On This Day Of The Foot And The Ball, We Will Instead Speak Of Puppies

Yep. I’m one of those guys who watches the Puppy Bowl, not the Super Bowl.

That may put my masculinity in question, I dunno. Here, let me fix that: I also like Sarah McLachlan and one of my favorite TV shows of all time is Gilmore Girls.

Wait, that probably didn’t fix anything. Shit.

Uhhh.

I like guns?

My favorite movie is Die Hard?

I have a mighty beard that destroys my enemies in its tangle of choking vines?

I dunno. It may be too late for me.

Well, whatever. The Super Bowl hasn’t really ever been a thing in any incarnation of Der Wendighaus. We were a baseball family, which is not to say we were a family made of anthropomorphic baseballs but rather, we watched a lot of baseball. I still dig the World Series. And I also love the Oscars. The Oscars are my own Nerd Super Bowl.

I’ve tried watching the Super Bowl. Ehhh? Muh? I just don’t get it. I get bored. Is that weird? I watch it, I get bored. It seems like the game is mostly about not playing the game. Dang, a football game is 60 minutes, split into four 15-minute quarters, right? So, why then does the game start at 6PM and end at 10:30PM (provided it doesn’t run over)? It takes four-and-a-half hours to play an hour-long game? The rest of it is commercials and time-outs and replays and analysis and more commercials and then there’s a flurry of activity for 30 seconds where someone kicks over the bee-hive and then it’s back to commercials and time-outs and guys punching each other in the balls or whatever. Plus, that doesn’t even account for the two hour “pre-game.” Which is not, as the term suggests, the game before the game.

The Wall Street Journal estimates that in every football game, the ball is actually only in play for 11 minutes. Counter that with hockey, where it’s action action action at every turn.

When I watch the Super Bowl, I mostly want to take a nap. I’d rather watch a game of Monopoly.

Played by old people and children.

But again, everybody’s got their thing. Hell, I like the Oscars. The last Oscar telecast was, I think, 17 hours long. And they estimated that at least 21% of the audience committed suicide during the show. I mean, goddamn, getting through the Oscars is like watching snot dry on a little kid’s face. And the World Series next year is supposed to be “Best Out Of 31.” God forbid they play one game to settle anything.

Really, what I’m saying is, fuck yeah, puppies.

Man, if I’m having a bad day, the only thing I need to do is look at puppies. Puppies are a panacea. If I ever get cancer — and, given my family history, that day is coming — I plan on engaging in my own personal form of puppy therapy, which is to say I will be watching an endless loop of puppy videos. Hell, I might even buy a bunch of puppies and live with them as their pack mentor. I wonder: if you rub puppies on cancer tumors, do the cancer tumors go “Awwww!” and then slowly deflate?

Science is slow to pick up on the “puppy panacea” theory, which is why I say, screw you, science. America doesn’t need you. We only need puppies, baseball, and Jesus. And Democracy. But mostly Jesus.

Man, I’m rambling this morning.

Really, what I’m saying is, fuck yeah, puppies.

Take a moment out of your day, if you care, and deposit into the comments below something — anything, really — about puppies. What’s the cutest puppy? Got a puppy picture with a high-larious caption? Puppy video? Anything at all. Let’s engage in a little puppy therapy.

Here, let me get the ball rolling.

First: courtesy of Stacia Decker and Matthew Funk, the cutest designer puppy ever: the Pomeranian Husky mix, also known as the “Pomsky.”

Second: Lab puppies in slow motion.

Third: Iso, the dachshund puppy, playing in the snow (also in slow motion).

Fourth: “Puppy Can’t Get Up.”

Fifth and finally: Puppy Wakes Up.

There. A little puppy therapy.

Now, your turn. Then go shoot some guns and grow beards and watch Gilmore Girls.

I mean, uhhh, enjoy the Super Bowl.