As I soberly described when I threw some Kleinballs the other day, far too many of my friends are out of a job. And since the Super Bowl, for whatever reason, is actually sort of a big deal here,** and none of us had anything better to do on a Monday morning, I decided to have a little soiree at my place.
*No way am I gonna take the time to figure out those Roman numerals.
**Honestly, I have no idea why it's big here. But, you know, it is the Super Bowl.
I decided that this would have to be as authentic a Super Bowl party as possible, with a real celebration of Americana. And the first order of business was the food. For this, I decided that the main dish would be what my dear and deadbeat of a friend Ross has dubbed "manchos". That's right: nachos for MEN.
How good does that look??!? Corn chips, cheese, refried beans, beef with chilli seasoning, onion, tomato and jalapeno... lots of jalapeno.* And best of all, the above photo actually shows a very incomplete dish. For after it was taken, a very, very, very liberal extra layer of cheese was added. Good times.**
*I'm just gonna say it: Australians are idiots when it comes to anything Latino. Maybe we -- and by "we" I mean Americans -- are used to it because of all the Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, etc in the States, but most Australians are really ignorant of the language and food.
Take, for example, when I bought the jalapenos at the store. The woman scanning my food saw them, gave a bit of a blank stare and asked, "What are these?" I responded, "Jalapenos." She typed away on her screen, trying to bring up the right code. Ten seconds later: "I can't find it in here. How do you spell it? Is it h-a-l...??" I stopped her. "No, no. It's j-a-l-a-p-e-n-o." She typed away. Ten seconds later: "I still can't find it. So it's h-a-j-a-l...??" I stopped her again, a little annoyed: "No! J-a-l-a-p-e-n-o. No 'H'." Finally, mercifully, she found it.
Relaying this story to my friends back at my place, they laughed and one of them suggested that I should have just pronounced it phonetically: jah-lah-PAY-no. And another one countered that she would have come back with, "Oh! The jah-LAH-peh-nos! I love those things!"
**While we're on the topic, why don't you give the manchos a "10" rating on my new favorite web site, WouldYouEatIt.net.
Next came the guacamole. For this, I used a recipe I found online, and then doubled the amount of green chillies that it called for. Awesome.
And lastly came the booze. And for this, there was only one way to go: The King of Beers. So the day before, I bought a case, brought it home and put the beers in the fridge. But I wasn't done, oh no. It was time to get as American as absolutely possible. And so, using the cardboard from the beer case, I present to you this:
You know you love it.
Maz, one of my roommates, had a few bets on the game. One of them was that Roethlisberger would score the first touchdown, which was courtesy of a tip from me. So when Big Ben ran that broken play in for a touchdown on the Steelers' first drive, we went nuts. NUTS! Maz and I were jumping up and down and shared in a moment of bromance as we embraced. I was so proud of myself. And then, when it was called back on a challenge, well, that sucked. Ahhhh, the joys of gambling.
From what I understand, Ben Graham, the Australian punter for the Cardinals (and ex-Australian Rules Football star), got some press in the US during the two weeks leading up to the game, as he was the first Aussie ever to play in the Super Bowl. Now, to get a sense of how much attention he received here during the game, I want you to take whatever mentions he received during the telecast from the States (as far as I can tell, that consisted of one graphic that said "Ben Graham: first Australian to play in Super Bowl")... and then multiply it by about 8,568. Because when everyone in the States went to commercial and were treated to porn, we had a studio of Australian analysts gushing over Graham and breaking down every single one of his punts. It was hilarious, especially from my perspective. But hey, I guess that's the hook here. One thing I absolutely won't complain about was the feed that we got for the game. Last year, we received some feed meant for international audiences, with play-by-play by Dick Stockton and color commentary by Sterling Sharpe. My lord, it was awful. AWFUL!* This year, we got the same feed as in the US, with Al Michaels and John Madden. Say what you want about Michaels and Madden (or Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, who did last year's game), but for me, to have access to the regular telecast for this year's game, that was heaven on earth.
*Here's what I wrote to a friend shortly after last year's game: "Stockton was passable, but Sharpe... my GOD! He is such an idiot. As the Pats marched down the field to reclaim the lead, he kept saying, 'This is perfect for the Giants! The clock's still running, the Pats aren't picking up any big plays, this is going perfectly for them!' Meanwhile, the Pats are absolutely picking apart the Giants' defense. So what if they're only picking up 5 yards per play? So what if the clock's still running? Despite what happened on the Giants' next possession, that was a perfect march down the field! And on the Giants' next possession, on that play where Eli under threw Burress to just miss a first down, Sharpe says, 'It doesn't get any better than that!' Heck??" Yes. Heck, indeed.
Hey -- I don't think I ever wrote anything about Australia Day! Well, yeah, it was good. Barbecue at my place, Short's famous potato bake, Snellfinger, many drinks. Then we went to a bar that had some karaoke on and watched in pure delight as some guy, drunk out of his mind, simply tipped over halfway through his song.
And while we're on a tangent, the Penn men's basketball team currently has a ludicrous 1-3 record in Ivy League play. That includes losses to freaking Dartmouth and freaking Columbia. Earlier this decade, if you told me that I'd ever utter those words, I would have laughed you out of a room. Excuse me while my head explodes.
I've heard a lot of mixed reviews about Bruce Springsteen's halftime show. For the detractors, the argument generally seems to center around how it was cheesy and over-the-top and maybe a little campy. And I absolutely agree with that assessment; it was all of those things. But I guess I had a different interpretation of the intent; I think it was a conscious effort on the Boss' part to get a bit ridiculous, as if he just wanted to go out there and celebrate the biggest day in American sports by having a fun, goofy time. So while others disliked the performance, I found it to be a little endearing. Although he may have gone too far when he decided to rocket his crotch into millions of homes around the world. What I want to know is, where's the uproar??!? The fact that there hasn't been a backlash equal to that of the wardrobe malfunction tells me that all the politicians and pundits out there clearly have some personal vendetta against Janet and JT Two.**JT One, of course, being James Taylor.
And hey, have you ever noticed the resemblance between Larry Fitzgerald and Ronaldinho? I hadn't, but Shorty picked that up during the game, and it's definitely there. Sports Illustrated clearly agrees as well:
Here's a very cool feature from the New York Times, showing what words appeared in Twitter messages the most over the course of the game. I'm still trying to figure Twitter out -- don't forget that you can follow me here! -- but just the fact that we have the technology to do something like this... very cool.
Oh, and the commercials! Ummmm, yeah. They didn't show those here -- they were far too busy breaking down every one of Ben Graham's butt scratches on the bench -- and despite their omnipresence on the web, I somehow haven't found the time to watch them. Even the porn.
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