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Was notified back in April that I was going to be laid off at the end of October due to our department getting bought out by another bank. My employer didn't want to lose me, offered me a position on another team, and said it was mine if I wanted it. I discussed this with my wife and decided to pass on it and make a career change after being unhappy in the financial industry for the past 20+ years. In late August, I took a couple of night classes (Interpreting Engineering Drawings and CAD with SolidWorks) at the local community college while I was still employed. Took the three hour CSWA (SolidWorks Certification) exam last month and passed!! Now I'm trying to figure out if I should pursue an Associates Degree in Engineering. On hold for the past 30 mins with the transcripts department of my former college where I got my Bachelors in Finance, so I don't have to retake Calculus, etc. I'm in my late 40's and know that I am lucky enough to be financially able to change careers. Just wondering now if getting an Associates at my age will be enough for me to break into the industry.

Almost done with this monstrosity. Motorized version for size comparison

Wife surprised me with R2-D2. Not sure what I did to deserve this after the AT-AT but I’m thankful to have such a loving wife.

I sold my cargo van today. Crazy times we're living in...sold it for $400 less than I paid for it new 4 years ago. Sent from my LM-V600 using Tapatalk

So I'm on quarantine. Got covid from a vaccinated employee (I'm vaxed and boosted). Feel fine. Just very minor cold symptoms. I'm locked in my guest attic suite. Here was my weekend (built it in 2 days) covid project I picked up used for $150 before christmas. Needed to build to confirm all pieces are accounted for. Only missing 4 pieces. Not too bad considering the set was owned by a family with kids.

Spotted in a Russian catalog

should be pretty easy to turn that into Deathstar 1

Or just pay your FedEx guy well at Christmas and tell him to mark anything not in a box as damaged in transit. [emoji2368] Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Mind sharing how much you sold the lot for?

Keep in mind I don't have a BAM within several states of me, but I heard anecdotally they seemed to have just stopped getting new inventory since the pandemic. ALA Kmart during their final demise.

So it comes from Jesus, so it comes from the very top.

I’m in financial services and honestly it’s not what I want to do the rest of my life. But right now I have job security and it pays well so I’m not changing careers yet. I’m 100% behind you on changing careers. Sounds like you’re on the right path and best of luck!

Well... do you need to work for someone else? That is a pretty valuable skill set, and if you get a job, it's because you can make the owner more money than he is paying you... it has never been easier to self-monetize a skill like that... I think a person should always bet on themselves, which you have done by doing the hard work of learning a new skill, why not go all the way, and bet on yourself by being your own boss... freelance, or start an agency... Upwork, Fiverr, etc.. my two cents.. but, if a job is in the cards... an associates from a respected CC department in that trade should show an employer that you have the skills.

a true mapster would not care about price of his passion...

Mine goes on my credenza.

So jazzed about this one. Looks SO good. Can't wait to put it on my mantle.

Hopefully this one is more of a common cold, like Omicron.

Hmm. Hard to say. Right now I'd probably just take the full MSRP refund unless you plan on keeping it for a personal collection build. Nevertheless, I have a feeling that it might be going away in the next 12-24 months to make way for other UCS sets. I'm sure the set will gain value over time, but like you indicated, shipping is always going to be the X-factor on something this big. Will we ever see them again at 20-30% off before retirement? Who knows.

800$ MSRP https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B075SDMMMV/ref=ox_sc_saved_image_7?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

Hope you’re not talking about me. Because I definitely like them both. Just waiting on that World Map to go on sale before I pick it up.

We enjoyed it....watched it twice now. Some decent comedy...and poking some good fun at our idiotic government. Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

Finallllly got around to building one of these!

Couple of Christmas builds. I particularly love the airship; it's very cleverly done. Yay LEGO!

Lambo stickered up

Even old sellers were doing that with huge quantity. LEGO was not very short at all, even when it went oos it was back in and out frequently. Some stuff never went OOS at all and was even on sale 20 off the entire season. Nothing ever went up like last year over a certain point. If you raised a little it stopped selling altogether and had to lower back down. Then risk getting stuck on the non retiring with the sporadic restocks or stuff showing up in stores scattered all through the 3 weeks. Money was definitely tighter and a lot of people just jumped to other cheaper priced items instead of pushing up items like last year that they really wanted. That also was easier with so many damn sets out there. The most baffling part was the non lego toys that were actually hard to get and not out there online or in store many times that never took off yet still somehow had 300+ sellers. The limit 20 and unlimited stuff early on in season Oct/Nov with 30-60 day delivery times on amz didn't help either as a lot of that got into resellers hands during peak time and in large quantities. The whole Target x Collection BS Dec 4th didn't help any seasonal sets. Wreath never going OOS anywhere was ridiculous as well as other previous year holiday sets which is just pure overproduction. Pretty sure sales were even or a bit higher but only cause I bought more for the holidays. Profits were minimal at best on the stuff that actually did sell and had a good amount of speculation breakevens and losses. Few big winners but was hard to get those in quantity.

My sales are down about 25% from 2020 to 2021, but that is not surprising since I offloaded a huge chunk of my inventory in bulk deals earlier in the year. All of the new competition is going to make things more challenging in the years to come and will tighten margins, but I've been planning for this for at least 6 years and have enough scale to make up in volume what I lose in margin. Sent from my LM-V600 using Tapatalk

Hahaha! I won the bet with my wife! I said “I bet this one dude misses the whole point, and grinds the conspiracy-conservative axe on the back of my post!” $100 donated to Antifa!

Assuming all goes well, we'll have a girl in 9 weeks. Yay LEGO!

Interesting discussion. My son refused to sleep. Sleep training didn't rrally help because although he would go to sleep within 15-30 minutes, he would never stay asleep. His best game was waking up at 10/12/2/4/630, (royal flush?) Thirty five months later, he finally slept through the night and we jokingly assumed he died. (: Now, except when he has a cold, he sleeps through the night or at least until 4/5am and we can coax him back to sleep until I wake up I always assumed that he had trouble sleeping because he was dreaming of my Lego. What's the solution for when my second child is born? I don't know if I can take another three years of little sleep Yay LEGO!

https://www.thebrickfan.com I’m not sure how true this is but it looks like the LEGO Store Calendars that we’ve all been used to have been cancelled for 2022. In an imagethat has been floating around online, it states that due to market planning and in conjunction with world events, it has become difficult to develop engaging calendar content within a certain timeline and the December 2021 calendar was the last one. As of this post, there is no store calendars listed on the LEGO Shopwhich usually goes up a week before the new month. If this message is true, it’ll be extremely difficult to know what gift-with-purchase items LEGO will have for each month and in turn, makes it harder for consumers to manage their purchases as they don’t know what will be going on. I assume that a lot of people plan their purchases around the GWPs and with the calendar gone, it will most likely encourage more impulse purchases. Keep in mind that we’re not sure if the message is true or it has been fabricated but we’re looking to get some answers from the LAN so we’ll see. Thanks to Jesus for the heads up.

Not impressed with the size of the ‘Amazing Spider-Man Poster’ VIP reward. Modulars in the background give you an idea of the size. Yes, the dimensions are online but I had assumed it would the size of the Disney prints. Ohh well…At least it was not too many points. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Mine are in horrible condition. Seals broken and a hole punched through 1 of the boxes. Already printed the return labels. Disappointing