Friday, October 21, 2005

Damn You National Football League

The NFL is the bane of my existence. My husband is a NFL addict. He lives, breaths, sleeps football. Specifically Minnesota Vikings but since they are all deviant thugs right now he is just obsessed with fantasy football. This has long been a reality. It starts at the NFL football draft each year and ends with the Superbowl. I'm sure there is a countdown involved with the time between the Superbowl and the next years draft but that is even too pathetic for him to admit to. (FYI - my kids are technically both named after football players Chris "Carter" and Tom "Brady". It is an old family tradition for my husband.)

Anyway this is not a post about my husbands obsession, but of my little toddler Brady's entry into football obsession. Carter alas could care less about football much to my husbands chagrin. Brady is two. One of his first words was football. Really, truly at about 18 months he saw a game on tv and yelled out "daddy, fooball". Thus began his descent into obsession.

Anytime there is anything on tv, in a magazine, a book, or a high-school practice field related to football, Brady goes crazy. He screams at the television to show everyone the Monday night football commercial. He runs from person to person on Sunday to show everyone the Best Buy ad that has a football player on their picture of tv for you to buy. Every night we drive home past the local high school and his eyes open up as wide as possible in search of the afternoon practice. Imagine his excitement on Sunday afternoon's. He may only watch little bits of a game, but he watches with such passion. Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you that I hate and despise football. My dad loves sports also and let's just say that watching a game with him wasn't much fun. After each game there was a pop quiz to make sure you were really paying attention. Once I hit college, I decided there were much better things to do with my time that sitting and watching sports for hours and hours and hours.

Well yesterday something arrived in the mail. I didn't give it much thought. I just tossed it on the ottoman in the living room with the rest of the mail and went on with my day. Brady found it while I was cooking dinner. A really nice dinner for the middle of the week. I roasted a chicken, made Italian potatoes and a nice salad. Brady found the NFL catalog. At first it was cute. He grabbed it and sat on Dad's lap showing him all the football shirts, helmets, bears, blankets, everything football. Then it turned manic. Football, football, football. He had to go page by page through the catalog with everyone in the house. Imagine the excitement the dog had when he showed her all the football stuff. As soon as dinner was ready and it was time to sit at the table and eat, it was meltdown time. No one was available to sit and look at the pictures. We invited him to bring the catalog to the table and show us while we ate. No dice. I spent the meal with Brady literally trying to drag me out of my chair to go read his "book". He refused to eat. Or stop crying. Or stop trying to drag mommy. I have never seen him so upset, ever.

Oh the crying and the screaming. I couldn't concentrate on eating. I just started shoving food in my mouth as quickly as I could. Finally, my husband finished and took him in the living room to read the catalog. It was then we found that they, the devils at the NFL, actually customize each catalog so they have your last name on a jersey on the back page of the catalog. Even Carter found that cool and he wants one, right now. We then decided to put the catalog to bed to stop the obsession. You can only imagine what that meltdown looked like. Finally both boys cried themselves to exhaustion and we all went to sleep.

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