When I turned 18, there was a casino about 2 hours away on a reservation that I could get into. We'd get paid on Friday night, head to the gas station near us that would cash a paycheck, pile into my crappy little Ford, then make the drive. We'd get there a little before midnight and everyone had their own game.
The second time we went, one of my friends was hypnotized by the craps table. There were 16 players standing around this sea of green, and every minute or so, you could hear them screaming at the top of their lungs like they just won a million dollars. On the way home that night, I taught him everything I learned from books I'd read about the different bets. "Smart" bets where the house edge was only 1.4%, all the way down to the risky ones where the house edge was over 10% (meaning that for every $100 wagered, you should expect to lose $10).
The next time we went, we hung around the table, trying to figure out the right way to bet. It seemed a little complicated, so we tried other games. At the end of the night, I had the last $10 and he asked if he could borrow it to go place a bet. I handed it over, then went to the bathroom in preparation for the ride home. When I finally found him again, he had a stack of chips in front of him. He had been gone for about 5 minutes and already turned $10 into a few hundred. Well, if you can turn 10 into 100, you can turn 100 into 1,000 just as easily. We left empty handed that night, but I'll never forget the rush.
I loved blackjack. I learned how to play at an early age from my uncle, who would always cheat and take my money. He'd say "I just taught you a very valuable lesson." He actually taught me two: 1) if you play against a casino, you may have a good night and win thousands of dollars, but if you keep going back, you'll eventually have nothing left. 2) My uncle was a scumbag who continually cheated and took my money, then told the family I was a poor sport and they couldn't understand why I hated doing anything with him. One of my earliest memories at the casino was running $100 at the blackjack table into $3000, which is more than I made in a month of bussing tables. I went home, paid my rent and blew the rest on useless things I can't even remember.
What does any of this have to do with $GME? Well I'm still chasing the same high as I was when I was 18. I don't go to the casino anymore, but I've got something even better on my computer. I bought $2k worth of weeklies on Jan 25. Before everything crashed, they were worth over $100k, more than enough to fix most of the problems I've caused in my life. BUT, I was still standing around that craps table. The roller had just made his 30th point in a row, $GME was on fire and couldn't possibly roll a 7! I put my 2k back in my pocket and shoved the rest on the pass line. A few minutes later, the croupier inevitably yells "7 out!" and just like that, I'm back to nothing.
Now I do what every moron around the table does. You reach back into your pocket, pull out the 2k and make a deal with your maker. "Just let it happen one more time. I won't be greedy THIS time and I'll stop when I hit 50k." I stop looking at the smart bets and start eyeing the center of the table, where hard ways are paying 10:1. Yeah, that'll be how I get back to 50k. A couple of those in a row and I can put a down payment on a house. 5 minutes later, I'm on my way out to the car and I feel like I've been punched in the gut. Again.
Every one of you in this subreddit is another person sitting at the casino. Everyone has their game. The people holding $GME stonks right now? You're playing baccarat. If you've never heard of it, it's what James Bond plays in the old movies. It's about the most boring thing you can do. Two hands are dealt and you're betting on which one wins before anything happens. There's no actual skill and it's the same thing as betting heads or tails, while losing 1% of your bet every time.
The people who cashed out and picked something else like $AMC or $BB? Those are the slot players. You had a big hit and now you're going to switch machines because the other ones are "due". You're looking for the exact same magic, thinking there was something smart in your play, when it was really just dumb luck in timing.
The people saying "If Daddy Elon or Cowboy Cuban gets in, we can trigger a squeeze!" You're the guy who spent too much money in the first 20 minutes of the trip and now you're begging everyone else for a loan.
Tldr: Nothing is happening with $GME. Stop saying "tomorrow is the day." Billionaires are not coming to bail you out. If institutional investors come in, they're waiting for this constant downhill slide to end at where the stock belongs, probably around $20. You can't trigger shit by holding. The HFs will outlast you.
Edit: Screenshots from the worst 40 minutes of my financial life https://imgur.com/a/MlTRJmx
Edit 2: JFC, some of you are takin WSB way too seriously. You should not be using reddit for DD. Also, this is not financial advice. Don't take financial advice from someone who tells you stories about chasing highs at casinos.
Edit 3: This is WSB, my dudes. I'm glad most of you were entertained by my story. For the few of you who got that worked up by a random stranger on the internet telling you that he's a degenerate, you may actually have a problem. https://www.ncpgambling.org/help-treatment/

note - crossposted to WSB here go upvote if you like the stock or don't i'm just a retard do what you want
If I have to see another fucking message about today’s drop I’m going steal some $ROPE from all the $GME bagholders so I’m going to address some questions here. FYI Part 1 and Part 2 of this autistic $BB diatribe here and here, not going to keep answering the same questions.
As many in the #BANG GANG have always known, $BB becoming a meme stock has been a mixed blessing, to say the least. to say the most, it's fucking sucked.
Look at this chart. Look at this fucking chart. I don’t need to run a regression, let’s be just as retarded as all the candle-stick reading dipshits with a Bloomberg terminal (#Ben Graham GANG# FOREVER AND ALWAYS) - Look at the lines, and how they’re moving together. Try to wrinkle that smooth brain of yours for a second.
https://preview.redd.it/v11byiemb4f61.png?width=685&format=png&auto=webp&s=cae6839ad9f731f036d544ed749e57cb85e1a6d8
Why the fuck would an (a) Endpoint / digital security company, a vidya retailer (yeah, sure they sell funko pops too now great ), a movie chain (half of you morons have 3 streaming subscriptions and last I checked you’re not allowed to watch in your underwear while getting tendie crumbs everywhere @ AMC), and some Fininsh 5(g) provider (I don’t know a fucking thing about NOK) move in tandem other than just being meme stocks on this fucking board?
By the way - There's been a ton of great technical analysis posted on the others in $BANG. the short squeeze on GME was real and a once-in-a-lifetime catch and i respect the hell out of it (and am also a sad bagholder of a few shares). It's just that the reasons for liking each of the stocks is different.
For better or worse - There was a post, I can’t find it but somebody else can, that showed the Robinhood dashboard that basically said the three most commonly held shares in any given account was, you guessed it $BB, $AMC, and $GGME.
As you know, Mark Cuban took a break from his busy calendar of being the least retarded Sharktank (No offense Daymond John, I have a soft spot for FUBU but my wife’s boyfriend no longer lets me rock it) and touching tips with Luka Doncic to answer some questions. Somebody asked why $GME was taking a nose dive off of Mt. Everest. Per Cuban -
Supply and Demand, but in this case it literally could be because the source of demand has been crippled . When RH shut it down, then cut it back, lets put aside why, they cut of the greatest source of demand. They created a RobinHood Dive. No RH buyers, means sellers lower their price to find buyers. And they keep on lowering it till they find buyers. Keep the most natural buyers out of the market and the price keeps on FALLING.
Then that drop accelerates because the more the stock falls the more owners who bought on margin get margin calls. When that margin call happens, its brutal. They just take your stock, send you a fuck you note and sell your stock at the market price, no matter how low. They just want to get your cash to pay back the loan.
So. Two things re: $BB’s volatility.

#1 Stopping buys (but allowing sales) tanked $BB, just like it tanked the other meme stocks. The tin foil apes can keep hawking about citadel etc. but the truth is likely that RObinhood is a tech-focused firm with shitty financial controls and even shittier risk management (GUH). Never ascribe to malice what is usually (and always with that shitshow of an excuse of a company) incompetence. Those dumbasses had a liquidity problem and solved it in the worst way possible. I hope their IPO fails and Vlad steps on a lego

#2. The current free fall of $GME / $AMC is still dragging $BB down. Why? What happens when people get margin called? Their entire account sells off some or all of a portion to satisfy the account. For those of you more discerning retards you know that the same thing happened to the hedge funds last week.

It’s called degrossing, and is what caused the broader market to perform inversely to $BANG.

BTW - It was really fantastic for me to watch my MSFT calls get fucked because of the morons of this sub. Satya Nadella daddy dicked earnings and the stock (along with the whole fucking market) was down…Live by the retard, die by the retard. But look at the bounceback this this week, when all the hedge funds looked around and said – Wait, J. Powell is still printing money like Zimbabwe and stocks only go up.
What do you think will happen once things calm down, the stimulus checks hit, and retail investors start looking around again for stocks they might like?
So now what? Well, I REPEAT, smooth out that wrinkled brain of yours. What does #1 and #2 have to do with the actual reasons that #BANG GANG likes $BB?
If you said – "Huh, not much" then congrats you’ve evolved slightly beyond a retarded monkey playing at a slot machine and shitting out sub-par memes.

TLDR - $BB WENT DOWN TODAY BECAUSE OF FACTORS SPECIFICALLY RELATED TO ITS STATUS AS A MEME STOCK. $BANG GANG EATs WILD DAILY PRICE SWINGS FOR BREAKFAST. THE BIGGEST LESSON OF GME / AMC IS THAT RETARDS TOGETHER STRONG. ON THE OFF CHANCE THAT ENOUGH RETARDS BELIEVE, IT EVEN HAS A CHANCE TO ROCKET AGAIN IN THE SHORT TERM.

TLDR the TLDR - $BB #BANG GANG IS IN FOR THE LONG HAUL. WE’RE TERRAFORMING MARS, AND TAKING MATT DAMON WITH US.

POS – balls deep in $BB shares, planning to buy more today
Disclaimer – I am not a financial advisor and retarded
Mandatory edit for kids who can't read good and want to learn how to do other things good too - 🚀 🚀 🚀 🚀 🚀 🚀

Hey folks! I know there was a discussion on this topic about two weeks ago, but I had my appointment at the Landesamt für Einwanderung (LEA) for my Aufenthaltsdokument-GB (post-Brexit residency card) yesterday and thought some people might find a detailed rundown of what happened reassuring or helpful. It was all very quick and easy! I know there are at least two LEA sites processing people—I was at Keplerstraße 2, so if your appointment is elsewhere the layout will obviously be different, but the process itself should be the same.
​
There doesn’t seem to be any clear order in which people have been called for their appointment—I have friends who’ve been here longer than me who have been given an appointment either earlier or later than mine, and it doesn’t seem to be going alphabetically either. My housemate got an email earlier than I did, but his appointment isn’t for several months, whereas I got an email asking me to come in three weeks later. He also got two emails—one from the LEA and an automatically-generated appointment confirmation—but I only got the automatic one. As people here have said previously, check your spam filters! However, the only extra advice in the LEA email is not to staple your documents together.
I arrived for my appointment fifteen minutes early, as instructed in the email. There was a queue around the corner of the nearest building, which I joined. (Warning for people with their appointment in the next week: a BIG lump of snow fell off the building and almost hit someone behind me!) There was a sign on the door saying they would let people into the building ten minutes before their appointment time, but my experience was that there was a slight delay, so the queue started moving five minutes before and I walked through the door a minute or two before my appointment time.
A member of staff took my temperature with a forehead thermometer and told me to go to the third floor. I went up the stairs (though there is an elevator available) and there was a waiting room with widely-spaced chairs directly in front of me. I sat down and my number was called almost immediately—exactly on time—so be sure not to be late! There was a staff member who directed me to the right door down the hall.
There were two desks in the office and one of the clerks waved me over and asked if I wanted to speak German or English. He was very friendly and helpful throughout. I gave him my documents and pointed out that although I am a freelancer, I didn’t have the specific documents on the list, but I could provide my estimated Steuerbescheid and letters showing I had been given a tax number for freelance work, as well as proof of my health insurance. He was very friendly and said the most important thing was for them to be able to see evidence that I’d been active in Germany before the end of the transition period. I had two passport photos with me—one by a professional photographer that was over six months old, and one I my housemate had taken and I printed out at home on photo paper and following the biometric guidance—and he said either was fine, so don’t worry if your photo isn’t super recent! He took my documents and photo and told me to wait in the waiting room again.
I went back to the waiting room and my number was called again after about 5-10 minutes. The clerk gave me a card and told me to go down to the second floor and use the payment machine (set into the side wall directly in front of you when you go through the door from the stairs) to pay the fee (€37 or €22.80 if you’re under 24). You need to bring cash or a GIRO/EC card – the machine may not accept Visa or MasterCard cards. If you pay by cash, the slot for the notes is at the bottom right.
Once I had paid, I got my change and a receipt and went straight back up to the office with my friendly clerk. He checked the receipt (but let me keep it), took my fingerprints (both index fingers) using a scanner and asked me for my height in cm and eye colour. He printed out the information for my residency card and asked me to check and sign the paper.
He then gave me a letter confirming I could stay in Germany until 2031 and told me I would receive my residency card in the post in about five weeks’ time. The letter is valid as proof of my right to residence until May, so I have plenty of time to chase it up if my card is late. The whole process took less than half an hour.
​
I know dealing with bureaucracy can be stressful and anxiety-inducing, so I hope having a description of the process is helpful to anyone who wants it! It really was a very straightforward and positive experience. I'm looking forward to applying for citizenship already.

This is mostly my reactions and rationalizations to the Brave event and how it's affected me a a player of DMK. I've been playing for nearly a year. I've experienced Onward, Pocahontas, Hercules, two Tower Challenges, the Lock Shock and Barrel Halloween event, Mandalorian, and now Brave.
At first I was okay with not completing things since I just didn't have storyline characters unlocked or leveled up to be of any use. But starting around that second Tower Challenge, the one where they offered Rabbit for a second time in a row, things started feeling off. The Halloween event was brutal. Lock, the premium character, was surprising in that he not only was 500 gems but despite being useful to the point of being necessary for one of the tasks he ended up being not that useful for the rest. Meaning even people who purchased Lock found out they couldn't get Shock unless they got lucky with drops or burned through a ton of elixir buying the needed tokens. Then the Mandalorian came out a few weeks later, and I didn't participate much but I did hear that once again the premium character wasn't as useful as expected. Kuiil needed to be leveled up before he could be properly used, and he had some token conflicts with characters.
And now we are at Brave, where people who had both premium characters and the premium attraction and the parade float and discovered they could not finish the event. They did everything right, and it wasn't enough. The RNG was just too strong - there were too many stages where people got screwed over by RNG or bottle necked by arbitrary cooldown times. Some people even had full Frozen collections to help, and were struggling! I had Fergus, Dingwall, and the Ring of Stones at level 2. Up until the last hour, I had no idea if I would be able to complete the event or if I would come up short.
And I realize it's only going to get harder.
This isn't fun anymore. I've never played a game where I needed to wake myself up repeatedly during the night, to stand a chance at completing it. For days at a time. I've never played a game that made me wonder if I could 'get away' with sneaking my phone into my phone-hating teacher's class because lectures cut into a character's task completion. This is supposed to be a game, not a job.
With Brave, the difficulty is entirely intentional. Gameloft didn't want people completing the event. Gameloft wanted people so frustrated that they caved in and bought a sack of gems. Merida herself was 10USD, and without any tokens her costume was 970 gems. Two 500 gem deals bring her costume to just under 40USD. Let's say you did your best, got all the Glitched Fabric, but still came up short 7 comfy fabrics. That's still 560 gems that Gameloft wants you to spend.
You just busted your ass for the "privilege" of giving Gameloft an additional 24USD of your money. Nice hustle.
And then there's the fact that Gameloft made sure only Frozen characters can get Glitched Fabric. And not just Frozen characters, but you needed Anna and her traveling costume (so 2 legendary chests, minimum) or the Fire Spirit with the Enchanted Forest attraction upgraded to level 1 (another 2 legendary chests).
You could also have it dropped from the Dressing Room if you have it at level 2, but with an 8 hour cooldown most people couldn't collect enough fabric before the event ended and were forced to spend more gems. Some people were lucky enough to have the Dressing Room upgraded all the way to level 5, which requires a total of 475 relic tokens to do. And the odds of getting WIR relic tokens have decreased, now that Gameloft has added Brave relic tokens to the chest pools.
And when an event ends...does it even feel good having those event characters you earned? Thanks to the 75 character limit, you're going to spend the next few weeks leveling them up and then be forced to box them up and send them Home by the time the next event starts. There are so many storyline characters that have so many tasks needed to collect more tokens, but event characters are mostly isolated and very rarely are able to collect tokens for characters not in their collection. So their main purpose becomes slot machine bait: they'll eventually be the next helper collection for a future event (that you'll have to lose sleep, buy all the premiums, and even then burn through more elixir or gems or even real money in order to complete), and anyone who wasn't able to get all the characters can try their luck opening a legendary chest.
I'm not even done with the story. I'm at the brink of my game getting bottle necked because I have over 75 characters which can be out and about doing tasks. But with recent events, they prove it won't matter how far along in the story I am. It won't be enough to complete events.
Now, each new event character feels like it bloats regular chests. All those event character tokens taking up space, all those event relic tokens that you don't need anymore because the relic token system is utterly broken and Gamelot isn't interested in fixing it.
All for what? For shoring up for the next hustle. For making sure you have fewer gems ready for the next event, tempting you to give in and pay cash. And maybe this is because I've only been playing for about a year while others have been playing much longer, but it is discouraging knowing that I'll never be able to complete many collections because it all lies within the slot machine legendary chests. At first I thought Tower Challenges were going to be a chance to make up for it, but I realized Gameloft hardly ever offers Tower Challenges and when they do happen you get...one or two returning characters plus an attraction, common tier. It's been a year and Gameloft has offered a grand total of 5 returning event characters. They have also added 25 event characters.
Free legendary chests are sporadic, sometimes a few will be offered as milestone prizes during events but for the most part we get one, maybe two a month. But not in January though, we get nothing this month. Spending gems is the only way to really complete a collection, but of course you don't want to spend your gems because you need those for the next event, but of course what's the point when the 75 character limit prevents you from really enjoying and showing off your completed collections. DMK operates on FOMO: fear of missing out. If you don't complete a collection during its event, it is extremely difficult to do so after without spending money, and Gameloft ensures that the rate of free offers is outpaced by new events. "If I don't get the comfy, it won't be available again for years. And when they release it again, it will be just as hard to obtain, so I might as well spend money/gems now." That's how they get you. "If I don't get Merida now, she'll be in a Legendary Chest, but she'll only have a base 2% chance to get, so I might as well spend money/gems now." Same thing.
I've come to realize I don't feel like I'm playing a game anymore. I feel more like I'm trying to see how much I can get away with an abuser. This is no longer a fun time waster, but something negatively influencing my life. Between the 75 character limit, the lack of usefulness for premium characters, and the absurd hoops needed to complete an event to screw people over with RNG and tempt them into spending more gems/cash, this isn't a game anymore it's just a chore. I don't see DMK getting better. So, I'm done. Let it go, as a certain Snow Queen would say.
I hope I don't come off as sounding dramatic. I only want to rationalize my decision, and help others understand if they are feeling the same way. I am not demanding that anyone quit or stop spending their own money if they still find enjoyment and satisfaction. I am not angry at anyone, but I will note that the more people spend real money the more it encourages Gameloft to rig things with less and less fairness. If anyone is feeling reluctant to stop playing or reduce playing due to the time and money they have already spent, this is a phenomenon called the sunk cost fallacy. It's harder to walk away from something when you feel you have invested in it. But this is a tapping game, and the only investment is whether you still find it fun and rewarding to play. You're never going to get that money back, there will be no payout at the "end". The only real loss is your money and time if you continue to play a game that is no longer fun.
In case anyone was wondering if I was able to get Merida's comfy costume at the very end, it doesn't matter if I did or not. Because I'm walking away.
I thank everyone here, and hope whatever decisions you make, you base them on your own satisfaction. Stay healthy and happy.
And in case anyone is wondering what else to do for a time waster, I picked up the inexpensive Stardew Valley and have been having a blast with it. Yes, I traded my kingdom for a farm.

Anecdotally, I think accounting is taught wrong. My frustration is with how students seem to learn plenty of accounting theory right away, and then seem to immediately lock up and have no response to "journaling" even basic transactions for far too long.
How Accounting is Taught
Start with the theory. Explain that there is this theoretical equation, one which is mutable technically, but for the sake of accounting we leave it in a certain order. Define the technical definition of an asset explaining that it both represents the "physical" (like cash, tangible items) and also the concept of something like obligations owed to you. Define liability, and owners equity using words like "future obligation" "residual value" and "contribution" and so on. Maybe even get into share ownership.
Explain what a debit and a credit is - how a debit represents the left side of the equation, but how a credit can also be "applied" to the left side to represent a reduction (and the inverse with a debit).
Recognize that this is really hard to see so you bring out the T-Accounts to represent left/right side of each transactions and you have 10+ T-Accounts on the board. You quickly run through some transactions, slapping values from the transactions under the left and right sides of various T-Accounts as you quickly tie back to previous concepts.
Bring it all together, trying to show how your running totals in the t-accounts slot into the accounting equation now, how it all balances, how it all fits onto "statements".
Then, ask them a really simple question. The owner spends $4000 cash on a machine. What do you do? The students look at you with a blank stare, as they try to imagine your 10+ T-Accounts from earlier, two lessons on accounting theory, and they're full of doubt - which side???? Last time they saw this it had something to do with AR. Fuck this. Accounting is Hard
tl;dr - Slap them with a lot of theory, and overview of accounting systems and terminology until their eyes glaze over and the only thing they think they understand is why accountants are borderline alcoholics.
Why is this bad?
When teachers start with the Technical Definitions and Accounting Equation it is theoretical and magic, up in the clouds of a mystery language. Students are having trouble defining what effects a transaction has, let alone how this translates into the mystery language and signs and symbols.
Accounting starts with translating the "words" that make up a transaction into the "effect" on the business. Technical language and terms can be put aside.
My Suggestion
Lesson One should just be putting a bunch of very standard, day to day, transactions on the board and "translating" them into the basic language of what happens to the business. Vaguely define terms like Accounts Recievable, Accounts Payable, Income, and Expense, and then try to use them in the "answer" but otherwise avoid unneccessary terms like Debit/Credit, or Left/Right, or mapping things to spots on the equation/statements.
Explain quickly that every transaction has two sides - it's just a fact the students will have to have faith in for now. They don't need to know "why" (We don't teach the equations proof first in math, so why do that here?).

• "You buy a machine for $4,000 cash"

Remove $4000 cash, add $4000 machine. An asset because you own the machine now and it's worth $4000 and you still have it.

• "You pay $1500 of salaries"

Remove $1500 cash, but you don't get anything like in the previous one with the machine. So $1500 added to expenses.

• "You buy another $4000 machine, but you are going to pay the seller later"

Well, we will still get the $4000 machine...but....we will add $4000 to the tally of money owed to people, $4000 Accounts Payable.
I feel like if you keep doing these quick explanations of transactions people will follow along. They need to do a bunch themselves too - read a paragraph, select basic words that describe the transaction accurately. Only after this concept is covered can you start mapping in Debit and Credit.
Their brain will start to make the same connections as we all do, day to day, as accountants in our jobs. This is a key part of the mindset of an accountant. It's little effort to an experienced accountant but more than hard enough for a 101 Student.
Only after this, we start to introduce the concept of Debit/Credit and Left/Right side in the Equation, and start mapping these previous lines into the new language and T-Accounts and statements.
Tl;Dr2 The pre-requisite of understanding a transaction is only covered alongside with a mountain of challenging "theoretical" knowledge.
I'm open to feedback, and I'd love to hear from any profs.

RoyalRoad
First
Previous
Next
I ended up splitting off some of 8 into 9 based on feedback. The story I've thought of will end on 10, and then it's back to the drawing board for me. I'm not sure if I would continue with this universe or come back with another idea, let me know if you have an opinion either way.
I'll start posting these onto a site I found called RoyalRoad in addition to reddit. I won't take donations, but it does seem like it has nice utilities to manage all the stories even if the audience is smaller. Any advice on this welcome too.
And as always, I'm still a new writer trying to improve. Feedback about the story or my writing are all very welcome, and I read every one of them.
Galactic Credits weren't technically a currency yet. They had a lot of GCs in the bank, but as the aliens would say, that's just numbers on a screen. You couldn't pay rent and taxes with GCs, not yet.
As some human traders switched to exclusively buying goods from the market, they paid hard earned Dollars in exchange for virtual GC, and that became the revenue stream. This revenue balanced out almost perfectly with sellers who were instantly cashing out.
For every Dollar that someone paid GC to convert to credits, only about 95 cents would be asked to be paid out by a seller trying to withdraw their GCs for cash.
The transaction fees that GC made on every transaction can be visualized as credits disappearing into an untouched locked account. This was effectively a profit for GC, because it meant less credits that had to be exchanged for $. That 5% margin was a steady Dollar revenue stream that they could safely cash out.
But because all the humans needed to pay bills and taxes, they would withdraw their money almost immediately, which meant that they would always be stuck around that 5% margin. Unlike a regular bank, they couldn't make a lot of investments.
That's when the universe decided to give them a break.
Or rather, their interests had aligned with the self interest of some very rich people who had just started paying attention.
At first, the financial systems on Earth did not care much about GCs. They were used in spaceports all around Earth, and space was very exciting, but it was inaccessible to most people and the actual trade volume was a small percentage of total businesses done on Earth.
The aliens directly made a few people very, very rich, mostly traders and GC. But what were of more interest to financial institutions were the reverse engineered alien technology products that they predicted were coming shortly. At the same time Sarah and her friends were trying to fix a famine, the human economy was booming.
Like GC, banks were in the business of selling gold prospecting equipment, not looking for gold themselves.
Naturally, banks started allowing deposits and withdrawal of GC. This wasn't unusual. Banks have no issues holding onto cryptocurrency and non-USD currencies for customers' savings accounts. That was their business, after all. There were some costs, but it was generally a good business: fat transaction fees led to fat profit margins.
In the case of GC, banks needed to charge their customers a high transaction fee because GC itself charged a high transaction fee. This was bad for business. Not many people kept their credits in other banks because GC itself was a bank and they kept their money in there just fine without having to pay an even higher transaction fee.
They were understandably unhappy about several of their wealthier customers keeping a lot of money in another bank, but not enough to want to choke out GC's business. That would be killing their golden goose that is the booming alien knockoff economy.
So when GC decided to raise liquidity, as they would need to do to continue to bankroll a multi-planetary relief mission indefinitely, the banks saw an opportunity. Or rather, VISA did.
It was an incredibly generous offer: VISA would treat Galactic Credits like Dollars and allow full convertibility on their own network, in exchange for GC waiving their entire transaction fee for bank transfers. Their lawyers didn't want GC to go ahead and print money without limits, so they put a contingency that allowed them to cut off GC whenever they wanted and clauses that allowed for regular auditing.
Sarah and her friends thought about it, but not for very long.
Galactic Credit became no longer the only bank that could deal in credits.
Credits were now freely transferable between banks.
Now, you could pay taxes in credits converted to USD.
Which meant people stopped withdrawing their Dollars from GC immediately, and GC could "borrow" that money to pay for supplies, equipment, and then use some to invest in companies on Earth.
It was like a limited run of fractional reserve banking.
The aid operation to Gak continued.
"Isn't this technically a blatant violation of minimum wage laws?" Asked Sarah over the FTL video comms, the crisp and quick quality of which was a testament of how much human infrastructure had been shipped into Gakrek orbit, "doing some quick maths with the average fuel and maintenance costs here… it looks like we're basically paying the space traders only about $10 for every hour of shipping they do for us."
Kathleen Bryce, GC's head counsel shifted uncomfortably in a conference room chair 50 light years away, though her immediate reply indicated she had indeed thought the problem through, "Not if anyone asks."
She continued, "the short story is nobody has tested the courts to see if aliens working for us in space are subject to California employment and labor regulations, or federal minimum wage laws, or perhaps, even no laws."
"What's the long story?" Jen asked, slightly interested.
"We're pretty sure they're at most contractors, definitely not employees. Cali Prop 22 took care of that. The spaceport is probably considered international territory, or else the traders would be considered 'illegal aliens' every time they landed," Kathleen did a little chuckle at that most unoriginal pun around the GC legal team watercooler, "In which case, the lower federal minimum wage applies. Or maybe it's not even international territory, maybe it's some new thing. Too many edge cases to descri-"
"Ok," Sarah said after a moment, "it'll probably look bad though."
"What will?" Jen countered, rolling her eyes, "that they're being asked to voluntarily work just above cost to help save a billion hungry aliens, a problem that, let's not forget, most people in the galaxy think they helped create in the first place? Give me a break. There's fifty thousand Red Cross workers working for free on Gakrek and you're telling me we-"
"Ok, ok, we'll save this discussion for later, interesting as the implications are," Stearns interrupted, "until the labor board starts sniffing around, we'll let Legal deal with it. The other item I wanted to get to today is what we're going to do for Gak in the medium and long term."
"Right, the immediate crisis is over, but the moment we pull our people out and stop sending food constantly, the Gaks are back to square one in two months," Sarah returned to her presentation, "over the past two weeks, our models keep having to be revised down on the future of Gakrek farming. Their climate system has been dramatically spiraling downwards for decades now. With this disaster: the out of control burning and flooding, the trashed ecosystems, and the Gaks literally selling off their farming tools to squeeze out some more fruits from traders, they added up to one conclusion: traditional subsistence agriculture is no longer viable on Gakrek."
Here she put up a chart on screen. There were two lines. There's a straight horizontal line, marking the average calories that healthy Gaks needed, and then there's a quickly plummeting line denoting the drastic decrease of Gak agricultural productivity over time. They crossed about ten years ago. The meaning was clear.
"It's increasingly obvious that all Gak food will need to be shipped in from offworld sources until we completely overhaul their agricultural economy," Sarah continued.
"What kind of overhaul are we even talking about?" Benny chimed in. He owned a good portion of the company, but rarely came to these executive meetings. Today, he was making an exception for his son Benny Jr, who was on the view screen with the rest of the offworld team on Gakrek.
Stearns replied, "in a word: industrialization."
"The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race," wrote Ted Kaczynski, known more famously as his press nickname, the Unabomber. When this was published in the Washington Post in 1995 in response to a threat, a number of people thought he was making a lot of sense.
It made all the headlines, inspired countless hours of political debate, and gave a major boost to anarcho-primitive ideas in the academic sphere.
But as many historians knew, his ideas were not wildly original. Industrialization, like every major economic change, created winners and losers. Sometimes there were more of one, and sometimes the other.
In human society, previously skilled workers, usually guild craftsmen who made up the upper-middle class of late feudal Europe, became the biggest losers of industrialization as their labor was replaced by machines that could do what they did at hundreds if not thousands of times faster. Without skill, without rest, and without emotion. Some of them were so angry, they even went out and smashed the machines, but mechanization continued anyway.
The biggest winners of the Industrial Revolution were the subsistence farmers who made up the vast majority of lower class workers in feudal Europe. They went into cities, to work mind-numbingly boring jobs, doing the same thing day after day, on risky and dangerous assembly lines for excruciatingly long hours. Many got injured. Some died. A few were even children.
And yet mostly, they did so willingly.
That's not because they were all tricked, under some grand illusion that factory work was comfortable, safe, and enriching.
It was because subsistence farming on its worst day was a hecking nightmare.
The Gaks were living it.
"Why can't we just build a tractor factory there then?" Sarah demanded.
In her mind, tractors were synonymous with food. She'd been on a road trip through the American Midwest once, on the way to the Yellowstone. There, she'd seen rows of gigantic tractors plowing fields, endless food from horizon to horizon. To Sarah, the massive scale of the corn fields of America was just how industrialization was done.
"Because tractor factories depend on a thousand different parts. Who's gonna make the tires? Who's gonna make the motors? Who's gonna make the onboard computer?" Stearns explained, "and who's gonna bring them gasoline to keep running? And each of those components have a thousand factories to make them, and each have dependencies on thousands of other factories! It would literally be easier to move Los Angeles onto Gak than it would be to help them mass manufacture tractors."
Sarah made a facepalming gesture, but Stearns cut her off before she launched into despair, "there actually is a much easier solution to this problem."
"On Earth, most economists agree that the most efficient way to send foreign aid to areas that consistently couldn't produce enough food is not to send them food; it's to send them money so they can buy food, or if they have good soil, they can buy some tools to grow their own," said Stearns, leading Sarah to the obvious conclusion.
"But they don't use money here, we can't just send them money!"
"Exactly. So let's talk about that."
Gordorker's family had finally cleaned up his house from the dust storm. The broken roof was re-tiled as best as he could. His children had helped on some of the menial tasks, but that's what children were for.
It was nice to have purpose again.
The humans had said that their mission would be here for months, maybe years, but Gordorker was not so naive to believe that he wouldn't have to work for food again. He was certainly not so stupid to take this to mean he should be lounging around all day.
Winters on Gakrek were not bad in terms of freezing people to death, but the dry winds would not allow crop planting until spring again.
Next time, he would have 21 mouths to feed, not including his, and he'd have to get the fields plowed without poor Grunger. He was lucky he had so many children.
Traders Only
New Thread: Bohor spaceports have just banned bartering!
Body: If your friends want to do any business at Bohor, they better get themselves a GC Terminal fast! The Bohor are banning barter at their main port. You will only be able to conduct trades by credits starting in a few days!
Comment: Whaaaaat? Are you crazy??? Only two of my friends have Terminals. How is everyone else supposed to make a living?!
Comment: Get a Terminal lol
Comment: We told you guys last week this was gonna happen if you assholes keep holding up the line with your obnoxious rare fruit peddling. Newsflash, we don't care about how exotic your stuff is on Bohor. Just unload it. We weigh it, read the price list for food items, do the math, you get your credits, and you're out of there in minutes. You want air filters? We've got air filters for 2,800 GCs, no haggling, no bartering. If you don't like it, someone else will take it. Don't waste our time! -- Bohor Spaceport Management Team
Comment: Hey Bohor, have you considered maybe getting a Terminal yourself so that everyone else don't all need to get one just to get some fuel?
Comment: I'm selling air filters for 3,000 GCs in orbit above Bohor for traders who don't have Terminals.
"Our plan for the leasing model for the Terminals is not going to work," Sarah observed.
"Yup, the famine crisis on Gakrek is forcing our hand," admitted Stearns, "and we'd expected a much slower rollout to bring the aliens on board over the course of years, not weeks. In hindsight, it was obvious how this was different to how humans popularized credit and debit cards in the 1970s. We were replacing cash, which was just slightly inferior to a card, but with the aliens, we're replacing their entire dumpster fire of an economy. We earned a lot of goodwill with our relief effort and the galaxy is buying in."
"So what, we just abandon the original timeline and move to phase two immediately?" Asked Sarah.
"Exactly right. When the iron is hot, you gotta strike it," replied Stearns, "we'll give the merchants already with Terminals an option to opt out of their lease and switch to the new devices, but I doubt most will. Our internal data shows that they've universally been getting their money's worth out of those."
"Are our manufacturers even ready to handle the inevitable barrage of orders?" Asked Jen, eager to move onto the logistics and technology discussion.
They were not.
Version two of the offworld trading terminals were actually a downgrade to the original Terminals. The originals were prototypes, modified out of consumer tablets that cost hundreds of dollars to produce.
The new ones, branded Mini Terminals, were basic card readers with pin pads and a tiny OLED display, attached to a now mass produced FTL antenna you could get at RadioShack for $3.99. There wasn't even a thermal printer for receipts.
The whole device costs no more than $20 to make on a mass production line in Vietnam. GC was going to sell it at cost in credits.
Galactic Credit had prepared supply lines to ramp up production, ready to start rolling them out in a couple years. They've made a test batch of tens of thousands of units sitting in storage, but did not expect to need to start actually selling them for a while.
Carefully made plans were abandoned, schedules were expedited, employees in SE Asia worked overtime, and the company took on extra cost to push the schedule up.
It still wasn't enough.
On day one, all reserve units sold out. Some of the well connected human traders, unburdened with a strong conscience or ethics, bought them by the truckload as they were leaving their warehouses. They sold them at a large markup at the spaceport.
That was not very cash money of them.
GC sent a representative to the spaceport to let traders know that they were out of stock, but more would be made available shortly. Customers should just wait a week for the prices to come down.
The scalpers instantly sold out anyway. The alien traders lucky enough to be on the non-relief landing pads filled their cargo with the Mini Terminals.
Then, those traders sold them at a markup at other ports. And so on.
By the time the Mini Terminals reached average spaceport merchants on the other side of the galaxy, they were being sold for almost half the price of the original tablet Terminals.
By the end of the week, the craze died down. These electronics really were cheap and easy for human factories to make, and many of the production lines just needed time to start the machines. Prices returned to normal, and the average merchant could afford them with a bit of honest work and savings.
The Gakrek Spacelift was slowing down. The turnaround time had been increased to a leisurely 10 minutes, and the Livermore space traffic controller was occasionally allowing non-relief traders to land at open pads, which Zikzik was doing now.
Zikzik needed to refuel, but apparently that was still only allowed for the landing pads that had been designated for relief. He called up the Livermore port manager, pointed to his number one position on the relief pilot leaderboard, but she just shrugged her shoulders and said apologetically, "rules are rules".
Oh well, he could always refuel at Olgix on the way.
As he landed in Olgix, he realized this was the first time he landed at a non human or Gak port for at least a week.
He greeted the Olg who was running a reactor fuel line to his ship with a nod, and asked, "how much fruit to full?"
The Olg took one look at the sign on his booth, and said, "you know we also take credits on Olgix now, right?"
A little surprised, Zikzik took out his card and terminal and allowed the Olg to swipe his. He'd used his Terminal when doing exchanges with other traders, but this was the first time he'd been to a non-Earth port where goods and services could be paid for using his credits.
"That's 295.50 GCs, pleasure doing business with you."
Grob was one of the wealthier Gaks in the world. The famine had affected everyone, but he and his wife did not have to go hungry because the spaceport management made sure to keep feeding the people that kept the mobs at bay.
Everything else stopped working though. He used to pad his income by making sure that the vendors at the spaceport knew exactly who was protecting their livelihoods. Only very rarely did new ones not cooperate.
Grob really wasn't a bad Gak, but he did what everyone else in his position also did. This was just how business was done on Gakrek. You didn't get to survive to become a security guard family if you didn't do that. Another Gak would come along, take your place, and do what you didn't want to do anyway.
When the humans arrived, things changed. They started peddling these credits business, which he'd seen some of the traders used.
Of course, he didn't think much of it. Instead of getting goods, you just get a card, and use the card to trade for food and items? Seems unnecessarily complicated.
He'd heard that they charged a cut just for you to use the card, a concept that he was intimately familiar with and in no hurry to be subjected to. The humans had insisted on giving one to him and setting it up. Which he had to do because they were in charge now, but that was fine by him. Just because he had a card didn't mean he had to use it right?
A few days later, when he was on a patrol route at the spaceport, checking off the vendor stands, one of the luxury item vendors asked him if she could pay her next cycle's fee with her card because she had traded away all her wares.
"You gotta make sure to save wares for me next time," he'd told her, "but I'll take it this time." He ruffled through his backpack to find the card, handed it to her, and she inserted it into her machine, typed in her code, and showed him that it had deposited 18 GC into his account.
Hoping that she didn't stiff him, he went on with his route.
"Let me say this again," Zarko said at the edge of his patience limit, "you can trade these credits for food on Earth. Lots of food, shiploads of food. So much food, everywhere."
"But I don't have a ship," whined the spare parts vendor at the spaceport, "why don't you just bring food with you next time you want my parts?"
"You can exchange credits for food from some of the other traders that come down here too! Some of them have the new Terminals now, look, that guy over there, he takes GC," Zarko was almost shouting while pointing at a fellow Zeepil food merchant who had a I ❤️ GC sign on his booth across the spaceport.
This was frustrating. Every time he came across one of these less traveled planets he had to explain himself to these yokels all over again.
The vendor looked over skeptically and said, "how do I know that you two aren't working some scam together?"
That was it for Zarko. It had been a long day, this guy wasn't making it any shorter, and he had just been accused of being a dishonest trader. It was probably because of his species. Just because he was a Zeepil didn't mean he was a scammer!
He internally cursed the unjustified stereotype of his people and blew up at the racist:
"Listen to me very carefully. You're going to give me the secondary fuel modulator. You're going to walk over to the food merchant over there. Then you're going to swipe this card over here, on his machine. He's going to give you at least a month's worth of food. And if you don't, I'm going to leave a one star review on your spaceport on Traders Only, and nobody is going to come back here to trade anything with you ever again, got it?"
The vendor whined some more under his breath, but eventually relented. The threat had sounded real.
He got plenty of food. Whatever scam these Zeepils were running, they didn't rip him off this time at least. Whatever.
Zarko was fuming as he took off. Didn't these ignorant primitives know that a liquid currency to facilitate free and fair exchange of goods and services was obviously the bedrock upon which a modern economy needed to be built?
When Grob got home from work, he handed his wife the credits card saying, "hey darling, one of the luxury traders gave me her protection share using the card. I trusted her because she normally always pays on time. Did I get scammed?"
His wife was a teacher at a nearby school. Ever the practical one, she asked, "oh, how much did she put on it?"
"It said 18."
She did some math in her head and replied, "yeah that sounds about right," and to his surprise, she pulled out a card and said, "I got one from the humans at the school too, and I used it to buy a new pair of shoes for you!"
He tried them on. They weren't very fitting shoes, but neither were his previous pair so he couldn't complain. They did seem very well made even though the little holes in them seemed to be a design choice.
Pretty soon, he noticed that the other guards at the spaceport started extracting their share of protection fees using cards too. Oh well, if everyone else was taking fees with a card, he supposed it couldn't hurt if he did it too. It somewhat lightened his load on patrols, which he didn't mind at all.
Besides, his blue shoes were really pretty. He was not sure why there was a big check mark on its side though.
"They're doing what?!" Sarah asked, her temper threatening to go off.
"It's a protection racket. A practice as old as time. The security guards have basically been taking a percentage of the vendors' wares, and recently switched onto using cards to take payment. It's been going on forever and it's probably just how they do things there. Using cards is pretty innovative of them, I'll give them that," Jen said, "but it made it pretty easy for us to track down all of them. Should we revert the transactions?"
"No, probably not," Sarah said, calming down and seeing a slight head shake from her head counsel Bryce, "but we need to make it clear to them that they can't be allowed to do that anymore."
Grob wasn't sure how to feel about the cards anymore.
The humans had found the practice of protection fees distasteful, and they'd warned that anyone caught doing it again would face severe consequences. They made their point pretty clear when one of the other guards was made an example of: her card stopped working. She had to get a new one that didn't have any of her credits in it!
On the other hand, the humans also made the spaceport authorities start paying them with credits, which was good because now they were being paid on time and Grob knew he didn't have to worry about not being paid as long as the humans were there.
His wife had been buying them new clothes with credits she was getting paid as a teacher too. One of his human friends had giggled when she saw his shirt, which apparently said "2016 NBA Champions Golden State Warriors". He wasn't sure what was so funny about that, but it was a very comfortable shirt.
Maybe this whole credits thing wasn't as ridiculous as he thought at first.
By the universal inheritance path known as "dibs", Gordorker inherited his neighbors Gyuotin and Gyuovin's farmable land and possessions. They didn't have much.
Trinkets, gadgets, and a bunch of junk. It was mostly items that couldn't be traded for food during the worst periods of the shortage. With his immediate food needs taken care of by the relative abundance of food items the humans have brought, Gordorker thought perhaps he should go buy a stasis box with the trinkets he got from his deceased neighbors.
When he arrived at the offworld market, he saw a high end luxury merchant proudly displaying some fresh new wares from offworld, including a number of stasis boxes. These were apparently new ones made by humans. These were slightly bigger than the ones he'd have before, but he'd brought his neighbors' life possessions, so he thought maybe he'd be able to trade for one of those with some haggling.
Gordorker started laying out his items on the table, but the trader cut him off, hastily saying the weirdest thing he'd ever heard from a trader in his life, "no barter, credits only." The merchant then pointed him towards a human tent.
A human volunteer, his nametag said Marco, asked his name and gave him a shiny card, then told him to memorize 6 numbers. "As the head of your household, you have also been given a small stimulus by the GC corporation," he said.
Then Marco took him to a junk trader stall, where he gave the trader all his items. Marco showed an increasingly confused Gordorker how to insert his card into a small machine slot to "receive payment".
Marco guided him back to the merchant selling stasis boxes. Gordorker was instructed on how to insert his card and enter his pin code, which he mastered with no difficulty.
Marco then took him to a farm tools stall, where Gordorker repeated the same process with a steel plow, a small box of "semi-dwarf wheat seeds", a long garden hose, and a hand pump, all loaded onto a brand new wooden wheelbarrow.
"BAL: 12.50," the small screen had read.
Gordorker was not sure what unnatural ritual he had taken part in, but he was in possession of the most farm tools he had ever been in his life and he had the stasis box he was looking for.
"Alright, that should be enough. Make sure to keep the card safe and remember your 6 digit code. Ask a volunteer if you need to know what the tools do.."
Gordorker put his card in his stasis box. Then, being the prudent Gak he was, he wrote down his pin code and put it in the box as well.
Whatever else it did, he was sure one of his descendants could probably find a use for it in an emergency one day.
In hindsight, there were obvious economic side effects for Earth becoming a mass producer of everything from food to cheap consumer electronics, the reverse engineering of millions of years of alien tech, and ripping down the barriers that the barter based economies of the galaxy had erected.
A young forward thinking economist wrote a whole journal article about it with a typical economic study title: "Development Osmosis: Capital Outflow, Argentina, and Extreme Poverty in Offworld Economies".
Three other economists read the pre-print as part of the peer review, who all sent him an email saying something along the lines of "wow, this gave me a lot to think about. Somebody important should read this!"
Nobody else did, for a while.
It didn't make the news.
The reference to high yield semi-dwarf wheat seeds in the story refers to the research of Nobel Peace Prize Winner, Norman Borlaug. Borlaug noticed that stalks of wheat that are too high yield would bend and then break their stalks, so he solved that problem by breeding these plants with dwarfed plants. Shorter stalk, supports more wheat. His work in improving food security in developing nations is credited with saving the lives of over a billion humans. A real life HFY.
The next chapter's working title is:
Rising Tide
RoyalRoad
First
Previous
Next

Set dates and times don't work. When everyone makes a single transaction to buy an asset at one time, the sharks smell blood and will begin circling. These are the markets, after all, and they are ruthless. This was never going to be a big pay day, because public announcements like these always find their way into the ears of those who don't care and want to take advantage by any means necessary.
And what did we expect to happen anyways? Everyone had a single transaction queued up to fire off at 9:00 PM, and we expected that alone to carry the price to $1? That takes a steady stream of cash that the lot of us don't have. Billions and billions of dollars.
The only thing that will drive prices up is slow, steady progress with lots of traffic (buying AND selling) and more people using the currency. That's it.
We don't need to give up; we need to change tactics. Promote Dogecoin and continue to trade it. Play the markets. Keep the volume up. Learn how to invest and create an investment strategy that works for you. Learn to trade instead of pulling levers on slot machines.
We can do this, and steady growth is the best, most stable path to profit.

First post...be kind! This happened way back in the dark ages, 1986. I was 21 at the time and working for a gas station that was associated with a certain grocery store chain in Washington state. It was owned by a company not affiliated with said chain, but had locations at nearly every one.
As this was long before the days of debit cards, this was a cash only gas station. We didn’t even take credit cards. Customers would pull up, pump their gas and then come to my window to pay. We also sold cigarettes. No drinks, no snacks...customers couldn’t even get into my booth. I had been working there about a year when the company announced it was closing the location. My manager and I were offered positions at another location upstate and we both accepted. We moved our respective families and started our new jobs. As new hires (ugh).
This station was incredible busy. We did more business in 8 hrs than my old location would do in a week. This location also had a different set up: here you would pull into the station from a single entrance, pump your gas, and then drive forward to a single exit where the “Pay Here” booth was located. There were always 2 cashiers on duty. Each cashier had a cash drawer.
One thing I should note, there were also no computers. So closing the drawer down between shifts was timing consuming and tedious. We had to manually count the cigarettes remaining, and count the cash drawers. We would fill out an end of shift report listing the starting balances and the ending balances. We also had to list the gallons sold from each pump. At the end of the shift the total of gallons sold and the total cigarettes sold should equal the cash balance. It is important to note here that not once in the year I had worked for the previous location had I been off by more than 10 cents.
The following morning after my first shift I was informed by the manager that I was short $50. Impossible I said, I balanced out yesterday. He said that I must have stolen that money after I had completed the paperwork. I just looked at him and said, no I didn’t. He gave me a verbal warning and said if it happened again I would be fired and the stolen money would be deducted from my paycheck this week.
In the 5 days that followed I realized quickly the manager was up to something. My old manager who was just another worker now, was also accused of stealing. As was one other new employee. I can’t vouch for the other employee but I’m pretty sure she did nothing wrong. The employees that had been there awhile were never accused of anything. I did some checking and found out this manager was relatively new (had only been there about 6 months) and the other cashiers had been here before him. Only new cashiers were being accused of stealing. And that location had been having “stealing problems” for about 6 months and the turnover was high with the new employees.
I came to work at 6am on a Monday only to be told I was being fired. For cause. The manager accused me of taking $500 out of my drawer the previous Friday. He said he only discovered it this morning (even though he had worked Sat and Sun). I said ok and left. I was pretty angry and instead of going home, I parked in the grocery store parking lot and proceed to settle in to watch the gas station. I knew that at 9am sharp, he would take the cash in the safe and make the weekend deposit. At 9am he left the gas station and headed to the bank. But instead of walking into the bank, he walked into the Indian “casino” next door. It’s not really a casino like we think of today, but more of a betting parlor for the races. It did have slot machines, but no card tables.
I think “Well, this is interesting”.
He comes out of the casino at exactly 10 am, walks next door to the bank, does his business and then heads back to the gas station. I head home with a plan.
Every morning I follow him from the gas station to the casino. I take a picture of him leaving, and one of him arriving at the bank and walking into the casino. I take pictures of him coming out and then heading to the bank. I do this for 5 days straight. He even went on Saturday. On day 3 my old manager was fired for “stealing” $150.
I get the film developed (no digital camera in the dark ages) note the times and dates on the back of each one. Then I call the main office of the gas company. It’s after 5 but I’m hoping someone is there. And there is. I speak to a woman and explain my situation and she says she knows exactly who I should speak to and transfers me. By some grace of God, she has transferred me to none other than the President/CEO of the company!
I tell him my story and tell him I did NOT steal from his company and could prove who actually did. He took down my information and said he would be in touch. I’m thinking to myself “yeah right”. The next morning I went to the station to perform my usual observation of the manager. At 9am he leaves for the “bank”. At 10 am he comes out. At that moment 2 stern looking gentlemen approach him. One pulls out his wallet and shows him something. The other one is talking. The manager goes pale and takes a step back. Next thing I know he is being escorted to a car I hadn’t noticed and they drive off. I lose them at a traffic signal so I head back to the station. They all show back up about 5 min later, and a few minutes after that a police cruiser pulls in. The officer talks to the stern gentleman and proceeds to place the manager in handcuffs. The other man says nothing but is glaring daggers at the manager.
The President called me later that after noon and informed me that the manager had been arrested for embezzlement (turns out that in 6 months he had managed to steal about $5k). He would take the store cash into the casino and gamble with it; if he won, he would make the normal bank deposit. If he lost, he would make the deposit and note in his records that we had been short the previous day. The CEO had already been focusing on that location because of the stealing and high turnover rate, but my information helped them figure out what exactly had been going on.
I was thanked and sent a substantial check as a reward. My old manager was offered the manager’s job and I was offered my old job back. I declined as I had already found another job that I liked more and paid better. The gambling manager was sentenced to 1 year in jail and ordered to attend counseling for his gambling addiction. His wife divorced him and took their 3 children to California. His house was foreclosed on and he ended up in a homeless shelter.
Don’t accuse me of stealing. I will get revenge.
** UPDATE**
Thank you for the likes and awards!
Update 2: this was my first post and I really didn’t expect all the awards. Thank you!

mods please lmk if this violates the rules. i’m posting here because I write about the mob/casino and many relevant themes that are important elements of the Sopranos, in my opinion. I think they’re of the same medium and genre so wanted to post here. Hope that’s alright. Cheers! (11 min read) ————————————————————————
EDIT 2: TL;DR -
Casino is a story of sexual and financial intrigue, mob violence, union pension fund embezzlement, a “love” story, and the protagonist's masochist addiction to the pain and chaos his lover inflicts on him. It turns out that the sharp-minded genius who meticulously runs the casino, is no more rational than the gamblers who routinely frequent the casino, coming back to lose their money and hoping that the odds will magically shift in their favor.
———————-
Every good filmmaker makes the same movie over and over again—Martin Scorsese is no different
Scorsese's Casino is a phenomenal story of the condoned chaos and "legalized robbery" that happens on a daily basis to gamblers who bett away thousands of dollars and return each day for more “FinDom,” but without any of the sexual sadism. The whole scam only persists because the house always wins: the odds are stacked 3 million to one on the slot machines, but the same shmucks return wide-eyed each day hoping for a different outcome, devoid of any rational re-evaluation required to maintain their grasp on reality, and the liquidity of their bank accounts.
Casino is a story of sexual and financial intrigue, mob violence, union pension fund embezzlement, a “love” story, and the protagonist's masochist addiction to the pain and chaos his lover inflicts on him. It turns out that the sharp-minded genius who meticulously runs the casino, is no more rational than the gamblers who routinely frequent the casino, coming back to lose their money and hoping that the odds will magically shift in their favor.
Robert De Niro plays Sam "Ace" Rothstein, recruited by his childhood friend Nick "Nicky" Santorno to help run the Tangiers casino, which is funded by an investment made with the Teamsters’ pension fund. Ace’s job is to keep the bottom line flowing so that the Mafia's skimming operation can continue seamlessly. De Niro's character felt like half-way between Travis from Taxi Driver (of course, nowhere as mentally disturbed) and half of the addictive excess, greed, and eccentric business-mind of Jordan Belfort in The Wolf of Wall Street.
Ace’s attention to detail gives him a rain-man-esque sensibility; his ability to see every scam, trick, hand signal, and maneuver happening on the casino floor make him the perfect manager of the casino, and take his managerial style to authoritarian heights in his pursuit of order and control over what is an inherently unstable and dynamic scheme; betting, hedging outcomes, and walking the line to keep the money flowing and the gamblers coming back. I’m not claiming Ace is autistic, I'm no clinician, but his managerial sensibilities over the daily operations of the casino, from the dealers to the pit bosses, to the shift managers, are to the point of disturbing precision, he has eyes everywhere, and knows how to remove belligerent customers with class and professionalism, but ultimately is short sighted in “reading” the human beings he is in relationship with. Ace is frustratingly naive and gullible in his partnership with Nicky and the threat he poses to him, and in his marriage with Ginger.
Ace has no personal aspirations to extract millions of dollars for himself out of the casino corruption venture. Ace simply wants the casino to operate as efficiently as possible, and he has no qualms about being a pawn of the bosses. While Sam, “the Golden Jew”—as he is called—is the real CEO of the whole enterprise, directing things at Tangiers for the benefit of the bosses “back home.” Ace’s compliance is juxtaposed with Nicky’s outrage upon feeling used: he gripes about how he is in “the trenches” while the bosses sit back and do nothing. Note that none of the activity Nicky engages in outside of the casino—doing the work of “taking Las Vegas over”—is authorized by the bosses. Ultimately Nicky’s inability to exert control over his crew and the street lead to his demise.
In the end, capitalism, and all that happens in the confines of the casino, is nothing but “organized violence.” Sound familiar? The mob has a capitalist structure in its organization and hierarchy: muscle men collect and send money back to the bosses who do not labor tirelessly “in the trenches.” The labor of the collectors is exploited to create the profits of their bosses. The entire business-model of the Mafia is predicated on usury and debtors defaulting on loans for which the repayment is only guaranteed by the threat of violence. But this dynamic is not without its internal contradictions and tensions, as seen in Casino.
In a comedic turn, the skimmers get skimmed! The bosses begin to notice the thinning of the envelopes and lighter and lighter suitcases being brought from the casino to Kansas City, “back home”. The situation continues to spin out of control, but a mid-tier mafioso articulates the careful balance required for the skimming operation to carry on: to keep the skimming operation functioning, the skimmers need to be kept loyal and happy. It’s a price the bosses have to pay to maintain the operation, “leakage” in their terms. Ace’s efficient management and precision in maintaining order within Tangiers is crucial for the money to keep flowing. But Ace’s control over the casino slips more and more as the movie progresses. We see this as the direct result of Nicky’s ascendance as mob kingpin in Vegas, the chaos he creates cannot be contained and disrupts the profits and delicate dynamics that keep the scam running.
Of course I can’t help myself here! We should view Scorsese’s discography, and the many portrayals of capitalist excess not as celebratory fetishization, but a critique of the greed and violence he so masterfully captures on film. See the Wolf of Wall Street for its tale of money as the most dangerous drug of them all, and the alienation—social and political—showcased in Taxi Driver. Scorsese uses the mob as a foil to the casino to attack the supposed monopoly the casino holds on legitimate, legal economic activity that rests on institutionalized theft. When juxtaposed with the logic of organized crime, we begin to see that the two—Ace and Nick—are not so different after all.
The only dividing line between the casino and organized crime is the law. Vegas is a lawless town yes, “the Wild West” as Nicky puts it, but there are laws in Vegas. The corruption of the political establishment and ruling elites is demonstrated when they pressure Ace to re-hire an incompetent employee who he fired for his complicity in a cheating scam or his stupidity in letting the slot machines get rigged; nepotism breeds mediocrity. In the end, Ace’s fall is the result of the rent-seeking behavior that the Vegas ruling class wields to influence the gaming board to not even permit Ace a fair hearing for his gaming license, which would’ve given him the lawful authority to officially run Tangiers. The elites use the political apparatus of the State to resist the new gang in town, the warring faction of mob-affiliated casino capitalists. While the mob’s only weapon to employ is that of violence. The mafia is still subservient to the powers that be within the political and economic establishment of Vegas, and they’re told “this is not your town.”
I’d like to make the most salient claim of this entire review now. Casino is a western film. The frontier of the Wild West is Vegas in this case, where the disorder of the mob wreaks havoc on, an until then, an “untapped market.” The investment scheme that the Teamsters pension fund is exploited for as seed capital, is an attempt to remain in the confines of the law while extracting as much value as possible through illegal and corrupt means for the capitalist class of the mob (and the ultimately dispensable union president). Tangiers exists in the liminal space of condoned economic activity as a legal and otherwise standard casino. While the violence required to maintain the operation, corrupts the legal legitimacy it never fully enjoyed from the beginning. This mirrors the bounty economy of the West and the out-sourcing of the law and the execution of the law, to bounty hunters. There is no real authority out in the frontier, the killer outlaw on the run is not so different from the bounty hunter who enjoys his livelihood by hunting down the killers. Yet, he himself is not the State. The wide-lens frame of Ace and Nicky meeting in the desert felt like a direct homage to the iconic image of the Western standoff. The conflict between Ace and Nick, the enforcer and the mastermind, is an approximation of the conflicts we might see in John Wayne’s films. The casino venture itself could be seen as an analogy of the frontier-venturism of railroad pioneers going to lay track to develop the West into a more industrial region.
I would have believed that this was a documentary about how the mob took over control of the Vegas casinos in the 1970-80s … if it were not for the viewer being expected to believe that Robert De Niro could play a Jew; it's hard to believe a man with that accent and the roles he’s played his entire career could be a “CRAZY JEW FUCK!!” I kid! But alas, De Niro is a class act and the last of the many greats of a bygone era. At times, it felt like Joe Pesci lacked talent as an actor, but his portrayal of the scummy, backstabbing bastard in Nicky was genuinely remarkable, but I might consider his performance the weak point of the movie. It’s weird to see a man that short, be that much of physical menace. There are a number of Sopranos actors in Casino. I’m sure Vincent Chase watched the movie and said to himself, “bet, i’ll cast half of these guys.”The set design and costumes were gorgeous. The styles and fashion of the time were spectacular. Scorsese’s signature gratuitous violence featured prominently, but tastefully. The camera work, tracking shots through the casino and spatial movement was incredible and I thought the cinematography was outstanding, the Western-esque wide lens in the desert was worthy of being a framed still.
The Nicky//Ace dynamic is excellent and the two play off of each other well. The conflict between the two of them escalates gradually, and then Nicky’s betrayal of Ace by cheating with Ginger marks the final break between the two of them. Nicky’s mob faculties represent a brutal, violent theft that is illegal and requires the enforcement of violence by organized crime. Despite the illegal embezzlement and corruption at play with the “skimming” operation at work at the casino, the general business model of the casino stands in contrast to the obscene violence of the loan sharks. Ace operates an intelligent operation of theft through the casino, and his hands-on management approach is instrumental to the success of the casino. Nicky’s chaos pervades the casino, and the life and activities of “the street” begin to bleed into Ace’s ability to maintain order in the casino. “Connected” types begin frequenting the casino, and Ace unknowingly forces one particularly rude gambler to leave the casino, who happens to have mob ties with Nicky. The “organized violence” of the casino cannot stay intact perfectly, because the very thing holding it together is the presence of the mob. Nicky is in Vegas as the enforcer and tasked with protecting Ace but his independent, entrepreneurial (shall we call them?) aspirations lead him to attempt to overtake what he realizes is a frontier for organized crime to brutalize and exploit the characters of “the street” (pimps, players, addicts, dealers, and prostitutes) and the owners of small private businesses.
Nicky is reckless, “when i plant my flag out here you won’t need your [casino/gaming] license” Nicky thinks he, and Ace, can bypass the regulations and bureaucratic legal measures by sheer force of violence alone. But ultimately Nicky is shortsighted and doesn’t have a real attachment to the success of the casino. After all, he isn’t getting profits from it (or much anyway) and isn’t permitted to play a real, active role in its daily functions because of his belligerent, untamed personality. Nicky has no buy-in that would motivate him to follow the rules or to work within the legal parts of the economy, it’s not the game he knows how to play, and win. All that he is loyal to, or deferent too, is the bosses back home; for whom he maintains absolute, uncompromising loyalty to, but still holds intense spite for.
And now to the more compelling element of the narrative. Sam “Ace” Rothstein is positioned as remarkably intelligent, he makes informed decisions that aid in his skill as a gambler, he can read people to determine whether he’s being conned, he has an attention to detail—aided by the casino’s surveillance apparatus which monitors cheating—that is almost unbelievable. Ace knows when he’s being cheated, he knows how to rig the game so that the house always wins, enacting psychological warfare to break down the confidence of would be proficient gamblers, who could threaten Tangiers’ bottom line. But in the end, the greatest gamble Ace makes is his marriage to Ginger. Ginger is the seductive, charismatic, and flirtatious madame who makes her money with tricks and her sexual power. Ginger works as a prostitute, seducing men, and extracting everything she can, almost as a sort of sexual-financial vampirism.
Ginger is the bad bet Ace can’t stop making even when she destroys his life, her own, and puts their daughter Amy in harm’s way. Ginger is the gamble Ace made wrong, but he keeps going back to her every time, trying to rationalize how she might change and be different the next time. Ace is not a victim to Ginger’s antics. Ginger makes it clear who she is: an addict, alcoholic, manic shopaholic who will use all of her powers to extract everything she can from everyone around her. She uses everyone to her advantage and manipulates men with her sexual power in exchange for their money and protection. Ginger had a price for her hand in marriage: $1 million in cash and $1 million worth of jewelry that are left to her and her alone as a sort of emergency fund.
Ace’s numerous attempts to buy Ginger’s love—and the clear fact that no matter how expensive the fur coat and how grand the mansion, none of it would ever be enough to satisfy her—mirrored Jordan Belfort’s relationship with Naomi in The Wolf of Wall Street. Both relationships carried the same manic volatility and conflict over child custody was found in both films, with the roles reversed in the respective films. Ginger may be irredeemable and a pathological liar, but Ace can’t claim that she wasn’t clear with him; when he asked her to marry him, Ginger said she didn’t love Ace. Ace replied that love could be “developed” but required a foundation of trust to develop. That trust was never there to begin with. The love was doomed from the start to destroy the two of them; two addicts, two gamblers, lying on a daily basis to one another and themselves about reality to justify their respective existences, the marriage, and Ace’s livelihood. And as Ginger pointed out, “I should have never married him. He’s a gemini, a triple gemini … a snake” Maybe astrology has some truth to it after all.
Now I’m not licensed (but hey neither was Ace, and he ran a casino empire!), but Ginger has the inklings of a borderline personality: her manic depression, narcissism, drug and alcohol abuse, and constant begging for forgiveness all seem indications of a larger psychological disorder at play. In the end, Ginger runs away with all the money Ace left her and finds her people in Los Angeles, the pimps, whores, and addicts she fits in with, in turn exploit and kill her for 3 grand in mint coins by giving her a ‘hot’ dose.
Overall, Casino is an incredible cinematic experience. I highly recommend watching this and seeing it as part of Scorsese's anthology of commentary on our economic system and its human victims. I’d argue that Casino, Wolf of Wall Street, and The Irishman all fit together nicely into a trilogy of the Scorsesean history of finance and corruption from the 70s to the 90s.
————-
EDIT 2: TL;DR —
Casino is a story of sexual and financial intrigue, mob violence, union pension fund embezzlement, a “love” story, and the protagonist's masochist addiction to the pain and chaos his lover inflicts on him. It turns out that the sharp-minded genius who meticulously runs the casino, is no more rational than the gamblers who routinely frequent the casino, coming back to lose their money and hoping that the odds will magically shift in their favor.

throwaway, also on mobile if that matters
I (16F), got a job a few months ago. It's been nice having extra money, and as of right now it's all mine because I don't have any bills or responsibilities. I am also starting to save for a car.
My mom (37y.o) has never been the saving type, lives paycheck to paycheck and uses credit cards instead of a savings account. She isn't a gambling addict but, any extra money she has goes to the casino. She also frequently borrows hundreds at a time from my grandmother to throw in a slot machine.
I highly disagree with this lifestyle and want more financial security in my life when I get older. If there's ever an emergency, my mom either has to use her nearly maxed out credit cards or borrow money from my grandma which only causes more stress and debt. [One of her biggest stressors is her car, for some reason she has the worst luck and has to put a few hundred into it every few months, which she uses her credit card for.]
Whenever I comment on it she says it's her money and I have no right to be in her business because her bills are paid on time and there's food on the table, so after a while I left it alone.
My problem started a while ago when she low-key asked me to borrow money to go to the casino. I laughed it off and said no, but I've had a bad feeling ever since. The other day she asked if I'd let her borrow a few hundred if something happened to her car, and I said yes but I really don't like the idea.
I don't want her to start borrowing money from me like she does my grandma, I don't want her financial irresponsibility to be my problem, especially as I enter adulthood. She could easily have a savings account but chooses not to. I also don't want to borrow money from her ever because I hope to plan my finances in a way that provides stability and backup plans that don't include other people. On the other hand though, she has provided everything I've needed and plenty more throughout my life. I can't tell if I'm just being a selfish, entitled daughter.
So I guess my question would be, is this sort of money-borrowing relationship something that should be expected as I start having an income? And would I be the asshole for cutting her off from my income entirely?
sorry if I rambled alot, im not the best at summarizing
Edits: I'd like to clarify because I might've given her too bad of a rep, she would never steal my money. If I borrowed her money she'd give it back at tax time. (which would maybe be okay now, in December, but say she tries this stuff in march or something- I am really not comfortable waiting a whole year) That being said though, since she's more comfortable with my grandma, she'll try to persuade my grandma to let her keep some of the money instead of having to pay it back, and my grandma lets her sometimes. And I don't want her to expect that sort of treatment from me, ever. At the same time though she's poured thousands into me over my lifetime so maybe giving her a few hundred wouldn't be the worst... I don't know
Edit 2: I see alot of people saying if she really NEEDS the money, I should give it to her. But my thing is- she always would've had the money, she just allotted it poorly and is now in a bad situation. It's not like she doesn't make enough for the things she needs, she just chooses to spend her money elsewhere so idk. Does that still count? like I feel like maybe I'd be more open to helping her out of bad situations if she actually attempted to change her lifestyle but it seems like money down the drain when I know she's just gonna do it again. She's a very stubborn lady haha
edit 3: oh my god everyone is calling my mother an addict. I dunno how to feel about that. maybe here ill provide some more specific numbers because maybe you guys are picturing something worse. I'll let you decide
so before covid, she'd go to bingo (lmao bingo) around twice a week. Each session costs $100-200 and atleast part of it each time would be borrowed from my grandma I think. every year when she gets her tax returns she pays off some of her bills and uses pretty much the rest for slots, which is more expensive (she'd reasonably spend $2k on it probably, whether all at once or not) since covid only slots are open so when she can borrow money from my g-ma she will go with her.
I think my grandma likes this system because she doesn't get that much taxes back anymore, but now she gets a big wad of cash from her daughter (probably around $3k?)
I dunno I might've overexaggerated it in my original statement. It's probably self destructive because she doesn't have the money for it, but Im not so sure it's gambling addict behavior. You would think addicts would spend more and go more often. she hasnt been going as much since covid but she still spends money she doesn't have on it. very on the fence about it right now I guess :/

I was asked to make a post about some stories within the Casino grounds so I thought I'd share. I have many so I'll do my best to pick the better ones.
Some back information: I've been a Casino Dealer for 11 years, I've been a supervisor for five years, and I've been a Surveillance Operator for one year. I've worked at three properties, none of which are connected or owned by the same company. I've worked on : Government/Private/Native American owned casinos.

1. From Hero to Zero.

At my first Casino, I was one of the first group of people who were trained to deal Roulette . After 4 weeks of working 6PM-3AM then doing roulette training from 3AM-8AM (Not paid) , I actually really enjoyed the game and after about six months I became extremely quick at the number game and the pace of the action was steady with very low margin of errors. Young man walks in, cashes in for $500. He buys in for $2 chips and just loads the board. After a few spins and pretty decent hits, he then changes his chips from $2 to 5$ then to $10 and racks his winnings up to $10,000. It was then, five spins in a row, he loaded the board with some pretty gross bets, and every spin I would hit the ONE number with either NO CHIPS on it, or maybe 1 chip , He lost all $10,000 in a matter of minutes. He leaves , and I go on break. After my break I was going back to the same table and wouldn't you know it, the same young man walks in and cashes in another $500. He tells me he just sold his car outside and this is all that he had left. So we do the same deal, buys in for $2 chips, then slowly starts betting $5 chips, $10, $25...and he makes $10,000 AGAIN. Within the next 25 minutes it was straight agony. Every spin, same thing, he would bet $2500 in chips, and win only $250, $400, and after about a half hour he lost it all . Never saw the guy again.
2) Man down
At this property, we are 24 hours for table games. It's currently 5AM , and I'm dealing some $25 Blackjack to this guy. He's probably early thirties , heavy guy. He's sober as can be, but right away I can tell he's been losing. We know how much you've bought in for, how much your down, or up, and I could see he was down $2000+. After about twenty minutes of pure losing, his temper starts to flare.At this point I now have two other guests at my table. Drinking coffee, not saying a word, just losing their money. After losing hand, after hand, this guy looks me straight in the eye, seized up, starts shaking, he can't move. He tries to punch towards me and smashes his stack of chips all over the place and falls backwards to the floor. I call for security, we cannot touch him due to liability . I can't move from my table because, well, liability / casino cash property, all I can do is try to talk to him. As I'm doing so, these other two woman who are sitting at my table just look at me and one says "OK, dealer, cmon lets go " as she taps the table telling me to start dealing and forget about the guy having a stroke on the floor. As security takes him to the ambulance out front, I had to stay behind for a couple minutes and give a statement. I go on break. I come back, and 45 minutes later, he comes right back in with a oxygen tank and keeps gambling for the remainder of the morning.
3) You get a dildo, and YOU get a dildo!
On a late summer Saturday night, we had a large event for these massive muscle guys/strongman competition type thing. After their show, I'm at the roulette table , and five of these boys come over to play. They were absolutely hilarious. They were feeling pretty good, cashed in somewhat large amounts and I could tell this was going to be a fun time. After about a hour of dealing to these guys, it's almost midnight, everybody is pretty hammered , I spin the ball, and all five of these guys take out these god damn (what I can only tell was) two feet purple dildos from inside their pants, and wiping them around in the air. The ladies were just loving it, one of the dildos landed in the roulette wheel and we had to shut the table down to re-calibrate the wheel to make sure nothing had been changed. I just remember that night was so much damn fun, I couldn't believe what I was seeing and I would never forget it.
4) Full Moon
On this day, I was actually training dealers / supervising them on small games like Three Card poker. We opened the table at 10AM, and this older man came and sat down . He played all day. The jackpot was $21,000 and that was pretty high for this table. He played, and played and played. He's one of the players where you know he's wearing a diaper because he's been drinking coffee/pop all day and hasn't moved in eight hours. As the day went on, this man never moved from his chair. Getting closer to midnight, he was aggravated and said "I need to go have a smoke, I'm getting killed in here". He left, and the very next hand, the lady beside him was dealt the jackpot . He didn't say much, but you could just tell he just hated life at that very moment because had he not gotten up, it would of been his hand. The man calmly took his cane , his hat, jacket, coffee, and left. The next morning I found out when he did leave he drove his car straight through his bank and was arrested.
5) Slick Robber
I actually give props to people who can actually pull this off. This story may confuse you so I'll try and explain things as best as possible. A lot of casinos have machines as soon as you walk through the front doors. A man walks up to one of these machines and sticks in HIS $100 bill. He doesn't gamble it, instead he hits the cash out button and gets a $100 TITO ticket where he then takes the ticket to the ATM machine to get his $100. Now remember, his Original $100 is in the slot machine. He then takes the $100 from the ATM and goes back to the same machine, and repeats this process over a hundred times. Essentially he's taking money from the ATM, and loading up the Slot Machine . Now he knows he can't do it too much because if the slot machine gets full of money, the machine will shut down and the slow attendant will have to take all the cash out. So he deposits over $10,000 , then has a small crowbar, he cracks the machine open and makes a run out the front door. To my knowledge he was never caught . But damn, that was pretty smart .
EDIT:
6) Mental Health is a thing.
10PM man walks in to play some high limit BlackJack. This guy knows the game and played well. Dressed nice, drank juice/tea , a little bit of a attitude, cashed in over $10,000. When this man was half way down his buy in, he said something a long the lines of "If I don't win here tonight, I'm going to go set myself on fire." I wasn't sure if he was serious because when people are down, they tend to say a lot of nonsense. I actually left early that night, and from a third party was told he did exactly that in the parking lot. The next day it was clear something terrible had gone wrong in the parking lot .
EDIT:
7) Nothing good happens after midnight
After a busy Saturday night, I was dealing a mix of games, and during this story I was in the middle of Blackjack. I had one young kid (probably 19) sitting in the middle, one older male probably in his later 40's sitting beside him on his right, and I had a really nice couple in their 20's sitting together at the other side. This young kid wasn't playing just sort of watching, and ever time the old man won he would give this young guy some of his winnings. The older man, was a wine drinker, and he had black between all of his teeth, I'll never forget. He's a little drunk but nothing terrible. As the night goes on, the older man goes and uses the washroom, at which point the couple asked the young guy "Oh was that your dad?" and the young guy says "Hah, no I wish!". The couple and I just looked at each other. This old guy, was in complete control over this kid. Absolutely disgusting. The night ends, and I find out the couple called a few of their friends, and they all waited outside by this old mans truck and beat the living hell out of him. 40 years old, sleeping with a 19 year old, completely brain washed . Very weird.
8) That one co-worker where you just wish they would quit.
One of our co-workers, nice guy but had a very big ego and we as employees just sorta left him alone. One day he had enough of the atmosphere and quit. Now usually when you quit, you cannot come back until you paperwork is finalized. How ever, HR was in that day, and he was given the paperwork the very next day. He came in, cashed in $1000, and made $50,000 in about a hour at the Baccarat table. My manager, was extremely annoyed, because now this guy is just mocking the casino and having the time of his life (Thanks for the big tip by the way :) ) and so he decides to call it quits. He wants to ban himself and he wants $50,000 in cash. The casino says Nope, we are going to give you a cheque. Now here's the thing, most business people will take the cheque, how ever you CANT CASH the cheque until the following monday because it's on that day where the funds are available. The casino on the other hand will cash their own check in anytime , because they want you to play. So this guy pretty much said go to hell I want my cash, and he called the police. Police show up, and management promptly gave him the cash.I though it was absolutely hilarious .
​
9) No good deed goes un punished
I was dealing Three Card Poker, and the jackpot was around $17,000. This old man (a regular) was sitting there all day grinding it out. Super nice guy, always a pleasure to deal to. Well, after hours of playing, he stands up and says "Hey john!, can you come here for a minute?" so his buddy John comes over. He says to John "I need to go take a piss real quick, can you play my card until I get back?" John agrees . John takes the chips and I stop him and explain he can't play his friends chips, he needs to cash in and play his own. And he does. Welp, second hand out and bam, doesn't he win it. The old man comes back and is so happy, he can't believe it. John, took his $17,000, didn't say a word to his "buddy" and walked away. I never felt so much hatred in all my life. Didn't give him a dollar, not a thank you, nothing. The old man sits back down again, the progressive resets to $2500, and he sat there grinding away again.
10) The Top Knot
I had this player , young guy, who was born into a fortune. One of his relatives passed away and left him a pretty big sizable amount of money, so he played poker every single day for the rest of his days. I will add, he IS a good player. I did not enjoy his company just because of the "Know-it-All" attitude, but he was good. We'll call him John. John is 5'10, and well build, with muscle. John also decided today was the day to show off his Top Knot. (google top knot if you're not sure what I mean) So he sits down, and he's absolutely KILLING the table. Every hand, after hand, after hand. And because he's in such a good mood, he's playing any two cards, calling any $500 bet, and he's just dominating. This one guy at the table decided he had enough. He got up, without saying a word and left. A moment later, he comes back in, walks behind John, and takes a pair of scissors , and cuts off his Top Knot. I for one couldn't believe it, dying laughing inside, and it just turned into one big brawl. That was a good day.
11) That one bad seed
One of my best friends who I haven't seen in YEARS ended up being part of the crew. Was kind of nice to catch up. We never really got along as we grew up because he has a very high picture of himself . He wanted that 10/10 woman. A mansion, and a new Corvette. So every month or so we would all go up to the other casino to play. I myself would bring no more than $500, but I couldn't understand how this guy (we'll call him Kyle) was spending THOUSANDS of dollars at the tables. So this wen on for a few months. Well, one day, as we're closing the casino, he and I are in the High Limit room and we're getting ready to close the tables. We are told to take the chips out, count them, put them back, sign this piece of paper and that's it. Well as the supervisor was locking the tray, the piece of paper fell to the floor, so she asked Kyle to grab the piece of paper. As he bends over, a great big $500 chip falls right out of his sock. Kyle was fired immediately , but it all made sense. They offered Kyle a deal where if he replaced all the stolen chips they would not make it public. Not sure how that turned out.
12) If I ever decide to write a book, this will be the last chapter: <3
After working at my first Casino for five years, I met a Indian woman who was visiting from another part of the country. During this time I was explaining a game to her, which honestly I don't think she even cared. She explained she was visiting and sight seeing , and that was that.Well, two years later I ended up moving to the other side of the country and transferred casinos, and low and behold she worked there as a Dealer. We got married , and it's been 5 years.
13) The Tip
One of our tables that we've had for a couple years had a progressive jackpot that had reached $100,000. The dealer at the table was sitting pretty lonely. Nobody really played the game because people knew it was extremely difficult to win the jackpot. My memory is a tad foggy, but you somehow needed to flop the royal flush. This young guy sits down and says to the dealer, we'll call him John. "John, if you pay me that jackpot, I will tip you $10,000" Well John started dealing, and about a half hour into his shift, he F*cking did it. He dealt him the royal. And you know something?This young lad, kept his word, and he made sure there was a audience, and he tipped exactly $10,000. That was a moment right there. That pay cheque was real nice. I think we all got about $500 more than usual. The moment that jackpot was awarded they got rid of the table because the money it was making was not near what the casino wanted. I'm sure there have been bigger tips at other casinos, but that was something special .
14) The Lawsuit
Now this story I'm going to have to beat around the bush a bit due to the nature of what happened. I can't won't answer any questions that you may have on this topic other than what I have to say because it had a lot of publicity . The waitresses at this casino had to wear very thin sexy clothes. Not borderline legal, but it was noticed. One day they called all the waitresses to come in and explained they were changing their outfit to something even more sexier. Now these new dresses were very very borderline legal . The staff said No way. We're not wearing that.So , friday night comes, and the staff work their whole shift, then at the end of their shift were called into a meeting and were all fired. Welp, one of those ladies father was a pretty big time lawyer. Brough the casino to court and won. They won big. Good for them. We had no waitresses for a couple days haha.
Thanks for reading along, I have many more I can add as the day goes on, those were just some off the top of my head. Feel free to ask any questions of the Casino industry. I don't really have many stories about the surveillance department because that's the one area where I can't really say a whole lot due to its privacy and contracts I was and still am under.

In this strategy based article I will focus on the universal appeal of FPL, how to improve from a beginneintermediate level player into a mini-league demi-god, and mini-league specific tactics.
Introduction
During this protracted DGW19 I find myself pondering the great imponderable - what is so universally appealing about Fantasy Premier League?
Firstly, there’s the league itself. I grew up watching English football as a boy in the 1980's when football & life itself was much simpler. Black & white TV, squads of home-grown players, and not a pair of neon boots in sight. Nowadays, the world’s best players ply their trade in the English top-flight with all the accompanying razzmatazz, glitz & glamour. The Premier League is now very much an international product with industry analyst’s estimating a cumulative global audience reach of over 3 billion views per season.
Secondly, the FPL game has such a simplistic format - squad of 15, pick 11 starters, select a captain, organise the bench order, and your team is locked & loaded. The addition of chips (Free Hit, Bench Boost, & Triple Captain) has added an extra layer of variance to the game. When deployed in a double gameweek some addictively huge swingy point totals can be achieved akin to a super mega jackpot from FPL’s very own slot machine.
What’s The Hook?
As we finalise our team before each new season we dare to dream. Many have tried to take down the main event but given the miniscule chances of besting approximately 7 million participants very few succeed. A commonly held marker for success is an overall rank inside the top ten thousand with many of the game’s best players measuring success by a cumulative of low OR numbers from their career track record. However, the number achieving the loftiest of ranks is a mere drop in the ocean compared to the overall number of players actively engaging in the game. So what’s the hook? For me the universal appeal is simple - the watercooler moment. In both physical and virtual places across the world mini-league competitors either congratulate or jibe each other over their respective fantasy exploits from that weekend. Many of these leagues will have a dominant player, the fantasy guy or girl, who lifts the trophy season after season. Below I will talk about tips & mini-league specific tactics aimed at giving you the competitive advantage and turning both beginneintermediate level players into mini-league monsters.
Team Structure
A solid foundation & good team structure is a fundamental aspect of FPL. Historically, in order to squeeze as much positive value from my squad & facilitate a maximum number of big hitting options I would not have spent much of my budget on the bench.
However, as FPL managers it is important not to be too rigid in the beliefs you hold to be true. Due to current environmental uncertainty and Covid match postponements having squad depth is definitely more desirable this season than previously. As such it is important to trawl the league for cheap bench options that ideally start for their clubs.
One additional, and often understated, benefit of having a spread of cash on the bench is that better players have greater potential of steadily rising in value something compared with non-playing bench fodder. For example this season I reacted to the external Covid risk and bought Soucek as my 8th attacker in GW12 for £4.9m and he is now priced at £5.3m.
Furthermore, whilst in bygone season's I have aggressively traded to enhance my team value this is as practice I have forgone this year. Leave the transfers as late as possible because the information advantage is greater than a few £0.1m's.
Bread Knife to a Gun Fight?
It is important to go into battle with the right tools and for me paying membership to Fantasy Football Hub the last few season's has been very much an investment. Different players take different approaches to FPL and, whilst I watch a ridiculous amount of games, I am very much a stats man.
For me a large part of forecasting future FPL returns revolves around the analysis of underlying numbers from recent matches across a range of common metrics such as: shots, shots on target, big chances, touches in the box, big chances received, and big chance creation. Furthermore, analysing favourable & difficult fixture runs for teams is essential in-order to future-proof your squad for the weeks ahead.
Rather than just consulting a fixture ticker I think it is important for us as FPL manager’s to think how exactly certain games will play out – will it be tight game or potentially very high scoring? Successfully reading fixtures and approaching them aggressively with a double up in attack or defence can be just the tonic needed to shoot you up your mini-league.
Moreover, assessing future fixture strength will give you an idea who the most popular captaincy options will be for the weeks ahead. Such knowledge can help you plan accordingly to defend against a highly owned premium with a plum fixture or attack by doubling down on a big hitter that rivals do not own by giving them the armband. Generally I always like to have the top two players in a captaincy poll for any given gameweek by way of insurance.
Navigating Blank & Double Gameweeks & Chip Strategy
A former school teacher of mine used to preach that, “Proper Preparation Prevents Poor Performance”. This turn of phrase rings especially true when navigating both blank & double gameweeks in FPL.
Add the guru of FPL schedule forecasting @BenCrellin to gain competitive advantage in your mini-league. Whilst the unprepared and ill-informed may deploy chips early the additional information you garner may see you successfully muddle through blank gameweeks and set up a grandstand finish which will take your rivals by surprise and the mini-league title down.
Furthermore, Ben’s highly detailed spreadsheet can help you make an informed decision about when might be best to deploy your chips by forecasting possible strength of DGW fixtures both near and far.
Analyse Yourself & Opponents Teams
There are a number of free FPL utilities and one of my absolute favourites is FPL Statistico. Simply key in your team ID and it will produce a highly detailed breakdown of your team’s performance this season.
You can see which player has done the business for you when given the captains armband and which budget option is dragging down the defensive average in your rotation.
Furthermore, entering the team ID of a fierce mini-league rival might quickly reveal that they have a preference for a certain player as insta-captain and become an angle that you can gain an edge from.
Big Hitting Mini-League Differentials
An exercise I like to conduct is to analyse the top five teams in my mini-league and establish a list of common owned players. I take this exercise to excel (although pen & paper is good too!) and use popular fantasy utilities such as Anewpla’s live league viewer to see all relevant squads quickly.
From this base of common players I would aim to differentiate the other positions in my squad for the weeks ahead. A common misconception amongst chasing players is that they have to reinvent the wheel with the most obscure of picks when sometimes a very high profile player can be differential in your mini-league. You just have to do some ground work to discover who!
For those that have read, thank you. Hopefully you can put some of the tips from the thread into action and see positive results in your mini-leagues.
If you’d like to join @FFH_HQ you can get 15% off with this link:
https://fantasyfootballhub.co.uk/Hibbert/67
If you like the content drop me a retweet. If you aren’t a follower of mine click “follow” and keep an eye for more articles in the near future. Peace & good luck.

EDIT - one week after i posted this, Britain's most successful hedge fund manager Michael Platt has taken a 6.5% stake
tl;dr
At-NAV new SPAC with world-leading expertise in online gambling. Worth a bet on potential to be next DKNG on the hype train
   
+++++++
Hi all - have had a lot of great tips from this sub. Hopefully this pays some of you back. I have been watching and researching this since 23 December when it first filed S1, awaiting the units to be listed - they are available today trading as ADERU
Positions - 500 units @ 10.42 to start. Will be monitoring and building position below $15, especially if attention starts to build ahead of units and warrants splitting and shares coming available to Robinhood.
(My other SPAC positions are OPEN, IPO-E-F, PSTH, FUSE, PIPP, ACTC, CCIV and DMYD, 100 to 1000 shares each mostly around NAV and numerous warrants and options around these.)
As ever, this is not investment advice and do your own research
+++++++
   
26 Capital Acquisition Corp or ADER
is a 240m SPAC with usual terms - 10$ units, 1/2 warrants. Seeking a merger in "gaming and gaming technology, branded consumer, lodging and entertainment, and Internet commerce sectors".
I think this is highly worth a play on the online gambling hype if you can get in at near NAV, based entirely on the management which is unbeatable in its knowledge of the gambling industry
   
CEO Jason Ader
has held director level positions at Las Vegas Sands Corp. ($42bn one of biggest casino groups in world), IGT (£3.72bn multinational gambling firm specialised in software and slot machines) and Playtech (£1.4bn multinational gambling software firm)
Before starting his own fund in 2013 he was regularly ranked Wall Street's top analyst on the gambling and leisure sector
His fund, Spring Owl Capital, is a small activist fund focused on gambling and leisure. They are probably most famous for ousting the CEO of Viacom in 2016 and a crusade against Yahoo CEO Marissa Meyer in 2015.
Ader knows the gambling - and online gambling - industry inside out. He drove bWin to a £1.1bn takeover by gambling giant GVC (now Entain) in 2016, and has been driving similar change and demands for improvement at board level at Playtech
The fund mostly manages money for a select group of wealthy families, which could be a positive sign for the SPAC (although I don't know how much skin in the SPAC the fund has, if any)
Here is a video of Ader from November talking about how he's excited about SPACs. He talks about how he has been advising certain States about legalising sports betting and how to maximise value and liquidity by linking up with European companies in the space (Playtech e.g.??).
Ader is extremely bullish on US legalising online casino and more sports betting options, accelerated by need for revenue because of pandemic
   
Rafi Ashkenazi
One of the most highly respected names in the online gambling world, including COO and CEO positions at major online gambling firms such as Playtech and Stars Group (a world leader in online poker and casino). At Stars he led the $4.7bn takeover of Sky Betting to create the world's largest publicly listed online betting firm in 2018. Most recently he led the £10bn merger between Flutter (biggest gambling company in world by revenue, market cap £26bn), and Stars Group (Ader also involved). Also has connections into the booming Israel tech space which is interesting
   
Joseph Kaminkow
Special Advisor to the Chief Product Officer at Aristocrat, a leading gambling software provider and games publisher, previously Vice President of Game Design at Zynga Inc. This guy is a former video game / pinball designer who is credited with revolutionising the slots industry after moving into gambling software from video games in 1999. Regarded as a "legend" and "hall of famer" in this niche. At Zynga he designed so-called 'social casino games' which don't involve real-money gambling but are otherwise basically gambling apps (revenue from microtransactions etc). 130 patents on gambling/gaming design inventions
   
Greg Lyss
This is a very interesting but extremely low profile person. He was Bill Ackman a.k.a SPACman's right hand man at Gotham Capital. Ackman respected him so much that when Ackman set up a personal hedge fund to invest the Ackman family's money, he put Lyss in charge of it. To repeat - Bill Ackman thinks this guy is such a good investor and trustworthy that he put him in charge of investing his family's money. Don't know anything more about him, but I like this association with Ackman, which suggests to me some integrity around management of this SPAC, especially as the gambling world can be very murky.
The other member of the team is the CFO of SpringOwl with 20+ years' hedge fund experience and not notable (although clearly competent)
   
Thesis / potential targets
Based on the above experience and many public comments by Ader over the past year, I would be very surprised if ADER is not looking to merge with an online gambling technology provider / existing online betting website / social casino app / possibly a supporting technology provider
They are activist inventors, and specifically say in the IPO prospectus that they could look for businesses that can benefit from turnaround or are not being run well. I speculate that their deep knowledge of the European / global online gambling industry means they have a target in mind that they think would benefit from their expertise and US liberalisation of gambling legislation.
   
1) Ader believes the listing of UK-listed gambling companies in US is immediately big in terms of market cap because of the premium on online gambling stocks in US. He has pitched DraftKings to takeover Playtech and called on Playtech to spin off non-core business. This makes me wonder if he would spin off some element of Playtech to list in US to cash in on gambling hype.
This might be Finalto.com / TradeTech which is an online financial platform owned by Playtech. Playtech has been trying to sell this for 200 - 240m since August so it fits. This company provides liquidity and trading to brokerages and runs markets.com a trading site. I wouldn't be that excited although apparently the business has been booming during COVID and there could be a decent pop just on fintech hype.
   
2) This could be a 'picks and shovel' type data/B2B betting software play a la DMYD, or something like e.g. Israel based CRM software Optimove which works with some of biggest online gambling cos and has links to Ashkenazi. This would be interesting but probably not a huge pop
   
3) Possibly - given Ader's links to Sands - an online gambling tie-up with one of the big Vegas casinos who are desperate to get into the online betting space (see MGM's attempt to buy Entain for $8bn last week). Interestingly, Sands' owner Sheldon Adelson, previously a major opponent of online betting, has just died. Ader predicted a few months ago that Sands would be moving in this direction.

“There’s no stopping online gaming,” Ader said [before Adelson's death]. “(Las Vegas Sands’) initiatives to stop online gaming, at this stage, are largely historic. There hasn’t been a lot of spending recently to do that, especially post-pandemic.”
“I think the company will see the value created by DraftKings and FanDuel and Penn (National) Gaming and others. They’re not foolish,” Ader added. source

   
4) Ader is very confident that Macau will legalise online gambling in next year or two. Sands is big in Macau, the biggest gambling market in the world. A SaaS-type product positioned to capitalise on Asian gambling would be MASSIVE - at present however, China's attitude to gambling and local regulations mean this is unlikely
   
5) I also wonder if they might try to take legitimate one of the offshore bookmakers with big customer databases and brand recognition but which have been grey-area/illegal under US gaming legislation. For example, Five Dimes recently announced a settlement with the FBI to attempt to transition into newly legalised US markets. This might have the most hype potential
   
Potential upside
This is entirely a play on management experience and the meme factor / hype around online gambling in the US. I think if they pick a good target - which given their experience and connections seems likely - and get the right publicity and attention from retail investors looking for the next DKNG this could easily 3x and maybe 5-6x if on DKNG-type hype levels.
There is currently little spotlight on this and it is a good time to get in at NAV
   
Potential Downside

• Ader has been vocal that he thinks US online betting is overvalued and in a bubble - why is he starting his own SPAC in the space then? Does he just want to cash in while the hype is at all-time high or does he have a legitimate business goal?
  
• If he just wants to dump a part of Playtech which he does not like onto retail investors, this is a bad deal.
  
• Other targets could be e.g. hotel industry or other leisure sector which would be zero sexiness to retail. Given Ashkenazi and Kaminkow's background this seems unlikely though
  
• Usual SPAC caveats apply about potential difficulty finding a target, locking up your money for unspecified period of time, and the fact I may have completely misread the potential and my above thesis might be totally wrong
  

Wall of text warning... I posted the other day and have had many good discussions about how Doge works in the real world. I thought it would be interesting to talk to other small business owners that are or are considering implementing doge into their small businesses. Seriously though don't base any business decisions on something some dude from the internet said. Only you know whats best and feasible for your own businesses. I am not here to offer financial advise only to show some insight into how it was put into place in my business and my decision making process.
​
I have been involved in cryptos for about 3 years. I was serving and my manager at the time was pushing me hard about buying some TRX. So I did some research and hit a NANO/XRP/XLM pop and I was off to the races. I lost and gained and mostly lost but I was viewing the market as a slot machine. Bet on X and hope it hits. Bet on Y and hope it hits. Depending on your bets and what hits it can lull you into thinking you are a genius/idiot. I finally realized its not about quick money but is a long term investment and changed my strategy accordingly. After that I saw some modest gains. I also stopped trying to catch falling knives which helped alot. I had to cash out to help get me to where I am but I'm good with the trade off. I say all that to let you know that you need to, at the very least, know how to navigate the crypto marketplace. Just as in every decision you make for your business you need to have a basic knowledge of anything you are integrating into your business. That is the only reason I was able to throw it together so quickly.
Full disclosure I do have a small holding in Doge that has returned a nice profit and I personally would love to see it hit the moon. However I try to set aside those biases when making business related decisions.
I own a small business. I employ 7 people. I make food and as of last week I accept Dogecoin as payment for my goods. I know that Doge is a very controversial topic right now. Depending on who you are talking to it could be the best or worst thing in the world. Those things are fun to talk about but don't provide any help when making choices that have real world ramifications in regards to my income. That is why I wanted to talk about this. As a business owner it is hard to find information about doge that isn't memes or people bashing it. Below is my reasoning and I hope we can have a conversation about the pros and cons of doge in real world applications. I will never be too old to learn and I know many of you have much more knowledge about this topic than I do and I would love to hear it.
​

1. The biggest reasoning behind doing this is cost of entry. It literally cost me nothing. (Before you start yelling about capital gains wait till the end and I will address that.) I didn't have to buy any equipment to accept it. I don't have processing fees aside from transfer costs which compared to credit card fees are a non factor. And I have no large companies I have to setup accounts with or sign long term contracts. I was able to throw together a way to accept payment with a basic knowledge of the crypto market. That's it. If I never do a single transaction in doge I will be out zero dollars just to offer it.
2. Risk. I know it is risky to accept doge as a payment method but being in the food service industry is much riskier than that. For real, anyone that understands the margins in this industry knows its teetering on a cliff at all times. That being said there is inherent risk in everything and every situation needs to be judged on its own merits. In my situation the risk is very minimal. Even if doge drops to pre-pump levels I could at least recoup my food costs. Regardless of the USD price of doge that will not change the USD amount I will receive in doge per transaction. If today a pizza cost 200 doge and tomorrow it cost 500 then at the time of purchase I am receiving the same USD equivalent at the time of purchase. Which I can then take (weekly, daily, or even every transaction) and after a couple clicks I have those funds in a more stable currency like USD or even Tether. I know capital gains and all of the taxes involved could eat into profits. Yes that is true but even in the most aggressive models I imagine I will do sub 1% gross sales in doge in the near future. At this point I'm willing to accept the loss of profit but that may need to be reevaluated in the future.
3. It is so much more accessible than bitcoin. Coming from someone that deals with a demographic that is very under educated in regards to crypto, bitcoin can be intimidating. It's scary for beginners to jump into something that they will probably never amass one of. When talking about small retail purchases bitcoin is simply too out of scale. If real world implementation is what crypto is going for IN MY OPINION any coin valued over $500 will make most of the general public very hesitant to use in their everyday life. If I accepted Bitcoin a pizza would cost around 0.00047btc. Anyone that is not knowledgeable about crypto looks at that very strangely. We are not accustomed to seeing anything greater than a hundredth of a decimal in regards to currency. The market cap being what it is for doge is a positive in my opinion. Would it be great if it went to $40000 per doge? Absolutely but it's counter productive to smaller retail purchases. It benefits smaller sized establishments for doge to be in levels we work in. Doge is the training wheels that will get people to a point of keeping non-investment funds in a crypto for day to day spending use. Which brings me to my final point.
4. It makes me smile. I am almost 32. I grew up with the internet as it grew up. I've watched as the internet meta went from one thing to another and eventually became integrated into the everyday lives of people young and old. I struggle with the constant pressures of everyday responsibility and general crap that comes with being an adult. I miss the days of not having to worry about bills and the future. When I had everything setup to accept doge it made me laugh like I was a kid again. It actually made me giggle. Like a uncontrollable giggle. It took me back to the days of calling a restaurant and asking for Semore Butts. It is in essence the most childish thing I can do in my professional life and I love it. Doge, to me, isn't about being over or under valued. It's about the meme. It's about bringing a little joy, not only back into my life, but into my professional life at that.

That is why I did it. It has been a long pandemic for every small business. I have struggled with mental and physical health from the constant worry. The day in day out monotony of will I be able to pay my bills. That is why I believe in doge. It is a way for everyone to collectively laugh together at the pure outrageousness that was 2020. Look around at everything that is happening. We live in a time that has a pandemic killing thousands daily, riots and civil unrest at every turn, and a world that is seemingly on fire everywhere we look. Who's to say I can't accept a meme right next to cash or credit? No offense to all of the technical analysis and DD everyone does but I think we can sometimes get too focused on the hard numbers and forget to include the human element of it. Doge is a way for everyone to connect and has a very easy barrier of entry to overcome. It doesn't have a specific industry or field application behind it. It's about Doing Only Good Everyday.
If you have made it this far I would love to hear your feedback and to have a discussion about crypto and real world application in general.
This is simply me telling you how I implemented Dogecoin into my current business with zero disruption and zero negatives. I'm not betting the house on doge. I'm not altering my business model or strategy. I'm not trying to become a billionaire. I'm just trying to have a little fun in a world that is not very fun right now.
​
And because I'm really excited about it. I already made my first sale with DOGE. u/NoGuts007 has donated 20 pizzas for my local healthcare workers. I'll be delivering them tomorrow. If nothing else comes from this at least I was able to do some good in this world as the result.