Lulzpost | 2021.03.27




Review | 2021.03.15

Bloodborne head cage moon clouds
One house

Fire Emblem Three Houses

I had put my max difficulty/evil plot arc Fire Emblem playthrough on ice so that I had something to do on flights and layovers for our Jamaica trip.


2020 happened instead, but it turns out a turn-based game on Switch is pretty good for parenting. Plus I used Byleth as Dani's portrait for now, so I kind of have to.

Fire Emblem Three Houses flyers are super useful

The flyer strategy is working out well with pre-endgame battles. There have been some challenging paralogue quests, but the main story is pretty doable with a modest amount of pre-battle tinkering.
WSB/GME rides again

Reddit WallStreetBets Gamestop GME donations Fossey gorilla

Over the weekend, some WSBers decided to take the "we're ape investors/strong together" meme and use it for good.

Reddit WallStreetBets Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund Apes Together Strong

Donations eventually exceeded 300k and evoked a response from their main benificiary.

IforgotmyAOLpassword
/u/IforgotmyAOLpassword
This is so much better than the ass tattoos.
Still waiting on the chest shitter tho.
TheRealSamBell
/u/TheRealSamBell
What about a tattoo of an adopted gorilla on the ass?
AutumnCrystal
/u/AutumnCrystal
There was mention of a green candle ..
WillieDaWonka
/u/WillieDaWonka
ah yes, the green candle. I'm still waiting for thid payment.
TheRealSamBell
/u/TheRealSamBell
That dude went awol. You can't find the chest shitter username anymore

Meanwhile, the standard practice of wagering nonmonetary photos/videos if a price target is hit has seen a few accounts disappear. And Huffman told congress that the sub was full of authentic people, smh my head.

Symbol
Qty
Cost
Proceeds
Gain
Notes
GME Jan 29 '21 $36 Put w
1
$130.51
$0.00
-$130.51
Protective
GME Feb 05 '21 $165 Call w
1
$0.00
$2,314.43
$2,314.43

GME Feb 05 '21 $38 Put w
1
$253.51
$0.00
-$253.51
Protective
GME Feb 12 '21 $69 Call w
1
$0.00
$499.47
$499.47

GME Feb 26 '21 $190 Call w
1
$0.00
$2,999.47
$2,999.47

GME Mar 05 '21 $150 Call w
1
$0.00
$774.48
$774.48

GME
300
$39,868.17
$40,901.48
$1,033.20

Total
-
-
-
$7,237.03


Being currently out of GME (CSP on Thursday maybe...), I think my action could be classified as "FOMO, not YOLO". Apologies for the spreadsheet dump that etrade provides.

Side note: to convert dollars to text in Excel:

=TEXT(B2,"$#,##0.00 ;") 
Proper investing

JK more meme stonks

There are three more meme stocks that accompanied GME: AMC, Blackberry, and Nokia.

Symbol
Qty
Cost
Proceeds
Gain
Notes
AMC Jan 29 '21 $14 Call w
1
$0.00
$101.48
$101.48

AMC Feb 05 '21 $15 Call w
2
$0.00
$800.95
$800.95

AMC Feb 12 '21 $6.50 Call w
1
$0.00
$45.48
$45.48

AMC Feb 26 '21 $14 Call w
1
$0.00
$108.48
$108.48

AMC Feb 26 '21 $17.50 Call w
1
$0.00
$66.48
$66.48

AMC Mar 05 '21 $10 Call w
1
$0.00
$59.48
$59.48

AMC Mar 05 '21 $15 Call w
1
$0.00
$21.48
$21.48

AMC Mar 12 '21 $13.50 Call w
1
$0.00
$25.48
$25.48

AMC Mar 12 '21 $15 Call w
1
$0.00
$37.48
$37.48

AMC
100
$1,480.50
$1,147.48
-$333.02

Total
-
-
-
$933.77
Holding 200 more shares @ 12.62

AMC is currently a couple bucks above my purchase price.

Symbol
Qty
Cost
Proceeds
Gain
Notes
BB Jan 29 '21 $23 Call w
2
$0.00
$372.96
$372.96

BB Jan 29 '21 $25 Call w
1
$0.00
$279.48
$279.48

BB Jan 29 '21 $12.50 Put w
1
$8.01
$82.48
$74.47

BB Feb 05 '21 $13 Call w
3
$493.54
$721.43
$227.89

BB Feb 05 '21 $18 Call w
2
$0.00
$216.96
$216.96

BB Feb 12 '21 $15 Call w
3
$0.00
$88.44
$88.44

Total
-
-
-
$1260.20
Holding 300 shares @ 14.93

BB is currently a couple bucks below my purchase price.


Nokia was pretty straightforward, I was up $110 and down $506 on a couple of speculative calls. I also bought 100 shares near the $7 peak. I'm somewhat bullish about their fortunes a year or two down the road as the need for mobile infrastructure continues to grow.

Okay back to wheels

JonJon I'm interested in your seminar on covered calls.

Ten weeks into 2021, here's how things look with the regular wheel action. Painfully absent from the information reported by etrade:
Symbol
Qty
Cost
Proceeds
Gain
Notes
AAPL Feb 12 '21 $135 Put w
1
$69.51
$107.48
$37.97

AAPL Mar 05 '21 $125 Call w
1
$0.00
$223.48
$223.48

AAPL Mar 12 '21 $123 Call w
1
$0.00
$110.48
$110.48

AKAM
100
$11,180.52
$9,646.36
-$1,534.16
Ouch
AMD Feb 05 '21 $89.50 Call w
1
$0.00
$85.48
$85.48

AMD Feb 05 '21 $87.50 Put w
1
$0.00
$89.48
$89.48

AMD Mar 05 '21 $86 Call w
1
$0.00
$118.48
$118.48

AMD
100
$8,895.52
$9,333.26
$437.74

CRSR Jan 15 '21 $35 Put
1
$7.01
$199.48
$192.47

CRSR Feb 19 '21 $40 Call
1
$0.00
$407.48
$407.48

CRSR Feb 19 '21 $35 Put
2
$0.00
$708.96
$708.96

ERIC Jan 21 '22 $12 Call
3
$573.54
$898.43
$324.89

ERIC
200
$1,882.00
$2,359.55
$477.55

INTC Jan 29 '21 $56.50 Call w
1
$0.00
$51.48
$51.48

INTC
100
$5,633.00
$5,652.86
$19.86

JETS Jan 15 '21 $18 Put
2
$109.03
$0.00
-$109.03

MJ Jan 15 '21 $14 Put
3
$15.04
$124.44
$109.40

MJ Feb 19 '21 $28 Call
1
$0.00
$74.48
$74.48

MJ Feb 19 '21 $31 Call
1
$0.00
$39.48
$39.48

MJ Feb 19 '21 $18 Put
4
$114.55
$437.92
$323.37

MJ Feb 26 '21 $26.50 Call w
1
$0.00
$34.48
$34.48

MJ Mar 05 '21 $24 Call w
1
$0.00
$54.48
$54.48

MJ Mar 05 '21 $25 Call w
1
$0.00
$29.48
$29.48

MJ Jul 16 '21 $22 Call
1
$160.51
$249.48
$88.97

MJ
200
$4,122.93
$4,690.96
$568.03

NVDA Jan 08 '21 $537.50 Call w
1
$0.00
$522.47
$522.47

NVDA Jan 15 '21 $540 Call
1
$0.00
$307.48
$307.48

NVDA Jan 15 '21 $560 Call
1
$35.51
$1,021.46
$985.95

NVDA
100
$51,810.52
$53,111.29
$1,300.77

PFE Jan 08 '21 $40 Call w
3
$538.54
$0.00
-$538.54
They save the world and this is how you treat them?
PFE Feb 05 '21 $37.50 Call w
4
$202.06
$0.00
-$202.06

PLTR Jan 15 '21 $24.50 Put
1
$20.51
$80.48
$59.97

PLTR Mar 12 '21 $21.50 Put w
2
$0.00
$112.96
$112.96

RKT Jan 15 '21 $27 Call
2
$0.00
$92.96
$92.96

RKT Jan 15 '21 $19.50 Put
1
$0.00
$52.48
$52.48

RKT Jan 29 '21 $19 Put w
1
$2.01
$48.48
$46.47

RKT Mar 05 '21 $27 Call w
2
$0.00
$82.96
$82.96

RKT Mar 12 '21 $27.39 Call w
1
$0.00
$150.48
$150.48

RKT Mar 12 '21 $28.89 Call w
1
$0.00
$134.48
$134.48

RKT
115
$3,312.30
$2,307.98
-$129.26
Sold some to free up funds
SPCE Jan 29 '21 $34 Put w
1
$2.01
$133.48
$131.47

SPCE Feb 05 '21 $44 Put w
1
$0.00
$111.48
$111.48

SPCE Feb 05 '21 $51 Put w
1
$0.00
$115.48
$115.48

SPCE Mar 12 '21 $35 Call w
1
$0.00
$34.48
$34.48

SPCE
200
$5,003.04
$5,038.82
$35.78

TSM Jan 29 '21 $133 Call w
1
$0.00
$131.48
$131.48

TSM Feb 05 '21 $132 Call w
1
$0.00
$63.48
$63.48

TSM Mar 05 '21 $132 Call w
1
$0.00
$76.48
$76.48

TSM
100
$13,107.00
$13,518.17
$411.17

TWTR Feb 12 '21 $56 Put w
1
$1.01
$248.48
$247.47

USO Apr 16 '21 $34 Call
2
$207.03
$474.95
$267.92

USO Jan 21 '22 $43 Call
2
$207.03
$318.96
$111.93

XOM Jan 15 '21 $47 Put
1
$18.51
$86.48
$67.97

YOLO Feb 19 '21 $27 Put
1
$0.00
$114.48
$114.48

Total
-
-
-
$7,865.42


To address the aforementioned current holdings issue, I'm $5-20 per share down on CRSR, PFE, SPCE, TSM. I've continued to sell calls and won't be dissatisfied if I take a small loss on any of these positions.

A semi-meme outlier here is the $40 RKT call I sold for $625. I counted it here because I consider RKT to be a growth stock.
Bloodborne fin

Bloodborne dead guy

My co-op Bloodborne adventure ended in, well, appropriate fashion. J was waiting for me to come online and explored ahead a little. He had a conversation with a dude who, I guess, bypasses the final boss and ends the game. Since I hadn't beaten the second-to-final boss and probably couldn't manage without a carry, I decided my ending was about as good as J's.

thumbnail Bloodborne giant spider cathedral thumbnail Bloodborne spiders hammer thumbnail Bloodborne statue
thumbnail Bloodborne skull boss full moon
thumbnail Bloodborne snow castle witch garb statues thumbnail Bloodborne church invisible wall powerful enemy thumbnail Bloodborne guy head in cage
thumbnail Bloodborne room full of spiders thumbnail Bloodborne canyon stone piles thumbnail Bloodborne blue skin torch railing
Remnant

Remnant From Ashes PS4 screenshot subway

With Nioh 2 coming up, we decided to take a diversion into one of the PS+ games for this month, Remnant: From the Ashes.

Remnant From Ashes PS4 screenshot city ruins theater

It quickly feels like a The Last of Us-like setting mixed with some Fallout gear and technology.

Remnant From Ashes PS4 screenshot glowing travel stone

There's also a bit of a Half-Lifey supernatural element that (two sessions in) I'm not sure I totally understand.

Remnant From Ashes PS4 screenshot gunplay

The action mechanics are like The Division or Gears of War without the cover-shooting aspect. Firearms and enemies have elemental effects, one of which was very similar to Bloodborne's frenzy.

Remnant From Ashes PS4 screenshot skills abilities highlight enemies

Action skills can be applied to each of your two equipped firearms. Pictured above is the enemy highlight/prime mechanic, there's also incendiary ammo, healing pools, and so forth.

Remnant From Ashes screenshot boss

The bosses, even down to the fog door, are souls-inspired. They aren't easy.

Remnant From Ashes PS4 screenshot inventory

The gear system is neither deep nor shallow. There are a bunch of firearms available, each of which can be upgraded with currency. Same for armor that has matching set bonuses. Jewelry has some interesting effects including ones that buff certain traits at the cost of others.

Remnant From Ashes PS4 screenshot Eastern Wind desert

To be entirely honest, the first few hours of Remnant gave me the impression it was an indie game punching above its weight. The story, dialogue, and initial few environments feel heavily borrowed and some graphics elements such as character models felt a generation behind. While there's truth to all of that, the moment we hit the crazy alien desert I realized that there is more to this game than cutting and pasting tried and true shooter/souls elements. The claustrophobic streetscape turned into a (still on wide rails) I-don't-know-the-lore alien desert ruins that with thoughtful environment design.

Remnant From Ashes PS4 screenshot area transition

I should also say there's a fundamental element of randomization to both the maps and the enemy encounters. This is all second hand so I'm not sure the full story, but director/procedural generation is a neat way to make a game feel less scripted and more replayable. It can also make a playthrough seem generic. We'll see how this one goes.

thumbnail Remnant from the Ashes ads cooperative thumbnail Remnant from the Ashes thumbnail Remnant from the Ashes tower
thumbnail Remnant from the Ashes gun and armor upgrades skull pistol
thumbnail Remnant from the Ashes flame gun enemy ruins thumbnail Remnant from the Ashes vendor supplies engine
And now for your moment of zen

RobRob I don't understand why I'm legally allowed near software.



Storypost | 2021.03.12

Valheim bird delivery
New character


Danielle arrived.

Childbirth contraction surfing meme

I don't have a ton to say about the delivery, except this dank contraction meme.

JonJon How about Valentina Rossi Ritchie?
She may become a "doctor".

There hasn't been a shortage of congratuations, suggestions, and advice. It's nice to hear from people after a year of covid. We should do this more often.

AnonymousAnonymous When you get discharged people will give you a patronizing comment of how, "daddy has to babysit today", and you finally get to get on the social justice high horse and scream, "I'm fucking parenting, bitch, not babysitting. Maybe if your parents woulda done some of that you wouldn't be so stupid." I mean, make it your own thing, play with it. It's fun.

There's no such thing as bad advice, just bad people.


My contribution to parenting has been removing the wrist rope from a sponge and using it as a stroller leash for hills.

The hungry caterpillar
The Younger

Russian River Pliny the Younger Bottle gift

While my Pliny the Younger order did not go through Kevin's did and he was nice enough to share a bottle with me.

Russian River Pliny the Younger bottle pour

Any conversation about Pliny inevitably includes someone hating on the hype beer and naming something they'd rather have. While it's true that no beer is really worth Pliny quantities of commotion (well, maybe Brew Dog's End of History), it's undeniably an amazing beer. The hype makes you go in looking for a reason to criticize it - "it's too hoppy", "it's too dry/it burns", "it doesn't have much flavor", "it's undrinkably flavorful". None of these apply, it's absolute dead center on the pale/IPA chart and does so bringing 10.25% to the table.

If it was mass-produced, it'd be like an Arrogant Bastard that drinks like a Yellow Tail. That is, it'd be dangerous to civilized society.
New Taco


I don't even know how the adjust the seat yet, but I've moved to the current gen Tacoma. Carvana was a pretty decent car buying experience - the truck was delivered quickly and they seem to deal primarily in low-wear vehicles. The only snag I hit was somewhat misleading messaging on the order process - you get dibs on the vehicle when you provide a (fully-refundable) down payment. For the (normal?) financed case, this is something cheap like 5 or 10% of the purchase price. In my case of just paying cash, the down payment was the entire sticker price, which is more than I typically keep in a checking account (because that would be dumb). The problem is twofold: first, it means you need to move money before initiating the purchase process and by then your desired vehicle could be gone. Second, the cash-purchase-down-payment-is-the-full-price bit isn't obvious until you're pretty far along in the ordering process, so it's pretty annoying for a first time customer.

Carvana car vending machine

Ultimately I think I'd go back to them so long as they maintain their binding arbitration opt-out. I still disagree with having to opt out in the first place, but at least it's an option.
Projects


The (now grand)parents came down to help with the dog and some nursery projects that we'd originally planned to do in December before the covid surge. Since we had a bunch of time, Dad and I took on a few things, including moving the entry fence from urethane to stain.


The nursery got closeting, but the main project was putting up the whimsical, fantastical wall mural that Jes found on Etsy or something. The mural was printed on vinyl (rather than, say, wallpaper or paint-by-numbers) and was described as appropriate for smooth, primered drywall.


Applying the 7x2' strips was not easy and required three sets of hands, but we did a pretty good job. Hopefully Danielle will have something interesting to look at during the crib years and beyond.
Valheim

Valheim raft bro voyage

The lolbaters started a Valheim playthrough the evening before Jes and I headed to the labor and delivery. It's a Viking afterlife-themed survival game that supports ten co-op players.

Valheim early settlement

You start by building wood huts that provide shelter from the elements and the ability to craft of basic tools. As you gather more wood and stone, you create more Age of Empiresy workbenches and kilns and beehives that allow you to construct even more stuff. While your town does get invaded from time to time, it's closer to Fallout 4's settlement-as-busywork mechanic.

Valheim wandering

There's plenty of procedurally-generated terrain to hunt and gather from, the visuals are both very pretty and unrefined (it's pre-release).

Valheim deer hunting sneaking

Hunting with a knife isn't too bad as long as you remember to sneak.

Valheim boss Eikthyr

Game progression involves taking down a series of bosses scattered across the map. They serve as gates for your village/equipment leveling.
Investing

GME

Gamestop GME dip 10 March 2021

After languishing in the $40s, GME got a second wind. Much like last time when I sold a covered call for a tidy profit, on Monday morning I sold a $190 call against an adjusted cost basis of $175. Adjusted: had 200 shares, and half of them hit a stop loss, averaging me up to $175/share.

Chris
Chris
[GME Mar 12 $190 Call executed at $14.03]
And now that call is in the money. Zac
Zac
Did you follow your own advice, Zac? Sants
Sants
And buy GME when I sold?
No :( Zac
Zac
I YOLOed it. I'm rich as hell now. Kevin
Kevin
Would be a nice thing to say, but I didn't.

So this one is about $3,000 of gains, but about a third of what I would have made by simply selling at market close today. That sound bitter but it's really more amusing; who can be mad about a $1,400 weekly? While I'm currently happy to be relieved of my GME position for a tidy gain, FOMO is wondering how many weeks of insane IV I may miss out on.

Non-meme stonks

ZacZac You have to think big to stonk big.

We had a pretty decent market/nasdaq dip before getting back to all-time highs. Unfortunately, some of my favorite nasdaq wheels haven't recovered. Actually, strike that, only CRSR hasn't recovered. The others I bought even though I don't like them, namely AAPL and AKAM.

On the flip side, two of my long term holds (MJ and RKT) experienced a few days of high volatility from which I was able to extract good call premiums.

Kevin
Kevin
I took Chris's $MJ advice a few months ago. Glad it's paying off.
Makes up for that $GME bust he predicted.
What is $MJ? Sants
Sants
*shrug* Just letters to me.
I like to know as little as possible about where I put my money.
Lol cannabis ETF. Ryan
Ryan

I'll hopefully soon get around to posting updated wheel returns as a way of showing the effect of a market dip. Despite repeated stories about in-control inflation, since gold is pretty low, I've bought into a couple of ETFs.

AnonymousAnonymous I don't want to give money to Trump app developers [Phunware].
Might as well write a check directly to "White people".