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Super Bowls Ain’t What They Used to Be

The wife and I hosted a Super Bowl party at our house this year. Tonight, in fact. We thought it would be nice if the party coincided with the big game, ’cause that’s how people have done it in the past. We observe. We learn.

Apparently, we don’t learn well enough, though. Because one of my two very most favoritest teams just won — I lived in Pittsburgh for seven years before moving to New England — but something seems not right. I’m thinking it’s that here we are, at ten minutes till midnight after the biggest win the Steelers have had since the era of leisure suits and bellbottomed pants, and we’ve already wrapped the festivities up, cleaned the house, and taken out the trash. Plus, I’m not passed out in a pool of beer, sweat, and cocktail weenie juice. What the hell is wrong with this picture?

Because let’s face it — ‘big game’ football is just an excuse to party your eyeballs off. Back in the ‘burgh, ten years ago or so, we scored two tickets to the AFC Championship, hosted by the Steel City sweethearts themselves. And we got so blitzed — see what I did there, using a football term to mean something else; this is gold, people! — the night before, our tailgating experience consisted of getting to the stadium early so we could take a two-hour nap in the car and whimper miserably at each other. Also, I think I puked in some guy’s big foam finger. It’s okay; he wasn’t actually wearing it at the time. Because that would be wrong.

And then, the ‘Stillers’ went out and lost that game! You’d think tonight, watching the glory of a Super Bowl victory unfold, that things would be way more out of hand. There’s no way I should be writing this right now — I shouldn’t even be able to sit at this point. By all rights, I should at this moment be passed out face-down on the lawn, wearing nothing but black-and-gold boxers and a chili-soaked Terrible-Towel-turned-impromptu-bib caked onto my neck. The mailman should find me in the morning, still drunk and half-conscious, singing, ‘The wheels on the bus go ’round and ’round…‘ through a mouthful of bean dip and bite-size Tostitos. On their way down or on their way up, I don’t care which.

Instead, I sit here before you completely mostly almost legally sober, and there are no towering ‘beeramids’, broken appliances, or unidentifiable near-toilet stains to even suggest that a Super Bowl bash was had. Certainly nothing to show that the team we were pulling for won. Where are the keg stand contests in the kitchen? Where are the jubilant couples, getting it on in the bushes out back? Where, for the love of John Madden’s liver, are the wasted bands of naked revelers, streaking through the neighborhood and leaving trails of black and gold bodily fluids to commemorate the event? What the hell happened here?

I suppose the answer is: we just got old. Sure, we drank a few beers. And yeah, I have a big red stain that I hope is chili on the front of my sweatshirt. And fine, I did strip naked and pee on the widow Johnson’s front porch across the street. But it just wasn’t the same, man. The days of wanton drunken pigskinned hedonism seem to have passed us by.

I suppose it’s for the best, really. There’ll be no wondering where the hell my pants are tomorrow morning. No washing finger-painted team logos made of mustard out of the dog’s hair. Or my hair. Or the widow Johnson’s hair. And I’ll actually be able to make it to work before, say… April. So there’s a silver lining or two to this newfound lameness, I guess.

Still. How cool would it have been to wake up on the roof tomorrow wearing nothing but shoulder pads around my ankles and ‘ROETHLISBERGER RULEZ!!’ shaved into by back hair? I’m happy as hell my team won and all, but that, folks, is the mark of a kick-ass Super Bowl party. And we came nowhere near it.

I guess I’ll just have to console myself with the image of Jerome Bettis and his shit-eating grin hoisting the Lombardi Trophy for the next twelve months. And then, we’ll give the party another go. Maybe next year, we’ll start with tequila. And we’ll have it somewhere we don’t mind wrecking. Party at old widow Johnson’s place! Woo hoo!