"Can I park there? I think I'm gonna die!"

Much thanks to Scott Berken.

I got to attend my first regular season NFL game last night!
Not just any other game, but a Monday night game that showcased the Dallas Cowboys against the much-hated Washington Redskins.
Some media personnel have been using the old cliche tying football players with gladiators in the colesium. I my opinion they got it right.
Up until that point, I thought it was cheesy and a fabrication of passion that was only felt by the topless, beer-bellyed fan in minus 15 degrees. Then I realized that was all the media needed.
Walking through the outer section of Texas Stadium, I felt like Maximus walking into the ring. Not because I was passionate, but because everyone else was around me.
You got to hand it to 'em. The Cowboys fans are hard-core.
The metaphor of the players as gladiators is not as accurate as portraying the fans as gladiators. The aggression that was flowing between the maroon and blue jerseys is enough to make FEMA shiver. I mean there were people there that were ready to fight over a mediocre team that overcharged them for tickets and provided a grossly under-achieving stadium!

"REDSKINS SUCK!!! REDSKINS SUCK!!!"

Many have said that football has been the best medicine for the Katrina disaster. It takes people's minds off of the suffering, loss, devistation and death that occured in the Gulf Coast. The Saints are temoporarily "America's Team" and are playing for the hopes of the New Orleans natives. Football has given us a distraction, a temporary glimpse of normality.
The normality is what scares me.
For one second, everybody in Texas Stadium sang the same song (national anthem).
For one minute, everybody cheered for the same colors.

And then we had kickoff. And football brought us back to normality; hating people that cheered for a different franchise.

"Redskins Suck!!! Redskins Suck!!!"
"But they beat us!!!"
"So they are really just slightly above moderate!!!"
"They now have a better record than we do, so that must mean that WE are simply moderate!!!"
"Wow! Pledging allegiance to a sports franchise certainly causes one to really look in the mirror and search for the human being behind the face paint!!!"
"Wait, how much did I pay for this seat??"
"REDSKINS SUCK!!! REDSKINS SUCK!!!"

Redskins - 14

Cowboys -13

Still mad we didn't go for it...
M@