High on Football, Wings and Tapioca

By CHRIS ERSKINE

Jan. 31, 2001 12 AM PT

“When you get to be our age, you should eat mostly tapioca.” This is what Paul believes. Tapioca and toast. Me, I believe we should use our teeth while we still have them.

“I’ll eat tapioca when I’m 90,” I tell him.

“Me too,” he says. “I love tapioca.”

See what I go through?

Paul’s my friend. Hits a golf ball a mile. Has a portable electric generator. Loves tapioca.

In our last episode, I had invited myself over to Paul’s house to watch the Super Bowl, partly because his wife works Sundays and partly because he has this portable generator, our backup power source. In California, you can’t have too many power sources.

“If you want to go to a buddy’s house to watch the football game, by all means do it,” someone by the name of Kellan Fluckiger was quoted earlier in the week.

Fluckiger is the chief operating officer of Cal-ISO, a state agency that monitors California’s power load. Kellan Fluckiger. Love the name. His buddies probably call him Kel.

So with his permission, I go to Paul’s to help this state through the energy crisis. Conserve energy, that’s my motto.

“Can I come, too?” asks the boy.

“Sure,” I say.

Of course he can come. The Super Bowl is a holiday. You spend it with family and friends. You fix great feasts. There is television. In America, that’s pretty much all it takes to have a holiday.

And Paul has really worked hard on this little Super Bowl party. Days earlier, he bought a big bag of those honey-dipped chicken wings at Costco--a hundred wings, sweet as your first kiss.

“You’ve got the wings, right?” I ask.

“Big bag,” he says.

Right. Turns out his lovely wife fed most of the wings to his kids the night before, not realizing they were to be our holiday feast.

“How many are left?” I ask.

“A bunch,” he says.

“How many?”

“Twelve,” he says.

We are like the Odd Couple, Paul and I. When our wives eventually throw us out--and it’s pretty much just a matter of time--Paul and I will have to share an apartment. In a way, just the threat of that strengthens our marriages.

“Should I heat the wings up?” he asks.

“You’ve done too much already,” I say.

“Thanks,” he says proudly.

We’ve watched enough Super Bowls to know not to get our hopes too high. It’s the biggest, most-bloated spectacle on the planet. Bigger, even, than most weddings.

So Paul and I try to be philosophical about this year’s matchup. We don’t expect greatness. We just kick back, enjoy the game and eat till our blood reaches the consistency of pie.

“That Greg Gumbel, he’s awfully good,” I mumble as the CBS announcer prattles on about nothing.

“Yeah, Phil Simms is good, too,” Paul lies.

Fortunately, there is food to soothe us. I’ve brought gigantic ham-and-cheese sandwiches, the size of torpedoes. Paul has potato chips, cold chicken wings, drinks.

By the second quarter, my blood chemistry is 15% Pepsi, 20% chicken-wing sauce and 65% mayonnaise.

Basically, I am stoned.

“Is your dad OK?” the boy’s buddy asks as I begin to lose consciousness.

“Yeah,” the boy says.

“You sure?”

“Yeah, he always looks like that,” the boy says.

I look at Paul. He’s got that vacant, Tori Spelling gaze that guys get after too much football. It’s a blissful expression. Peaceful. Mindless. Takes 10 years off his face.

“Wanna play some basketball?” the boy asks at halftime.

“Yeah, right,” I snore.

“No really, Dad,” he says.

“OK,” I say.

And we pry ourselves from the couch and go out in the driveway to play basketball on Paul’s 8-foot hoop, bent forward from too many middle-age guys jamming.

“Feed the big dog,” Paul says as I pour pass after pass underneath the basket.

“What’s he talking about?” the boy whispers.

“He’s the white Shaq,” I explain.

“He is?”

“Not officially,” I say.

It’s a good basketball game. Without much effort, the white Shaq stands under the basket and swipes every rebound from the boy and his buddy. Conserve energy, that’s Shaq’s motto.

For 20 minutes, bounce-passes thud against the garage. Short jump shots ricochet off my forehead.

One hook shot soars into the neighbors’ yard. Rather than disturb them, we pull out another ball.

“Our ball,” I say.

“No, our ball,” says the boy.

“Our ball,” I say, then zing a pass off Paul’s nose.

In the third quarter, we head inside and watch the Ravens begin to pull away.

As is common with today’s pro athletes, the linebackers dance like 3-year-olds every time they make a routine play.

“Can you imagine Butkus dancing like that?” Paul asks.

“No,” I say.

Worse yet, one quarterback leaves the game for an injured little finger. That’s right, his pinkie.

“Jack Youngblood once played a game with a broken leg,” Paul says, flailing at the ghosts of Super Bowls past.

“Two games,” I say.

“Two games,” Paul says.

Then a terrible thing happens. The Ravens score again.

After 34 Super Bowls, I know exactly what will happen: The Ravens are going to get a cheap touchdown and pull away, draining all the emotion from the Giants or the Jets, or whatever this weak-kneed New York team is called.

By early in the fourth quarter, Super Bowl XXXV is over. CBS has given up on the game and is showing only the coaches. If you’ve ever seen a coach, you know how unpleasant this can be.

“Rematch?” asks the boy, heading back to the basketball hoop.

“Our ball,” I say.

“No, our ball,” says the boy.

“Feed the big dog,” says Paul, waving wildly, like a guy chasing ghosts.

“What’d he say?”

“Something about his dog,” I say.

Chris Erskine’s column is published on Wednesdays. His e-mail address is [email protected].