Just a warning i did not back out of my last match yesterday and I woke up to my last 10 resurgence matches (that i didn't play?) had a score/ damage of zero and over 50 total deaths bringing my kd from 2.2 to 1.9 .
Nice feature lol

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Sidenote: I will be paying about $4,000 for my study abroad trip starting in May and have no issue putting it on a credit card to earn points. It will be paid in installments through my community college, so I’m essentially paying tuition and will not actually be buying flights or hotel stays, etc.
I’ve already got 2 cards that give me cash back, and have grown accustomed to using them instead of my debit card for everything after lurking around on this subreddit and learning more about how credit works. I would love to be traveling more often, so I want my next card to be a card that allows me to be earning points towards travel no matter where I am spending the money, if possible.
As a 23yr old who graduated college last year, I feel behind when it comes to my credit score. Any tips to improve it would be appreciated. I don’t have any late payments, and I keep my usage below 15%. I can also increase my average monthly spend in the categories above by making my parents authorized users on the accounts, as they spend much more than me but don’t use credit cards.

So, Rank Match is coming to EN (in less than 12 hours as I’m writing this!). Maybe you’ve seen a few posts crop up on your twitter TL or randomly on this subreddit bringing up fear of cheaters. Maybe you haven’t and have only seen the ones saying “I’m no good, I’ll probably only languish in bronze” or something like that. But all the same, I think we need to treat with the topic.
Let’s talk about cheating. It’s rampant, and it needs to be recognized. It’s worth addressing. It’s worth keeping EN’s integrity as a server.
A little context, before I do: I'm a user from the community Sekai server (henceforth referred to as Sekaicord) linked on the sidebar. By habit, I am not a reddit user, and I apologize if this comes off too strong as a consequence. I understand this is a contentious topic, and I recognize that I might have perception bias if the only posts I see from here showcase the "worst" posts and not the actual "average" opinion on this — but, my impression is that, in general, this subreddit has a terrible track record when it comes to identifying cheaters, and an equally awful slate of defenses for their behavior. I'm writing this post not just to address some of these defenses, but also to open the conversation. The less we know about it, the less we can push the devs to take action on it. And likewise, the more we’re aware…
Some context for my viewpoints / experiences on the matter:
- I'm a Day 1 JP player, with 240+ Master FCs. I played EN from day 1 up until around Scramble, when the amount of external tiering drama got too much for me (and, if my handle on what happened during White Day is right, it hasn't gotten better). Level-wise, I’d be about Lv31-32 for FC skill and 26-28 AP-wise. Ask me for a handcam if you want. On Sekaicord I frequently talk to much better players — yes, even ones who can FC/AP 33+ songs (which are probably the most likely to get doubted). I asked a player with Lv34+ FCs (AMARA, 16bit, Intense Voice, Disappearance/END) to review this huge treatise before I wrote it out. I'm pretty confident as to their legitimacy and generally see some patterns that emerge as to why they are. I'll explain some of these here.
- I tend to give the benefit of the doubt to APs up to around Lv32 in the wild, but a lot of Lv33+ FCs tend to be more suspect for any number of reasons you can see from the co-op results screen.
- The atmosphere in Sekaicord around cheating is, as you can probably infer from my tone, highly distrusting. Cheaters are banned on sight once proof is established beyond doubt – so in fact, it surprises me that technically speaking, the rules on the subreddit’s sidebar don’t concretely penalize cheating!
But like many communities, it didn't start out like that. The dedicated gameplay channel was VERY happy to celebrate players' accomplishments (we used to have every 33+ FC pinned) and generally didn't ask for much proof — until Rank Match came on JP, and a player who we all thought was just insanely good got exposed (because JP caught and banned him). Here's the thing — he was a good player in his own right (i.e., Lv. 32+, but not good enough for the results he cheated), and the way he hid his results was much less blatant than some of the people later banned from the server for cheating, who… well, put in about as much effort as some of the cheaters that have been linked to me from here. This is how it goes for pretty much any community: break the established trust, and obviously nothing's the same afterward.
I will try to write this in such a way that it gives cheaters as few hints as possible on how to make their plays look more "legit"; I simply want to point out some of the common patterns that emerge when a cheater really is afoot (and which are never an issue for a legitimate player), and refute some of the more common defenses.
Another thing: yes, not everyone condescends to the level of some of these defenses I’ve written out. However, I’ve seen them appear enough in more or less these exact forms, unchallenged, that it’s worth quoting them in exactly the same way to give you an idea of what’s wrong with these viewpoints. This is not meant as a personal attack (moreso if you may have said something to these effects in the past); it’s simply an attack on the logic behind them.

DEFENSES:

(1) "Has it ever occurred to you that someone might just be that good? / Or maybe they're just that good?"
Statements like these are, to put it bluntly, passive-aggressive and condescending towards people who might have genuine grounds for suspicion. People weren't born yesterday; we're fully aware that people on the level of HPS, MaengZombie, nanoflower, REN, STK, SkisK… exist. (I've specifically excluded jack just because he's the low-hanging fruit and also to point out that if one’s only knowledge of a "good player" is jack, well… there’s a whole world out there).
But the reason people don't cast doubt on those players is because they have put in the effort to be deserving of that trust. Every one of the players I've mentioned has videographic evidence — YouTube, Twitter clips, the list goes on. They frequently compete to get world-first on APs, and they're well aware that if you do not have a video that shows your hands, your play means nothing. For example, tweets purporting to show world-firsts on Six Trillion Years and Overnight Story were, pretty much without exception, disregarded by JP players when the user was silent on the question of handcams.
(The first recognized AP of Six Trillion Years is from SkisK , at 1d 1h 19m after release.)
(A little aside: JP players can be pretty ruthless about cheaters. From the official JP Discord, I passed by this message of someone posting a Yaminabe AP tweet with no proof on release day and was (not) surprised to see a slew of X-to-doubt reactions -- and, as with the tweet above which I had to resort to Wayback Machine to show you, it was later deleted presumably after getting called out.)
I also want to be clear on this: this also means that a player you don't expect CAN come out of nowhere and stake their claim on an achievement, as long as they have the proof to back their claim up. Here's a good example: the maxed score on Arcaea's hardest chart, Testify BYD, was achieved by a player (005saikou) who otherwise wasn't known for any other world-firsts! And — you guessed it — he had an annotated video to back up his claim, commenting on which parts he thought was hardest, and other peculiarities of the chart.
There's a common counterargument to (1) that goes something like
(2) "Well, maybe some people just don't want to show their hands / dox themselves / don't know how to record / etc."
Let's do this point-by-point.
2a) "...don't know how to record / not everyone has a second phone or camera to record handcams with..."
The trial-and-error process required to reach the level of play we're talking about 99% demands the ability to record, review, and rewatch your play. Even if you're not going to post it, you almost certainly will have tried it at some point on the road to 33+ just for your own "where did I go wrong?" purposes.
This argument is also an insult to the intelligence of a player; recording ISN'T EVEN HARD. Recording is built-in on iOS. Recording on Android is as simple as typing "screen recorder app" into Google Play Store (or its equivalent, for Xiaomi and other no-Google builds) and downloading the first free option that doesn't have ads every 0.1 seconds. While screen recordings are less trustworthy than handcams because, well, you can’t see what the player is doing in order to get that result, they’re trustworthy enough in conjunction with players who, besides a recording, can talk about what, why, and how they do what they’re doing (more on this below).
As for handcams, please don't be intimidated by the fact that most well-known YouTubers have professional-looking, crisp 1080p setups: even a grainy 480p view is enough as long as it's clear you're not pretending to mash away while a bot automatically PERFECTs the 200BPM portions of Intense Voice. Google "handcam setups", or DIY one by cutting a slit at the top of a cardboard box and pointing a camera lens down while you play from the bottom (my preferred solution). I have seen players who record themselves using cheap $20 webcams not even clipped to anywhere stable, players who ask to borrow a family member’s phone or camera for a paltry five minutes… anything to be honest! For as many cheaters I’ve seen accused, I’ve also seen nearly as many people who put in the effort to be honest, which deserves a good mention.
Just about every case I know of someone who wasn't a cheater was willing to provide a handcam of some sort. It doesn't matter if they took 30 minutes, five hours, or three days — they came back and defended themselves. I've even seen it on the EN discord! The first instinct of a cheater, by contrast, is to either stay completely silent and let other people do the defending for them, or to get extremely defensive and use some of the many arguments here.
Incidentally, there are legitimate examples I know of of completely unknown players who pop up one day in Sekaicord with some godlike play, and the reason they were believed on the spot? Handcam.
2b) "...don't want to show their hands / dox themselves..."
I suppose nothing can be done about that, but on this point I'd like to point out that Sekai is hardly the first (and will not be the last) rhythm game community to have doubters. This is frankly small-time compared to osu! players doing this like it's a JOB. And that comes down to a fundamental truth about rhythm games: difficult skill-based achievements have always had value because people SHOW they can be done. Consequently, if there is no proof, there is no value; if you're willing to make an outrageous claim; you best be prepared to show some outrageous play, or risk it not being worth anything at all.
There are other ways to show you clearly did what you're claiming to that don't involve a handcam, mind you — but they involve knowing what you're talking about, describing the chart / your strategies in detail, and, well, generally a certain level of passion about the intricacies of the game that most cheaters don't really seem to have, because they're only really here for the one fleeting shot at attention (mentioned this above already; skip to “spotting cheaters” below if you’re curious enough to know how).
Moving on…
(3) "But they posted a recording of…"
Let me be clear on this point: I personally (and many others) are not wondering if they photoshopped a rainbow clear diamond on a song; anyone can do that in three minutes. I am also not wondering (and do not care) if someone has a recording of themselves scrolling through a list of songs with a shiny line of rainbow diamonds, because that doesn't really mean anything if they cannot demonstrate the ability to repeat it (and that a bot didn't do it for them). On this point, most players aren't so letter-of-the-law obsessed as to demand a recording of a re-AP (understandable: players like Mita Kousuke take months even to get a singular AP on What's up? Pop! and there's no guarantee the perfect moment will be caught on camera for most players) — I (and many others) just want to see a level of play that reasonably LOOKS like they can do what they’re claiming to have done. Put simply, I really just want to see someone’s fingers dancing where the notes are landing, not their hands flailing miserably against the glass screen while a bot does the actual playing.
What would "reasonable" look like? Take a look at the Mita video as an example. While he lists some of his current personal bests at the top, you'll find that the majority of these streams are him failing, sometimes incredibly early, sometimes amazingly -- but the overall level of play is high. Players who've just finished with a feat from the night before / day before / two hours / 30 minutes before don't "rust over". A few hours' rest (if necessary) for exhausted hands is almost always enough to show something approaching legitimate if the player in question is legitimate -- again, no one's asking for a second AP.
(4) "You're just jealous!"
And? So what if I am? Since when was emotion a valid reason to stop reading and avoid the possibility that even people driven by emotion can make valid points? But part of why this argument is unusually effective is because most aren't aware of the common patterns that drive cheaters, and so valid arguments are often dismissed as being down to jealousy if you're not aware of why some of these defenses for cheaters just don't stick.
Part of why I shared the context of where I come from with this was partly to dispel this argument. I've long since accepted that there are people much better than me, and I want to explain why people (who don't necessarily have that chance) react the way they do towards cheaters without resorting to ad hominems like this.
But never mind me. If me potentially being jealous is enough to discount it at my sub-33 skill level, then would you believe the distaste for EN cheating if it came from the world-first AP on Kusaregedou to Chocolate? Incidentally, I assure you he's got nothing to be jealous of: after all, he's going to Tokyo for Spring CS and rubbing shoulders with HPS and the rest of the Sekai gods.
(5) "It's just a game, why would anyone cheat on Sekai?"
If you've ever heard a variation of the common schoolyard boast (or jokes about it) "my dad works at Nintendo / Game Freak / Activision / [insert AAA video game company here]", the answer is: it’s for exactly the same reason immature people have lied since the dawn of society — attention and self-esteem. Of course they gain nothing from this, it is just a game, after all — but kids literally lie just to win arguments as petty and easily-forgotten as those in a schoolyard. Why would Sekai be the first skill-based game (of many, many rhythm games out there) immune to this?
(6) "It's just a game, calm down lol"
I genuinely struggled to write an answer to this without getting a bit irritated; I’ve seen this so many times in so many places for so many wrong reasons. But what’s wrong with being passionate about a game? What’s wrong with wanting the pastime you settle into after a stressful day of work or school to be a fair playing ground? Why shouldn’t a game be taken seriously when competitive PvP games fuel multi-billion industries, have university scholarships, and round-the-clock teams and sport scientists analyzing them, and ignite the passions of people just as intensely as any “traditional” sport?
“Because that’s esports, and this is just Sekai”? Here, tell me you can’t feel the room shake when Mita APs Brand New Day live on stream.
What’s wrong with being passionate about something in the same way others, you included, are passionate about things besides Sekai – enough to be offended if someone said this exact same thing to you? What’s wrong with wanting fairness for one thing and not another?
(7) "Trust the cheat detection!"
I hate to have to say this, I really do, but automated cheat detection for EN is TERRIBLE. It might not even exist. As evidence I'd like to point towards some of the more infamous cheaters: the T2 for Mesmerized by Mermaids in EN. There are some pretty damning threads from long-time tierers that have explained the point in much more detail than I could eloquently say. Now, this exact cheater was defended by someone using the exact same argument I'm about to reply to, and it's just as fallacious now as it was then.
Allow me to explain exactly why "trust the cheat detection" doesn't fly.
- T2, as the threads I've linked demonstrate, was clearly botting, and did so for the entire week the event ran. So why didn't the supposed "cheat detection" pick this up? Why was T2 allowed to play all the way until the EVENT ENDED? Why was the event title AWARDED to T2, denying the T4 (nara) the T3 as a result?
- The appeal to authority argument particularly disgusts me because of one thing: JP has had its own issues with cheaters of a different nature: those who share accounts so that they can tier 24/7 with no downtime. The example I know of is from Unnamed Harmony: not only did they outright admit to account sharing (and insinuated that the t2 who lost was probably also cheating), they weren't banned. I use JP as an example for this reason: JP, which actually, proactively bans botters in Rank Match, still has cheaters that are left completely alone. How then, can you expect EN to have better scrutiny when even botters need a public outcry and a LOT of angry support desk mails just to get one T2 banned? (oh, and come back, and get that account banned too, and admit to committing about 7k euros worth of chargeback fraud…) No offense, but EN can't even herd its official discord channels together; how am I supposed to believe they have time for botters?
T2 Mermaids is hardly the only example there is — only the most notorious one. But if even the cases of people high enough to be in the ranking spotlight take so much effort to call out (no thanks to people spouting uneducated defenses and convincing enough people), how much more botters who just roam the wilds with all perfects that show with 0 notes hit?
Put another way: why use a tiering cheater as an example for skill-based cheating when tiering skill boils down to whoever has the stamina to slap Envy for the longest time? Answer: they use the same tools. The person running around with an EmpErroR AP in public rooms may be doing it to show off, while a tiering cheater may be doing it so they doesn’t lose sleep or struggle the same way their competitors do, but the means are (almost) always the same: a machine does the work for them. And if the game isn’t banning one of them… how can you be confident they’re banning the other?
“Well, that was months ago! They’re better now, I hope!”
The proof is in the pudding. If you’re right, then I’d be happier than anyone else.

SPOTTING CHEATERS:

Besides the whole "they get really defensive" / [insert argument above] things listed above, there are a few more tells that really go a long way towards sniffing out a cheater, and I'd like to go over some of them here (since they didn't really fit naturally into the counterarguments presented above). I'll skip over directly critiquing their results in the case that a prospective cheater reads this and takes notes on how to avoid getting caught.
Now, a little disclaimer, for fairness: most of the posts I’m aware of don’t actually involve the cheaters themselves risking getting caught on here, and so the uses for such red flags may not be easily applicable. But all the same, they go hand-in-hand with the (fallacious) defenses for cheaters, and it’s important to know what you’re looking for when someone inevitably comes here asking why they got banned (for “no reason”) assuming EN is any trustworthy when Rank Match hits.
Keep in mind: each of these ALONE does not mean someone is a cheater — it's when red flags like these, ALONG with refusing to provide videographic proof, come together, that someone becomes more and more suspicious.
(1) Unrealistic timeframes for improvement
Let's not mince words here: the highest levels of Sekai are HARD. As in, it competes with "pure" rhythm games like Arcaea, Lanota, Phigros, Cytus, Dynamix, CHUNITHM, maimai, ONGEKI… levels of hard. Sekai itself is unusually hard for a popular rhythm game (sorry Tokyo 7th Sisters, no one knows you) with funny PNGs you roll and pay for, in a market where the closest competition (and therefore most people's previous frames of reference for existing difficulty) is Bandori or Enstars. And, well, no offense… but Bandori doesn't have six Hell or Hell SPs (and it took THIS long to release the 33+ specials…) and a release schedule that promises more every three months, like we're getting with Yaminabe and Jinsei. As for Enstars? Two years to release Awakening Myth and Seishun Emergency SP (and they’re only roughly as hard as ~32lv. Sekai charts).
What this results in are cheaters who grossly underestimate the time needed to get to Sekai's highest level. You might hear things like "i was up all night / week / month getting this omg my fingers are so tired". To use an example from sekaicord / experience: most players who commit to the improvement grind tend to find that they'll improve really quickly from 26 to 30 — and then hit a major wall at Lv31, where the difficulty then spikes exponentially. The average time it takes legitimate players to go from Lv31 to 32? Six months or more. 32 to 33? You'll be lucky or just insanely good if it takes you six months.
Anyone claiming to be the exception to this pattern, put simply, needs the proof. People are willing to believe someone’s good if they can see someone play good.
(2) Not recognizing patterns when questioned
An actual story about a banned cheater from sekaicord: they claimed to have AP'd Don't Fight the Music on Master, and immediately fell through when people started asking them about patterns from other charts, including Hibana and KING. The issue? They were told that those patterns were from Don't Fight the Music. This is pretty much self-explanatory: you'd at least be expected to know the charts you're claiming to have beaten!
But besides that, people who have pulled off such feats (hell, pretty much anyone) always has a devil of their own. Everyone has That One Pattern they find, and which they hate. And if you're a devilish enough little Pattern (hello Greenlights / Bitter Choco Decoration), you'll be so absolutely evil that everyone will know you, not the other way around. Someone who picks out a pattern that is pretty obviously free to someone actually at that skill level OR doesn't have a least favorite pattern at all tends to stink from a mile away.
(3) Low-quality / vague explanations and/or misuse/lack of terminology/jargon
A common trope in TV shows, video games, and so on is a smart character (usually a scientist) who launches into a convoluted explanation with a LOT of jargon you're not supposed to understand, before a character stops them and says you're making my brain hurt. While silly, this trope has some basis in the fact that people who are good at something tend to be really passionate about it, and often won't hesitate to explain in a lot of detail exactly how they pull off what they do. The same almost always goes for rhythm game players — it's common for people who have just conquered a chart in sekaicord to follow up their FC / AP screenshot with a long-ass postmortem of the parts they hated the most, the strategy that finally got them through it, and pretty much everything in between.
As a cheater, it would be pretty difficult to emulate this. There's no adrenaline rush as you get through the part that you've been struggling on for weeks, possibly months, no sitting down staring at a chart viewer cursing the disgustingly hard part, no detailed "L-R-L-R(index)-R(middle)" big brain strategy just to pass something extremely cursed. There is nothing to explain. Most often, you will get "i was just shaking throughout it's all so hard", "uhhh i just mashed as hard as i possibly could" “go watch a video instead of bothering me” without reference to a specific pattern, and almost no way to describe their solution in terms any reasonably practiced regular would be familiar with. Did you jack this part here? Two fingers or multiple? Is there a BPM divisor that helps you get the rhythm down on this?
Let's go back to the 005saikou Arcaea example I mentioned earlier. Pretty much anyone at that level will have thoughts about their own achievements, and which parts they found hardest to conquer; look at the pinned comment (translation of the CCs) on his Testify video and see just how detailed they can get. I'm not saying everyone has to get to that level of detail, but someone with practically nothing to say about their achievements AND no video either is a serious red flag.

A brief conclusion

Why I took the time to write all of this is pretty simple: I would very much like if people were more aware of the players they're defending who don't deserve to be defended. Not only are there legitimate players out there much more deserving of your attention, but there's also a glut of illegitimate ones out there cruising along with the potential to make Ranked Match completely unplayable if we're just going to sit here and pretend it's not a problem. Perhaps you’re thinking it’s not going to be a problem for you if you only stay in Bronze / Silver / Gold / Plat. Good for you, but then that leaves Diamond and Mastery completely unplayable wastelands fit only for people who jump onto sites-that-shall-not-be-named for modded apps. Pretty much every time I talk to a JP player about EN and the prospect of ranked match, I universally hear back the words “cheating” and smell the implication that there’s no point to even touching it. There’s already so few legitimately skilled players on EN (let alone those who aren’t simply imported / previously JP players) and the last thing EN needs is to drive those players away.
Genuine question: If the playerbase is capable of raising enough of a stink to get an entire event memory-holed out of existence (I have not forgotten RMD), please tell me why it's not possible to push the devs to take action on people who will undermine the legitimacy of an entire game mode? It's easy enough to ignore if you're just running around co-op getting event points and can forget about someone who's not playing the game, but in a game mode whose basis is a fair and even competition between two players, surely there's some reason to get them to do something.
Call me jealous, salty, misguided, whatever you want, but if at the end of the day this post has you thinking a bit more critically about why people can be so suspicious of others (and why it's more legitimate than just jealousy), then writing it will have been worth something. Please, don’t throw these words by the wayside, and keep a more critical eye out for the people you meet, be it in ordinary rooms, on social media, or, well… on Ranked Match. If you could do something about RMD, you can do something about cheaters.
If you’ve gotten this far, thanks for your attention and time.

My professor sent us this email yesterday. I have indeed been using artificial intelligence to write my discussion posts but it wasn’t entirely copied and pasted it. I don’t know what the teachers use to check plagiarism especially in college but I need some help and I don’t know what to do.
Dear SPAN 248 students,
This email is being sent to the entire SPAN/LLS 248 class (all students, all sections) to make sure everyone is aware that the use of AI assistance for writing Discussion Forum posts (or any other assignment) is a serious violation of academic integrity. Again, everyone is receiving this email, so if you have not used AI for completing forum assignments, do not be concerned. Please do not reply directly to this email in any case.
While the fact that using AI assistance in assignments should be self-evident, it has come to our attention that several students from various sections of the course have more than likely completed discussion forum posts using the assistance of an AI such as Chat GPT, ChatSonic, Jasper or some other AI software. This is a serious infraction of academic integrity (as stated in Article 1, Part 4 of the University’s Student Code) as well as a violation of the course’s stated policy on academic integrity as written in the SPAN 248 course syllabus.
We are currently reviewing all past discussion board posts to determine if AI was used in any of them. We consider ANY use, whether partial or total, to be cheating, and this includes modifying the results obtained from an AI to make them seem like original work.
If anyone who used AI for our assignments comes forward voluntarily by no later than this Wednesday March 22 at 11:59 PM (by emailing your TA and cc’ing me), we will allow you to redo the post(s) for half credit and will not file a report through the University’s FAIR (Faculty Academic Integrity Report) system. For students that do not come forward but for whom we determine that any past posts are likely completed with the assistance of AI (in part of fully) we will initiate an individual report for each student through the U of I FAIR system, and if we find that the student is in violation of the alleged infraction, the student will receive a 0 for any suspected work and additional disciplinary action could be taken in accordance with the student code and other University policies.
Going forward, any additional forum posts that are credibly deemed as completed using AI or not being original work will automatically receive a 0 and the student will be immediately reported through the FAIR system.
We truly regret having to take these disciplinary measures and hope everyone will do their work honestly and in accordance with the high expectations we have of U of I students, that is, with academic integrity, as most students do.
Sincerely,

What do you guys do to drop your splits and to improve fitness for a 2k. Had one yesterday and went 5 seconds slower than my pb when I was expecting much faster. I have another 2k on the 30th and want to improve my score a lot as I fear I won’t be able to make the top boat

Yesterday, I ordered a pizza + breadsticks and gave them a specific location on campus outside my dorm building to deliver it to, then went directly to that location to wait before it arrived.
I received a call saying the pizza was here, but I didn’t see a car anywhere in sight. So I asked where he was at, and he names a place on campus I had never been to. For reference, I’m a freshman and it’s a pretty big campus, so there’s places I have no idea the location of. I told him where I was and asked if he could come there but he said he tried and couldn’t find it, so fine.
He emphasized I needed to come get the pizza soon, since he had other deliveries to make. I thought him rushing me was an unfair demand since he was the person in the wrong place, but whatever. I told him I’d be there ASAP. I then googled a map of campus, figured out where the place was, and ran there full speed, just so I wouldn’t make him wait too long. And I run track for my college, so it was pretty fast. All in all, it took 15ish minutes.
When I arrived at the location, he was nowhere to be found, so I called and asked where he was. He said I was a rude customer who was making him wait too long and had cancelled the order, which meant he kept the money + the tip (altogether 40ish dollars) and I didn’t get the pizza.
My reaction was essentially wtf. I understand him not wanting to sit around while he had other deliveries to make, but he’s the one that parked at a spot multiple miles from where I indicated he should. I showed up at the spot he should have went to ahead of time just to make things quicker for him, and ran multiple miles. I did what I could, and at the end of it he kept my money and my pizza? So I told him he should go fuck himself, then called the pizza place and reported him.
Afterwards, I was talking to my friends about the event, and half agreed with me, but half said it’s not his fault that he couldn’t wait around. I understand that to an extent, but I think going to the wrong location and blaming me, not telling me he’s cancelling the order before I had to run multiple miles, and not even refunding the money but just keeping it all make him TA.
AITA?

The SD Reader's "Picks of the week"
Also: "The SD Readers list of "Fun Things to Do"
As well as, the "Best of List"
If you're visiting on certain dates You can plug in your dates at the San Diego Reader and see what pops for events that might be of interest to your family.
Another "cheap or free" page from the local news station
For those that are thinking of going down to Tijuana Mexico
A list of 69 things to do in Tijuana
Thank You, u/Matingas for this link <_ Brother Moderator of Tijuana :)
Of course, there's the regular weekly stuff:
Saturday's u/ thedaymayne organizes a semi-regularly about a flag football game Saturday at 11a at Jefferson Elementary (turf field). There's a solid core of 6-8 people and were always looking for new people to join. No ones D-1 athletes and we don't allow blocking to keep it clean and injury free. PM for more info.
u/lightwolv Suggests:
https://www.meetup.com/Casual-Socce Heads up for soccer players. We run a free meet-up every Tuesday and Thursday from 5 - 7. It's outdoor with big goals, cones and co-ed. If you wanna get outside and active, sign up. All skil All skill levels welcome, for those who played in college and stuff, it's competitive and it's a good work out.
Every Sunday at 2pm-3pm, free organ concert at Spreckles Organ Pavilion in Balboa Park.
Every Sunday Farmers Market at the Hillcrest DMV
Free yoga classes All around San Diego (Coastal) :
A good list of classes all over the city, Solana Beach
Sunset Cliffs, USS Midway Museum
Yoga on the Bay Every Saturday 10:30 am
There's a Sunday live video streaming of the classes in PB 10-11:30 am
u/YmcaAdultSports suggests: If you are interested in joining an Adult Sports League, come check out what the Dan McKinney Family YMCA has to offer (La Jolla)
IF there's something that you think is important or needs to have tickets purchased in advance... please post in the comments. IF there's a link that's needed, please try to not make it part of some text but the full URL string So I can just copy and paste it. (It'll make things easier) I'll try to retain these in the following week until the date of the event.
Please don't post events that are several months in advance. Try to limit it to 30 days or so - unless there's a real need for advance notice well in advance for ticket purchases.
Stuff from Last Weeks post: N/A
u/SD_TMI has suggested the following events
Monthly Yoga class at the South Embarcadero Rady Shell
The MsMargo activity section (welcome back!)
Free Guitar-Based Classic Rock Jam
Mondays, 6:50 pm-9:00 pm Our Savior's Lutheran Church 4011 Ohio Street San Diego, 92104 Age Limit: 18+ All levels welcome. Bring your own guitar, mandolin, flute, etc. or just sing along. Song chords and words are displayed via projector to a large screen. No practice required.
Gilbert Castellanos Presents: Young Lions And The Wednesday Jam Session - FREE!
Wednesdays
Panama 66 restaurant, Balboa Park
"Every Wednesday Panama 66 at The San Diego Museum of Art comes to life with the sounds of jazz. San Diego jazz hero Gilbert Castellanos showcases young music prodigies with The Young Lions Series (7:00–7:50 p.m.) followed by the Wednesday Jazz Jam (8:00–10:30 p.m.) that transforms the James S. Copley Auditorium into a swinging speak-easy. Order a craft cocktail or draft beer, take in the view of the Museum’s Sculpture Court and Garden, and enjoy an evening of music from San Diego’s finest jazz musicians.
Visit the Panama 66 Instagram page for updates on performances, closures, and schedule changes.
FREE event. Drinks and food available for purchase."
https://www.panama66.com/livemusic
IF there's something you think others will want to be know about please include it in the comments, reoccurring events can be added to the weekly post.

im a recent college grad, currently working a corporate job. I want to go to law school, but needed a gap year (or years—not trying to rush it). I’m studying for the LSAT, and am interested in entering a legal career in public interest. My major concern, however, is the money in relation to debt of law school. To that end I’d like to try my best at getting a scholarship. What LSAT score range would give me that shot? I also have a 3.9 undergrad gpa.

Let me preface this by I am incredibly anxious about this situation. For some background my girlfriend and I have been dating a little over two years, we are a medium distance relationship and can only see each other on the weekends. On many occasions, we have had fights when she didn’t like how I interacted with other females that night that are usually in our friend group. From my point of view, I don’t go out of my way to flirt with other females, and I feel very dedicated to my girlfriend. However, from her point of view I try to catch their attention and I “have this energy about me that girls just want so they try to flirt with me.” I think also I have issues where sometimes I literally don’t realize other girls are trying to flirt with me and this is part of the problem. We have had this fight several times and despite the way I feel I am trying to learn and make sure my girlfriend feels secure. I could get into more specifics but for the background, I am trying to be conscious of her feelings and do my best to devote my attention to her.
Enter in friend B, Friend B is (26-27F). Both my girlfriend and I have been friends with friend B for years (since college) and even before my girlfriend and I started dating. Friend B has been known to also be a bit of a flirt and uses her looks a lot to get what she wants. For background I have gotten in trouble with my girlfriend once because I was playing a game of cornhole with friend B. Friend B and I are both fairly competitive but I didn’t really see the game as actual flirting but my Girlfriend didn’t like it.
The problem: Friend B texted me yesterday saying “I miss you” “We should hangout soon maybe play tennis when the weather gets better next week.” Friend B has also texted other boyfriends in the group to hangout and kinda navigated around the girlfriends. Also, for context Friend B, has a boyfriend too.
I by no means have an interest in hanging out with friend B especially if it’s going to be one on one. I don’t think that’s appropriate. I would be much more comfortable with a group setting or while my girlfriend is around. I don’t know how to reply to friend B and tell her this and I don’t know how to communicate this with my girlfriend without it blowing up in my face . I am driving myself up the wall trying to figure out how to deal with this especially because it is a pressure point in my relationship

Yesterday I went to get a physical with a new doctor. She never discussed my weight except when I brought it up, but she did want to take some standard labs. I guess you could call me a small fat or midsize (size 16, 5 ft 6 218 lbs). All my labs came back normal except for vitamin D and two of the cholesterol numbers were one point off. My overall cholesterol is normal.
I feel really awful about the cholesterol thing. I am working to live a healthier lifestyle, but I just feel so ashamed. The doctor hasn’t even talk to me about it yet, but I keep thinking back to what I could’ve done differently. I had a really tough first three months back in college where I went through a break up and had very tough courses. Maybe I didn’t eat the way I should have? Like should I not have had fries that day blah blah blah? I don’t think that people should be shamed for health conditions or for being a certain weight, but I really struggle with it for myself.

I have a GPA of around 3.7 (maybe a little more if you average my other colleges) and I scored a 160 on the GRE verbal and 151 on the quant (I haven't taken math classes I'm 8+ years). Do you think I'd get in and get some scholarships? I'd love to go to Law school but I can't afford sticker price.

So for a few months now I've been feeling like shit but finally I think this might be the turning point, yesterday I had a good morning and then felt shit in the afternoon but today I've felt good about myself all day and I think it's thanks to one thing that I'll explain now. So I'm autistic and extremely scared of making new friends and talking to new people in general however, last week I got asked if I wanted to be in a group chat with my college class (I know that's very small but it was a big thing for me lol) and today someone came over to me and spoke to me and even asked if I wanted to hang out with them and their friends. I said no because I did have work to do but it felt so good to have people be nice to me and feel like I could actually talk to them without worrying about their opinions on me. That's all, have a good day everyone 😀

​
My husband was relocated here for work a week ago. Currently, we are living in a hotel suite (that's growing smaller by the day) while looking for our new place. Happy to be here, but we are running out the clock on the house hunt. I'm shamelessly requesting assistance from my fellow Redditor's!!
A little bit about us: We are in our late 40's with no kids in school . We love to hike, bike, cook, watch live music, watch college football, grill out, go boating, explore breweries and much more. This is an important piece of info because we don't want to land in an area with few entertainment options.
ISO
3/2 (minimum)
1700 sq. ft (minimum)
Single family home, condo, loft or townhome
Lease or lease option (Likely a 12+month lease)
Price range depends on the amount of home & term ($1900-3000 per month range)
Cat friendly (non negotiable- for one mild mannered calico cat)
Move in prior to 4/30/23
Nice kitchen and baths
Backyard or outdoor space is a must. IE: Private or semi private courtyard, deck, balcony, pavers, large pad etc. The outdoor space must be grill friendly
​
Husband works in HD (E Bay Street) so we would like to be no more than 45-55 min away from his work
The areas we are currently considering are wide in range. We are definitely open to suggestions based on availability of any rental that fits the wish list above.
At the moment we are looking at Georgetown, Richmond Hills, HD, Gordonston, Ardsley Park, Whitemarsh, Wilmington, Ilse of Hope, Thunderbolt Tybee Island, and Bluffton, SC.
I am from the Gulf Coast originally, so being close to the water would be fantastic, but not required.
If you have a rental, know of a property about to go on the market etc, please don't hesitate to reach out or message me directly.

I got pityriasis when I first went away to college (when I was under extreme, extreme stress) over ten years ago. I was terrified and thought I was seriously ill on top of being completely alone. When the doctor told me I was fine, but uncurable, I started bawling in his office. He assured me it was a "one and done" thing and said my reaction wasn't normal.
It took over three months for the damn thing to clear up. But at least it was mostly only on my arm, and at least it wasn't itchy.
I was on my honeymoon at the beginning of this month. On the second day on the boat, in the middle of the Caribbean, I noticed a few itchy dots in a line on my chest one morning and started freaking out about bed bugs but couldn't find a trace of them. Then the dots spread up, and then the dots spread down. Then they were creeping down my arms and legs, and up my neck. I spent $500 to see our ship's doctor and she gave me medicine for scabies.
The dots didn't get any better and every day I was having extreme anxiety. I barely enjoyed a day of my honeymoon. I just wanted to get home and see my dermatologist. If it wasn't scabies, what was it? I couldn't sleep, partially because of the itch, and partially because I was picturing bugs tunneling in my skin. It was so, so itchy and it spread so fast. I couldn't wear my swimsuit because my body looked horrifying. And I was scared to leave the stateroom often incase I could infect other passengers.
I finally got home and I saw my derm yesterday. He said he'd run a skin scrape, but thought it might be pityriasis. I said nope, I already had it, and it was totally different. This is unbearably itchy. This is everywhere. And my last doctor said no one gets it twice.
Yeah, so much for "one and done." Got the call today that there's no mites and no fungus. That's good I guess. But now I have to deal with this itchy, disgusting hell for an indefinite amount of time. And if I was one of the lucky 2% to get it twice, can't I assume I can get it a third time? Forth? Fifth?
I'm miserable. The only way I could get relief from the itching last night was to throw my pajamas in cold water and wear the soggy clothes to bed. I feel horrible and I hate myself and I hate my body. I'm depressed and am wondering if there's something fucked up about me that made me get this again. My mom's side has many autoimmune issues- am I part of the club? Will this get worse and worse each time I get it?
I don't want to go out in public. I'm scared to go to work because no one will know what this is. It's all on my neck, there's no hiding it. It looks so bad. And I can't stop scratching because it's so, so itchy. I'm so gross, I'm so itchy, I hate this.
My derm wrote me a script for prednisone but it's held up at the pharmacy because of an insurance issue.

We put my childhood dog down yesterday. I've been away at college, and halfway through one of my classes yesterday my mother texted me saying "call me asap". I knew what it was going to be about. Gut feeling I guess. It's nothing like in the movies. He doesn't just "go to sleep". He was having a hard time breathing and was coughing/ breathing heavy and I thought the sedative would slow his breath down until he stopped breathing. It didn't. He just stopped. 100 to 0, no slow down. It was like he ran a marathon and then it was just over. It didn't feel peaceful, just quick. Anyways he was almost 14 years old, he lived longer than expected and I'm gonna miss him. It was his time.

My partner (28) and I (26) have been privately engaged for 4 years and together for 6, but announced to their family yesterday due to us feeling more financially secure and being ready to share the news (just got our rings this month). FMIL is a taurus and a very big personality who loves facebook and taking pictures of everything - almost to the point of being a stereotypical facebook mom who has everyone groaning while she’s like “ wait! let’s take another picture!” on vacations or at family gatherings etc.
When we told their family at a restaurant, I was watching her face and there wasn’t even a hint of a smile and she was very quiet. The only people who reacted positively were my partners sister’s. I’m not sure if it’s cuz she just discovered she might have shingles earlier that day (but kept insisting she was fine and still wanted to eat dinner out) We were considering postponing announcing cuz of that, but fiancé’s grandma is unexpectedly leaving the country today so it was our only chance to tell them while she was still here.
She eventually said congratulations and said she liked my ring but her voice was so dry and her expression was very indifferent, it felt like she was holding something back. She asked some questions about where/when the wedding would be, but in a matter of fact voice. I also dressed nice for the occasion and got my nails done bc I knew she‘s the type of person who would want to take pictures - and not one photo or family photo was taken. Again, not sure if it may be the shingles but she didn’t even take pics of me and my fiancé, the ring, etc. So there were no pics from this announcement except for one snapchat selfie with fiancé’s sister lol.
I feel a bit bummed because I was hoping for more excitement or something. My partner talked to her privately after asking what was up with her reaction and she said it was cuz she thought I was pregnant. But we def confirmed we weren’t. I’m not sure if she feels a type of way about me joining the family. Or if she feels left out of the “proposal” process or that we were secretly engaged for much longer than they knew. This just isn’t how I imagined this big day would go and am looking for some advice/reassurance. Did anyone have similar experiences?
Edit: Adding in some more context about our dynamic - I’m worried FMIL will be JNMIL. She didn’t invite me to to their annual family vacations until last year after my fiancé confronted her. Partner opted out of the vacation before that due to covid and the years before that we were in college so I understood not being included then a bit more because we were younger. But she is very territorial about family and doesn’t consider me family because we’re not married (she’s catholic fyi) She has been working on it a bit though after that confrontation, but definitely still sense that dynamic. She and FFIL do fancy restaurant dinners as tradition for their wedding anniversary and they asked my fiancé if it could just be family and that I didn’t come to their most recent one. Of course it’s their decision and their celebration so we couldn’t say anything but this dynamic of exclusion has been annoying. This is also one of the reasons we publicly announced our engagement since marriage is such a big deal to her.

I want to start out that I’m aware I’m in the wrong. I guess I’ll tell one of the incidents that made me sad.
Before my boyfriend, we’ll call him Jake, and I got together, there was the girl he really liked. We’ll call her Ashley. Ashley was in a relationship at the time so that prevented him from actually asking her out.
Well this incident happened when Ashley broke up with he bf and Jake and I were together. The incident was a long time ago, like a couple of months, and I still hurt when I think about it. It sucks because I do forgive him. I really do. I just can’t help but cry about it.
I had an event that I went to early in the morning that Jake dropped me off at, and I asked if Jake could pick me up when it was done. He said sure. The event was 8 hours and at about 3-4 pm I got back to the place Jake dropped me off. I called him and he didn’t pick up. Then I called a second time and he picked up. I told him I was back and if he could pick me up. He told me he couldn’t because Ashley was there, and he asked me to walk back. I was okay with this because he lived about 20 mins away. I’m a college student and I walk that every day! So no problem. When I got there, Jake was with his 2 friends and Ashley.
Later that day we decided to go swimming! So we go swimming. Jake has a big ass leather football bc we were gonna play. We were all in a group. Including Ashley. Boom he hits me in the face with the football. I wasn’t upset till I saw him laughing. I obviously got upset and left after a while bc I was embarrassed. I didn’t dramatically leave, I waited a few minutes then left. All I wanted to do was cry bc I felt embarrassed.
He came up to me a minute later and asked if I was mad. I said yes, and he said I could push him in the pool. I did just that. And we were okay.
Okay now this is the part that hurts my feelings the most. So, I’m the youngest out of my friends and not as smart. I’m not going to lie, I’m insecure. There are a few comments from some of the people in the group that say things along the lines of me being stupid. So I’m insecure about the stupid comments.
We decided to go back inside and play a game called Taboo. If you don’t know it’s a game where one player on your team has to guess a word with descriptions from your other team members. The goal is to get as many correct words in a certain time limit.
I was on the team with Jake. Ashley was on another team. When it was my turn, I already was insecure because they say things that make me feel stupid. As I’m about to stand up Jake goes, “Aw no, can we switch team members? Can I have Ashley?” I instantly felt my heart drop. We had a conversation before that incident where I didn’t like the comments he made, and for him to do it in front of Ashley made me extremely embarrassed. I try to laugh it off. His friend called him out and said “dude she’s already insecure, why would you say that?” And I felt better. I just wanted my turn to be over. Then it was Ashely’s turn. Jake was complimenting her the whole time, saying “wow, she’s like a secret genius.” And so on. I got more insecure and I felt a mess.
After the night was done, Jake and I went back to his place. We were in bed and the conversation got brought up. He then told me that Ashley was cold, and snuggled up to him. I was confused and made a face at him. He tried to say that he didn’t do anything and then said “I just looked at her.”
Is it bad that I wanted him to get away from it? Maybe say something? He could even blame it on me and say “I don’t think my name would like this.” But he just looked at her. Granted he didn’t snuggle back.
I think back to this day, along with other issues sometimes and cry. I told him I have problems about the issues and he apologizes. I do forgive him, but I can’t forget. That’s what brings me back to me being in the wrong. I know I’m being toxic because I keep crying and thinking about some stuff he’s done, then bringing it up.
What can I do? I want to be a better gf.

Originally posted in lunchmoney

Background

This is a method that goes over how you can make $5,000 - $10,000 risk-free by signing up for new user bonuses with various regulated sportsbooks (earnings depend on your location). Because I am in Canada, I will cover the Ontario market, but if you live in other regulated areas you can still use 99% of this guide to learn how to make money on sportsbooks. I made another guide on Sports Betting Arbitrage here, where I show you have you can make $500 per day, risk-free. I have personally made over $25,000 from sports betting and will answer any questions you have in the comments!

Basics of Sports Betting

Here are some common sign-up bonuses, terms and conditions (T&Cs), and sports betting lingo:
Different Sign-Up Bonuses:

• Deposit Match – A deposit match is what it sounds like, when you sign up for the sportsbook and make a deposit, the sportsbook will match your deposit in bet credits or cash.
• Bet & Get – When you sign up and place qualifying bets, the sportsbook will grant you a certain amount of bet credits (usually significantly more than your initial bet).
• 2nd Chance Bet – Some sportsbooks will offer a 2nd chance bet where the bettor only gets a bet credit if your initial bet LOSES. To make the most of this bonus, you should intentionally lose on the initial sportsbook and cover your loss on a different sportsbook and then use your 2nd chance bet.

Common T&Cs:

• Minimum Odds – Some sportsbooks will implement a minimum odds clause in their T&Cs for bets placed in connection to a promotion. If the book sets the minimum odds to -200, this means you must bet on odds of -200, -150, +150, +200, … etc.
• Wagering Requirements / Rollover – A rollover clause means that you must bet the amount of your deposit a certain amount of times. For example, a 5x rollover on a deposit of $100 means you need to wager $500 to claim the bonus. Be careful because sometimes you need to rollover both the deposit and the bonus.
• "Stake Not Returned" – When a book does not return your stake, this means that for the bet credits you are granted, you only get the winnings and NOT the stake. For example, if you use $100 of bet credits that don't return the stake, and you bet it on a +150 event that wins, your account balance will go up by $150. If they did return the stake or if it was just a cash bet, your account balance would go up $250 (because you would get the initial $100 stake back).
• Flexible Bet Credits - if a bet credit is flexible, it means you can bet in any increment you want, for example: if you get a $100 flexible bet credit, you can place 100 bets of $1 each, 2 bets of $50 each, 4 bets of $25 each, etc.
• Semi-Flexible Bet Credits - if a bet credit is semi-flexible, it means you can bet in the increment that the sportsbook allows, for example: if you get a $100 semi-flexible bet credit that is split into 4 bets of $25 each, you cannot place 8 bets of $12.50 or 10 bets of $10.

*These are just a few confusing T&Cs. You must read the T&Cs of each promotion to ensure that you understand what the bonus entails because that could change your strategy to maximize each bonus!
Common Sports Betting Lingo:

• Stake vs. Winnings vs. Payout - in betting, if you place a bet of $100 on the Raptors to win at +250 odds. If the Raptors win, you win $250 and are paid a total of $350. From this example, the $100 was the stake, the $250 is the winnings and the $350 is the payout.
• This guide assumes you know the basics of sports betting. If you do not, please follow this link to find a quick online guide.

Maximizing Winnings on Each Sportsbook

• Although all of the following sportsbooks are in Ontario, if you live in the US or Europe, many of these same books will have identical (or very similar promotions), so this will still apply to you.
  • If you are in the US or Europe, go to my google drive resource here and download my bet tracking excel sheet. Under the "Bet Credit Retention" tab, you can customize your own bet credit terms, and my excel sheet will tell you exactly how much you need to bet to get a risk-free win! Remember to read the instructions for the excel sheet (also in my google drive) because it can get a little tricky.
• I will also put a ⭐ rating (out of 5) which only rates the sportsbooks sign-up bonus, which is not the same as what I would rate them overall!
• As a note, in the title of each credit, I will specify whether the stake is returned, what the rollover is (assume no rollover if I say nothing), and whether the bet credits are flex, or semi-flex (assume just neither if I say nothing).

⭐⭐⭐ 888Sport - 100% First Deposit Match (up to $250) - Stake Not Returned

• Deposit $250 and bet in $50 increments on odds of -200 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Claim your $250 bonus and wager it on a +300 event, wager $562.50 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• When the credits don't return the stake, wagering your bet credit on the highest possible odds will allow you to make the most money off your credit (in this case I chose +300 odds because they are quite high, and going above that is tough to find, even with the screening software I explain later on in this document)
• I explain why betting your credit on the highest possible odds is optimal later on, so keep reading!
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $187.50
  • Reasoning: If the +300 wins, you get the $750 of winnings and since you bet $562.50 on the opposite side, your net payout is $187.50! If the -300 event wins, you get the winnings of $187.50 and you get your original $562.50 stake returned (since you used bet credits on the +300 side, you have no cost so you are still up $187.50 regardless)!

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Bet365 - Bet $1 and Get $250 in Bet Credits - Stake Not Returned & Flex

• Deposit $10 and bet in $1 on any odds (this must be done according to the T&C) – no need to hedge on this as its only $1
• Claim your $250 bonus and wager it on a +300 event, wager $562.50 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
  • Remember, because these are flex credits, you can place a smaller bet using your credits (on the +300 side) so you don't have to cover so much on the -300 side. And this goes for every other flex credit too, not just Bet365!
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $187.50

⭐⭐⭐⭐ Bet99 - 100% Matched Bonus on First Deposit (up to $500) – Stake Returned, Flex & 5x Roll

• Deposit $500 and wager your deposit 5 times on odds of -125 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook (since these are covered, you make nothing on these initial bets)
• Because the stake is returned, you can treat the bonus as a cash bet so you can bet the bonus on a +100 event and cover a +100 bet on another sportsbook (by betting $500 on the other sportsbook)
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $500

⭐⭐⭐⭐ Betano - 100% Matched Bonus on First Deposit (up to $500) – Stake Returned, Flex & 5x Roll

• Deposit $500 and wager your deposit + bonus ($1,000) 5 times on odds of -200 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Claim your $500 bonus and wager it on a +100 event, wager $500 on the opposite side of the original line at +100 on another sportsbook
• Betano is a great sportsbook for hedging because it has a “MAX” button which tells you how much you can bet, allowing you to execute on another sportsbook first with high confidence that Betano will accept your bet on the opposite line!
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $500

⭐⭐⭐ BetRivers - 2nd Chance Bet (up to $500) – Stake Not Returned

• Deposit $500 and wager your deposit on odds of -200 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bet on another sportsbook
• The goal with 2nd Chance Bets is to intentionally lose on the original sportsbook because you only get the credit if your bet loses. So you should try and bet on the highest odds possible (+400, +500, +600, +700 … etc.) and cover your bet on another sportsbook. I'll explain this later in more detail.
• Once you’ve intentionally lost on BetRivers, claim your $500 bonus and wager it on a +300 event, wager $1,125 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $375

⭐⭐⭐⭐ BetVictor - 100% Matched Bonus on First Bet (up to $300) – Stake Not Returned & Flex

• Deposit $300 and wager your deposit on odds of +100 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Claim your $300 bonus and wager it on a +300 event, wager $675 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $225

⭐⭐ Betway - 100% Matched Bonus on First Deposit (up to $200) – Stake Returned, Flex & 10x Roll*

• Deposit $200 and wager your deposit 10 times on odds of -150 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Claim your $200 bonus and wager it on a +100 event, wager $200 on the opposite side of the original line at +100 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $200

⭐⭐⭐ Caesars - 2nd Chance Bet (up to $500) – Stake Not Returned

• Deposit $500 and wager your deposit on any odds (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Similar to BetRivers, you want to intentionally lose to claim the bet credit, so bet on the highest possible odds where you can find a hedge on another sportsbook
• Once you’ve intentionally lost on BetRivers, claim your $500 bonus and wager it on a +300 event, wager $1,125 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $375

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ DraftKings - Bet $5 and Get $200 in Bet Credits – Stake Not Returned & Semi-Flex

• This promotion is unique because you need to deposit $10 and bet $5 on a winning pre-game moneyline for any College Basketball game and then you get 8x $25 bet credits (totaling $200). Pick a heavy favourite to maximize your chances (there are no minimum odds for this)
• Claim your $200 bonus (of 8x $25 bets) and wager each bet on a +300 event, wager ~$450 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $150

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Fanduel - 2nd Chance Bet (up to $1,000) – Stake Returned & Flex

• Deposit $1,000 and wager your deposit on any odds greater than -300 (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Similar to BetRivers and Caesars, you want to intentionally lose to claim the bet credit, so bet on the highest possible odds where you can find a hedge on another sportsbook
• Once you’ve intentionally lost on Fanduel, claim your $1,000 bonus and wager it on a +100 event, wager $1,000 on the opposite side of the original line at +100 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $1,000

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ LeoVegas - Cash Bonus on First Three Deposits (up to $500)

• LeoVegas offers a unique sports welcome bonus that will require some explaining
• The bonus is claimed in three different deposits. Firstly, you are going to want to deposit $300 and wager it 10 times on odds greater than -125 and hedge your bets on another sportsbook. Once you’ve done this, you claim a $300 cash bonus straight into your account balance.
• Next, you are going to deposit $100 and wager it 10 times on odds greater than -125 and hedge your bets on another sportsbook. Once you’ve done this, you claim a $100 cash bonus straight into your account balance. Repeat this one more time for another $100 cash bonus and then you are all done!
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $500

⭐⭐⭐ NorthStar Bets - 100% Matched Bonus on First Bet (up to $150) – Stake Not Returned

• Deposit $150 and wager your deposit on odds of -500 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Claim your $150 bonus and wager it on a +300 event, wager $337.50 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $112.50

⭐⭐⭐ PartySports - 100% Matched Bonus on First Deposit (up to $100) – Stake Returned, Flex & 5x Roll

• Deposit $100 and wager your deposit 5 times on odds of -200 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Claim your $100 bonus and wager it on a +100 event, wager $100 on the opposite side of the original line at +100 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $100

⭐⭐⭐⭐ PointsBet - 2nd Chance Bets (up to $1,000) – Stake Not Returned & Semi-Flex

• Pointsbet’s welcome offer gives you a 2nd chance bet offer for your first 10 days as a participant. You can get $100 in bet credits (broken into 2x $50 bet credits) each day!
• To claim this, deposit $1,000 on your first day and wager $100 on any odds greater than -200 (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Similar to BetRivers, Caesars, and Fanduel, you want to intentionally lose to claim the bet credit, so bet on the highest possible odds where you can find a hedge on another sportsbook
• Repeat this step for 9 more days and claim your $100 bet credit each day!
• Once you have all 10 of your $100 bet credits, wager them on a +300 event, wager $225 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $750

⭐⭐⭐⭐ theScore Bet - 2nd Chance Bets (up to $500) – Stake Not Returned & Semi-Flex

• Deposit $500 and wager your deposit on any odds and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Similar to BetRivers, Caesars, and PointsBet, you want to intentionally lose to claim the bet credit, so bet on the highest possible odds where you can find a hedge on another sportsbook
• Once you’ve intentionally lost on theScore, claim your $500 bonus (10x $50 Credits) and wager it on a +300 event, wager $1,125 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $375

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Sports Interaction - 100% Matched Bonus on First Deposit (up to $1,000) – Stake Not Returned & Flex

• Deposit $1,000 and wager your deposit on odds of -200 or greater (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Claim your $1,000 bonus and wager it on a +300 event, wager $2,250 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $750

⭐⭐⭐ Unibet - 2nd Chance Bet (up to $200) – with Stake Takeback

• Deposit $200 and wager your deposit on any odds greater than -300 (this must be done according to the T&C) and hedge your bets on another sportsbook
• Similar to BetRivers, Caesars, and Fanduel, you want to intentionally lose to claim the bet credit, so bet on the highest possible odds where you can find a hedge on another sportsbook
• Once you’ve intentionally lost on Unibet, claim your $200 bonus and wager it on a +300 event, wager $450 on the opposite side of the original line at -300 on another sportsbook
• Guaranteed risk-free profit: $150

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Summary: Summing all of these guaranteed profits up, you can get $6,437.50 by completing all of these sign-up bonuses! Many of these same sportsbooks also offer promotions for active users that you can use as well (reload bonuses, boosted odds, refer-a-friend promos, etc.) so you can continue making money once you have done the sign-up promotion.

Finding Odds

How the Previous Section Assumes that Odds Work: If the Lakers play the Warriors and the Warriors moneyline is +100 on Fanduel, and since the Warriors will win 50% of the time (based on those odds) then the Lakers will also win 50% of the time. Because of this, based on expected payoffs, we assume Fanduel will have the Lakers moneyline at +100.
How Odds Actually Work: Fanduel obviously wants to make money, so if they put the Warriors at +100, they will put the Lakers at -150 to give Fanduel a nice chunk called a spread. This is inevitable in the sports betting industry because sportsbooks need to make money. Assuming the spreads are 20% (which is like a tax on each bet), instead of making the original $6,437.50 from the sign-up bonuses, you will only make $5,150.00, meaning you would lose $1,287.50 if you took that 20% spread!
How can we Save the 20% Tax: Software! Odds change every second of the day and after months of searching for odds manually, a very inefficient and time-consuming task, I finally found a tool called OddsJam. OddsJam screens millions of odds per second on hundreds of sportsbooks, including all the sportsbooks I’ve mentioned above. Using the OddsJam platform has saved me thousands of dollars and is the reason I was able to make so much off sign-up bonuses.
If you decide to start harvesting bonuses on sportsbooks, using OddsJam is a must and you can use my link and promo code “Firebet” at checkout for 25% lifetime discount (to ensure you get the discount, press on my link before signing up and enter the promo code at checkout)! Remember, this software can increase your earnings from the signup bonuses by $1,287.50💵❗You can make even more if you use the arbitrage tool, which I cover in a different guide (linked here).

Example of Doing a Sign-Up Bonus

Steps:

1. Log into OddsJam and go to the Arbitrage Betting Tool (this tool comes with the industry plan)
2. Once on the Arbitrage Betting tool, use the filters to find odds

https://preview.redd.it/ldre9efnx4pa1.png?width=990&format=png&auto=webp&s=e9aae7abb7c0b2b2f6a524433d77144c2bd7fdcb

1. Find an opportunity on OddsJam and press the calculator to find how much to bet on each sportsbook

https://preview.redd.it/ikl6kh7ox4pa1.png?width=988&format=png&auto=webp&s=0c46adbe829180beb5a321ae876588b6c2533295
https://preview.redd.it/6yhztilox4pa1.png?width=988&format=png&auto=webp&s=2b853af0b89b47ce0ac6a9c696b36a229d6a91f9

1. Log into each sportsbook and place the bets!

https://preview.redd.it/l0rbk5ipx4pa1.png?width=1031&format=png&auto=webp&s=a1edc10a99159d3fcc11497ec1ce40aaa9d3b63f
https://preview.redd.it/58pb963qx4pa1.png?width=1030&format=png&auto=webp&s=619754015376ed51eff412b3af6e99561c09dc38

1. We have now completed part of our wagering requirements for Fanduel and Betano. We can repeat this process to harvest the sign-up bonus!

The Math Behind the Bets:

• If we bet $50 on Fanduel on under 195.5 at +850. To covehedge this bet, we need to bet $410 on Betano on the over at -625
  • Since there are only two possible outcomes (and we have bet on both of those outcomes), we are guaranteed to win $15.52! On top of that, we are also completing our bonus wagering requirements!
• With this particular bet, if the over wins, we get our $50 stake back and we get the winnings of $425 on Fanduel. Since we also bet $410 on Betano and this bet did not win, we lose our stake. Because the winnings of the initial bet are greater than our stake for the opposite bet, we come out on top!
  • If the opposite happens, we get our stake back on Betano and we get winnings of $65 which covers the $50 stake we do not get back on Fanduel.

Why we Want to Lose our 1st Bet for "2nd Chance Bet" Offers

• For 2nd chance bets, we only get the bet credit if our first bet loses
• So to give us the highest chance of losing our first bet, we should bet on the highest possible odds (+300, +500, +1000, etc.) where we can find opposite odds on another sportsbook
• For example, below we see odds of +250 on Betrivers and odds of -238 on Betano for the Pelicans – Mavericks game. The +250 odds imply that there is a low chance that this will occur so we take this bet because we know we have a $500 2nd chance bet on BetRivers
• Using the provided calculator, we bet $500 on the over using the Betrivers and we also bet $1,232 on under using Betano
• If the over loses, which it should ~75% of the time based on those odds, we win $517 on Betano and we lose our initial stake of $500 on BetRivers – so we still come out with a $17 profit
• We are then awarded with our 2nd chance bet of $500 on BetRivers which we can use as described in a previous section of the guide

Why we Use Bet Credits on the Highest Possible Odds

• When given bet credits (that do not return the stake), we want to maximize our guaranteed earnings
• You may be wondering why I keep saying you should bet on odds of +300 (which are high) for each sportsbooks bonus guide
  • The reason is that we want to maximize the potential payout-to-credit ratio, which gives us a higher retention of the bet credit
• As you see in the chart below, the higher the bet credit odds, the higher retention of the bet credit!

https://preview.redd.it/rqrx7r6rx4pa1.png?width=770&format=png&auto=webp&s=2079602f75b5841adb94c30a24c6cdf38b877ed4

Summary

• Sign up for each sportsbook and participate in their sign-up bonus (following my advice for each book and for each type of sign-up bonus) and make $6,437.50, risk-free!
• Sign up for the OddsJam platform here and use my promo code “Firebet” at checkout for 25% lifetime discount (to ensure you get the discount, press on my link before signing up and enter the promo code at checkout)! This software personally helped me make $1,000's and can help you save $1,287.50 by finding odds that have no spread!
• Go to my google drive resource page here to get my excel tracker that helps track everything (deposits, bets, credits, profit per day, week, quarter, etc.)! I also provided instructions to the excel sheet that should help
• If you want to learn more about how I made $500 per day (risk-free) by doing arbitrage betting, here is another Reddit post I made showing you how you can do the same thing as me!

Feel free to comment and ask questions below! Also, let me know if you want me to do any other betting guides!
*This document is for entertainment purposes only and is not financial / investment advice. Please read the T&Cs of each book to make sure you are complicit with their rules and your local regulators' laws. This guide is not intended for real money betting and it is only intended for adults. If you have a gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER

Take me back to the start. 2001, the last of the good times for a lot of us who were relatively grown up and not tiny kids at that point due to a certain horrific event we would all witness that year. Watching this season was a nostalgia trip for so many reasons; social media wasn't a thing, cell phones were still in their infancy especially compared to now, the internet was a thing obviously but not to the point where there was a massive presence for any of the contestants, the show was in standard definition, Phil?... actually, that dude hasn't aged much, WTF lol. It's almost like this was just a big experiment, considering all the changes made since and in some cases the very next season. The overall aesthetic was peak 90's - early 00's, the editing, cinematography, etc felt very much like The Real World (makes me wonder if there was some crossover in terms of people working on both shows), and as a 90s kid this made me smile. You get the sense there was a general attitude of "To hell with polish, just film it and whatever shakiness there is we'll leave it, even if it's an awkward super zoom into a contestants face). Plus, another ode to the time period is that there was a particular focus on the interpersonal dynamics within the teams and between them as opposed to more strict focus on the race itself which happened later on, which has its good and bad merits. Bottom line is this felt like a gamble that the producers and network took to take advantage of the reality tv boom, I remember how Survivor premiered and EVERYONE was watching it at some point, even I wound up watching the final few episodes of that first season. After that, it just exploded and how ironic that a few decades later, out of all that came from that time specifically that it is these 2 shows that are still going. One very creepy thing which almost happened was the finish line being the top of the World Trade Center, but they couldn't get the needed permits, and the show premiered 6 days before 9/11, so as I alluded to at the very start, it really is like watching a completely different world when you watch this season for many reasons and the nostalgia hit me hard a lot of times in good and bad ways. But what about the season itself?....
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Rob/Brennan - The first winners are photogenic attorney friends. I have to admit, these 2 didn't make much of an impression on me at all. It's not that they were bad racers, or bad people, as they actually seemed rather kind and intelligent (lawyers, so of course), but I felt they were rather bland TBH. After they won the first ever leg in show history thanks to the fastforward (which was available in every leg, something they thankfully changed), they hit a snag in Tunisia and were on the verge of being eliminated and were one of the teams which got infuriated at airportgate (which I will get into later), but then they really hit their stride once they hit Asia, and wound up winning 4 of the last 5 legs. I know it doesn't seem like I have a ton to say about them, but the truth is they weren't particularly charismatic or even featured in a starring way til it got down to the end legs. A great all-around team, but not really one I ever got behind. I found it interesting that post-race, Brennan was with Emily for a time, unlike other seasons I never got those vibes from any interactions between them but they must have been there. I do know they had befriended both Nancy and Emily during the race and were a part of the airportgate situation and were pretty pissed off about it; like they said, you don't treat women like that if you're a guy.
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Frank/Margarita - Maybe the loudest team, at least he was. Seriously, the guy must have been a mute when he was a child, cause his natural tone was LOUD lol. Anyway, they were the top team going by the composite average score and by the fact they were either 1st or 2nd in the final 8 legs. Their story was an interesting one, while at the same time not ridiculously frustrating. A separated couple with a small child who part of the reason for getting on this was to work on their relationship. You immediately saw why there were issues with them; as he is constantly yelling and flexing, ultra-competitive, making alliances which last just a few minutes before his massive pride has him essentially saying to hell with that. And at times, he even shouted and yelled at her, not necessarily out of anger but his way of motivating, and she showed her disdain for that often. But; there was actual growth from him, as he wound up apologizing when he reached maximum dickhead mode, something I am not accustomed to seeing on here. And, they wound up falling for each other all over again, which was shown more than once, which even if you weren't a fan of theirs, was a bit heartwarming. I thought they had it in the final stretch, going to their literal backyard for the finish line, and they felt it too which may have been their undoing. Thanks to the production and camera work, you literally saw as they were jogging to the finish line the emotions on their faces go from joy and relief to downtrodden when they saw the team they were head-to-head with for what felt like most of the race with how the final legs were strung out, already there. I was not surprised to find out they did indeed reconcile, but then split for good and remained friends, which is cool to know.
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Joe/Bill - Team Guido, sigh. I love that they named their team after their dog, but beyond that, ugh. The ego and smarminess oozed off these guys almost from the start. They made multiple alliances but were so full of themselves that they would break them almost instantly, constantly bragging about how they had lived in Paris, they spoke French, they had traveled a lot. They truly thought they were better than everyone else, even saying out loud at one point that they had no competition. This behavior would be obnoxious enough from a team that was winning constantly, but they weren't. They actually only won 1 leg. Namecalling the New Yorkers by referring to them as 'The Fatties' wasn't exactly classy either. But the moment which cemented them as true douchebags was airportgate as I call it. They flip out when they find out that 3 teams managed to get a flight which would get them to the next destination first, ahead of them, when they had just been beaming over getting what they thought was gonna be the earliest flight. And their response was the mature thing to do obviously; going to the entrance as they were getting ready to board and blocking them and causing a massive commotion to try and keep them from getting on the plane. Security gets involved and at some point one of them pushes/physically restrains the smallest and oldest member of those 3 teams in Nancy, almost knocking her down. That was a scummy and cowardly thing to do, bottom line. They tried to retcon it afterwards, talking about how Kevin/Drew started it with their sarcastic yet threatening talk of breaking their legs earlier that day, and yes that was a bit much and I would be inclined to give them some benefit of the doubt there, except they didn't put hands on either of them and just so happened to target the physically weakest member in that crowded confined space. Now, due to it being so confined, we could only see so much and thus didn't experience the whole thing, but at this point it went from these guys are jerks in terms of strategy or whatever to they are massive pieces of shit. And they were treated as such basically the rest of the race, except by Nancy and Emily of all teams (I don't get that, Emily seemed like she wanted to push them off a cliff and then a few legs later they are hugging?). Their egos were their downfall, as they won a fastforward in Thailand and proceeded to almost get eliminated anyway by taking their sweet time to get to the pitstop. After that, they were hours behind the top 2 teams and as far back as an entire day before getting the clue that told them the race was over as they were still out in the wilderness. They were good sports about it, and even when they won the fastforward, tried to help out Nancy/Emily a bit which was shocking, but they left a bad taste in my mouth, and at times it seemed like they were a little too inspired by the first Survivor winner in fellow gay man Richard Hatch, they even talked a lot like him in terms of vocabulary and their approach to the race. I know they did pop up again in another season, and I admit they were certainly memorable, though not for good reasons.
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Kevin/Drew - I know from looking into this season afterwards that they were the fan favorites this season, and while they weren't my favorite I can see why. They weren't deceivers, they didn't hide their true feelings, they were who they were and loud about it. Their preferred form of talking to each other was insults and putdowns, true guy friends there lol. They were all over the place in this race; at the bottom, at the top, in the middle. Their elimination basically came from the dreaded luck of the taxi driver, even if they had survived they were destined for third place with how far apart they were from the top 2 teams. There was a charm in their upfront attitudes, but some things made me shake my head, like saying Paris was nothing special, being a little too upfront about their disdain for India and them jokingly (maybe) telling Team Guido they would break their legs. But also, like Rob/Brennan, they befriended Nancy/Emily and almost saw them as their own mother and sister. I know they said it would be more beneficial to keep them around than one of the stronger teams, but you could tell by basic body language it wasn't just strategy and that they truly liked them. They were infuriated more than anyone after airportgate, and they made sure Team Guido knew it. I know they came back for an all-star season and also know Drew has had a variety of ailments and injuries unfortunately.
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Nancy/Emily - They might have been my favorite team. Nancy reminded me a lot of my Mom in terms of her kindness but was really most similar to a great Aunt of mine, extremely faithful, prudish but not in a judgmental way but more of a hearing so much cursing and such made smoke go out her ears cause she is that innocent lol. I got to admit, Emily was someone who if I had been watching at the time I would have had a major crush on and even now I thought she was really cute and before anyone comes at me, I am actually several years younger than her and she was an adult at the time and is now a 43 year old wife and mom (way to make me feel old after seeing her be like a kid at times on here lol). Maybe the original underdog story, they even had a little faction on the show they called 'The Underdogs'. It was an interesting switch on the usual dynamic, as Emily took the lead role on the team as Nancy was rather meek and got flustered easily, though as the end neared for them they both were showing signs of having nothing left in the tank. I pointed out Emily was quite cute, even when she had that drastic hairdo change a few legs in (my biggest remaining question of this season is did she do that herself or did someone else do it and if so, why? Boredom? Early-00s fashion? I wasn't a girl at that time, I was busy dressing like a nu-metal punk with spiked hair and playing Playstation, female fashion trends didn't come on my radar lol). She pulled it off, but I remain curious. Anyway, the point I was trying to make was about her being the attractive one there, and it played into things in a good and bad way. Good and sweet when in Tunisia a whole horde of guys her age and younger volunteering to help the team out and Nancy being quick to point out it was probably because they thought she was cute (they weren't nearly as enthusiastic to help out any of the other teams). The bad coming in, sigh, India, where Emily gets propositioned on the street by a guy asking how much she charges. Holy shit, India was a major issue from the very beginning on this show in regards to female contestents, as they were repeatedly refused train tickets as well just because they were women and women are below rats there in terms of rights and importance. And this was where the beginning of the ned came for them, as they were both being swarmed by these males with zero boundaries as well as being deeply affected by the massive poverty, seeing dirty impoverished kids and babies coming up to their taxi, begging, staring, they were barely holding back tears. All of the teams dealt with seeing these things, and being hounded by people begging, but it really hit these two the hardest which was only amplified by the sexism and Emily cracked, she was calling them stupid out of frustration and it didn't get better in Thailand, as Team Guido once again prevailed over them, this time in a race for the fastforward and then they walked around for a few hours trying to find the vehicle the next clue directed them to and no one was being of any help and she just plain and simply says "Screw you" to one of the Thai people and they wind up giving up and taking a taxi to the pitstop. You could call them out for all of this, but it was just a buildup of stress and anxiety which finally broke them. Think about it; the airport incident which really upset Emily, as she was saying do what you want to her but not her Mom (whose biggest concern afterwards was the image this put out of American tourists, not even thinking about herself), they kept on coming in at the back of the pack, the India degradation and claustrophobia-inducing chaos there, coming in 2nd to Guido yet again and then not being able to find anyone to assist them. I said to myself a few legs prior that Emily was showing some fight still but they both just seemed completely battered and defeated and Nancy even admitted as much. And the saddest thing is, they would have moved on if they had just persisted with the task in Thailand due to Bill/Joes epic mistake, they would have finished ahead of them. And making it extra heartbreaking was finding out afterwards that Nancy died in 2011 of Lou Gehrigs disease, which is just among the worst ways to go. Thinking back on it, Nancy may have been showing a few early signs of it during this :-( Just a sad story, Emily is apparently doing fine, she was with Brennan for a while after the race (which raised my eyebrow, considering in interviews before the race she talked about her boyfriend at home more than once, I hope she didn't screw around on him during the race). But still, hard to not root for them and if I had been watching at the time, Emily would have been my first crush on the show FWIW lol.
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Lenny/Karyn - This was a frustrating team to watch as it went on. I am just thankful they weren't married or engaged before this, cause they found out they were not meant to be during this. She says she was ultra-competitive, I say she was the definition of a nag, just incessantly chastising him and the longer it went on it spread to drivers and other public people as well. He wasn't innocent himself; routinely mocking her and being a complete dumbass, like in Paris he goes up to look for the monument and just immediately gives up and then just guesses (wrong) and they would have been gone right then and there if Emily hadn't inadvertently helped him find it. Talk about coldhearted though at the end, where she proceeds to end their relationship and lists every reason why. On national TV. I mean, damn that was brutal, you could see him just leaving his body as she went on and explained basically all his flaws and failings, WTF. They did indeed break up right after, though they said it wasn't because of the race, which I kinda agree with since these fissures were gonna explode regardless of what they were doing. He got married and has a few kids and she started a law firm, so I'm sure she isn't hurting for $$$ lol.
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Paul/Amie - They were opposites, which made me wonder how they got engaged. She was competitve and he wanted to quit every five minutes. That was the tale of this team, and I wanted to genuinely smack this guy. Every leg, he is bitching and whining about wanting to go home, wanting to quit. Struggling to get a taxi? Let's quit. Taking too long at a task? Let's quit. Pulled a muscle? Time to quit. Hard time taking a dump? Let's go home, I quit. It was like a cuckoo clock set to go off every hour with this douchebag. He tried to make excuses a few times during it, saying he was only saying things like that cause he hated to see her get upset, BS dude, you just are being a little bitch, trying to break the telescope in Paris and kicking things as you threaten to, what else, quit. If she had an equal partner in this, this team would have gone much further. Instead, she had a big baby who said he didn't want to do this and was only there for her (to what, make her miserable?). Their end came via getting lost in the Sahara Desert, talk about nightmare fuel there, and they were so lost they wound up driving to the back of the pitstop somehow. She's throwing up in the back of the car, it was torturous to view. They did indeed get married several years later, but are no longer together (damn, none of these couples survived, kinda sad to see). Her near-catfight with the teachers was humorous though, even yelling at one point "You're a fat bitch!" (somewhere, Nancy turned beet red lol).
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Dave/Margaretta - Probably the first team in TAR history to inspire the "Awww" feeling. Immediately, you saw it was gonna be a struggle for them physically due to the age differences, in the very first leg they could have gotten the fastforward but they got outpaced by Rob/Brennan and had to struggle their way back up after struggling all the way down. They continued to persevere though, and continued to struggle, like completely passing the clue in Paris and getting penalized at the start of the next leg as a result. Along the way, they did inspire the other couples with their amazing relationship and love, and provided some insight I actually hadn't thought of before, specifically about how these are all good people who are thrust into an intense, super-competitive, high pressure situation which is also exhausting and that will bring out the worst in people. They were truly kind people to the very end, which was frustrating to see it end sooner than it probably should have, as their taxi driver was an asshole for lack of a better term and was refusing to take U.S. money and arguing with them. And seeing a bunch of the teams at their elimination saying their goodbyes and paying their respects to them (which happened several times this season, can't recall seeing that in any other seasons) just drove home the point these were good people. Finding out that several years later, Dave would lose his soulmate to after a multiyear battle with cancer and pulmonary fibrosis was quite sad to hear, he is still going last I checked but you could tell they were 2 peas in a pod so that was extremely sucky news.
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Pat/Brenda - The first team to go from 1st to eliminated in the span of 1 leg, not a great achievement. They never exhibited the mental togughness I think you need to really compete in this though, as they were freaking out at the airport prior to Paris over issues with flights. They had the fastforward, like, no reason to flip your lid. Unless you get there 10 hours after everyone else I think you'll be fine. But then, they made the huge mistake of going to the wrong Pantheon and get eliminated. They seemed like solid enough people, but I never thought they were a threat in this.
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Kim/Leslie - They were teachers and yet repeatedly did stupiud things and said they were stupid... that makes one feel so secure about the countrys future lol. They weren't good, came off as mean girls (to Amie anyway, though I found out afterwards they were quite the class clowns during their time on there), and were lost on both legs. And yet their run ends because of a damn taxi driver arguing with them over change. Nancy/Emily seemed friends with them, and they both attended one of their weddings a while later. I know Leslie is married with 3 kids and Kim has 2 kids, I assume she is married too judging by her last name being different. They just went on to normal lives it seems.
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Matt/Ana - Forever famous for being the very first elimination in TAR history. Hard to say a whole lot about a team that is gone after one leg, I do know they did get divorced at some point later on. They did get pretty testy with the locals in Africa though for not being able to tell them where a location was. They wouldn't have been eliminated, but they got really lost on their way to the pitstop and thus arrived last. If they hadn't gotten so lost, I would have been deprived of the Nancy/Emily team which would have made this a worse season for sure.
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I can see why this became a sensation of its own, though not on the level of the absolutely top tier of reality/game shows, in terms of ratings and buzz that is, like Survivor, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire and (ugh) Big Brother. A pretty good and challenging path, though no trip to South America, and there was certainly a novelty and uniqueness of taking these teams from all kinds of backgrounds and forcing them to travel the world as fast as possible, culture and language issues be damned. A bonus in some eyes would be a lack of stars or 'celebrities' or stunt casting, save for Team Guido who really seemed like they were trying to be what Richard Hatch was to Survivor. You had everyday friends, family and couples racing for the million dollar prize but also being friends for the most part, I think in part because they were enjoying this unique experience and in part because they knew they were a part of something special. Just seeing the way a lot of teams would gather at every pit stop to say their goodbyes and pay their respects to whoever got eliminated was such a departure from the likes of a Survivor, where you had people doing everything but wish death on the other (and I think even that happened once) and that is as much of a reason for TAR thriving and survivng as anything else. So much has changed since then; HD is the standard now, everyone is on about 5 different social media platforms, so many of the casted are already known figures in this era of no anonymity, cameras are always on you somehow, and have it ingrained in them to have a motto of "how many likes can I get and what will generate the most clicks?". Such a different world, and seeing the ages of the contestants from this season now makes me feel old lol (the youngest is now in her 40s and married, I see her on here and she's a college kid who looks like she is still in high school). This was far from a perfect season, a lot of drag in the latter stages due partly to the massive separation that developed between the top 2 teams and bottom 2 teams and later with the top 2 and 3rd place team and partly due to what seemed like an attempt to get to 13 episodes by any means necessary which led to a bit too much filler content which easily could have been trimmed and just felt like they were desperately trying to reach the episode quota. Also had a string of production issues and errors which led to teams placements getting changed, time credits being given, a pit stop being moved due to dangerous weather conditions (which they had no control of obviously, but it counts) and it was not exactly the most challenging in terms of roadblocks and detours, as they really seemed to make it so that the biggest challenge of the race was the actual traveling part, luckily in future seasons they managed to get a better balance so that you had to put max effort into everything and not just the tasks. But for several endearing people and teams, seeing some amazing sights around the world like the Great Wall and that waterfall in south Africa which you didn't get to see unless you read or watched National Geographic up to that point, the final sights of a simpler and better world for a lot of us millennials, the groundbreaking nature of the show, the camaraderie between a lot of teams, knowing with hindsight this was the start of something awesome and a flashback and massive shot of nostalgic warmth to days where I didn't have gray hairs popping up or injure my back from sleeping the wrong way (too many mosh pits lol), I give this inaugural season a 3.75 out of 5. As you can see, that puts it pretty high up there, but it comes up short of reaching my upper echelon. Next time, it will be a later season, since you can't go earlier than S1 lol.
Ratings:
S5 - 4.75/5
S15 -4.5/5
S13 - 4.5/5
S1 - 3.75/5
S27 - 3.5/5
S25 - 3.25/5
S21 - 3.25/5
S23 - 3.25/5
S2 - 3/5
S19 - 2.5/5
S29 - 2.5/5
S16 - 1.75/5
S32 - 0.25/5