The Case of What Happens to Traitors, or Eating Bitter Goddamn Crow

Your ol’ pal Steve Baltimore has tasted pain this weekend. Where to begin? How about the way Odense crashed out of the Royal League? No, that’s small time. OK, how ‘bout how Werder Bremen and Bayern Munich fucking tied, dunking me on two bets with one game? (All you gambling historians out there, I had Werder for the win – based solely on Miroslav Klose being available for the game, and then he pulls out moments before the start.) Sure, that hurt, but my gold standard for the year, my clockwork assassins, my beloved Celtic; Celtic. Celtic – lost – in the derby – to fucking Rangers. RANGERS. I spontaneously shit myself over that one. And then the crying started.
Oh, but I didn’t know pain, not real, biting sorrow, until I checked the League Championship scores. The Tigers of Kingston-on-Hull, the brave men of the ancestral hometown, won. Handily, as well, at 2-0.
And I had bet against them.
I had bet against them.
Why?
I’d bet for them every game this year. At 6-2-10, I’d weathered a terrible beating, financially and emotionally, at the hands of Hull AFC. But I stuck with them. Marmey, Windass, Ricketts, Barmby, Forster and my personal favorite, The Beast Jon Parkin, I backed them every tie. But with Preston fully 12 slots ahead of them, I thought I’d bet with my head. With the statistics and the probabilities and the likelihoods – I’d go with those, and stop betting with my gut. My rotten, booze-soaked gut, which had thrown me down the hole too many times this year. I thought I’d take the shortcut, and make some of my Hull money back by betting against the boys. Parkin was on loan to Stoke, anyway – I was hurting.
2-0 to Hull. Lucky seventh win. Three spots (by dint of goal differential) clear of relegation.
I have learned a terrible lesson.
This gambling is a metaphor for life. I have piloted many a sinking ship to the bottom – but always to the bottom of a safe harbor. You see? You can’t abandon a sinking ship just because it’s sinking. Not even when the shoals are looming out there in the night-black waters. Not even when the engines die. Not even when the captain’s drunk.
Because that sinking ship is YOUR ship, and it’s your goddamn duty to stay with it until the bitter end.
I heard you, Hull AFC. I’m back on board.
300 on Hull to win this weekend – I’m back.

The Case of the Goddamn Bath

If I were a religious man, I’d claim that God was trying to kill me. But if God was trying to kill me, he’d have made Scotch dangerous for human consumption in large quantities, and not the bracing pick-me-up that starts and ends every day. Besides, God’s too busy telling fat women and their ugly children that he loves them to worry about a sorry sonuvabitch like me. But come on: I called two winners out of thirteen matches this week, and Celtic drew in the Champions League. Two for thirteen. I’m so far in the hole I can smell my own ass. I need to sweep this weekend or I’m actually going to be in my own ass. Goddamn Hull went down hard yesterday, too. I can take the losing – it’s my natural state. But those sentimental losses, they’re taking years off my life. Tigers; Parkin. Parkin, I’m begging you – turn it around. Do if for your old pal, Baltimore.

The Case of the Bloody Ass

If you’re one of my ex-wives, you’re no doubt wondering where my alimony check has been. Listen, it’s not something I want to talk about at the dinner table, but I got hemorrhoids the size of kielbasa. That’s a pretty picture on a cold winter night, innit? I spent the last few weeks sleeping on my stomach and drinking standing up in the hopes that the south of Baltimore would right itself, but nothing seemed to work. I finally got around to talking to a doctor, or as close to a doctor as I’ll get – Doc Ettinger, one of the finer barkeeps you’ll ever encounter. Doc’s advice on the subject was to stay outside with my ass-end facing the North wind. “Freeze ´em up and chip ´em off, Baltimore,” the Doctor ordered.
I took him up on half his prescription. I stopped wearing longjohns, tried changing my pants every couple days, and basically stayed outside as much as possible. My ass has never been colder – but it is drier, and everything seems to have tightened up and gone back inside the hole like a good little groundhog. I’ll take another six weeks of winter if it means that “soupy” and “loopy” will no longer describe my nether regions. Standing at the bar just makes it easier to hit the falling down drunk part of my job description.

The Case of the Post-Yule Burnout

Goddamn. I'm tired beyond all belief. Let's not talk about gambling, or football, or the fact that I'm drowning in a backwash of sour luck and hopeless flailing. I've swum out about as far as I've ever swum -- the coastline of safety is not even a pale band on the horizon of the world at these distances. It's darker out here with my eyes open than it is with 'em shut. If the cold doesn't snap my lower extremities off, my spasmodic churning is sure to do it. Probably for the best, anyway. My legs are just deadweight, another thing that could drag me under. I'll add them to the tally of "things that are pulling me down," right under empty optimism, plans and whatever that hunk was I coughed up a while back.

The Case of the Missing Bookie

Tuesday p.m. and still no word from my mysterious, wager-placing friend, Rat-tooth Garibaldi. I call him Rat-tooth, but I suspect his mother calls him "Alphonse." But that's not my problem. My problem right now is that in a drunken whirlygig, I bet on Stenhousemuir (second league) instead of Wick Academy (Highland league). Wick Academy lost 1-3, but I have no idea how the Warriors did -- and Rat-tooth is nowhere to be found. Needless to say, I suspect I won, and Rat-tooth figured I'd never know I placed the wrong bet. I been burnin' up the wire looking for a final result on the Stenhousemuir game, and burning up a nice batch of ass-kick for when Rat-tooth shows up with my winnings. Or not. Hell, I have no idea. Trying to find lower division scores is a bitch in and of itself, but when the guy who has a vested and financial interest in knowing these things goes missing, I got a feeling the two are related. It's not like Rat-Tooth is scarce when my pick goes down in flames. No, then he's camped out on my goddamn stoop waiting to gloat and tease me on the Portugese action.
But I stand by my hard-won knowledge of the beautiful game, and I stand by my knowledge of men, especially when it comes to gambling. You can bet on the EPL, because it's a game of men. You can bet on the SPL, because it's a game of angry men. You can bet on the Bundesliga, because the Germans take shit from no one. Likewise for the Danes and Norwegians, and even the Dutch will play the game. But the Portugese are cry-babies of the worst kind. Absolute pansies. The only thing worse than them is the Italians, who had the guts to buy their victories but didn't have brains enough to hide how they did it.
And wouldn't you know it? Alphonse "Rat-Tooth" Garibaldi sounds like he's got a little Italian blood in him. He'll have a little less in him if I find out I won. And if I can find him.
Oh, but I'll find him. By my accounting I'm up $2 on the weekend if the Warriors lost, and $26-something if they won. I'm drinking Ledaig if that happens. Otherwise --- I'm just drinking.

The Case of Football Sunday

I bet a bundle on the games this weekend, and I ain't breakin' even. Five bills on Hull to win brought me a tidy sum, but Celtic's draw (goddamn Ranger bastards) and the Gooners inability to score have cost me dearly. Adding to my woes are Sparta Rotterdam's dismal match and the absolute godawfulness of Werder Bremen's showing in the Champions League. Still, the GreenWhites did pull it out today, so I've picked up a little dosh on that front. If the Royal League would pick up the pace and play some games, I might actually turn a profit before Christmas.
Ah, why'm I complaining? That Hull victory has put me ten dollars in the clear on their season. I kept betting with my gut on those damn Tigers and they kept kicking me in the same spot. Maybe if The Beast hadn't gone down, I'd actually be drinking top-shelf rye tonight. Instead, in honor of my eight dollar bet on the Highland League, I'll be drinking Scotch and hoping those crazy Scots Vikings can find the back of the onion bag. Gimme a goal for every slug and the world'll be my oyster. A shit-filled, throat-choking oyster.
I think the real problem here is that everything I know about gambling on football I learned from my old man's old man -- and gramps died two years before I was born. I'm handicapped by fate and death, but I've got the blood of a lower-class drinker in my veins. I'd say it all cancels out, and my meager cash flow would back me up. Well, it'd back me up if it was currently available. I did lay that bet for Stenhousemuir, after all. I may not be making a killing on the games, but I drink like a champion.
See? It's a dead heat. Thanks, Old Man.
Stevedore

You're All On Notice

Stevedore Baltimore here. I don't like you and you don't like me. Or as my second ex-wife liked to say around drags on her Menthol, "Steve, I don't like you and you don't like you, either." She also like to call me a "dumb bastard" and "lazy in the sack." Guilty, guilty and guilty.
But my failings as a person make me a fantastic judge of other people. That's why I ended up as a private investigator. It may take a thief to catch a thief, but it takes a self-hating dumb bastard to catch another self-hating dumb bastard who happens to be balling the jewelry off the company whoore.
If you want that other dumb bastard caught, that one you married, I'm your man.
And if you're that dumb bastard -- watch out.