God, the Devil, and Bob 1.9 - Bob Gets Greedy

Plot: Money's a little tight in the Allman house. Perhaps Bob should go to the strip club less often. Or the bar. Still, it's hard to begrudge him taking Megan to enjoy a night of heckling the Chicago Blackhawks. Naturally, God has to show up and ruin everything by telling Bob to do some volunteer work. Bob comes home to the Devil in his chair, ready to tell him all charity work in a scam, and to leave his Palm Pilot behind. Which just so happens to have the scores for upcoming sporting events.

You see where this is going. Bob begins raking it in by gambling, and continues to not do charity work, to God's annoyance. When Donna finds out, she is. . . completely OK with it. She only hates his gambling when he's losing. Well it's about time that Donna gets a turn being a bad example. Why should Bob hog all the fun? The two take a trip to beautiful Windsor, Ontario, where Bob finally twigs to the idea perhaps the Devil has ulterior motives, like getting Bob's soul in exchange for all this help. So Bob smashes the Palm Pilot, thwarting the Devil.

Or not, because the Devil can obviously recreate the thing and leave it for Donna to find, so that she'll place a wager on the game that will clinch a playoff spot for the Red Wings. Which leaves Bob in the unenviable position of having to make sure the Red Wings lose. Which does provide him an opportunity for charity work, though it might be court-ordered, so I'm not sure that counts. God seemed cool with it.

Quote of the Episode: God - 'Oh, I've outwitted Bob Allman. You'll forgive me if I don't do an end zone dance.'

Smeck Smacks: 1 (20 overall).

Other: In addition to Smeck being forced to eat a clipboard for making the Devil do paperwork, there was an awkward moment where the two of them were watching Bob and Donna seal their fate, and Smeck misread the situation, and tried to snuggle up with the Devil. Very awkward, but at least no violence.

So Bob saves Donna by first running on the ice, then runs back into the stands and makes his way on top of the Jumbotron, unhooking it and causing it to crash into the ice. Which causes the Red Wings to forfeit, rather than have to finish the last 2 seconds of the game (that they were leading by three goals). Uh-huh.

One suspects the writers don't know a hell of a lot about sports. Which should have been obvious when they were trying to get us to feel like it was a big deal for the Red Wings to make the playoffs. One, it's hockey, more teams make the playoffs than don't, just like in the NBA. Big whoop. Two, they're the freaking Red Wings. Aren't they the NHL's version of the Lakers, or the Yankees? What, I'm supposed to feel bad they had a rough decade or something? Oh, boo-hoo, cry me a fucking river.

Bob ends up in jail, of course, and Donna neglects to use their remaining winnings to pay his bail. Then someone puts a hand on his shoulder, and Bob warns them he's not a considerate lover. The owner of the hand is God, who replies that he knows, he's heard Donna's prayers. Kicking a man while he's down, God? What am I saying, God's always kicking people when they're down.

Although we learned from Mike that Bob at one point resorted to selling his blood in a parking lot when he was sure he "couldn't lose". If you waited for a moment Bob wasn't down to make a joke about him, you'd never have a chance.

While they were in Canada, Bob takes some time to bet on a bizarre sport involving golf carts, polo mallets, and ham. I think it's basically polo for people who hate horses, but also don't like water. Or round objects. Could be interesting viewing at 2 a.m. if you were drunk.

Bob's volunteer work ends up being the guy at the dunk tank. Except, having apparently cost the Red Wings a playoff spot, everyone just throws the ball at Bob, rather than the target. Given Bob's cries of pain, they were doing pretty well, too. The Tigers should probably have some scouts there making contract offers.