Tomorrow is the big day for religious football fanatics. They call it Super Bowl. I have no idea what number it is. There have been too many to count.
Cult members paint their bare chests and faces with the colors of their favorite team and gather in an open stadium in twenty below temps to scream unintelligible gibberish into the camera of any news station crazy enough to come within spitting distance of them. That is a religion to be feared!
These people dress their infants in miniature matching team outfits, indoctrinating the simple-minded by repetition and chanting. Those that can’t afford to sell their house and buy tickets to the main event, rush down to Best Buy and purchase the largest flat screen they can get their hands on, living on faith that when their team wins, those extra hours of overtime and that second job at Blimpies to pay for it, will all be worthwhile.
True fanatics force their non-footfall loving family members to endure fourteen hours of pregame bull-larky at surround-sound hearing loss proportions while they couchpotato quarterback, convinced that if they just hear the message they will fall down and worship at the shrine of footballdom.
Their wife or house-husband must prepare lots of football shaped hors d’oeuvres to tide them over until the pizza delivery guy shows up and the game actually begins. Then they scream and yell at their mythical heroes—steroid-pumped men in tights and cleats, hitting and falling upon one another—as though they can hear and answer back.
Those with no football belief system--hold no particular team in high esteem, have no leanings whatsoever on whether football should be “the” national pastime (replacing the outdated religion of baseball)--are treated like ignorant souls who will someday realize what they’ve missed, but it will be too late.
For those of you who would rather watch a “Leave it to Beaver” marathon than endure a day of football, there is hope. And there are no beavers involved.
For only $2.99 you can download Entangled and spend a blissful afternoon and evening reading a mystery set in the warm, Napa wine country. Check it out:
One lost summer is time best left forgotten
When Minneapolis divorce attorney, Billie Fredrickson, inherits her uncle's small California winery, she has no intention of actually moving to the west coast and starting a new life. Her only thought is to get it off her hands as quickly as possible. But her return to the winery after an absence of twenty years opens up more than the reading of her uncle's will. Childhood memories, long-buried, begin to surface, prompting more questions than anyone is able or willing to answer.
A late night prowler, a break-in at the winery, and an unearthed box of shocking photographs is someone's way of pulling the Welcome mat out from under Billie's feet, but it only makes her dig her heels in deeper.
More secrets lie buried beneath Fredrickson Winery's innocent facade and Billie intends to get to the root. But disturbing the past lays bare the skeletons of others, including her mother's. Can she live with the consequences of full disclosure or will she run home where everyone is Minnesota Nice?
For any football fanatics reading this instead of watching the pre-pre-game suppositioning—welcome! We accept all sport believers alike. Your fanatical inclinations in no way prohibits you from enjoying a good book after the game.
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