In This Economy?

The only sure bet in this economy is betting. Normally, I don’t support gambling. Sure, I have stocks, I play the lottery, I make weekly trips to a Kiowa casino, I’m rocking ass in my celebrity dead pool, I’ve got $5,000 on my sister having a C-section this week, I openly cheat on my black-belt wife and I had the shrimp at Long John Silver’s today. But I abhor every second of my miserable life. So it’s all good.

I’ve also been kicking myself a little something extra for not betting on the Kentucky Derby. Mine That Bird was a 50-to-1 long shot and reportedly had a bit of a cough according to this footage from celebrity-gossip maestros and dutiful public servants TMZ:

Sorry. That was Top Secret! I get the two confused because TMZ is a fucking joke.

I haven’t slept in two days thinking about how a moderate bet on a Derby underdog like Bird would have solved all my problems forever. Instead, I’m sitting here on the verge of losing my house if my sister doesn’t have complications during childbirth.

But you know who did get rich on Mine That Bird? The owners. One of whom is Mark Allen, who is better known as the son of Bill Allen, who is better known as the key witness in last year’s prosecution of Alaska Senator Ted Stevens, who is better known as having a Grandpa Simpson-like grasp of the technology behind the Internet, which is better known as a series of tubes.

Mark Allen (who may have lost a wardrobe bet)

The Allen family are gamblers after my own heart. They put money on politicians, like Ted and Ben Stevens, and pray that those politicians are competent enough to push through legislation that would benefit the Allen clan and any businesses they are involved in (e.g., the oil pipeline company Veco that Bill Allen once led and that when sold, paid a cool $30 million to stockholder Mark Allen. Did a history of bribery help boost the value of Veco? I can’t say for sure. But being a gambling man, I’ll go ahead and say, hell to the yeah it did. Better still, Mark Allen received an immunity deal to avoid prosecution for bribery. All it cost him was his father, who currently awaits sentencing. What a gambler!)

So cheers to Mark Allen. With Mine That Bird, his winning streak continues and shows no sign of slowing. Even if it does, he’ll have enough high-grade horse meat to get him through next winter. And that’s how you survive… ITE.

Tags: gambling, Kentucky Derby, Mine That Bird, Ted Stevens

This entry was posted on Monday, May 4th, 2009 at 1:26 PM and is filed under Human Encounters. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.