Greetings Syndicate Brethren,
Is everyone enjoying the eminently more pleasing and
irrefutably-less-headache-inducing White Text? Relax your eyes. Allow them to
adjust to a kinder and friendlier form of esoteric blogging. Let the virginal
purity of white slowly but surely seep deeply into your retinae. Allow the
uncorrupted hue of complexional chastity to massage your mind, muscles, and
marrow. Conjure up the aroma of ambrosial incense and the tranquilizing tones of a softly-played pan-flute. Lie down, loosen up, and prepare for the assuaging and palliative chirapsia that will begin your journey. ; )
Hooooooooom.
Hooooooooom.
Hooooooooom.
Alright. Now that you’re through with all that nonsense,
I’ll remind you that the official color of your Shadow Scholar Syndicate always
has and always will be “Slime Green”!
Why? Because “Slime Green” happens to be the official color of the
Deutscher-Fußball-Bund and I’m a superstitious motherfucker. So it goes.
It’s “Syndicate Season” once again, gentlemen. Time for us
to exchange barbs, bets, and general irreverence in the exact same manner as we
have over the past 13 years. Your friendly bookie returns, ever so excited by
the prospect of reconnecting with all of you. That’s absolutely genuine zeal,
gentlemen. Another year of working myself into an early grave as an academic
ghostwriter leaves me positively effulgent at the mere prospect of setting
lines, making phone calls, and of the other aspects associated with keeping a
modest Sportsbook.
Your “Friendly Neighborhood Betting Syndicate” shall always
remain a low-key, “invitation-only” affair. This blog will never so much as
purport to be some sort of mass-market-moneymaking-operation. Never! A few
valued Syndicate Members may have been “tagged” to represent this launch on
their Facebook Profiles, but no one will ever be asked to “like” my page.
Promise ; )
To pull a few lines from last year’s “State of the Syndicate
Address”:
Let’s
get together and feel all right.
Let’s
get together and feel all right.
“Whether
you plan to play, read, watch, or have no interest whatsoever, please consider
stopping by and hanging out with us during the month-long football holiday,
even if you can only stay for a drink”
It’s this bookie’s pleasure to report that all 200+
Syndicate Members have been accounted for. Not one of you is the midst of a
mental breakdown or existential crisis. Everyone is healthy, insofar as I’ve
been informed. ; )
That isn’t to say that the past year hasn’t been a harrowing
one for many Syndicate Members. Many have lost vital aspects of their life.
Good jobs, beloved family members, and true loves are now gone forever. The winds of change blow harsh grains
of sand upon many of us. I empathize with all members who lost crucial members
of their family over the past year. Should it provide any consolation, your
friendly bookie lost most of his family this year too. ; ( All the more reason he’s happy to spend
some time with you. ; )
On a lighter note, it may have been a truly fucked up year,
but we can at least try to derive some sardonic humor from it. Let’s give it a
go:
1) How fucked up a year is it when BOTH Jon Stewart AND
Stephen Colbert cancel their shows and give them to black dudes?
2) How fucked up a year is it when John Forbes Nash decides
to take a car to campus for the first time ever and dies in an automobile
accident?
3) How fucked up a year is it when every White Paper on ISIS
Strategic Positioning ceases to make any sense a full EIGHTEEN times before
deadline submission?
4) How fucked up a year is it when Lebron James returning to
Cleveland and Germany winning the World Cup still fails to engender warm
feelings in the most hardened of pessimists?
5) How fucked up is a year is it when Ted Cruz decides that
he’s actually a worthwhile individual of any sort…..and Hillary/Jeb get to
capitalize on his moronic attempts to join the digital age?
6) How fucked up a year is it when Percy Sledge dies on
April 14th and B.B. King dies on May 14th? To hell with
the 14th! Mother fuck the 14th. Outkast once sang that
“Everyday is the 14th”, but those overrated losers never had any
talent. They merely wrote “ironic hipster” songs for white college kids to sing
along to. We just lost two iconic legends on the 14th…..that’s how
fucked up a year it’s been.
Good luck, Syndicate Members. Give your winnings to charity
if you can. ; )
Alles aus Liebe,
S.S. PJW
