Lacking anything more apropos, post title is from this because Jonah mentioned it.

***

Last Sunday, Courtney (sp?) at CHPC asked if anyone was having a Super Bowl party and I was like, "Oh, I think my friend Jess who would usually host such a thing said she's gonna be out of town."  I had literally forgotten that the Super Bowl would be coming up.  At lunch the next day at work, folks were talking about the upcoming Super Bowl and so I asked who was playing.  Upon hearing Pittsburgh Steelers and Arizona Cardinals I thought, "The Arizona Cardinals?  Didn't we play them in baseball?"  Yeah, I was thinking of the Arizona Diamondbacks -- and the St. Louis Cardinals.

My flist is apparently similarly uninterested..  (Has anyone even mentioned who won the Super Bowl?  Not that I rely on my flist for all my news -- I mean, okay I mostly do, but for stuff like this I also have the metro on my morning commute -- but it just entertains me that basically no one was invested in the result enough to post about it.)

From yesterday:

fox1013: Is there a particular team I should be rooting for? I ask this like I'm not just going to be watching the Puppy Bowl, which is a lie, but I don't even know what teams are playing and I feel I probably... should? Or something?

cidercupcakes: You should be rooting for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band!

...what, the halftime act could totally surprise everyone and win it.

Also seen on the flist, post title "Steelers & Cardinals open for Springsteen"

I haven't seen many of the Super Bowl commercials.  Any recommendations?

***

I went to give blood after work today.  My iron needs to be 12.5 and it was 13.5.  My blood pressure was 110/88, and my pulse was 66.  I do not have awesome blood-giving veins, but the last 2 times I've gone to give blood I haven't had serious difficulties.  This time my blood was coming out really slowly (I guess I was not sufficiently hydrated?) and they need you to be done in under 20 minutes (otherwise they start to worry about clotting in the tube).  Le sigh.

***

"Joy Sadhana is a daily practice in the observation of joy."
-mylittleredgirl [more info]

Do not be afraid, I am with you
I have called you each by name
Come and follow Me
I will bring you home
I love you and you are mine
     -"You Are Mine" (David Haas)

Five good things about today:
1. This afternoon I was feeling mopey, so I went downstairs to get something with chocolate from the vending machine.  It told me "Transaction Invalid" and "Card Deleted."  It's beautiful out, so walking over to Spangler isn't exactly a hardship, but…  I emailed Ian to be like, "have they not calibrated the vending machines for the new ID cards?" and he replied (in part), "Well i'm sorry to give you the news, but they did talk about staff cuts at the last faculty meeting, and I think this is their way of giving the news to you….. "  I LOL'ed.
2. [redacted, v. 2]
3. I am loved.  This is included in #2, but I also wanted to say it explicitly.  Plus, I am demonstrably loved by other folks today as well.
4. I called Ari while waiting for the bus back from blood donation and told her all about my day, and then we drafted our "25 Random Things About Me" posts aloud to each other.  (I think the most "us" moment was each of us trying to list all the churches we've each been to, largely utilizing LJ tags.)  After 2 hours and 55 minutes on the phone, she posted hers and I let her go get ready for bed.
5. My cup runneth over.  So much more chocolate than I was expecting (and the abundant generous love that implies), and my best friend, and folks who oblige me on the love meme, and an email from my mom that almost made me cry (in a good way).

Three things I did well today:
1. ( gym )
2. I took care of a bunch of the expense stuff (albeit not all of it) and contacted people about getting together.
3. I successfully found St John's Church in Watertown and was cooperative and gracious throughout the whole blood donation process.

Two things I am looking forward to (doing [better]) tomorrow:
["anything that you're looking forward to, that means you're facing tomorrow with joy, not trepidation," as Ari says]
1. CWM Lenten Worship Planning
2. finishing my "25 Random Things About Me" post

[Seattle Seahwaks] Entrance music: "Bittersweet Symphony" (the Verve) ?  Rock.  I could barely discern that the other team [Pittsburgh Steelers] had music nevermind know what it was.  I realized early on I was rooting for the Seahawks 'cause their outfits were prettier.  Lo I am shallow at times.  Plus, never been to the Super Bowl versus going for fifth?  I grew up in Red Sox country (though my family isn't hardcore about sports); rooting for the underdog is what I do.

Nice touch having musicians from Detroit and NOLA (though I wasn't impressed by the rendition of the national anthem).  And I recalled the criticisms of the lack of mention of NOLA in the SotUA and thought, "The Super Bowl knows how to play it."  As soon as they said they were gonna have a moment of silence I knew one would be for Coretta Scott King but I was trying to remember who would be the other one ('cause I was running through recent deaths and was like "Betty Friedan . . . ") but if Rosa Parks is from Detroit, that would be a duh. [Edit: The Metro confirms my father's suspicion that that was Condoleeza Rice in the stands.]

When I saw Terry on Saturday he said Seattle Seahawk linebacker Lofa Tatupo (51) was friends with his nephew Kevin.  They went to (high?) school together, played football together.  I told my dad and he got all excited and explained the history to me and then they even had a little spiel about him early in the game.

I was mostly interested in watching the commercials (I had my dad call me back for them) but I ended up seeing most of the highlights anyway.

( Do I even need to cut for this? I mean, anyone who cares watched it. Oh, why not. )

Commercials:
- "Let your man out"?  Um, no thanks.  Besides the obvious "Oh yes, Super Bowl, your target audience is stereotypically macho men," scenes of pointless rampant suburban destruction do not make something appeal to me.
- "Three guys standing around watching while one guy does all the work ... would never fly in the corporate world."  Of course we see the punchline, but I enjoy that the one working worker is a woman.
- Co-opting Dr. Seuss (and Oh, the Places You'll Go! no less -- IIRC, that was my first LJ bio) to pimp the Super Bowl?  Sadness.  I was also kind of weirded out just generally by how many "Super Bowl = rawk!" commercials there were in the first batch.  Like come on, we're already watching.  Do you need to convince us it's big and exciting?
- Disneyworld.  *rolls eyes*  I mean, I get that "What are you going to do now?" "I'm going to Disneyworld" is a Thing, but I've never understood the Disney fetish.  My dad explained that the winners of the Super Bowl used to get a free trip to Disneyworld.  Makes such more sense now.
- "But FedEx doesn't exist yet." "Not my problem." And then the ba-dum-bum at the end.
- Sci-fi geeks repruhsent in the Aleve commercial.
- Classy and exotic black woman (whose cuffs reminded me of Witchblade) emerges dripping water.  Walks off.  Then emerges a 2007 Escalade.  The parallels are obvious, and gee isn't that problematic on a multiplicity of levels?  Plus, I am so not a car person, so I was like, "car whatever, could I watch the woman again, on repeat?"
- Ford Hybrid: "I guess it is easy being green."  *rolls eyes*  I also disapprove of the co-opting of Kermit, duh.
- "Light beer . . . just got darker."  Tackling the blonde chick ded, kinda worrisome; redeemed by her tackling him in the bar at the end, though.
- "You might just watch for the commercials" (shot of a guy and his dog; props to it not being a woman, which would be the expected stereotype)  I was contesting the uberAmericanness of the Super Bowl, but yeah, everybody watches the Super Bowl, whereas the World Series is more about the fans of those two teams plus baseball fans in general.
- "Low fares, even at the last minute."  I was wondering if that guy was the personal assistant and was reminded of the commercial for whatever it is (some cell phone information service thing) where the workers are dancing and one guy comes in freaked out and they're like "We've got it under control."  Anyway, moral of the story is: Be nice to the people who run your life.  But apparently he was just a random employee.  When they cut to the "we value our employees" conferences I wanted a dramatic entrance a la "You killed my wife" in The Fugitive.
- The football players being so into Desperate Housewives . . . wigged me out the first time and they keep repeating it.
- The silver woman getting off the backflap to admire the truck (Honda Ridgeline) . .  I thought of Emma -- the whole hot women who also knows cars thing.  Kinda confused by Yosemite Sam's hat saying "Back Off!" since they were totally playing subtext between the two characters.
- Fabio: I can't believe it's not butter shampoo Nationwide Retirement.
- "We ate non-organic food, and we liked it!"  "It's a papaya."  "The old-fashioned way; we went . . . to the Internet."  Reminds me of Prof.B's comment about an old-fashioned way of syncing his Treo ;)
- zomg, the mutant hamster thing and the robot . . . tru wuv . . . and zomg pregnancy, and they birth a truck :)  Hummer!  Calling it a little monster is perfect, 'cause it gives the opposition and the supporters a catch phrase.
- Sprint: "crime deterrent"  I was amused.
- Sprint: Benny Hill (As with That 70's Show season finale, my dad pointed out that it was Benny Hill and I nodded, not really having any familiarity with Benny Hill, though when we saw That 70's Show my dad explained the original scene to me.)
- Emerald Nuts.  Um, yay druid?
- Budweiser: creating the bottle, and the glass, and the pour, and the drinking, with the bleacher audience cards was quite good.
Edited to add ones I'd neglected:
- Clydesdale!  And shortly before it aired I'd been thinking, "I miss the Clydesdales from last year."
- "Don't judge" (AmeriQuest?) "Well that killed him" and the airplane one
- debit MasterCard (MacGyver)

Bud Light series:
- Office workers going that ballistic over beer?  Though the small print "Please drink responsibly" on the heels of that did make me laugh.
- I liked the "magic fridge" one a lot.
- The bear one?  *shrugs*
- The roof one?  Eh.  I'm even less impressed by that one.

Walking to church with the melting snow and the sun and i don’t know, something in the air, it felt like spring, which was rather ironic coming as it did on the heels of this Groundhog’s Day.

The Scripture readings were Exodus 24:12-18 and Matthew 17:1-9.

Liza gave the sermon, called “Coming Down From the Mountain.” She started off talking about Moses and how the patriarchs were rather jerks, and moved into how God calls people one wouldn’t necessarily expect, at times one wouldn’t necessarily expect. I almost wept when she talked about Jesus says of the one who is to betray him three times, “This is the rock upon which I build my church.” And later in the sermon, moving back to the actual title, she talked about how one isn’t allowed to just stay on the mountain basking in the glory of God, one has to go back down the mountain back to the people and do God’s work. (Tonight, among other things, i’ve been Blackboard discussing Narnia and Surprised by Joy, and this connects nicely.)

"Swiftly Pass the Clouds of Glory"
Swiftly pass the clouds of glory, heaven's voice, the dazzling light;
Moses and Elijah vanish - Christ alone commands the height!
Peter, James and John fall silent, turning from the summit's rise
downward toward the shadowed valley where their Lord has fixed his eyes.
Glimpsed and gone the revelation - they shall gain and keep its truth
not by building on the mountain any shrine or sacred booth
but by following the savior through the valley to the cross
and by testing faith's resilience through betrayal, pain and loss.

This memories meme brings me joy.

"we've had a lot of fun." -lilithchilde
Dude, that sounds so farewell-y.

Me (on Tess): “It’s a classic.”
Cat: “That means you hate it.”

Peeve: If i friend you on facebook and also send you a facebook message along the lines of, “I miss you,” confirming the friendship but not replying to the message is teh laem.
Peeve2: Fake LJ-cut tags.

SuperBowl was tres boring. So much stoppage in the first half. I feel like the last time i watched football it wasn’t nearly this bad. But yeah, the point of watching the Super Bowl truly is the commercials. Clearly my winners were the gay shoutouts (Diet Pepsi wins!), which really are subsumed under the category of twisting gendered assumptions (motorcycle gang leader: “The salad bar is better at the place up the road”). The “Can you hear me now?” monkeys and the “Don’t assume” cat commercial were also good.

And dude, Felicia is usurping my place as She Who Hates Everything. I defended both Tess and the frozen car commercial tonight.

Note to self: Do not try to write Genius Girl while watching the Super Bowl. You will want to research every other line, which is just not feasible in that situation. Though i did get plot worked out in my head, which is good.

"Your ideal partner" options from this quiz include:
-Wears glasses and calls you "sir"
-Dresses like you and likes to blow bubbles
-Is brainy and busty
Remind me to work these into fic some time :)

( 'cause Cat WISHES she were gay! ;) )

And finally: I aim to avoid my homework please. (I had finished Death of a Salesman and was totally justified in taking a break.)

( Dame Judi Dench )