The game: Chargers at Patriots
The beer: Murphy’s Stout
The result: Win, 21–13; Vikings win, 33–16
The commentary: “Come on you motherfuckers! I’m supposed to win this goddamn thing!” Competition brings out the worst, particularly when your heavy favorite is settling for field goals and your wife and daughter are out of the house. Entitlement is ugly.

Another week correcting earlier damage done by the Dolphins, Steelers (twice) and Falcons (twice more) leaves us with an in-the-black twenty through eight weeks, thanks (presumably) to a forgotten Hotmail password two weekends ago—welcome to the late nineties, Craig. But wait: “in-the-black”? I’ve plotted out the projected failure rate required for me to win this goddamn thing—the “remaining,” “undefeated” (four) and “magic number” (twenty-two) figures are promising against the benchmark (twenty-eight, twenty-eight and fifty-six, respectively) but if the “remaining” line stays flat for three more weeks then I’ll be in the red and concerned. Maybe Sunday will be better. Maybe I should relax.

It was a week to drink. Wednesday saw an evening with Commissioner Rico himself! He is knocked out and done with this shit, since CBS’s strict anti-gambling policy zero-tolerance racketeering scheme piles on the manual work. “Are you gonna win?” I hope so, man, because it sounds like you aren’t doing this next year. My spreadsheet and I remain the logical successor(s) but I won’t do the crime since I can’t do the time. Put the next round of Lawson’s IPAs on Ice Cube’s tab.

On Friday I met Hector, Ivan and Oleg at the Trillium Beer Garden because eight-dollar beers are better enjoyed outdoors in the dark. Ivan and Oleg were pregaming a Mighty Mighty Bosstones concert (shudder) while Hector wonderfully took his time relating an HR nightmare involving sex, race-bating and videotape. As if management isn’t for suckers. Dinner at Mr. Dooley’s invited an appreciation for Murphy’s stout, “vegetarian” platters consisting of beef stew and shepherd’s pie and a typecast Irishman (pictured) playing the music of Pink Floyd—shudder—and other seventies mainstays. Our waitress was made to constantly repeat herself but it wasn’t due to the noise. “Excuse me?” Typecast.

Somehow we never hit the Caddyshack bar—“T’anks fer nuttin!” At least Hector didn’t get a parking ticket and I caught the nine ten with ease, spitting out two hundred half-assed words while waiting to board. I learned at dinner that Hector and Oleg are semi-regular readers (!) and, therefore, potential members of the “Biff! Bang! Now!” Facebook group I’ll one day create in a drunken fever dream. “Yeah, I mostly skip over the football stuff.” Good luck.

Up next: Root for either the Saints or the Seahawks. You’ve come this far, baby. Cheers!