PRESIDENT TRUMP: "We have a blockade. It's been extremely effective — and the reason we have it is they tried to blockade and now we blockaded them. They're losing $4-500 million a day... We have the ultimate blockade."
A 24-year-old Polish tennis player arrived in Paris last week ranked 114th in the world, with no sponsors, no guaranteed income, and no certainty she could even pay for her hotel room.
She had to win three qualifying matches just to enter the French Open main draw. Prize money is only paid at the end of the tournament, so a Polish sports drink brand quietly stepped in and covered her hotel bill.
Her name is Maja Chwalinska. And today, she plays in the French Open final.
Before this tournament, she had won exactly one Grand Slam main draw match in her entire career. She had battled depression so severe that in 2021 she couldn't get out of bed. She underwent knee surgery in 2022. She spent years grinding through small tournaments across Europe just to stay afloat.
Then she arrived in Paris, won three qualifiers, and kept winning. Zheng Qinwen. Elise Mertens. Maria Sakkari. Diana Shnaider. Nine straight matches. One set dropped.
She is now the first qualifier in French Open history to reach the final. The last time a qualifier reached a Grand Slam final, it was Emma Raducanu at the 2021 US Open. Raducanu won.
By simply making the final, Chwalinska has earned more prize money than her entire career combined. The runner-up cheque alone is $1.6 million. If she wins today, she takes home $3.25 million.
One week ago she couldn't pay for her hotel room.
It literally ruined Star Wars. It’s been a shit show of awful ideas and miserable fans ever since. It’s the moment on the timeline it all went south. Fans were split (to say the least) and Disney didnt know what to do.
Movie successes & failures are fascinating. This had good buzz but there was not a barrage of Backrooms contend shoved down our throats and it made an opening. No big names and very little about what it was about.
Fun to see this happen.
I’d argue that most roast jokes feel forced.
But they can still work.
They aren’t jokes a comedian would use on their usual sets, they are for the roast night only. Purposeful. That’s why a free pass can be allowed.