The Art of American Football

In light of today being the college football championship game, I'll be taking this opportunity to tell you about something i have learned to love in 2009, a lot: watching sports. Now, I'm not like some people who have been die-hard fans of the same team since approximately the Civil War and I don't claim to know too much about any sport- really, just enough to get me by in conversation and give me good things to yell at the TV. I digress…sports are great.

Here is why…

1. Wings. When you are at a sports bar, someone will always order chicken wings. Since it is a scientifically proven fact that your body doesn't absorb calories that are taken from other peoples plates, this is great. Why? Because everyone loves chicken wings. They are amazing. Though not nearly as amazing as

2. Drinking. Fact: Sports games encourage…no, require, drinking. When your team scores? Shots. Your team's losing? Better have another beer. Your team wins? Celebratory round on the house. By the end of the game, everyone is slammed and no one really cares who won. Its great.

3. Getting rowdy. If you don't favor a team at the start of the game, you have to pick one. There is no choice. Really it doesn't matter which team because either way you will (as previously stated) be 1. eating wings 2. getting slammed, so you will obviously be having a good time. But really, whats a good sports game if you aren't screaming at the TV and/or jumping up and down every time someone scores, living vicariously through other peoples accomplishments when all you're actually doing is sitting on an uncomfortable barstool demolishing inappropriate amounts of beer. Everyone wins.

4. Violence. There are 2 categories here: violence on the TV and violence in the bar. Both are great. Of course a bar fight is going to erupt…here is how it usually works, 1. The ref makes the call of a senile blind man 2. the 40 year old man who's been throwing back beers since noon yells at the TV 3. Some underage, trust funded college student makes a snide remark about how the man is old and/or fat and therefore his opinion doesn't matter 4. The old and/or fat man obviously hears the underage college student. Violence is the only answer. Of course violence on the field is great, too- mostly because the average person could never imagine being hit by 200 pounds of pure muscle coming at you at full speed with only one purpose: bringing you to the ground. Interestingly enough though, the further into the game you get (i.e.: the more you are drinking) the more confident you are that the players are, in fact, acting like girls, and you could take this sort of abuse any day of the week. Sports are great because they foster and encourage this sort of delusion.

5. An atomic bomb could go off at the bar next door and you would not notice. Put simply: football, basketball, baseball…they all require absolute 100% focus of our attention. God forbid we divert our eyes for even a moment…there's really no telling what could happen. Bill Shankly once said "football is not a matter of life and death. It's much more serious than that." Even if you don't start out with any stake in the game, with all of the drinking/wings/testosterone in the air, it's impossible for you not to start caring. Caring a lot. The universe is full of inexplainable abnormalities that defy the laws of logic and the explanations of physics. Brett Farve is one example of this. Seriously, even if you aren't a Farve fan, you know what I'm saying. These guys are absolutely nuts. So it's necessary that we pay attention to their every move, ensuring that we too will one day be able to throw with a a career of 69,329 yards gained by passing. That's usually how it works, anyway.

And so, tonight, whether you're yelling "Roll Tide" or shouting "Hook 'Em" at the top of your lungs, you can rejoice in knowing that you're participating in Americas greatest (and most violent) pastime: the only one that advocates returning to our most barbaric form: screaming, stuffing our faces, and pounding beer.

Cheers!