A Fool's Utopia 2.9.12: Super Bowl Thoughts

Posted by Ron Martin on 02.09.2012

This week in one man's utopia we take a look at some observations about commercials, the game and activities of Super Bowl weekend. Also inside, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles the arcade game, a Three's Company reunion and Supernatural.

Usually this week of the year, i do a breakdown of the good, the bad and the ugly of the Super Bowl Commercials. In this mile a minute 24 hour news cycle we have, a Super Bowl story coming out on Thursday seems ridonkulous. I believe that to be the proper use of the word ridonkulous -- well, if it were really a word, that is. I'm not one that's ever played by those rules, so I'm just going to "blog" about my Super Bowl weekend, seeing as I was in the host city for most of it and 45 minutes away for the rest of it. Without further adieu, I give you my thoughts on the Super Bowl.



Heading into Indianapolis Saturdayr> afternoon, I was extremely worried about parking. Last week, I was able to park at the Indianapolis Zoo for free and shuttle into the city as I was working the event. This week, I was a consumer and had no such privileges. As it were, there was plenty of parking, but I parked in the first lot that I saw, about six blocks from the festivities for $40. I'm sure the same spot went for $100 the next day. The first thing I saw was a parking lot full of New York Giants fans RVs. They had set up a tent, had music, food and boos for all. This would become a running theme for New York Giants fans.

Overall, in the Super Bowl Village and Indianapolis in general, I would say Giants fans outnumbered Patriots fans by about 25-1 (at least those who made it visibly known which team they were rooting for). I've heard several explanations of why this was -- It was Indianapolis where the Patriots are hated, Boston areas fans have been spoiled in the past decade with championships in every sport, etc. I was still surprised by the lack of fans for the Patriots. The cool Patriot fans were walking around in Colonial attire. I am ashamed to admit that it took me several hours to figure out why people were walking around in Colonial attire. However, Giants fans taught me things...like this guy...



Who knew Tom Brady threw like a kicker?

Almost every restaurant in town had a bar set out front where they were selling the 16 oz aluminum Budweiser, Bud Lites and Bud Lime for between $6-$8 depending upon how close to the Village they were.

I feel like I should have a "random celebrity run-in" story here to tell, but I don't. I have failed you.

One of the reasons I went to Indianapolis on Saturday was to see a free concert by one of my favorite bands, Here Come the Mummies. A local news lady came onto the stage in the pouring rain to introduce them. She asked how many GIants fans were in the audience. The Colts fans kept quiet while a smattering of Giants fans cheered. She asked how many Patriots fans were in the audience. I expected the same reaction. Instead the entire area was drowned with boos and jeers. We were told to "be nice."

A random guy with a flask came up to me just before the show and recognized me as the bartender where I work some 45 - 50 miles away. Then he offered me a shot from his flask. Not thinking that it might be piss, poison or a roofie, I took a swig. Lucky for me, it was Wild Turkey. Four shots later, the same guy also supplied me with several Pabst Blue Ribbons. I'm not one to turn to turn down free alcohol.



The Mummies rocked as usual, even in the rain. Note to all those who feel like it's appropriate to be in the middle of a crowd and hold an umbrella up -- if you have to have an umbrella to enjoy a concert in the rain, you don't belong there. Plus, it's extremely rude to block the view of those behind you. Just before the show, the Colts Cheerleaders showed up in the small outfits and stood on the side of the stage like they were going to do something with the Mummies. Halfway through the show, they had mysteriously disappeared. I never saw them since. The police blocked off the area about half an hour before showtime, I'm thinking in reaction to the crowd problems they had the night before at the free LMFAO concert on the same stage. If you didn't get into the area before it was blocked off, there were giant screen all over town that you could watch the show on.

Watched the Indiana/Purdue game in a sports bar downtown filled with Giants fans. There were literally three people in the bar rooting for IU and one rooting for Purdue in what is one of the biggest rivalries in the Big Ten. When the three IU fans (two of which were sitting with me) did their "Ho-Ho-Ho-Hoosiers!" chant, everyone in the room looked at them like they were crazy. By the end of the game, Giants fans were absent mindedly clapping whenever the chant went up because they figured something good had happened.

Watched three hours of pre-game mostly because it was in Indianapolis. Became a bigger fan of Victor Cruz because of it. The highlight of those three hours for me was the NBC sing-a-long from all of their shows (highlighting the Thursday night lineup) wishing America a Happy Super Bowl. Told you it was a holiday. When they switched from 30 Rock to The Office, my thought was Parks and Recreation better be in here. When Parks and Rec showed up, I was looking for Community. Thank goodness! They got a prominent spot. That's good news. My favorite part of the whole thing? During the Parks and Rec segment everyone is still in character -- Ron Swanson does not sing and when everyone else gives a thumbs up - April gives the thumbs down.



Watched the Super Bowl froma local sports bar with a friend of mine who is a Patriots fan. He brought me out for good luck because I wanted the Patriots to lose and he knows that I have terrible luck, therefore his theory was if he bought me, it ensured Patriots victory. He bribed me by paying for my drinks. I was surprised the bar was not packed. In fact, it's more packed on an average weekend night.

The commercials seemed better to me this year than the last couple. Nothing iconic, but highlights for me were the Metlife commercial with all the cartoon characters (I spent my first viewing looking for Waldo in every shot), the Clint Eastwood Chrysler commercial, Jerry Seinfeld's Acura commercial and the Sandman's Kia Optima fiasco. I'm tired of all things babies, vampires and dogs. It's time to retire the E*Trade Baby. He's done.

Madonna may have lip synched, but Super Bowl halftime show was worlds better than the last two (Black Eyed Peas and The Who), which have to be two of the worst in history. That guy on the tight wire was ridiculous. By the way, who did M.I.A blow to get in the show in the first place. Let's see, Madonna, LMFAO, Nicki Manaj, Cee-Lo and M.I.A -- one of these thing doesn't belong. I guess if I were a second rate rapper no one's ever heard of with the largest audience in the world, I would do something completely stupid to try and draw attention to myself as well. Good job, M.I.A, you got a couple of headlines for a couple of days. Now we can all go back to forgetting you exist -- aside from the guy you spread your legs for to get the spot. My prediction of a Taylor Swift cameo during the halftime was way wrong.

As a Colts fan, I understand I'm biased. Eli Manning has two Super Bowl rings and two Super Bowl MVPs. The pass to Manningham was amazing. I still just don't see him in Peyton's class. Or Brady's for that matter. Or Rodgers or Brees. To me, he's fighting tooth and nail with Roethlisberger, Stafford and Rivers. He shouldn't be, I know. Maybe it's the crappy regular season games he has. The guy's going to the Hall of Fame and I'd feel like my season was over if I got stuck with him as my quarterback in fantasy football.

Overall, it was a positive Super Bowl experience. My hometown killed it as host. The media (which I was most worried about bitching about it not being Miami) loved it and is begging the NFL to bring the game back to Indy. Reading all the positive remarks from reporters all around the world made me proud to be a very small part of it (all my volunteer shifts were done by Monday). I said last week there was no way that Indianapolis gets a Super Bowl. Listening to Roger Goodell dodge the issue keeps me believing that, but then again, I'm a pessimist. Now, if the Super Bowl came back to Indianapolis, I wouldn't be surprised. I'm not expecting it, but I wouldn't be surprised. Does that make sense?




FIVE RANDOM THOUGHTS



1. Thank you, NETFLIX! I knew I paid $8 a month for a reason. I've been using NETFLIX for the past year and I've mostly used it to watch TV shows. I only have the online service, so my watching is at their mercy. Over the last year, I've seen every episode of Drawn Together, Workaholics, 10 Items of Less, Twin Peaks and Home Movies. I got caught up on Season Two of Parks and Rec, Season Six of The Office and the first two seasons of The Twilight Zone. I have a bad habit of not wanting to come into a show (especially one hour dramas) in the middle, so if I miss a bunch, even if I like the show, I just hold off until I can see the whole season. That happened to me with Warehouse 13. Like the show, saw the first season, got behind the second season (my fault, not theirs) and I abandoned it. How happy was I when NETFLIX got the show for the ON DEMAND service. It was actually Warehouse 13 I was going to watch when I saw they just added the first six seasons of Supernatural! Awesome. This is a show that I had heard so much about for years, but never started watching because I didn't want to come into the thing in the middle of season 3. I started watching two days ago, am six episodes in and won't stop until I have all six seasons digested. I'm digging it. I'm sure I'll be writing about it as I go. I am wondering if other characters aren't added. The show seems a little small with just two characters to follow. It works, though, so I'm not complaining. For the record "Jessica" from the pilot episode is smoking hot and will be added to my list in the "5" bulletpoint.

2. I'm not a Superhero guy. I've never been a comic book reader. I don't normally watch Superhero movies. I make exceptions. I've seen most of the incarnations of Batman, all three X-Men movies (not counting the prequel), along with a few Superman movies here and there. For some reason, I really want to see Avengers. Maybe because it was written by Joss Whedon, I don't know. The commercial just popped for me. I didn't see Ironman, The Incredible Hulk, Thor or Captain America, but I'd like to see this one. I have no idea why.

3. Kind of completely lost in the shuffle last week was a mini-reunion of one of my favorite TV shows, Three's Company. For those of you under 30, the show took place in the late 70s/early 80s and starred John Ritter, Joyce DeWitt and Suzanne Somers. After five seasons, Somers demanded more money and got booted from the show. That was thirty years ago. The cast had held a grudge for that long. Finally, in their old age, Somers and DeWitt re-united on what I think is an internet show. This probably should have happened on some sort of Daytime TV Show (Ellen?), but I'll take what I can get. By the way, if Somers has had work done, that's the way plastic surgery should be done. She looks pretty good for 65.



4. Interesting note: The Circle K gas station that sits just outside of my neighborhood still has Reese pumpkins and trees. It has recently added Reese hearts and eggs. I kind of want to buy a Reese pumpkin, even though I don't like peanut butter, just to buy Halloween candy in February.

5. Onto the 250 women I would rather bang than Men's Health's sexiest women of all time, Jennifer Anniston.

As mentioned above, the girl who played Jessica in the pilot episode of Supernatural. She may appear more in the series, but I'm only six episodes in. A little research tells me her name is Adrianne Palicki. She's in.

Let's add to that Scarlett Johansson from The Avengers. No explanation necessary.

Maybe she's a punk and fame whore who makes bad decisions, but that doesn't mean that M.I.A. isn't smoking hot and I still wouldn't do naughty things to her. It just means that she would probably be more receptive to naughty things, right?

One last entry for the week -- I don't know who she is, but that model they used for FIAT 500 commercial during the Super Bowl made things move in my pants like no other. Whoa!




MY LIST
1.Brandi from Storage Wars
2. Megyn Price
3. Miss USA 2011, Alyssa Campanella
4. Rosa Mendes
5.Lee Meriwether
6. Julie Newmar
7. Meg Tilly
8. Jennifer Tilly
9. Lindsey Lohan
10. Rashida Jones
11. Rachel Nichols
12. Bonnie Bernstein
13. Jennifer Love Hewitt
14. Adrianne Palicki
15. Scarlett Johansson
16. M.I.A.
17. The Girl from the FIAT 500 commercial




USELESS TRIVIA and SHAMELESS PLUGGING


Last Week's USELESS TRIVIA

Two of the ladies on my list of women I'd rather bang than Jennifer Anniston once played a mother/daughter combo in a movie. Who are the women and what was the movie?

ANSWER: The movie is 1996's House Arrest where Jennifer Tilly played the "wannabe hip" mom to Jennifer Love Hewitt, who was like 16 at the time.

This week's USELESS TRIVIA

An easy one this week -- see if you can figure it out without using the internet.

What was Suzanne Somers' character's full name on Three's Company?


SHAMELESS PLUGGING

Over in Ask 411 Music this week, I'll talk about all girl Korean pop bands, 360 deals and sexy videos from the 80s! Seriously, check it out.





THIS WEEK IN RETRO



I don't really remember how old I was. I want to say that I was in Eighth grade when I joined my first bowling league with a few of my buddies. I have no idea why I joined a bowling league. No one in my family bowled. I wasn't terrible at it. I wasn't as good as the kids who had grown up on bowling, but I wasn't as bad as the rest of them, either. I bowled one year and wouldn't pick up a bowling ball for another ten. But this isn't about bowling -- it's about Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the arcade game.

What did I automatically segue into a middle school bowling league? Because after bowling every Saturday morning, my bowling team would take over the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game in the bowling alley's arcade room. You could play four players, which was perfect because we had four kids on our team. Many years later, I would learn that this game was a "beat 'em up," but back then, I just knew it was TMNT and that it was cool.

Each bowler got a turtle and better than that, every week, each bowler for the same turtle. I, of course, chose my favorite of all the turtles, Raphael because he was like me -- cool, but rude. This was a mistake. Raphael is by far the worst turtle to have in this game. He's not as bad in this game as he would be in the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles NES game, but he was the worst turtle to have simply because of his weapon of choice -- sai. In the real world, I think sai are pretty cool. In this video game -- they sucked. The "range" for the weapon was basically nonexistant.



We had the game down the point that we knew where each enemy was going to come from and we had assigned individual turtles for each enemy. At least for the first few stages. Oh yeah, the point of the game was to rescue April and Splinter and stop Shredder from doing whatever it was he was going to do -- I can't even remember what his diabolical scheme was at this point. We'd pump almost $5 each into the machine every Saturday. Soon, we had a crowd of kids watching us every Saturday. By the end of the league, we were regularly defeating the game, even without moments where the others had to all get change from the change machine and one guy had to try to stay alive long enough for the others to join.

My nephew had a birthday party at that bowling alley last year. Part of me fully expected to walk into the arcade and see Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in its old spot. Hadn't we pumped enough money into it to justify it's existence there for the last twenty years? Nope. I guess we didn't. Not only was the game gone, but the arcade had been turned into one of those deals where every game allocates you tickets. Tickets that get you Tootsie Rolls and finger puppets. Being a kid today must suck.

23 Years Ago Today

February 9, 1989

#1 Single





"When I'm With You" by Sheriff



#1 Album




Don't Be Cruel by Bobby Brown




#1 Movie






Three Fugitives




I must leave you now.