The Mind Reels

After two weeks, it's all beginning to sink in:

• The Chicago Bears are IN the Super Bowl!
• I am going to watch the Chicago Bears in the Super Bowl TOMORROW!
• My brother will be AT the Super Bowl TOMORROW watching the Chicago Bears!

This is NOT a dream! This is NOT a hoax!

Aye-freakin-carumba!

Nerves got the best of me and so I awoke early this morning (well, early for a Saturday) because I was unable to stop pondering it all. My mind is racing! I hit some of the Super Bowl ticket sites and noticed prices had dropped about 50 percent in a week. Tickets that were about $3,600 a week ago are about $1,800 today. Still, I think I will be happiest ("most sane?") at home with a small crowd soaking up the game in beautiful, warm HD.

I'll post my prediction tomorrow, but regardless of the outcome, the fact that the Bears still have any football to play in February is amazing beyond mere words. This is SUCH a big deal for Bears fans. And I have the entire season on DVD and in iTunes format to watch and enjoy over and over.

For me, the backdrop of the Bears season in terms of my life is kind of fascinating. I enjoyed the 2006 draft in the comfort of my home in Crystal Lake, Ill. By the time training camp opened in July, I was working in Florida. I watched opening day against those cheaters from Wisconsin in a hotel room in Cocoa Beach. Within weeks I was bunking at the parents and we had joined a growing cadre of Bears fans each Sunday at Hooligan's, a sports bar in Ormond Beach. The weekend after Thanksgiving, I was back in Illinois at the Boxwood Drive abode watching the Bears fall to the New England Patriots with Mary as we took a break from finishing up the packing before the big move. By Dec. 3, we were in the new Melbourne home with a new big-screen TV in time for the Minnesota Vikings game. On Christmas Eve, Mom, Dad, Mary, Mary's Mom and I reconvened at Hooligan's to watch the Bears squeak by the Detroit Lions. And, in the end, the Bears will play in the Super Bowl XLI just 2-and-a-half-hours from our home down Route 95.

On one hand, the NFL football season always seems to go by so quickly. This year, a lot was going on!

It's been a wild trip from Illinois to Florida for both me and the Bears. And it all comes down to tomorrow!

Meanwhile, the alternative we came up with (vs. spending about $10,000 on a full-blown Super Bowl experience) is a trip back to Chicago in March for the Bears Fan Convention. I literally stole plane tickets from American Airlines last night and we are ticketed up for a few days of fun to celebrate a great season with the Bears and other Bears fans.

More later.


Mark