However, later that day, I noticed something. The jacket was no longer up to $81; it had dropped down to a lean $30. Someone had retracted their bid. Retracted their bid a lot. If you will, they retracted the shit out of their bid. This was not good. I checked the bid history and saw this jaw-dropping information:

I find it a LITTLE hard to believe that one person could enter in the wrong bid price on four non-consecutive occasions, especially when three of them are the same amount. Clearly, mysterious doings were a-transpiring. It was time to do some research on our little friend, Mike Deckers. In the meantime, he kept sending more email to me. If it feels like you're reading the same thing over and over again, imagine what it's like to be me.

Wow. What a horrible auction title and description. No picture either! Who buys used clothes anywhere with no photo? And "Redsox" is two words, dipshit. Later, I checked his bidding history and noticed that he would bid insane amounts on similar jackets then retract the bids. If you put the pieces together, he tried bidding up other sellers' jackets to make his own seem like a better deal to prospective bidders. Then, after a short while, he would retract and bid again soon after. Obviously he had no intention of winning or paying for other jackets. This is a crafty (and completely ebay-illegal) maneuver IF you cover your tracks. Btownsox9 did not. How far would this moron go to make his auctions look better? This far:

Eighty! Eighty retractions in the last six months! Not slick. At this point, I added Mr. Deckers' account to my blocked bidder list and put up a disclaimer in my item description telling btownsox9 to piss off. He then sent me this email:

A few days later, I checked his profile and saw this:

Victory!

Not only that, but I ended up selling the jacket for near $100. So in the end, the bad guys got locked up and the good guys got the women and rode off into the sunset. I, however, sat down and ate a bowl of cereal.