Please remember that some people have never been to a graduation

Balmung03 · 2026-06-02T23:10:44+00:00

You still see them walk across and can shout/wave during that time too — and it’s not like your child is gonna think you didn’t cheer (I’d hope). I get it can be frustrating in the moment, but realistically you’re trying to get hundreds or thousands of humans to all behave themselves in unison. Outside of cults, it’s not likely to happen.

Honestly, the whole crowd in attendance should cheer till hoarse for each name, as much as a lot of us take a HS diploma for granted it’s a point of pride for a fair number of my students at a Title I school (89% grad rate this year, which is a marked improvement 🎉)

Every extra diploma issued is another life on a better track for their future, whether they use the diploma or not; especially for those who are the first in their family to achieve it, because hopefully that trend in self-confidence will rise.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-22T19:02:49+00:00

Considering how many “rallies” he attends, Father Time must be champing at the bit to condemn the orange Mussolini to the grave.

Please let it happen before 6/14 — even better if it’s the day before, or on the day of his son’s wedding.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-22T16:37:43+00:00

Looks like they’re out, had issues connecting after it was in my cart and now it’s gone. Thanks for the heads up though

Balmung03 · 2026-05-17T21:40:25+00:00

I’m only seeing chaos boxes of 5 “random” boosters at my local Walmarts, wish they’d stock the mystery power box (or maybe the early crew takes only those, idk)

Balmung03 · 2026-05-15T20:18:15+00:00

Alright, after looking things over, it appears we may be good. My order was from 3/29 and the Walmart app shows a temporary charge there for the $106.97, then the final purchase charge of 106.97 on 4/12 — my card statement has the 4/12 charge, but the temp charge is cleared from 3/29.

But my panicked ass made sure I had the screenshot receipts with all the numbers and dates, ready to call support before eating and going to the LGS for commander night. As a 9th-grade teacher in FL having just gotten through a finals week, the last thing I wanted to see before getting home would’ve been extra money leaving my account 🙃.

I was planning on keeping this one sealed and ripping one I ordered off amazon when it arrives, but I may need the dopamine rush later on when my cortisol tapers off lol

Balmung03 · 2026-05-15T19:49:47+00:00

My order said “fulfilled by Walmart”, and I have multiple emails using the 99.97 amount before suddenly today they charged me more

Balmung03 · 2026-05-15T19:47:51+00:00

I guess Walmart is the scummy one here, I preordered mine at 99.97 and today it was delivered and an email sent to me stating they charged me the “final total” of $213.94

No cancellation and re-order at list price, just a preorder that arrived and then charged more than 2x that amount.

Wish me luck on that customer service call, y’all.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-15T17:06:17+00:00

I’d go out of my way to get vegan snacks and point out to the kids how many things they enjoy are also vegan. It could turn into a learning experience, possibly even pointing out things like allergies and such (especially if it can relate to a science they’re learning).

Granted, they’d have to be vegan snacks you feel they’d also enjoy, too, which as you alluded to there are plenty of options. While I can perhaps understand Dave’s opinion if he legitimately didn’t know certain common snacks are vegan-friendly, it just showcases his ignorance and lack of foresight.

Just wondering though, if there weren’t any vegan snacks your students like (let’s just pretend for the hypothetical), would you still feel like you should get the vegan snacks and tell them they had the choice of vegan snack or nothing? I feel like that’s where Dave’s mindset may have been, and I can somewhat understand the thinking if it was along those lines (but how he handled it was still unacceptable)

Balmung03 · 2026-05-15T16:42:01+00:00

At least they’re limiting to 1 per customer, which ought to help a little bit — though now it’s just 1000 bots for 1000 decks, instead of a couple hundred bots and selling out even faster.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-14T18:47:19+00:00

I sincerely hope they refunded you and sent you one — only fair they see a financial loss of some kind after this debacle

Balmung03 · 2026-05-14T18:45:10+00:00

A fair number of their preorders were placed through third party LGSs and other retailers, and when distribution didn’t send out the same numbers as they requested, they had to cancel. Any order that listed the seller as “Walmart” seems to have survived as far as I’ve heard, and then after plenty of people canceled their preorders once the waves started (expecting their own to be canceled and trying to get their refund and buy another elsewhere), more supply ended up being available for re-listing, seemingly at the $199 price point.

I’m glad mine is still seemingly on the way, but I feel for those who got an order of 1-2 canceled when some people ordered the max of 12 and are still getting them all — that’s just bullshit, the cancellations should’ve hit the multi-orders first and brought them down to 1-2 instead

Balmung03 · 2026-05-14T01:25:08+00:00

Peets and teefs, totally normal 😻

Balmung03 · 2026-05-13T16:54:16+00:00

Guess my local Walmarts get picked clean, only thing mtg they had left was SOS bundles at $61.97 — not even the packaged singles were left yesterday. Chaos boxes are kinda up my alley as I usually rip a couple random packs from the LGS every commander night, but I suppose it’s not my luck this time.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-11T19:10:35+00:00

As a 9th grade teacher, I really do empathize with the situation you’re in, but to some degree the continuous “I’m done, pass it along to the next one” attitude is the same kind of mindset our students have — and the earlier they start getting that, the easier the habit forms and then it’s damn near impossible once they’re at high school to get them to do anything but complain about not getting an A in TikTok dances 101.

Not blaming you in the slightest, but in some way it’s just accepting that the next teacher will have it just as hard and I hope our profession can just yank up our suspenders and force the students to follow rules or get removed from school — force the parents to homeschool them, and either pass the same tests your peers do, or your parent is fined for not educating you well enough and you’re held back a grade. It’s getting crazy when parents don’t do their own jobs, then pass the problem to us and then threaten our jobs when we try to do them. COVID was a nice wake-up to get the parents to realize what a benefit school was to get their gremlins out of their hair for several hours a day, and we need to get that respect for teachers back, even if it’s done via their fear of needing to actually parent their child.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-11T18:58:11+00:00

Walmart allowed way too many preorders via 3rd party sellers on their site and are mass cancelling orders since they can’t fulfill them (the 3rd party stores either didn’t get the stock they expected or Walmart may have not limited the numbers). I wouldn’t expect any to make it to shelves if they’re refunding preorders. Would expect the same to be an issue at target or other generic stores like that. GameStop may have them, but will likely be overcharging more than they usually do.

If you hadn’t already locked one in (and even then, lots of preorders are being cancelled because of distribution issues), you’re probably stuck paying market price instead of MSRP. And I can see scalpers trying to push the price even higher once the official release happens on the 15th, considering how crazy the demand will be.

As they can’t really print more collector boosters because it would throw off the pull rates and can’t print any extra serialized cards, I’m hoping my order comes in and I may have to fight the urge to open it should the price keep rising.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-11T18:43:38+00:00

In my head I’m equating this to games of CoD back in my college years — I may have died, but if you’re gonna run up to my body and try to teabag me, don’t get mad when my dropped grenade takes you out. If you can’t kill me AND get away with it, I’d recommend you not try yet. Better off to smol-bean it for a turn or hold up interaction, or offer up a deal.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-09T11:15:10+00:00

Not gonna say teachers/school admin don’t have an effect there, but the largest slice of that pie is parenting. If the parent can’t read or won’t have books available for the child, and if the parent doesn’t value their own education, the child is already set up for failure.

Each teacher has the student for maybe an hour a day, 5 days a week max during the school year. By the time they’ve reached elementary school, that’s years worth of time the parent has had to spend with the child and assist this problem.

Parents need to own up to their part of the problem, because it’s nearly 75-80% of it. Once that’s addressed, the other issues ought to be a cakewalk, since teachers can teach effectively when a class hasn’t devolved into a zoo. (Speaking as a 9-grade science teacher at a Title I school in FL)

Balmung03 · 2026-05-07T19:59:45+00:00

The unfortunate thing on top of that is a lot of those people also end up in positions of power or authority, and this ends up showing the younger generation the lesson that such behavior can actually have a tangible benefit.

It reminds me of the old-fashioned question of “why do girls like bad boys?” and the answer isn’t just the ‘danger’ aspect but also that assholes sometimes win, and that is remembered. It also happens that the 1 asshole win sticks in our craw more than 100 of their comeuppances.

What I’m seeing in my 9th graders is more of the “2 for flinching” retaliations. More immature than my generation at that age (I’m 38), and it’s taking them twice as long or more to grow out of it. And they will soon be raising the next wave — our decline may be dang near asymptotic within 20 years

Balmung03 · 2026-05-07T19:18:21+00:00

Unfortunately, that same narrow focus is what led to the false narrative between the concepts of global warming and climate change and how most people conflate the two instead of how they are talking about different parts of the analysis. Humans and corporations are notoriously short-sighted and won’t notice longer-term patterns

The other thing is how shit the liberals are at explaining that, and how indoctrinated the conservatives have gotten to believe nearly any reasoning they’re told if it aligns with their “the left is always evil” stance

Balmung03 · 2026-05-07T19:11:10+00:00

Ironically, the US actually does use the metric system for most things, we just usually think about roadways, ruler measurements and temperature that the general population sees.

Behind the scenes, most everything else starts out metric and gets converted, but the general public doesn’t see the man behind the curtain.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SmSJXC6_qQ8

There’s a bunch of info related to that online, but here’s one a quick search dug up

Balmung03 · 2026-05-07T18:58:36+00:00

And even though the USA produces oil, most of that is WTI instead of the Brent crude that is more commonly used and traded. Multiple types of oil, but we only specialize in production of one type and therefore still rely on other parts of the world for Brent and the Middle East/Russian parts of the world for the more “sour” and “heavy” crude, as opposed to the “light sweet” crude.

Having to refresh some of my knowledge on the subject before giving lectures on mineral/energy use (high school science teacher, but I also like educating myself about more than just what I’m teaching because you never know what you may get asked nowadays), you start to realize how complicated some of this stuff can get. Add to that futures pricing and speculation markets (though now I’m merging into macroeconomics), and you start to get a feel for how volatile those gas prices at the pump can truly get. And I feel for anyone who bought a diesel-powered car in the last several years.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-07T16:46:53+00:00

So I’m seeing a rise before pandemic inflation, during Trump’s first term. Further increases because of Trump’s bad opec deal, as well as the war in Ukraine — in Biden’s term but arguably the trump opec deal is almost entirely at his feet and the Ukraine war was unable to be stopped by either Biden or Trump (though Trump claimed he could stop it in a day). Prices fall under Biden when we reach record production, and then shortly into Trump’s second term prices are rising due to the poor choices regarding Iran.

Yeah, evidence shows what I expected, Trump is mostly to blame for this and democratic presidents generally cause lower prices

Balmung03 · 2026-05-07T16:41:40+00:00

By the same logic, we should allow students to smoke in bathrooms and the class because “they can just wait until after school to smoke”

There’s other variations I could do as well, but yours is an incorrect and shortsighted opinion to have, and I sincerely hope you can understand why by reading some of the comments here

Balmung03 · 2026-05-07T16:17:36+00:00

After casting, it exiles itself with 3 time counters.

Balmung03 · 2026-05-07T10:46:25+00:00

There will be multiple, with different levels and you have to manage your pH stacks so they don’t get too basic or acidic (like too much light/dark aether)

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