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gobigorgohome22

gobigorgohome22

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Hey fellow Class of 2018ers!

I hope everyone is enjoying the last free summer of your lives!

As the start of 2nd yr gets closer, I have started thinking a little about the infamous STEP 1 exams for USMLE and COMLEX (I'm an Osteopathic student). I thought it might be a good idea to have kind of a study group here to help keep me in check and keep each other in check as studying starts and decided to create this.

I would like to open this up to both USMLE and COMLEX discussion.

So, how's everyone spending their summer? Started thinking any about the hell that is going to be coming up over the next year?
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gobigorgohome22 said:
@Amba & @Entadus

You two are our only hope of having a 260+ score in the group. We're all counting on you to make us proud! Don't disappoint us, or else ......
Click to expand...

The pressure is building.... 9 more days until my exam!

Derivations said:
NBME 15 on May 9 - 232 (3 weeks out)
NBME 17 on May 27 - 232 (5 days out)
NBME 16 today - 254!!! (2 days out) (18 wrong)

Honestly I'm in shock, I felt good during the test but not that good. Could have been a fluke, I don't know. I'm just aiming for a 240+ on the real thing so this is great for my confidence heading in. I am not doing NBME 18 after hearing the horror stories :laugh:

Just going do one more speed read through FA between now and the test and hopefully I'll be good to go on June 1st. Good luck to everyone here! I'll be sure to report back here on my test day experience.
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Wow nice job!!! I'm taking that one on Wednesday...



----

Today I took NBME 18 and scored 256 .... still not in the 260's but this is my highest practice test yet, so I'll take it:biglove:.... Must fight on....
 
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gobigorgohome22 said:
Took NBME 13 (offline) today:


  • NBME 13 (offline): 237 +/- 5 (2 weeks)
  • NBME 18: 232 & UWA2: 230 (3 weeks)
  • NBME 12 (offline): 85% = 236 +/- 5 (4 weeks)
  • NBME 16: 215 (5 weeks)
  • NBME 15: 225 (~7 weeks out)
  • UWA 1: 195 (~9 weeks out)
  • COMSE: 395
  • NBME 5 (offline): 187 (4 months out)

Happy with the score. I was kinda out of it during the exam though. Just wasn't in the mood for a practice exam. Spent time online/FB during break lol.

It's getting down to crunch time!!!
Click to expand...

Good job man. You keep getting better. Keep it up!
 
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Derivations said:
NBME 15 on May 9 - 232 (3 weeks out)
NBME 17 on May 27 - 232 (5 days out)
NBME 16 today - 254!!! (2 days out) (18 wrong)

Honestly I'm in shock, I felt good during the test but not that good. Could have been a fluke, I don't know. I'm just aiming for a 240+ on the real thing so this is great for my confidence heading in. I am not doing NBME 18 after hearing the horror stories :laugh:

Just going do one more speed read through FA between now and the test and hopefully I'll be good to go on June 1st. Good luck to everyone here! I'll be sure to report back here on my test day experience.
Click to expand...

Wow, that's a huge improvement. Great job!
 
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Entadus said:
The pressure is building.... 9 more days until my exam!



Wow nice job!!! I'm taking that one on Wednesday...



----

Today I took NBME 18 and scored 256 .... still not in the 260's but this is my highest practice test yet, so I'll take it:biglove:.... Must fight on....
Click to expand...

Very impressive, but I wouldn't expect any less from you. Keep up the hard work.
 
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Took UWSA1 today. I really don't trust the score but it was nice to see such a high number!
I'd die if my real score was anywhere near that.

Uworld - 60%/60th Percentile
NBME 16 - 222 (4.5 weeks out)
UWSA1 - 249 (2.5 weeks out)
NBME 17 - TBD
UWSA2 - TBD
NBME 18 - TBD
 
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AsadaBurrito said:
Took UWSA1 today. I really don't trust the score but it was nice to see such a high number!
I'd die if my real score was anywhere near that.

Uworld - 60%/60th Percentile
NBME 16 - 222 (4.5 weeks out)
UWSA1 - 249 (2.5 weeks out)
NBME 17 - TBD
UWSA2 - TBD
NBME 18 - TBD
Click to expand...

That's a big jump! Even if we subtract 10 points from your UWSA-1 that's still a solid improvement.
 
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Anyone know what the deal with the new USWA scoring metrics is? I took UWSA#1 on the 15th and it reported a ~220, but the updated metrics now say 243. I'm not sure I confide in the number that much - anyone else have a similar experience?
 
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Man, I wonder if I should just cough up the $50 to reschedule my exam time from morning to afternoon on the same day. Can't seem to fix my sleep schedule to wake up before 11AM. :|
 
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TheShaker said:
Man, I wonder if I should just cough up the $50 to reschedule my exam time from morning to afternoon on the same day. Can't seem to fix my sleep schedule to wake up before 11AM. :|
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haha, i'm the same way. I wake at 10-11 everyday and i'm really concerned that I'll have to wake up at 6am on the test day. I won't change the test timing though. I'll force myself to wake up early everyday next week to prepare for it.
 
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NBME 18 either tested to my strengths or I've gotten way smarter in the last week. I'm guessing/hoping a little bit of both. Either way, you all gave me an appropriate amount of fear of the thing.

NBME 12: 185
NBME 15: 215
UWSA 1: 237 (don't trust this, calling it a 227)
NBME 18: 237

Taking an "NBME Customized Exam" through my school later in the week, and then NBME 16 and UWSA 2 (don't trust the numbers but might as well since it's paid for) over the weekend.
 
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TheShaker said:
Man, I wonder if I should just cough up the $50 to reschedule my exam time from morning to afternoon on the same day. Can't seem to fix my sleep schedule to wake up before 11AM. :|
Click to expand...

Yeah, this is probably one of my biggest problems during dedicated. I can always force myself to stay up later but have a hard time getting up, I'm slowly becoming nocturnal. :vamp:
 
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ortnakas said:
NBME 18 either tested to my strengths or I've gotten way smarter in the last week. I'm guessing/hoping a little bit of both. Either way, you all gave me an appropriate amount of fear of the thing.

NBME 12: 185
NBME 15: 215
UWSA 1: 237 (don't trust this, calling it a 227)
NBME 18: 237

Taking an "NBME Customized Exam" through my school later in the week, and then NBME 16 and UWSA 2 (don't trust the numbers but might as well since it's paid for) over the weekend.
Click to expand...

Nice!

What about NBME 17? You don't plan on taking it? When is your test?

I agree with you regarding NBME 18. The test was hard but not as hard as I anticipated. I mean I did miss a good number of questions, and perhaps if it wasn't for the lenient curve, I would've ended up with ~230. However, the questions weren't much longer or trickier than other NBME tests. Sure, there were fewer one-line first order questions, but I would still say the test is a little easier than an average UWorld block. Like someone mentioned earlier, UWorld actively tries to trick you. NBME doesn't do that. They rarely put two answer choices that are very close to one another. I hope that this is the case on the real deal so I won't have to come back and eat my own words.
 
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Ibn Alnafis MD said:
Nice!

What about NBME 17? You don't plan on taking it? When is your test?
Click to expand...

Taking USMLE end of next week, COMLEX the week following that. Planning on NBME 17 beginning of next week. Not going to have time to do NBME 13. I have to do a COMSAE next week, but other than that I'm pretty much ignoring COMLEX until after the USMLE. Wow that paragraph has lots of acronyms.
 
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ortnakas said:
Taking USMLE end of next week, COMLEX the week following that. Planning on NBME 17 beginning of next week. Not going to have time to do NBME 13. I have to do a COMSAE next week, but other than that I'm pretty much ignoring COMLEX until after the USMLE. Wow that paragraph has lots of acronyms.
Click to expand...
I'm kinda in a similar boat. Planning on taking NBME 17 on Monday. I will take 13 this Thursday though (like in 2 days!). Next week is my exam, so I will only do NBME 17, the free 132, and FA rapid review during the 3 days leading up to my test. My COMLEX is 4 days after the USMLE and I have done nothing in regards to that, nor I'm planning to until I'm done with the USMLE first. I may get ComQuest and burn through as many Qs as I can in three days and hope that this would be sufficient to get a decent score.
 
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TheShaker said:
Man, I wonder if I should just cough up the $50 to reschedule my exam time from morning to afternoon on the same day. Can't seem to fix my sleep schedule to wake up before 11AM. :|
Click to expand...

Ibn Alnafis MD said:
haha, i'm the same way. I wake at 10-11 everyday and i'm really concerned that I'll have to wake up at 6am on the test day. I won't change the test timing though. I'll force myself to wake up early everyday next week to prepare for it.
Click to expand...

CyberMaxx said:
Yeah, this is probably one of my biggest problems during dedicated. I can always force myself to stay up later but have a hard time getting up, I'm slowly becoming nocturnal. :vamp:
Click to expand...

Wow thank goodness; I thought I was the only one!! The struggle is real!

I'm trying to get on an earlier schedule... woke up at 9:30 today so that's progress.... the thing that sucks is that a single morning of falling back asleep can screw up the whole week's sleep adjustment plan :scared:
 
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Entadus said:
Wow thank goodness; I thought I was the only one!! The struggle is real!

I'm trying to get on an earlier schedule... woke up at 9:30 today so that's progress.... the thing that sucks is that a single morning of falling back asleep can screw up the whole week's sleep adjustment plan :scared:
Click to expand...

The killer for me is that one or two extra hours of studying that just couldn't wait until morning.
 
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6 days until my exam and I'm having trouble staying focused. I've read FA 3-4x so far, been through Pathoma twice, and just finished my second pass through UWorld. Reeeally hoping I don't have a mental melt-down on test day.

NBME 12: 232 (5 wks)
UWSA1: 242 (3.5 weeks)
NBME 17: 260 (2 weeks)
NBME 18: 260 (1 week)
 
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ButterButter said:
6 days until my exam and I'm having trouble staying focused. I've read FA 3-4x so far, been through Pathoma twice, and just finished my second pass through UWorld. Reeeally hoping I don't have a mental melt-down on test day.

NBME 12: 232 (5 wks)
UWSA1: 242 (3.5 weeks)
NBME 17: 260 (2 weeks)
NBME 18: 260 (1 week)
Click to expand...
On paper everything looks verrrry solid, stay focused you're almost there!
Maybe run through Pathoma again? I'll be doing my last NBME 5 days before my exam, but that's just personal preference. There's not a lot more you can do at this point, what are you planning to do in the days leading up to the exam?
 
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ButterButter said:
6 days until my exam and I'm having trouble staying focused. I've read FA 3-4x so far, been through Pathoma twice, and just finished my second pass through UWorld. Reeeally hoping I don't have a mental melt-down on test day.

NBME 12: 232 (5 wks)
UWSA1: 242 (3.5 weeks)
NBME 17: 260 (2 weeks)
NBME 18: 260 (1 week)
Click to expand...

Wow.

When you say you read FA 4x, do you mean that you actually read every word of it, or just skimmed through it and whenever you came across something not very familiar you stopped and did more in-depth reading?
 
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Ibn Alnafis MD said:
When you say you read FA 4x, do you mean that you actually read every word of it, or just skimmed through it and whenever you came across something not very familiar you stopped and did more in-depth reading?
Click to expand...

For the most part, I've read every word. A few exceptions: psych/ethics and rapid review. I've read the 10 systems chapters twice in the past 5 weeks, and some of the other sections a few more than that (the ones I felt weak on: pharm, micro, biochem). I even bought an extra used copy so that I could rip out some of the sections that I really needed to hammer into my brain (lysosomal storage, antiarrhythmics, neuropharm, all of biochem). I just made it a point to read a chapter a day, and it adds up pretty quickly.
 
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Entadus said:
There's not a lot more you can do at this point, what are you planning to do in the days leading up to the exam?
Click to expand...

My plan is to go over my weaker areas; I'm working on neuro today and will do heme/onc tomorrow. With the last few days, I'm planning on reviewing the drug sections, biochem and micro in first aid, and squeezing in the last minute nit-picky disorders and minutiae (lysosomal/glycogen storage, RNA/DNA viruses, CYP inducers/inhibitors, disease genes, CD/receptor types, all that really fun stuff). I've been over it before, but I just wanna make sure I can recall it quickly if/when I need to.
 
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7 days out and I just wasted an hour reading horror stories of people getting well below their NBME average. What is wrong with me? Why do I do these things?
 
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ortnakas said:
NBME 18 either tested to my strengths or I've gotten way smarter in the last week. I'm guessing/hoping a little bit of both. Either way, you all gave me an appropriate amount of fear of the thing.

NBME 12: 185
NBME 15: 215
UWSA 1: 237 (don't trust this, calling it a 227)
NBME 18: 237

Taking an "NBME Customized Exam" through my school later in the week, and then NBME 16 and UWSA 2 (don't trust the numbers but might as well since it's paid for) over the weekend.
Click to expand...
A 50+ points jump! how many weeks? Can you share the secret?
 
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Good luck to everyone taking the real deal today! I'll be practicing with NBME 16.
 
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Got a 605 on a school administered COMSAE today. For my MD colleagues, the score is ~85th percentile.


  • COMAE: 605 (1.5 weeks)
  • NBME 13 (offline): 237 +/- 5 (2 weeks)
  • NBME 18: 232 & UWA2: 230 (3 weeks)
  • NBME 12 (offline): 85% = 236 +/- 5 (4 weeks)
  • NBME 16: 215 (5 weeks)
  • NBME 15: 225 (~7 weeks out)
  • UWA 1: 195 (~9 weeks out)
  • COMSE: 395
  • NBME 5 (offline): 187 (4 months out)
 
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UWSA1 5/7 - 214
UWSA2 5/13 - 234
NBME 15 5/18 - 217
NBME 13 5/21- 228
NBME 16 5/25 - 226

NBME 18 6/1 - 239!!!!!! super pumped :) 3 more study days after today....
 
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gobigorgohome22 said:
Got a 605 on a school administered COMSAE today. For my MD colleagues, the score is ~85th percentile.


  • COMAE: 605 (1.5 weeks)
  • NBME 13 (offline): 237 +/- 5 (2 weeks)
  • NBME 18: 232 & UWA2: 230 (3 weeks)
  • NBME 12 (offline): 85% = 236 +/- 5 (4 weeks)
  • NBME 16: 215 (5 weeks)
  • NBME 15: 225 (~7 weeks out)
  • UWA 1: 195 (~9 weeks out)
  • COMSE: 395
  • NBME 5 (offline): 187 (4 months out)
Click to expand...
Wow, nice job. What form is this? Also, have you been doing any Combank/Comquest/green book?

Regardless, seems like you are on your way to getting 240+/600+!!!
 
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Ibn Alnafis MD said:
Wow, nice job. What form is this? Also, have you been doing any Combank/Comquest/green book?

Regardless, seems like you are on your way to getting 240+/600+!!!
Click to expand...

Thanks! I think it was form C but not % sure. It was school administered. I have been doing 50 or so combank questions a week. Haven't done any specific OMM studying though.
 
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gobigorgohome22 said:
Thanks! I think it was form C but not % sure. It was school administered. I have been doing 50 or so combank questions a week. Haven't done any specific OMM studying though.
Click to expand...

My school administered form E a couple weeks ago, and I was surprised at how mellow the OMM questions were. I was able to snag a 624 on it with absolutely no OMM prep. I'm curious about the OMM questions on the real thing and if they're comparable.
 
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gobigorgohome22 said:
Thanks! I think it was form C but not % sure. It was school administered. I have been doing 50 or so combank questions a week. Haven't done any specific OMM studying though.
Click to expand...
Regardless, that's a great score. I haven't done any COMLEX related studying. Planning on doing that in the 3 days between my tests. Hopefully that's enough.
 
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ButterButter said:
My school administered form E a couple weeks ago, and I was surprised at how mellow the OMM questions were. I was able to snag a 624 on it with absolutely no OMM prep. I'm curious about the OMM questions on the real thing and if they're comparable.
Click to expand...

Not sure if we attend the same school. But my school administered COMSAE E a couple weeks ago as well. I got 544. If I get this score on the real thing, I'd be happy.
 
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Ibn Alnafis MD said:
Regardless, that's a great score. I haven't done any COMLEX related studying. Planning on doing that in the 3 days between my tests. Hopefully that's enough.
Click to expand...

COMLEX questions are so weird (i.e. crappy) it might be worth flipping through one of the q-banks once or twice just to get yourself re-acquainted to the question style. I know I have totally different strategies on Uworld vs Combank. With a 544 last month you probably don't have anything to worry about though!
 
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Ibn Alnafis MD said:
I'm calling it, 260!
Click to expand...
Sorry to let you down! I don't know what happened but NBME16 was my worst so far, 239...:dead:

Oh well I still have a week to go! I'd rather have a bad day on a practice test than the real thing! I'll take NBME17 on Friday and hopefully that one will be much higher:shrug:
 
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Entadus said:
Sorry to let you down! I don't know what happened but NBME16 was my worst so far, 239...:dead:

Oh well I still have a week to go! I'd rather have a bad day on a practice test than the real thing! I'll take NBME17 on Friday and hopefully that one will be much higher:shrug:
Click to expand...

Damn. Sorry about that. Perhaps it tested a lot of concepts you are weak on, or maybe, you weren't 100% focused when you took it.

For me, I felt 16 was a little harder than 18 because it had a lot of first-order, straightforward recall qs that you either know or you don't. 18 was more of a "thinking" exam and there were a lot of occasions where even if you didn't know the answer you could kinda reason it out.

Anyways, you are still scoring well above average so you'll be fine.
 
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Hope everyone's studying is going well, a lot of us are already pretty close to having this being over. Looking forward to life post-step. Hoping someone could make sense of my logic (perhaps flawed)- but for the UWSA- if you take the averages they give you say UWSA1 average % correct is 62% could we approximate this to being 230?
 
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Does anyone know anything about kaplan simulated exams? My school forced us to take one today. In retrospect, I probably should have just marked C on everything and continued with regular step 1 studying, but I took it and got a 68%. No idea what that means though.
 
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apr27 said:
Does anyone know anything about kaplan simulated exams? My school forced us to take one today. In retrospect, I probably should have just marked C on everything and continued with regular step 1 studying, but I took it and got a 68%. No idea what that means though.
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It means your school is being paid by Kaplan and they're going to use your class' scores to establish the curve of their future practice exams. /tinfoilhat
 
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Just took the beast today. Here's my breakdown of test day for anyone interested:

Let me start by saying my testing center was busy as hell. In my room there were about 20 people all taking different tests and they were constantly coming and going making lots of noise. Chairs were squeaking, people were coughing, at one point had some guy talking really loudly and the proctor wouldn't shut him up. It really threw me for a curve at first because I had done all my practice tests in complete silence. Also, signing out/scanning in/getting stuff from your locker takes a long time so if you're planning to go out and scarf down some food and be back in 5 minutes, it's probably not going to happen. Plus, sometimes the staff was busy helping someone else check in and I had to wait which was really annoying. Also, the bathroom at my testing center was a 1-2 minute walk alone and it was confusing to get to so I'm glad I went early to figure out where it was. I recommend doing the same.

Okay, now for the test. Oh. My. God. It was HARD. I think on the first block I marked 5 out of my first 10 questions which got me to panic a little right from the start. After that I settled into a groove but on every block I marked around 10-15 questions (compared to NBMEs where I'd generally mark 5-10). The difficulty level was around an average UWorld block, maybe sliiiiiightly easier, but much harder than NBMEs 15-17 (I cannot comment on 18 since I did not take it).

I'd say break down per block was around:

5-10 gimmes - straight forward classic presentation, easy points if you know FA relatively well

10-15 moderate questions - these require thinking and are initially difficult when reading the question but (most) become fairly straight forward when you catch on to what they are asking for (which can be a challenge in itself sometimes). For example I had a lot of graph interpretation stuff that looked really scary at first but then once you really get down to it was just application of a simple concept, so try not to get intimidated by these

10-15 difficult questions - vague patient presentation with no buzzwords or specific findings to clue you into any specific pathology, convoluted cardio/resp physiology questions (my weakness), micro questions with seemingly more than 1 correct answer (I guess one of them is "more correct"), etc.; I was stuck between 2 answer choices very often due to the ambiguity of certain questions and had to make a guess. These are the questions that just eat at you because you know you're probably missing something hidden in the question to push you to one answer but just can't figure out what. Probably the most important questions that separate the 220s/230s from the 250s/260s.

2-5 or so WTF questions - Basically, there were a lot of WTF questions. There were pathologies I hadn't seen before. There were anatomy q's with structures I hadn't seen since 1st year anatomy. Obviously can't go too much into detail but had a couple, umm, let's say interesting epidemiology questions that I guess I could have prepared for by browsing wikipedia and memorizing random trivia throughout medical school? I don't feel too bad about missing these because everyone is going to be feeling the same way.

I'm just glad to be done though. I know most people feel awful after they take it and I'm no exception. I was originally aiming for 240 but I will be ecstatic with a 230+ now. Good luck everyone.
 
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