Avoiding Ron and NFL Divisional Round

 

For the second consecutive flight I have been placed next to a passenger which cannot sit still, every four seconds a herky jerky move like he is unable to be comfortable in silence or a stationary position.  When I was in elementary school these children were called “hyperactive” and dosed up with some kind of downer to make them less disruptive in class.  As an adult, people can mask this behavior if they somehow fail upwards as being “on-the-go” or perhaps have their casually laughing wife say something like “Oh, you know Ron… He just can’t sit still.” as if that were some sort of virtue.  In the suburbs guys like this can blend in, intently running their leaf blowers and power washers, whatever they have to do to not sit quietly in their own minds.

I have a theory that the rise of smart phones has created an epidemic of these people, unable to go more than a few moments without some kind of stimulus for their brains.  Maybe this hyperactive trait had always been there and now it’s been exacerbated by a steady regimen of dopamine hits from quick videos of guys getting hit in the nuts and girls in yoga shorts stretching.  It could also be the rise of the coffee chain culture where maybe this dude is just speeding his dick off from a quad shot Venti Pike delivered via suppository for faster intake.  “Ron?  Ron?  Quad Pike Venti?  Ron?  Yes, can you step over here onto the plastic tarp?  Your drink order is ready.”

It could also be from dwelling in a world of apps and online portals that have just fried people’s brains out.  I spent 90 minutes yesterday trying to check into a flight in which Frontier Airlines had constructed the absolute perfect electronic maze.  Log onto the app with your Frontier Miles number.  Password not recognized.  Forget your password?  Click the button to have a link to set a new password.  No email arrives.  Go to the website.  Chat with our AI assistant.  What’s the problem?  I’m happy to help.  Explain the problem.  Have you tried to log onto our app?  Connect to representative.  Hello, I am happy to help.  What’s the problem?  Explain the problem.  Have you tried the app?  That’s the problem.  So sorry.  I have re-set your password in the app.  Log onto the app.  Unexplained error.  Unable to log in.  Please try later.  Log on with your Frontier miles number.  Unexplained error.  And back around.  Have you tried our app?

I am hoping to dive in Mexico, something I haven’t been able to do for a number of years now as I have been traveling almost exclusively to wine producing regions.  Of course, there is some sort of risk with my exciting new heart status, but there are worse places to die than in a light blue ocean surrounded by colorful fish.  My doctor told me a story of a guy that had a heart attack at depth.  He had to do a safety stop waiting for his blood to decompress as he absorbed the attack.  He then flopped back onto the boat and chugged back to the port.  He went to the airport to get back to the Clinic to receive care and somehow lived after an intense surgery.  Glass half full, he somehow lived after all that.  Glass half empty, maybe he should have just removed his regulator and slowly sunk to the bottom.  I am hoping to have a couple low to medium depth dives in nice reef locations where I can weightlessly float around, not feeling the need to move every seven seconds like Ron over there to my right.  

My fear is that Ron will wind up being at my hotel.  I will then fixate on Ron, watching him get up to go to the breakfast buffet, sit down, get up again, swiftly walking across the room in his Sketchers and backwards baseball hat, checking his Apple Watch, grabbing a plate for a muffin he doesn’t need or want.  I overspent on the hotel as usually this type of guy is very concerned about securing accommodations that qualify as “a great deal”.  This will then enable him the opportunity to engage unlucky guests at the swimup bar with unwanted conversations like “Great weather, huh?  Way better than it is back at home.  We’re from Cleveland.  Yeah, had some snow right when we left.  We usually don’t come down here this time of year, but I got A GREAT DEAL on the Apple Vacations website.”  I have found that the extra $300-$500 a week tax to price yourself into a higher end place in Mexico is usually worth the payoff to leave Ron at the airport.  Even though I know I will not allow myself into the proximity of Ron to potentially get ensnared in his conversational web, a $100 a day payment on top of the normal cost will be well worth the insurance cost of me not staring at that guy monitoring his behavior, which is of course MY poison I bring to this party.  You’ve got to understand what you’re made of and deal with the reality of the situation.

As expected, Ron was shuttled off to a discount hotel chain at the Mexican Airport which is like arriving in Saigon in 1969.  “Hey GI?  You need taxi?”  A small mini van whisked off to check into the 5 Apple (whatever that means) hotel location where I had the worst glass of sparkling wine I’ve had since a sekt at the Hamburg Art Museum café in the mid 2010s.  I fell into a deep sleep where I had a dream that I had been unconscious and woke up to find myself baked into a large vase with thick clay walls.  The only part of me exposed was my head, with my neck being contained by the top rim of the vase like an amphora collar.  My body was constricted inside the vase in a half squatting position where it was impossible to stand or sit due to the constriction of the chalky interior of the vessel.  My thighs burned but if I relaxed them, the weight of my body would cause great pain on my jaw being jammed against the rim of the opening.  I was in a large room with a tile floor totally alone.  It was silent and with a growing darkness like late dusk.  Across the room I saw a stairway heading down.  If I could figure a way to knock the vase over, maybe I could roll over to fall down the stairs where hopefully the impact would break the vase and free me from the prison.  I rocked my body back and forth and felt the vase gradually topple over and begin to roll.  The floor and the ceiling alternated as I helplessly rolled towards the staircase.  Suddenly I stopped short of the stairs, the vase having rolled into a corner of the room where my face looked down at the tile, trapped into looking at the floor in an uncomfortable position forever.  Then I woke up with the vivid memory.  

I don’t know what you know about dream interpretation, but here’s what I took out of it.  I better get on the Denver Broncos.  Does the vase represent the pass rush of the Broncos D line?  I dunno.  Maybe.  I am not bought in on this Bills team.  Maybe I’m pissed that they beat the Jags last week in what was a great game that I wish I could pin on my personal nemesis Trevor Lawrence, but I can’t.  I keep thinking about that Eagles game where Philly bullied the Bills line and made Josh Allen ineffective (though admittedly he almost pulled it out).  This divisional round is usually where good defense (and a rested one with Denver) beats a good offense.  I am on Denver -1 at home.

I just can’t see how the 49ers can keep losing star players and keep winning.  Kittle is done with an Achilles, approximately the 47th such Achilles tendon injury of this NFL season.  When I was a kid watching football, NOBODY got an Achilles injury.  Now it’s a couple guys a week.  I have no idea why this is, but it takes a good two years to come back from it, which means Kittle is probably done as a premier NFL player.  When you look at this game, the decision is this:  Do you think Sam Darnold will fuck this game up for Seattle?  Darnold has led his team to two (2) consecutive 13 win seasons, and yet it’s hard to shake the “I’m seeing ghosts” NY Jets Sam Darnold.  Even that kid in Oregon was like “Fuck that, I’m staying in school.  I don’t want to be a Jet.”.  I think the Seahawks run, run, run and keep it away from Darnold to win it on his own.  Again, well rested team.  I’m thinking about teasing this game with that 7 point spread making it Seattle -1.

That means I need a dance partner.  I can logically go Chicago +10 or Houston +9.5 as NE +2.5 makes no sense.  I think the Rams are the best team in the NFL.  However, I just saw Stafford sprain his index finger on this throwing hand last week, and now he is going to have to pass the ball in single digit temps in Chicago.  I’m seeing a whole bunch of “Matt Stafford hasn’t won a game in under 40 degrees since 1912” shit which concerns me.  He also was having epidurals for his back in late August.  That dude can tough out whatever happens, but this fucking Bears team is some kind of Team Of Destiny.  I just need them to keep it close on a shitty night in Chicago.  Seattle -1/Chicago +10

Current Record:  36-32

Wild Card Weekend In The Home Of The Free

 

I have had to take a break from social media because it's really starting to stress me out how stupid almost everyone is in the country.  Like most of you, I created a Facebook account whenever the hell that rose to prominence so my "friend" group is sort of a relic from that time where I have a disproportionate number of people in my feed that I had casual business relationships with in the early 2000s.  I have two basic groups on Facebook, my musician friends and my old work world.  My musician friends for the most part are reliably socially liberal, not that concerned about how people spend their time as long as it doesn't negatively impact others.  Then I have this other 15-20% of people that have become increasingly radicalized into Far Right (read as "fascist") talking points.  I'll see these accounts where the profile picture is some smiling suburban Dad with three kids and the text will be the most hate filled bile you'd ever imagine.  Meanwhile everyone at the office is saying "Bob is such a nice guy."  

Well, Bob might be agreeable at the water cooler but he's also loudly suggesting that half of the country needs to be publicly hung from meat hooks because they have a measure of tolerance for (fill in your topic) trans people/people from different cultures/different religions/rule of law, whatever.  It's hard for me to wrap my head around the idea that people will proclaim on a public platform "That Minneapolis Mom got what she had coming because she didn't comply with the law" as if we all didn't see the same video of some commando cosplay hillbilly shoot some woman in the face as she drove away from him.  I think we are all on the same page that we need to have police in our communities.  I don't think we have the same level of buy-in that if someone doesn't comply from orders from whatever this paramilitary ICE goon squad is then that person gets immediately executed.  Is this even a real discussion?   

Something people forget is that when the Kent State students got shot in 1970 by the National Guard, the majority of Ohioans thought it was the students fault.  Students protested an illegal bombing by the government in Cambodia, and later that day essentially untrained military personnel shot them.  You know, sorta like those ICE hillbillies.  It seemed ludicrous as an incoming student at Kent that anyone could have thought the students "deserved" to get shot, but sure as shit that's what some people thought at the time.  I watched all these man on the street interviews in black and white film when I did my Intro seminar at the university.  History has certainly changed that point of view with even the most ardent "law and order" honks willing to begrudgingly take a "mistakes were made" position on shooting kids.  This is just like it will when this time period is looked back upon on the chapter of an American History book called "The Beginning Of The End" when they talk about shooting some Minneapolis mom.  

The fact that the existing Democrat leadership seems only be able to argue about points of legislative procedure and standing around pretending to be cool headed shows how unwilling they are to get involved in the accountability business.  There is one ruling party now and it's an 80 year old man with God Knows What health issues surrounded by Yes-Men and authoritarian zealots.  These guys are showing you that you will get shot in the face if you defy them, and there is nothing you can do about it.  The courts will not rescue us.  The Democrats exist now to serve the lip service "resistance", the same role that Putin has given to the performative "opposition parties" that serve as the Washington Generals role as imaginary competition.  The Democrats are sitting there playing checkers against someone hitting them with a boxing glove and they just keep saying "Well, when someone makes that guy play by the rules, he might lose this checkers game!".  There is no one coming to save anyone.  We aren't "slipping into autocracy", we are there.  Look around.  You live in Turkey or Hungary now, but everyone is somehow more stupid.  

But just when that can bum you out, the good news is it's Wild Card Weekend!   Let's turn that frown upside down, bury the Mom and PLAY SOME FOOTBALL!  OK, I think the Rams are the best team in the NFL.  It's not a sure thing, that's for sure, but that's where I'm at as of today.  The Panthers fucking stink and there is a good chance that the Rams humiliate them in that carefully planned "Saturday Shitty Early Game Slot" usually reserved for the Houston Texans.  That point spread is one of the largest of all time in the modern NFL Playoffs, and I think it's too many.  However, I'm not running to the window to drop money on the Panthers even if they are getting 10.5 points.  I do think the Rams are going to score and score frequently.  Bryce Young is going to come though for me with an otherwise meaningless bullshit touchdown late to get me the Rams/Panthers OVER 45.5.

I am going against my longstanding personal policy and betting on a Trevor Lawrence led team with Jacksonville +1.5 at home against Buffalo.  Look, I think Josh Allen is more injured than anyone is saying and his mobility is limited.  More importantly, the Jags are just a better team right now.  This line is being led by the idea that Buffalo is the best team in the AFC, and they clearly haven't been.  It seems to me that there has been a generational shift in the QB stars where Mahomes/Lamar are sitting on the couch and the narrative of Josh Allen having a clear path to the Super Bowl is just sorta stupid.  The Bills aren't as good as they have been in the past.  The Jags last loss was the first week of November to the Texans and they are 8-2 against the spread in their last 10.  They've gotten really good but no one gives a shit because they're the Jags.  This is where the value is on this game.  I think they are a live Super Bowl team.  Jacksonville +1.5

Current record:  35-31

History Repeats and NFL Week 18

 

Something that not enough Americans do is travel internationally.  Our country is so large you could spend your entire life within our borders going from evergreen forests to desert to swamp to coastline and never see all of it.  Still, if you don't travel internationally, it's very difficult to have any perspective on global news.  I will never forget that one time I was walking down The Strip in Vegas in front of these rubes that were having this conversation while strolling past the Paris casino.  "Well Jenny wanted to go on a vacation in Europe and I said "Honey why go to all the trouble of traveling over there when you can see ALL of Europe just walking down the street in Vegas?".  I mean, what are you going to do with that?  It does provide fairly solid evidence that most people you'll come across in the next few days offering up opinions that will be fed to them via Fox News and Facebook view other countries as nothing more than Disneyland paper mache backdrops and casino themes for their own recreational needs.  Going to see the Great Pyramids in Egypt=Walking into the Luxor.  Same thing.

I am finishing up a book called "Berlin In War" which chronicles what it was like living in Berlin in 1934-46.  I fell into this after being in Paris and reading a street plaque which noted a small act of courage in Paris during the German occupation, reading the book "Paris 1944", which then led me into reading about what it was like on the flipside of that experience.  The most interesting part of the "Berlin In War" book is seeing the easy acceptance from the population and the normalization of things like secret police forces plucking their neighbors from the streets, losing personal freedoms, and total state control.  They went from the depths of post WW1 poverty and ruin to a total rebuild only to allow themselves to get plunged right into destruction again.  In 1939 they were living in relative prosperity and by 1940 despite their military strength were having to huddle in their basements every night while the city was getting bombed by the RAF.  

There were enough people that were ready to accept whatever bullshit that the government fed them, their Fox News of that time was a national radio system.  Whatever ludicrous explanation that was given for invading Poland, jailing Jews and political critics, mountains of money flowing into military buildup, etc, the population for the most part bought into face value from what the radio said.  There is a chilling similarity between demonization of Jews to targeting immigrants, invading Poland to striking Venezuela, eliminating German oppositional journalists to Govt pressured censorship of Kimmel/60 Minutes/Colbert, and the rise of Hitler's government model to the Trump Administration bulldozing our laws.  Of course, if you point this out to MAGA faithful they will get caught up in the wrapping paper of Nazi outfits and the lack of mirror perfect historical redundancy.  This is because of the general lack of education and inability of most of the population to be able to grasp complicated ideas and nuance.  In a world of swirling gray chaos, we live in a social media feed of people that look at life as a WWE script of heroes and heels.  

I would imagine that the spin of this blatantly illegal military strike on Venezuela and subsequent kidnapping of its leader will get framed as "America getting tough on drugs".  I can see the MAGA crowd doing a rah-rah tough guy cheer now, none of them having traveled further than "that one time we went to Florida".  They do not and cannot see Venezuela as a sovereign nation, filled with people just like them but in different circumstances.  We don't do empathy in the U-S-A.  Everything revolves around the narratives provided by our devices.  The Gulf War has shown that the lack of factual evidence isn't a real problem to a motivated cabinet, but at least back then we stuck with protocol of debate and presentation of what were alleged facts.  There will be some alternate reality constructed that will be acceptable to everyone as long as their gaming systems connect, Chik-Fil-A is open and you can get your vape cartridges at Speedway.  Congress isn't going to do shit.  We are the people of Berlin in 1938 waiting for our next radio broadcast to justify what previously unthinkable thing just happened. 

The news isn't all bleak though!  The Panthers are playing the Bucs to determined which one of them gets smoked in the Playoffs next week.  Now THAT'S drama!  I know that I should not get involved in this game.  All signs point to this being one of the biggest Eels of the season.  Tampa has been awful for two months.  They have lost 7 of their last 8.  The Bucs are 1-9 against the spread in their last 10.  They haven't won a game since five days before Halloween.  On top of that, Carolina is the one getting points!  All logic and common sense says to take as much money as possible and bet against the Bucs.  I know that this is why, when the game is so clearly one sided, and the line appears to be soooo wrong that it is a first class Eel.  I am powerless to stop myself from betting on Carolina though I know this will lose!   Carolina +3  

I found myself in a difficult position.  That enormous New Orleans under 6.5 win bet I placed with great confidence back in August is now sitting in a precarious spot with the Saints at 6 wins having won 5 in a row with Tyler Slough at QB.  If they beat Atlanta on Sunday, that was set up to be a major loss for me.  Then it hit me... New Orleans is an underdog!  Why, this isn't a disaster!  This is OPPORTUNITY!  I am now going to hedge out of my position by placing a matching massive bet on New Orleans +3.5, creating a fabulous middle.  If Atlanta wins by 1-3 points, I win both sides.  Any other outcome and I'm out clean.  If I can get a last minute Kirt Cousins led drive for a field goal, the Saints will become my all time favorite team.  I will take some of the proceeds and get myself some sort of ugly ass Saints hat ASAP.  New Orleans +3.5 for the middle.

There is nothing like a Browns v Bengals game in January with nothing on the line to capture the spirit of the NFL in Ohio.  I have no idea how the Browns can manufacture points even with the shitass Bengals defense on the field.  One Browns starting offensive lineman is playing.  Both tight ends are out.  The running backs are out.  It's Sanders trying to throw to Jerry Jeudy in the cold.  How is THAT going to work?  Meanwhile the Browns defense has always been good against Burrow.  They held them to 17 back when Burrow was healthy in September.  It felt like both of these teams have moved on to next year even more so than that horrible Jeff Driskol start the Browns had last season.  Or was that two years ago?  Man, do the Browns suck.  Cincinnati/Cleveland UNDER 47.5 

The Packers are playing a meaningless game against the Vikings.  I think they have to start Clayton Tune at QB after Willis got hurt last week.  Maybe it's Desmond Ridder.  I don't know.  I don't really care to be honest.  I just think they can score more than 13.5 points.  The Packers have been here before.  Remember when Love got hurt earlier this year and last year, they dropped in Willis who had been discarded by the Titans, and kept rolling.  The bar is set remarkably low here.  JJ McCarthy is starting for the Vikings, and he's shown he is more than willing to provide a couple short fields on turnovers.  I think the NFL's 11th ranked offense in the Packers can scrounge up more than 13 points.  Packers team total OVER 12.5 

Current Record:  32-30

The Newspaper and NFL Week 17

 

I used to get the daily newspaper delivered to my house.  I think not having a widely read daily newspaper, something which centered all discussions on current events on facts, has been a societal loss.  I talk to people now and again which have taken the bait on the idea that the media is some sort of enemy who can't seem to wrap their heads around the idea that the people that keep telling them not to trust the media are the ones pulling all sorts of scams that need to minimize the impact of what happens once they get caught.  When there are no solid facts, how can you even debate an issue much less hold anyone accountable.  Here's an example...  

Every once in awhile I think about the alleged suicide of Jeffrey Epstein.  This is a guy that was a total cockroach, who scurried on top of the shit heap by leveraging connections to free himself from consequence.  He had no discernible morality, thus felt no shame or remorse in a traditional sense.  The scenario that the American Public has accepted is this:  "So, that guy who was involved in wrangling teenage girls for powerful guys to fuck on his island killed himself.  Yeah, it was before he even went to trial.  It was quite a surprise he didn't try to just ride it out and get his crimes pardoned like everyone else in the country, but he just went and acted totally out of character.  Yes, it turns out he managed to kill himself in a maximum security prison.  Where were the guards?  Oh, they were sleeping.  Hell of a thing.  They just went to sleep on the job.  The security tapes?  Amazing thing, the video tapes from that tiny period of time are missing.  Yep.  The machines just didn't work for that tiny slice of time.  Oh well, that's what happened."  Meanwhile the American Public just shrugs and says "Ok".  Doesn't that seem worth looking into?  Seriously, the vast majority of our population are so fucking stupid you could present any news item, lay it out in painstaking detail, and they will still be either unable to follow it or just attach some fantastical illogical counterargument that they got fed to them on whatever bullshit social media platform that has broken their brains.    

It's sort of like the Golden Age of Yellow Journalism again.  It really was a better time when you could open up that tangible newspaper, point to the story and say "There it is" without wondering if they just were making shit up as part of some maximum grift.  It was a big deal if a newspaper fucked up a story back then.  All the crackpot shit was in those newspapers you'd glimpse at the grocery store checkout lines, understood by everyone except my college roommate's mother to be entertainment.  (Actual phone call from his mom once... "Be careful if you go out tonight.  People are stealing kidneys from teenagers.  It's true.  I read it in the paper."). From a selfish standpoint I liked to walk down my driveway first thing as some sort of "first person instant weather report", back in the days before we looked at our phone to confirm it was cold outside in the winter months.  There's a satisfaction to walking barefoot in freshly fallen powder to retrieve the NY Times Sunday edition, your feet getting numb and painful as you do that herky jerky high step walk as if you can keep your feet off the snow by high knee lifts.

I started re-watching MadMen over the holidays.  I remember the tail end of that culture, men smoking cigarettes opening the newspaper to find out what had happened.  When I watch that show I get flooded with sense memories.  There were some distinctive smells to that era, a combination of old tobacco, men's hair tonic, and whatever industrial cleaning product that had dominant market share.  It's odd what you remember from childhood, so much of it these sharp little details that float in your brain without context.  The sound of a leather shoe turning on freshly waxed tile.  The feel of a worn leather bound menu at a dimly lit big city restaurant.  The sharp taste of ginger from a cookie.  The sound of a manual car window being rolled down.  Also in my case, the smell of a cheap cigar being lit at Veteran's Stadium by the man behind me watching the 2-11-1 Eagles futility.

I have been watching shitty pro football teams for almost my whole life.  Geographic proximity has doomed me to rooting for the horrific Eagles teams from 1968-1974 where the best team I saw in person was the 1974 team that won three at the end to finish 7-7.  We moved to Erie in 1975 and had to choose between the Steelers (couldn't get tickets), the Browns (they sucked) and the Bills (Hey, they had OJ!).  In 10 years backing the Bills, I saw two winning seasons (1980-81).  I went to college, and didn't really follow anybody because I didn't have a reliable TV.  Then I moved to Cleveland and made the worst mistake of my life, going in on Bleacher tickets on the Browns.  I have seen 6 winning seasons while staring at the Browns for 36 years.  To summarize, I have had great interest in pro football for 57 years and my teams have had winning seasons for 8 of them.  I have never had a team I support get past the divisional round of the playoffs and into the conference championship game.  Not once.  I am an expert on what losing organizations do.

This is why I am focused on betting against losing organizations this Sunday.  The real whopper of the week is where the loser of the Raiders v Giants game gets the #1 pick.  The Giants give all appearances of the organization actively trying to sabotage the team's chances, but the Raiders won't be outdone and just sat their two best players in Bowers and Max Crosby.  That game is a wilderness of mirrors.  The question there is will Pete Carroll, who is sure to be fired, try to win more than that Giants interim coach who needs to show he's not incompetent.  The hell if I know.  I'd like to say I'm staying away, but all the way back in August when I thought the Raiders would win 8 games or so I took an early line of Raiders -2.5 as I was sure the Giants would suck.  That line is now Raiders +2.5, so I'm five points the wrong way.  Ye Gods.

The Jets are clearly tanking.  They, as usual, need a QB in the draft.  I don't know why they think they can turn around the fortunes of this team by ruining some poor kid's life by drafting him, but they will make that same mistake they've made with Zac Wilson/Sam Darnold/Christian Hackenberg/Geno Smith one more time.  That spread is up to two touchdowns, so I am going to take the Patriots in the first half -7 as I assume Vrabel will want to crush the Jets spirit early.  Quick reminder, the Area Youth is still in at QB for the Jets and he's bad... real bad.  NE -7 First Half   

The Browns are the absolute worst franchise in American pro sports.  Despite all the evidence, they have decided they can "lose to victory".  I'd like to point out the 76ers tried this concept and failed.  The Jets have done this and failed.  The Browns themselves have done this and failed only a decade ago.  I will likely wait and see what the Ravens do tonight in their "I guess I'll watch it" game vs the Packers in the exciting Snoop Hundley v Malek Willis head-to-head.  If the Ravens lose, they're done so Pittsburgh might take off the gas on Sunday.  If the Ravens win, Pittsburgh will come into town to deliver one of their patented bully-kick-to-the-nuts games they love to do in December.  Side note, the Browns and Steelers roster is almost the same, yet Pittsburgh is about the win the AFC North and the Browns will pick #2 in the draft.  The Browns organization is a fucking bunch of losers and they always will be until the hapless dumbshit Haslam grifter family sells the team.  The Browns will do what they have to do to lose is my prediction.  If Baltimore wins, Pittsburgh -3. 

Current record:  31-29

  

Christmas Past and Netflix Football.

I am cooking a leg of lamb for Christmas.  I used to have this dish every Christmas Eve when my family would go to Tarrytown NY to visit my Aunt Rose and Uncle Jack.  As far as I know, that leg of lamb is the only thing that was ever successfully prepared in that house.  The powerful combination of East Coast Catholic historical cuisine, general lack of interest in cooking, and living in New York all but guaranteed that any homecooked meals there would be bland and horribly over/undercooked.  My Uncle Jack knew how to cook that lamb though.  Rose was too busy holding court and smoking cigarettes to offer much help.  After she turned 50, I don't think Rose ever finished a meal as she was too distracted by conversation.  They're all gone now, my cousin Nancy passing away this summer unexpectedly.  It doesn't seem that long ago, but now when I think about that long table of people, only Krusty, my NY cousins and I are left.  Sigh.  

Christmas is quiet for me now, but I kind of like it.  The bassets doze by the fire.  I open some good wine (Grand Siecle Champagne No. 25 in this case) and gamble on football.  It's sort of a second shot at Thanksgiving, by any rational argument America's finest holiday.  After my stupid heart procedure I didn't even set up any decorations.  That bummed me out a little bit last week, but now as I think of all the teardown I avoided I couldn't be any more pleased.  The day will ease past and I can count on the most important things in life: cooking a good leg of lamb, opening an aged Bordeaux, and winning some money betting football.

I'll come back with regular Sunday action, but I wanted to loop you in on today's plays.  I am fucking red hot.  I have hit 13 of my last 14, and that little Vegas trip swung my overall season numbers richly in my favor.  Today's games are complete bullshit, but I think there is a way to get at them and maintain mild interest during the sure to be amateur Netflix broadcast.  When these digital companies overbid on these games, I bet the last thing they thought when they got these matchups is the games would be almost meaningless, and would feature three third-string QBs.  That's the way I got at this today.  With the spreads, there is too much to chance as you can't tell how motivated Dallas or Denver is to pile on.  I decided to roll all three teams into a moneyline parlay.  Dallas/Detroit/Denver moneyline.  

You can run up to the window and put money down on Josh Johnson, Max Brosmer or the "Area Youth" that is lining up for Kansas City, but I am not getting into that business.  I have seen Josh Johnson play, and he's not great.  He's exactly what you think you're getting in a journeyman 3rd string guy.  He's probably awesome in the film room, brings bagels, and agrees with everyone about everything in the building.  He's not going to lead a shitty Washington team to a win over the Cowboys though.  

Brosmer has been really shitty when he has come in, like enough so that Viking fans are hoping that piece of shit JJ McCarthy gets back in the lineup.  That's a bad sign.  I think Detroit coming off that loss will be max motivated as they got sort of fucked last week v Pittsburgh and are still in theory alive for the playoffs.  Dan Campbell teams after a loss have been great.  Although I see this as the weakest of the three legs of this parlay, I think Detroit gets it done.  

The Chiefs dynasty came to a thudding end a couple weeks ago, then Minshew blew his knee out three minutes into the following game leaving some guy to play QB that was universally reported to be "really fucking terrible".  That guy gets to play against a brutal Denver defense coming off an embarassing asskicking at home from the Jags.  Denver wants to get the #1 seed, and I'm sure they wouldn't mind kicking KC when they're down along the way.  KC put four (4) players on the IR this week and for all intents and purposes have closed the book on the 2025 season.  If Kansas City were to win this game, I would consider that to be the biggest upset of the last decade.  It's inconceivable to me that Denver loses this game.  By tying all three together moneyline, I got it at -123.  I'm down with that PLUS it gives me something to watch while the lamb slowly cooks away, I sip on my wine, and I reminisce about the ghosts of Christmas past.

Season record:  31-28          

 

Las Vegas Report and NFL Week 16

 

I went on a quick hit trip to Vegas last weekend to get out of the cold and enjoy a Sunday of NFL gambling with Krusty.  I stayed at the MGM Grand, not because I particularly like the MGM Grand, but because the room rate was really cheap.  I don’t know when the last time was that you went to Las Vegas, but at this point all the Strip properties are owned by three companies.  It sort of doesn’t matter where you stay unless you are concerned about restaurant choices or location of the property.  As far as I can tell the only difference between the MGM Grand, New York New York and the Excaliber are only if you care about if the place has a paper mache castle or has a giant gold lion statue.  They are all pretty much just big metal sheds that are made to keep you contained while they drain your bank account at every turn.  It’s not very different than just staying at the airport and eating all your meals there.  I spent $17 on a bottle of Desani water and a magazine to read on the Frontier direct flight home.  A bottle of Heineken was $10.84 which I rounded out to $12.00 to give the bartender a tip.  I ate a $34 chicken cutlet that came with a cucumber salad the size of my palm, although that might have been a negligibly better deal than the $28 bowl of noodles I ate for lunch when I arrived.  

Those nostalgic stories you hear about “The Old Vegas” are right on the nose.  I remember going out there and eating cheap as the hotels would make the basic meals a loss leader, kill you on the high end dining, and make sure you were good n’ drunk with free flowing booze to keep your decision making skills dulled.  It used to be only Caesar’s that employed the practice so accurately described by an old college roommate as “pounding it up your ass with a stick”.  Now gambling anywhere on The Strip is an exercise in stupidity as the games are all tweaked to make winning impossible.  The only potential way to make any money in Strip Casinos is in the sports book or I suppose the poker room if you know what you are doing and get lucky enough to find a table full of people that don’t know what they are doing.  It makes me bitter.  Thus, I have really enjoyed taking money from “The Lion” (as we call the MGM) at every opportunity when I’m there.  I don’t play even a quarter slot machine in those places, walk great distances to avoid eating meals there whenever possible, and leap at the opportunity to make good sports bets at favorable lines.  The most bleak scenario is to have to hand over your money to a place that is pounding it up your ass with a stick with $12 beers and $34 chicken cutlets.  The last thing you want to have happen is to “feed the lion” by losing money in rigged up table games or playing juiced up vigs.  The rooms are fine, but I don’t even buy a coffee in there now.  I’m out of the MGM Grand business.  

It was an odd vibe in the hotel because it was filled with honest to God cowboys in town for the annual rodeo.  The music on the overhead speakers had been changed to fit the clientele with absolutely identical country songs with laughably predictable choruses played.  I could not identify one artist but it didn’t matter because they all sounded the same.  It was shit like this every time I made the two mile walk from my room to get out the door.  “I got an ice cold beer and a shot of crown, ain’t gonna let nothing get me down, my honeysuckle rose got her bluejeans on, and that country music is playing all night long”.  The songs have the EXACT same arrangements.  I don’t know why people like it.  It’s fucking brutal.

One thing I have to say though, every one of those cowboy hat square toe boot boys was polite, courteous, and well behaved.  Everyone looked sort of the same, guys with thick necks and trimmed beards under enormous cowboy hats.  The women all looked like Erica Kirk.  Nobody was visibly drunk, yelling across public spaces, or using their speaker phone.  Yes sir, no ma’am.  That rodeo crowd is fine by me.  As someone said, “They’re all really nice as long as you don’t let your conversation drift into politics.”  It was odd seeing so many cowboys walking around, like if an Amish community took over the hotel and you were the only one not in town to put a barn up.  In an America that is very homogenous, these people live on a different planet than I do.  There must be a much larger sense of certainty in your ideas when everyone looks the same as you do, likes all the same things, and has the same shared values (and I say that from my suburban bubble neighborhood with an army of blonde Moms in Lululemon workout pants driving their kid to soccer practice in their enormous SUVs, none of whom I can differentiate from the other much less match a name/face).  We all have our tribes I suppose.  

I spent a good majority of time down at Circa for a couple beneficial point spreads and their great sportsbook set up.  From there we would venture out to some truly dodgy casinos like the one in The Grand or over at The Californian with its thermostat set at 76 degrees to keep their Hawaiian clientele comfortable in the “cold” of December Las Vegas.  We were friggen whales in those rooms.  Quick word of advice, those downtown casinos have two sections in them which are “Smoking” and “Heavy Smoking”.  I will probably be fighting lung cancer next week after sitting next to a woman that aggressively smoked cigarette after cigarette down to the filter, but the beers were only $4 in the sad little sportsbook so there was a reasonable trade off to watch the Cowboys lose in prime time.  I just like it better when the joint is with a 52/48 house advantage not a 65/35 Fuck You Stupid set up. 

I was stuck in EST sleep patterns, so I would wake up at 430am and wait around until a good coffee place was open in a location that would force me to make a long walk.  Early morning walking The Strip is a great place to see some lost souls, mentally ill, and the occasional Mexican drinking something blue from an enormous plastic globe talking shit to his buddies.  These are where one can pick up the best sports gambling tips as one can be certain that whatever these guys think is about to happen in not only the NFL but the world in general is completely wrong.  This is my “fade the public” strategy that has proven to be very profitable long term.  It’s not 100% certainty as the old adage of “even some of the people some of the time” is correct, but for the most part a guy drinking a 120 oz alcoholic blue drink from a globe is a guy that has made and will continue to make bad choices.  Fade that guy.  

I had an absolutely monster weekend of winners out there, so let's see if we can keep that rolling this weekend.  After my historic "Sunday Turnaround" I am back to being profitable for the year so I'm feeling it.  Let's see if the mojo continues with getting on the UNDER in the Saints v Jets game, an NFL contest which might set the record for the least amount of interest.  Look, the Jets are starting an Area Youth at QB and that hasn't been going very well.  That young man tossed three INTs last week, scaored only 10 versus the shitty Miami D, and is the 46th ranked QB this year.  He is firmly into the "Did you hear that Brady from sales used to play in the NFL?  Yeah, he started three games!" camp.  The Saints meanwhile have been playing hard, which is a key for defensive results.  They are playing a dink n dunk offense which has failed to produce a pass of over 20 yards for five weeks, which seems impossible.  Unless the area youth tosses some brutal pick sixes, I like New Orleans/Jets UNDER 40.5.

I watched Phillip Rivers play last week, and I have no idea why Seattle chose not to blitz the immobile overweight middle aged man.  I do believe that Robert Salah, a horrible head coach but very good defensive coordinator, will watch the same game that I did and reach the same conclusions that I did.  Rivers, and let's hand it to him, did everything he needed to do to provide the Colts with a chance to win last week.  Good for him.  Now let's see how his 44 year old body does a week after playing his first NFL game in four years trying to replicate that feat.  Based on what I could see, Rivers is very limited physically with what he can do, and the 49ers saw the same shit I did.  San Francisco -5.

I think all those teams in the NFC South sorta suck.  Carolina is Atlanta is Tampa.  I won a nice sum of loot betting against Carolina last week because they "had to have the win" versus New Orleans.  These teams all sorta blow.  Tampa goes to Carolina this weekend basically for the right to get smoked in the playoffs.  I would normally bet on Mayfield here, but he's doing his 'wounded warrior" thing, and if he's limited physically he's got a real problem.  It's not like I love Carolina, but a divisional game with the home team getting points?  Carolina +3.

I am on Jacksonville +3.5 over Denver.  It is very difficult to take money and say "I'd like to invest in Trevor Lawrence in this important football game" but here we are.  There is some stat about teams that have won 11 games in a row only cover 33% over their next start that dates back to 1990, and Denver fits that bill.  Do I think Jacksonville wins?  No.  But I do think this will be that game where Bo Nix plays sorta shitty and then at the very end leads a good drive down the field and they kick a late FG to win by 2 points.  Cut to a shot of Trevor jogging off the field excited to call his girlfriend and set up their big afternoon at the corn maze on Monday.  Jacksonville +3.5   

I think the Raiders are the worst team in the league now, which is saying something with the Browns and Jets running around out there.  This is the point in the season where some teams have given up, or ownership has made it clear that there will NOT be a Merry Christmas at their coach's homes this year casting a pall on the team.  The Browns, Raiders, Jets, Miami and probably Cardinals are all getting blown up in a few weeks and everyone in those buildings is spending half their day doing their job and the other half making calls to their friends around the league looking for their next landing spot.  Who has no hope, no motivation, is in a bad spot this week, and just wants this to be over?  Cleveland/Raiders/Washington.  How about some nice little moneyline parlays of Philadelphia/Buffalo/Houston and Buffalo/Houston as a little stocking stuffer?  Unless it's really windy I am taking Buffalo -10 (which might tamp down scoring) as the Browns have zero (0) healthy offensive linemen this week.

Current record:  25-28

Disturbing Appearances and NFL Week 15

 

“Do you know who that is?”  I stared at the skeletal woman with massive amounts of plastic surgery that had an appearance that ceased to be identifiably human.  She was like some sort of animatron from a 1970s movie about “The Future” or like an early attempt at some rubber sex doll, lifeless and creepy.  Her eyes were sunken into her head but were the only feature that betrayed that this thing was indeed alive.  “That’s Kelly Osbourne”.  Jesus.  Wasn’t she a round faced bratty teenage girl just a few years ago?  Why does she look like a senior citizen version of Angelina Jolie’s skeleton now?  I don’t know.  It’s a fashion I guess?

The preponderance of “Mar A Lago Face” is a real momentary cultural glitch.  Every day on the news I see this army of mid-market looking TV weather girls with exaggerated lips, eyes and cheekbones with hair extensions that are allegedly the Directors Of Very Important Departments.  This is a weird time in history when clearly incompetent government officials are in their jobs because the 80 year old CEO of the USA thinks plastic surgery disaster chicks are hot.  The rest of us are just extras in this movie.  It’s a tough break to be sent to some Salvadorian gulag because the old weather gal from FOX-TV in Tulsa decided that you were an Enemy Of The State.  Meanwhile, we are all expected to take moon faced looking hate robots like Laura Loomer seriously because some dork that stumbled into being a Congressman in Indiana believes she can keep his flabby ass in that Congress seat.  Can we stop pretending that these freaks are legitimate human beings?    

It hit me the other day that these odd looking people are modern versions of the Court of Versailles.  Instead of pancake makeup and fake moles pasted on, you have billionaire wives like Susan Dell willingly transforming themselves into looking like wooden puppets because that’s what everyone else is doing in her social circle.  If you don’t look like a surprised Mr. Potato Head, that signifies you aren’t a player in The Big Game.  I think this is all a riff on that annoying Baby Boomer trait of pretending that they aren’t aging, forever young, as if we need to all embrace the willing suspension of disbelief that Paul McCartney still has a full head of boyish brown hair and Donald Trump is an active athletic fella with a healthy looking tan despite the fact they were both around while Hitler was alive and full of his suddenly re-popular ideas.  History is just a loop that goes around and around and around.

History is getting ready to repeat again as New England plays Buffalo in December for the AFC East title.  Buffalo somehow managed to milk a mere three years of post-Brady bliss as undisputed AFC East kings before Bob Kraft assembled a good team again.  If you question Bob Kraft’s skill as an executive, just remember that he got caught on film at a strip plaza massage parlor getting a handjob, and no one remembers it at all.  Poof.  He made that disappear during the height of the Me Too movement while that Aziz Ansari comedian guy had a date that went south and never worked again.  Bob Kraft gets things done.

The Patriots are still lurking in that spot where the public hasn’t completely bought in.  They’ve won 10 games in a row, an amazing accomplishment in the NFL despite the fact it seems like they only play the Browns, Jets and Titans every week.  Hey, a win is a win though.  While they beat Buffalo earlier this year, it is widely accepted that Buffalo is the better team.  I don’t know if that’s true.  I have no idea who the better team is really as Buffalo has plenty of warts and imperfections (unlike Susan Dell).  History does tend to repeat though.  This has all the makings of one of those Josh Allen games where he decides to take the entire game onto his shoulders and will try to pass, run, and maybe even kick them to victory on his own.  I think this game is a back and forth scoring affair with whoever has the ball last wins.  Buffalo/New England OVER.

There are quite a few shaky as fuck QB situations this week.  The Jets are starting their third string guy.  I think his name is Brady Cook or something like that.  He looks like a college kid that is very polite to his parents’ friends.  Last week Krusty sent me a text when that guy went in saying “I’m on the wrong side on this Jets game.”  Then he sent a photo of the guy I just described with a mock local newspaper headline.  “Area youth plays in NFL game.”  It’s tough to see the Jets winning a game with an undrafted QB that is an “area youth”.  Then you consider the Colts are either starting their third stringer with his fucked up knee or tossing 44 year old actual grandfather Phillip Rivers in after a four year absence from the NFL against a vicious Seattle defense.  That can’t end well.  Or maybe if you’re feeling up to it you can toss some money on the Raiders with Kenny Pickett under center against a desperate Eagles team.  I’m toying with the idea of just doing a moneyline parlay betting against all those guys with a Seattle/Philadelphia/Jacksonville ticket.  Oddly enough, the grandpa seems like the most likely to win one of those games.  The Colts are still sorta good but just have NOBODY to play the most important position on the team.  That is a good game to bet the Taylor over on carries as they will want to keep the ball out of their QB's hands.  They might be able to hang in there if they can get the running game going despite Seattle clearly being the better team.  I'm not betting on it though unless I see Rivers is starting.  Father Time has never lost.  If I look at the "unlikely victory" column, the Jets winning in Jacksonville seems the most insane.  I feel no sense of confidence in the Jags but I have even less with the Area Youth at QB.  Jacksonville straight up has to win.  I think the second least likely team to win is the Raiders going on the road to play at 1pm in Philly with Kenny Pickett.  Is there anything in that sentence that makes you feel like the Raiders can pull an upset win?  You gotta think Philadelphia wins but somehow by less than you figured.  Seattle might make sense by tying in the Raiders where you go Seattle -7.5/Raiders +18.5.  When did Philly last beat someone by 19 points?  Dallas in 2024 I think.  That was a long, long time ago.  I suppose I'll have to wait and see what the Colts QB situation is, 3rd string guy with a knee brace and horse tranquilizers shot into his knee or 44 year old out of shape Phillip Rivers.  

The Carolina Panthers have not won a game in which they were favored for years.  While it is true they aren’t favored very often, they still are 0-11 straight up as a favorite to show you show shitty the Panthers are as an organization.  They have the Saints this week, and unlike the Browns, the Saints don’t seem like they are tanking.  They seem to think Slough might be their QB of the future, which I don’t, but as long as the Saints do that means they are playing hard and trying to make this thing work.  New Orleans is getting 1.5 at home, which makes me uneasy as I am getting ready to cash the massive season under win total bet I made on them in August, so it seems counterintuitive to sprint up to the window and say “Gimme some Saints!”.  The one thing I do like is the public narrative is “The Panthers have to win since the Bucs lost on Thursday.  This is a big game for them!”, as if that makes any difference in that piece of shit NFC South chase.  I’d like to tease the Saints up if I can find a likely partner on it.  Denver is getting points at home despite winning ten games in a row, sort of a different version of the Patriots.  I get an excellent defense at home with more than a TD and I need the fucking Panthers to be the Panthers.  Denver +8/New Orleans +7.5.

I really like the Rams this week.  The Rams are playing Detroit and the book is dangling out a 6 point spread just to lure you into betting Lions.  Here’s the thing though.  I think the Rams are the best team in the NFL, and not by a small margin.  They were good in October and they are better in December.  Detroit seems like a team who has a rapidly closing window.  All those Stafford draft picks they morphed into a core of an excellent team now have some mileage on them.  The receivers are all a step slower, the routes a little less crisp, and the offense is much less explosive.  The “we are going for it all the fucking time on 4th down!” mentality now seems reckless as opposed to aggressive.  The Eagles gave the Lions offense a beatdown, and I don’t know why the Rams can’t do the same in LA.  LA has been winning with margin for six weeks now.  This is a game where they assert their dominance and casual fans will go “Hey, the Rams are really good”.  Rams -6    

I'm heading out to Vegas this weekend, and dammit I am going to get after it and win $52,000.  I was absolute shit last week, but hey, I just had a friggen heart operation.  I'm back now baby and getting ready to be The Whale with Krusty at some piece of shit Sportsbook we have identified off strip.  Running out of time to turn this thing around! 

Bleak Current Record: 20-27