While I don’t know much about football, I do celebrate the annual paean to it called The Super Bowl. They had another one this year and celebrate I did. You see it’s been a little over a month since we’ve had a good excuse to ingest a days worth of empty calories. Super Bowl is that day. Most years, I typically  make a large pot of jambalaya and take it to a gathering with friends. Usually, those people have also prepared snacks, sides and snippets of goodies to share with everyone as well. And it’s all waiting to be washed down with festive beverages. 

The gathering was smaller this year, owing to the pandemic and social distancing considerations. I spent time with two other adults in my family and their children. I didn’t make jambalaya for the first time in memory, but I did order and pick up chicken wings. All of us enjoyed the wings, along with queso dip, something referred to as “crack” dip that no one could get enough of, two kinds of chips, fried rice, celery sticks, a fruit plate, a veggie plate, various cheeses, some olives, diet Coke and white wine. There was enough food and variety for a party the size of the neighborhood and the five of us managed to put a good dent in all of it. Despite our best efforts, there was still enough for me to take home left overs.

That’s why we need to have the day after the Super Bowl declared a holiday. After a day of sampling everything in sight, I was too full to get to sleep, so I stayed up even later than necessary. Yes, I noshed on a few items while watching more tv.  The next day, I was wiped out from all that eating. My body hardly knew what to do with itself, so I took not one, but two naps. Each meal of the day after was comprised of the aforementioned leftovers and as a snack in the evening, I ate popcorn because, you know, Super Bowl.

Not only did my body need more rest, but I was hungry. Not the real hungry you get from working and doing things like an adult, but the hungry you get when your stomach has been fed too much and it just misses more food. So I ate some. 

Throughout the day after, I was tired, hungry and out of sorts from eating food that didn’t have a strong relationship with nutrition. I had done my part in watching some of their activity with a football. Mostly I really just enjoy the commercials. Those things are highly entertaining and I hate to miss even one.  This is the occasion that calls for all this food after all.  It’s a party on TV, so it should be a party at my house. They make it seem like the real reason for all that eating anyway.

I did need to rest up from the workout of all that overeating. I’m sure others felt the same. So I’m going to begin a petition to have the day after Super Bowl declared a holiday. We all need the rest and those leftovers aren’t going to eat themselves.