Surviving Football Fever

I love college football so much that I hate it. As I sit here flipping channels trying to watch all the pregame shows and waiting for that first game, I can’t help but to think: I am miserable.

We wait for it all year, but now that the “most wonderful time of the year” is finally upon us, I’m remembering what I’ve spent eight months forgetting. College football makes me miserable.

I went to church one Sunday morning and asked a woman if she had fun at the ridiculously close game she had gone to the day earlier. She said, "No, I didn't. I'm glad they won, but I did not have fun."

For the next four months, I will wake up on Saturdays to a full lineup of games. Then, I’ll spend the next nine hours watching games, biting my nails, having my blood pressure go through the roof, swearing, sweating and screaming.

During particularly intense games, my blood pressure goes up so high I get light headed. I thought I was going to pass out during this play in 2009. 

I’ll obsess over stats and scores. You can’t just hope your team wins. No, that’s only part of it. You need your team to win and other BCS Championship hopefuls to lose. Next thing you know, you’re crunching numbers and hypothetical bowl game matchups.

Then there are the friends and family members you can’t talk to until Christmas. There is always that one annoying cousin who does not realize that obnoxiously chanting the other team’s fight song is not cute.

How am I even related to those people?

I get one day off today then every game is marred by my hypothetical Heisman hopefuls. 

My poor neighbors will have to get used to hearing, “Get him” being yelled from my home all day. My sleep schedule will suffer because I have to check up on my blogs and websites.

And what makes me mad are the people who just don’t get it or who say those dreaded words: It’s just a game.

They don't understand.

I know there are more important things in life. Really, I do. But there’s just something about college football that strikes a chord with Southerners.

So unlike these games, my love/hate relationship with football is a no-win situation. I’ll watch and stress and be in a bad mood when my team loses. But at the end of the season, I’ll look back and say I survived another round of football fever.  

Just don't break my heart, boys. I'm counting on y'all.