here. “Actually, know what - how about I help you out with this ‘Gasoline Family’? As compensation for tailing you, yeah?” Ace said, grinning.
“Hm? You want to help?” Holiday said, mildly surprised. “Well, sure - I was just about to ask you to do the same. While you’re here, might as well make yourself useful. It should also help reassure you that I’m not doing anything illegal here or something like that, if you don’t believe me.”
“Alright, perfect-” Ace said, taking another look at the crater. “I assume those fires hurt stands, right? Uh… Got any tips about dealing with that? If I don’t know any weaknesses or whatnot, it’ll be hard to deal with Gasoline Family when my stand’s liable to be burnt up just like that. I’d rather not get flash-fried.” Ace said with a chuckle.
“Oh, that? Shouldn’t be a problem for you. See, my Sleep Apnea has the ability to force out ‘aspects’ or ‘parts’ of objects or people into copies of them that it creates. By putting the copies together, they’ll merge, but otherwise, the original body will lose said ‘aspect’ forever. Now, when Sleep Apnea first touched you, I made it activate its ability on you. It removed your body and your clothes’ ability to heat up. Of course, this means that the fire won’t hurt you or your stand at all, so that’s not going to be a problem.”
Now this was information that was useful to Ace. Knowing Holiday’s stand would certainly be useful for Vitus, but… It didn’t take long for the analytical part of his brain to realize what the catch here was. His body wasn’t heating up, but it could probably still cool down - that might’ve been why he felt colder before. “And I assume you’ll bring me back to normal once Gasoline Family’s dealt with? I’d rather not freeze to death, you know.”
“Well, don’t worry about that - I’d rather not have anyone’s death on my conscience, so I’ll return you back to normal so long as you don’t try to attack me or keep me from killing Gasoline Family, alright?” The anger in Holiday’s voice had disappeared, now replaced by a more nonchalant attitude, though Ace knew that he probably hadn’t calmed down much.
With a sigh, Ace took a step towards the crater in front of him. “Well, alright then - catch me up on what exactly Gasoline Family does, and I’ll get to work.” Knowing that his life was in Holiday’s hands wasn’t very uplifting, but this could very well turn out to be in Ace’s advantage if he played it right, and if he showed Holiday how useful and cooperative he was to make him lower his guard and spill information.
Max wasn’t sure what to expect when Holiday first mentioned Gasoline Family and told him where to go, but now that he was here, at the center of the crater in which it resided, he could see just how intimidating the stand was. The crater was absolutely decimated - thick puddles of a liquid that seemed to be gasoline were spread around, many of which had already been ignited. Piles of scraps and soot were strewn around, and the smell of smoke was overwhelming. However, Holiday used his stand on him to give him resistance from the fires, which would help in the fight.
Well, if he wanted to get anything done, he’d have to actually get closer to the stand. He briefly glanced behind him, towards Holiday, and spotted someone else descending down the pit towards him, a man with a checkered suit and a bowler hat.
“Oh? Who’re you? Did Holiday get you to help out here as well?” Max asked nonchalantly. In response, Ace grinned and spoke. “I guess you could say so. The name’s Ace High.” Ace sounded quite calm, unphased by the dangerous stand at the center of the crater. “Huh, I see. I’m Max. Having anyone else around to help deal with this is nice.”
With a shrug, Ace took another step forward and spoke. “Heh, yeah - just make sure that you don’t get in my way, yeah? We just gotta get this over with quickly”. Max wasn’t sure if Ace was just cracking a joke of some kind or if he was belittling him. Either way, it slightly annoyed him.
“Oh yeah? Sure, sure, I’ll stay out of your way… But I’ll probably be done with it by the time you get close - and if you step in front of one of my attacks, it’s your fault, not mine.” Max responded. Dealing with Gasoline Family was of utmost importance, of course, but he did get a slight urge to try and outdo Ace.
“Hey, I’m just joking around, yeah?” Ace said, noticing the effect of his comment. This wasn’t entirely true - in his mind, the most important thing would be gathering information from Holiday, and performing impressively against Gasoline Family could help build trust between Holiday and him. To that end, Ace really would have preferred it if Max stayed out of his way. “And don’t just blindly rush that stand down, it’s not gonna help. That is, unless you’ve got a deathwish, of course.” Ace said, his comment doing nothing but further annoying Max.
The two men stood at the bottom of the crater, taking a look at the stand in front of them while preparing themselves for the fight ahead of both of them. It likely wouldn’t be easy, but neither of them was going to leave until the stand was dealt with and the fire raging in the scrapyard was finally extinguished.
OPEN THE GAME!
Location: A crater at the bottom of an abandoned scrapyard by the edge of the slums. Each tile is 4x4 meters, making the map 64x64 meters overall. The players are currently at the bottom of the crater, 8 meters deep into the ground. The grey border is the incline / drop from the outside to the crater into the crater itself, and it’s quite steep. The dark grey areas are the outside of the crater, and are inaccessible to the players. The light orange shapes surrounding the map are puddles of gasoline formed within depressions in the ground - these are roughly 0.2 meters deep, and are currently the only areas of the map capable of containing pools of gasoline deep enough for Gasoline Family to teleport to (though more might end up being formed as the match goes on).
The ground is a mixture of dirt, soot, and ruined pieces of (non-conductive) scrap. Despite the mess, Max is somehow still able to rollerskate around without much issue. The hollow circles are burning pieces of scrap (mainly tires), constantly emitting dense smoke. The area that the smoke obscures is represented by the transparent red circles. Piles of scrap (which also contain various pieces of conductive metal scraps of varying sizes) are littered around the area and are represented by the areas filled with various small light grey shapes, piling up to about a meter in height.
At the bottom right corner of the map is Modern Holiday, whose purpose is explained in the Additional Information section.
Goal: Make sure that you contribute more to the defeat of Gasoline Family than your opponent!
Additional Information: Gasoline Family’s sheet (and a shortened description of its ability) can be found here. Pastebin version here
For the purposes of this match, thanks to Sleep Apnea’s ability, the characters, their stands, and any and all gear that is on them, are functionally immune to any and all fire or heat damage, not even feeling it. Force from explosives can still be felt and smoke is still hazardous to breathing.
Modern Holiday has briefed both characters on Gasoline Family’s abilities, and on how it fights - In general, it will remain mostly quiet, sometimes punching an object near it out of frustration but otherwise staying still until someone gets close enough for it to fight them. Gasoline Family doesn't seem to be capable of very complex thoughts or of formulating involved plans, but it doesn't need that most of the time - its overwhelming power and durability grants it the edge it needs to win out in most direct encounters, but it also knows how to use its ability to grant itself an extra edge.
In close combat, Gasoline Family knows how to create and activate buttons in the environment around it to create explosions for extra damage, and even purposefully tears them off and utilizes the gasoline streams as projectiles should its opponent stay for too long outside of its range. In addition, it will attempt to advance towards any opponent that has gotten close and that is now trying to escape.
After taking enough damage, Gasoline Family will attempt to teleport away to the puddle that is furthest away from where it currently is. Put in numerical terms, this happens when it loses a fifth of its “health”, meaning that it will teleport four times over the course of the match. If no puddle is available, it will attempt to fill the “viable” pools with more gasoline using streams, and if any of them have been plugged up, then it will dig out more with its own two A pow hands. At any moment it will try to make sure that there’s at least two pools available and filled with gasoline, though more than that may form as the match goes on.
Modern Holiday is watching the match from the bottom left corner of the map, at the top of the scrap pile, and is willing to assist you out in a limited degree - he’s willing to use Sleep Apnea on any object tossed to him, and will toss you back the copy of it that the stand creates (without manipulating any property or aspect of it), which will be a stand object, and as such will be able to hurt Gasoline Family.
Should you try and leave the map or directly and knowingly attack Modern Holiday, he will simply refuse to return your bodies back to normal after the match and you will eventually freeze to death, just as Ace predicted. Same goes for attempting to kill your opponent - injuring them is allowed, but not to an extent where they wouldn’t be able to assist in the fight any more.

Team	Combatant	JoJolity
Sharp Lookers	Ace High	“M-Maybe the attacks weren't meant to hurt us... they were meant to douse us with gasoline!?” So you’re going to have to get rid of this stand before you can get any information from Modern Holiday, but that’s fine - you’ve handled worse in the past, and you can already think of a few ways to manipulate this situation to your advantage. During the match, make use of the environment and of the various stands within it!
Baker Street Rat Pack	Maxwell “Ten-Ten” Tenet	“He doused himself with the gasoline... He panicked, because you were going to finish him off!” You’re not sure how this whole situation got so crowded and messy, but dealing with Gasoline Family shouldn’t be too bad either way. In fact, this might even open up some new opportunities for you - During the match, make use of the environment and of the various stands within it!

Link to the Official Player Spreadsheet
Link to Match Schedule
As always, if you would like to interact with the tournament community and be among the first to get updates for the tournament, please feel free to PM a member of our Judge staff for an invite to our Official Discord Server!

Growing up, I was always told to avoid addictive substances, because alcoholism ran rampant in my family.
Unfortunately, I married an alcoholic and my wife died as a result of a DUI.
I have two daughters. They are fraternal twins and are middle school aged. I have no other family besides my twins.
I worked as a laboratory technician in a hospital and the day to day grind was starting to get to me.
My kids transitioning into teenagers just made everything worse.
I needed an outlet. I started to contemplate the idea of sports gambling. I played sports my whole life and I felt like I could predict the outcome of most games.
I decided to reach out to this guy, who I went to high school with, who ran numbers for the mob.
He was fine with taking my bets, but warned me to do it just for fun and to only bet within my means. He said it was a win win scenario for him and his associates and they would allow me to bet as much as I wanted.
However, if I was to lose be prepared to pay up any cost and he reiterated to do it just for fun.
I nodded and agreed and decided to put $25 dollars on this weekend’s football game.
Surely enough I won and I decided to double down. I kept on winning and now I was up to $1,000.
I got such a rush off of gambling and it seemed to be a great distraction from my day to day worries.
Then something fell into my lap, the lab where I work received a spinal tap specimen from the quarterback of the Eagles.
This information wasn’t decimated to the public and I knew I had inside knowledge, that no one knew besides a small handful of people affiliated with the Eagles.
I knew this was a once in a lifetime opportunity.
I knew the Eagles were playing a team with the best defense in the league and if the Eagles quarterback had a serious back injury then the defense would pummel him.
I decided to bet one million dollars against the Eagles. I called my mob friend and he reiterated the same warning as he stated before I started betting, that he would allow any bet that I wanted, but I was expected to pay regardless and if I couldn’t then the consequences could include death.
I had to take this bet because this was going to be my ticket to quit my job and just be happy. I had enough and I was ready for whatever happened.
I was ready on game day and the usually predictable Eagles weren’t predictable this game and they actually pulled off a miracle, despite the Eagles quarterback barely being able to throw the ball.
The second the game ended my bookie called and said he would be over in five minutes to collect the money.
I told my kids to go to their room’s and I had to accept my fate.
There’s a knock on the door and as I open the door he says “give me my money.”
I tell him straight out that I can’t pay that and he responds “I have to pay my bosses ... I’m going to have to kill you and one of your kid’s.”
I said “what!”
He replied what he said and took a handgun out.
Then, I said “you said nothing about harming my kid”
He replied “I also didn’t tell you who the president of Italy was!”
I said “I will do anything you ask please don’t harm my kid”.
He then said “You work in a hospital?”
I said “Yeah”.
Then, he said “are you willing to kill six people?”
I said “I’ll do whatever it takes to save my daughter”.
He explained that I needed to access hospital records so I could find suitable organ donors to sell to wealthy people who were looking for heart transplants. I would need to access the hospital systems medical records database and find six candidates spread out throughout the country.
Basically anyone who came into the ED with a minor injury, but was otherwise healthy. The six people needed to be spread out, that way it wouldn’t cause a red flag of missing people in a small geographical area.
Once, I found the six candidates, then I would need to have the mob’s former licensed surgeon approve the candidates. I would then have to kidnap each victim, once a month, then drive them back to a cabin in Pennsylvania, where their heart’s would be harvested.
It was the only way, I could ensure my daughters safety.
I agreed and I was given six people’s blood type, sex, and the desired focal age. Basically, five people in their early twenties and one six year old.
Also, they brought the surgeon to my house and implanted a tracking device into both of my daughters. I told my daughters I did it to track them in case they ever got kidnapped, but it was really for the mob to find them in case I didn’t follow through with the agreement.
I was given six cities that were given to me by the mob to find heart donor. Then, I knew I had a very limited amount of time to access my hospital’s national medical record database, before their online security system would catch me for accessing private information.
Picking potential victims made me gag, these poor people who came into the ED, with nothing more than a sprained ankle, are now going to be kidnapped and literally have their hearts ripped out.
So, I scoured the ED records for the specified genders, blood type, medical history, current location, and their ages, and saved the information to a Zip drive.
The mob’s heart surgeon reviewed my information and told me which one to kidnap first.
I had to travel to Cincinnati which was around a seven hour drive.
I had to quit my job and potentially leave my kids for a few days by themselves.
I ditched my EZ-Pass so I wouldn’t leave a trail.
My plan was to scope out where my first victim, a 22 year old female, resided and then quickly get her into my car somehow.
I drove to her address and I had her ED picture with me to help identify her. I arrived at her address at about 2:00 pm. I waited outside for about three hours and I finally observe her leaving her house to take hee dog for a walk.
Prior to leaving, I had picked up a revolver handgun from a pawn shop that I was quite certain was stolen. I also bought six pairs of handcuffs from the same store. I had my car windows tinted and would utilize the car’s child safety locks.
I never shot a gun before and I hadn’t been in a fight since elementary school.
My plan was to meet her about 30 yards from her house, say her name and tell her there is someone who wants to talk to her, while I point my partially concealed gun at her three my sweatshirt.
I knew if I failed then at least one of my kids was going to be killed .
I had to sound forceful and intimidating, but I couldn’t have every neighbor hear what’s going on and then potentially rescue her.
I see her coming back from her walk with her dog and I’m pretending to be playing on my phone.
As she comes next to me I say “Julie O’Brien” and she acknowledges her name, then I point my concealed gun at her and say “you need to come with me because someone wants to speak with you.”
She seems like she was completely taken off guard and perhaps my nice guy demeanor didn’t overly scare her.
I guided her into the front passenger seat, then I closed the door and I ran around to the driver seat.
I instructed her to put the handcuffs on as I drove away.
I had to drive her to a remote cabin in Berks county Pa, where the surgeon, the heart recipient, and members of the mob would be.
I’m guessing the heart recipient easily paid over a million dollars for the operation.
I had to text “I’m a gambler” on the burner phone, when I had the unwilling donor in the car, so everyone could gather at the cabin.
Driving back to Berks county, I felt like the biggest scumbag. I made up a story and told her that “someone who had money from your past hired me so they could talk to you”.
I had filled up the car with gas, right before getting to Cincinnati, so I should have just enough gas to make it to the cabin with my small four cylinder car.
She was crying and she kept on asking me, where we were going. I had to block Julie out and focus on my daughter’s survival.
This girl was less than 10 years older than my daughters. She seemed like she was just so innocent. I thought to myself “Why didn’t she put up more of a fight when she got into the car?”
I started talking to her and she told me she was in her last year of nursing school. Her dad died of cancer. It was just her and her mother.
I thought to myself why cause this young girl any more grief. I might as well keep her calm and let her think everything was OK.
She asked about her dog and I assured her that her dog was going to be ok.
I kept on talking to her and we were now about 10 minutes away from the cabin.
The area was really undeveloped with next to no houses.
I could tell that Julie was getting more and more nervous. She kept asking me “where are you taking me?”
Finally, I pull into the long driveway at 11:00 pm. .
It’s a dimly lit one story cabin. There are two cars parked in the driveway.
There are two mob looking guys waiting for me and I assume that the surgeon and the heart recipient are in the cabin.
The mobsters open the passenger door and forcefully take Julie out of the car. She is now crying hysterically.
I then slowly drive away and let off a sigh of relief that they didn’t kill me.
I get about 100 yards away and I then stop the car. I say to myself “I just killed that girl” and decide that I can’t let them rip her heart out.
I figured I had bullets in the gun and I had to use them. The gun was a revolver and the guy at the pawnshop showed me how to release the safety to shoot the gun.
I stopped the car and walked up the driveway. I peaked in through the cabin’s window and I saw Julie strapped to a table crying hysterically. Also I see the surgeon, the female recipient, and the two mobsters.
I decide to set the mobsters car alarm off and when they come outside I would shoot them.
I attempt to open the mobster’s car door which would set the alarm off then I would crouch down next to the car so they can’t see me, when they come out of the cabin.
I hear them come out of the cabin and walk towards their car. As I hear them get closer, I dart up and point the revolver at their chests and fire all of the rounds in the revolver. I hit both of them in the chest and there both still alive. I quickly reload the gun and shoot each one of the mobsters in the head.
I then head towards the cabin and release Julie from the gurney.
I tell Julie to take the surgeons car and drive back home or go to the police. I give her cash for for gas.
I leave the woman who thought she was getting a new heart to her own demise.
I then told the surgeon to come with me. I handcuffed the surgeon and forced him to my car.
Then, I drove to my house with the surgeon. I made him remove the tracking device from my daughters.
After he successfully removed the tracking devices, I then handcuffed him to the refrigerator door handle.
It was late at night, but I hurried my daughters to pack up their belongings. I packed the car up and had the kids wait in the car.
I then went back into the house and shot the “surgeon” in the thigh.
I then drove across the whole state to Utah and decided to a new life in Utah.