True Stories: Stupor Bowl Sunday, Giants versus Patriots by J.T. Knoll
J.T. Knoll
Being in politics is like being a football coach. You have to be smart enough to understand the game, and dumb enough to think it’s important — Eugene McCarthy
Well it’s finally here.
Yes, dear readers, that vaunted day in America that ranks right up there alongside Black Friday, Christmas and the 4th of July.
Stupor Bowl Sunday, Giants versus Patriots.
No, that’s not a typo. I did say Stupor — which is defined as a state of near unconsciousness. Induced, in this case, by hype.
Yes, nation, we have had promotional media out the wazoo. (Take a moment to check your own wazoo and see for yourself.)
• Week-long advertising campaigns launched to promote the commercials that Coke, Kia and others plan to run during the big game.
• Reports of infighting in the Madonna camp because of her insistence on keeping the temperature for rehearsals at 78 degrees, driving the other dancers crazy with sweat and exhaustion as they practice for the halftime extravaganza. Could the always provocative Madonna be planning a “double exposure” to beat out Janet Jackson’s “costume malfunction” in Super Bowl XXXVIII? Stay tuned.
• Fans paying money to view reporters from the stands on media day while commentators comment on the commentators interviewing the players.
• Endless blather about Super Bowl parties, picks, food, drink, and promotional items. Not to mention a poll as to whether married women with cheating hearts would prefer to have an affair with quarterback Eli Manning or Tom Brady.
Sheesh! You’d think these guys were running for the presidential nomination.
Speaking of which, if, as Mitt Romney asserts, “Corporations are people, my friend,” would it not follow that corporations are susceptible to mental illness? Lets say, for instance, narcissistic personality disorder, a condition in which people have an inflated sense of self-importance and an extreme preoccupation with power, prestige and vanity.
If so, it might be said that Newt Gingrich qualifies as a mentally ill corporation as evidenced in his promise to build a permanent colony on the moon with the long-term goal of making it the 51st state. (For more, look in the dictionary under the word lunacy.)
Maybe you’ve heard the rumor going around that the candidates we’re seeing on the primary stump are actually imposters planted by the Democratic National Committee who have kidnapped the real GOP candidates.
Not only that, the conspirators are forcing the republican hostages to work two minimum wage jobs and supplant their income with food stamps while using voodoo to brainwash them into supporting “trickle up economics”, wherein large salaries, bonuses, tax breaks, and other economic benefits are given to the lower and middle classes with the contention that it will benefit the upper one percent as it trickles up to them.
In other news this week, the social media site, Facebook, filed papers to go public with an offer of 51 billion in public stock. Facebook now has 845 million users, each of which has an average of 118 friends. My guess is that, of those 118, a user would be lucky to get two they could rely on in a crisis. One thing’s for sure, keeping up with all those “friends” posts could easily make a person Blue-In-The-Facebook.
With the amazing financial success of Facebook, no doubt spinoff social sites will be created. Let’s see, how about Just-Another-Pretty-Facebook, Poker-Facebook, Egg-On-One’s-Facebook, and Feed-One’s-Facebook. Maybe a site called AboutFacebook for people who want to do a 180 and quit because they’re tired of it all.
Getting back to the Super Bowl, I’m old enough to remember the first one (then called the AFL-NFL Championship), which was held at the Los Angeles Coliseum in 1967, when I was a senior in high school. The Green Bay Packers beat my beloved Kansas City Chiefs 35 – 10 before a non-sell-out crowd of 61,946. (The Chiefs returned to beat the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl IV.)
It was fitting that the Chiefs and the Packers would be the teams to play in the first ever championship. Kansas City owner Lamar Hunt was the person who founded the AFL, while Green Bay was widely considered one of the better teams in NFL history.
I don’t remember much about the promotional hype for the game but I do remember the halftime show featured renowned trumpeter Al Hirt. I can’t recall what he played, but I remember he had an LP out titled “Music to Watch Girls By” — which was more than enough to get me to pay attention.
J.T. Knoll is a writer, speaker and prevention and wellness coordinator at Pittsburg State University. He also operates Knoll Wellness Training & Consulting in Pittsburg. He can be reached at 231-0499 or jtknoll@swbell.net.
