Wow. I feel bad. I have empathy. I feel the pain every Atlanta National League Football Falcons fan feels this Monday morning. Mere hours after the NFL’s most elite team, those pesky Tom Brady led, New England Patriots erased a 25-point deficit to win their fifth Super Bowl in seven tries, I can only feel for the losers.
Patriots 34, Falcons 28.

Misery loves company, I reckon, and maybe as one of the ever-heart broken Detroit Lions fanbase, I — we — know what the faithful in Atlanta are going through. And, the fact I really don’t even like Atlanta as a city does not stop me from wanting to give them a big ol’ Motor City hug. It’ll be okay, Falcons, maybe next year.
* * *
On the other hand, it is really nice to share the pain, because a shared pain is a lesser pain, right? I truly thought it was only a Detroit Lions strategy to lose football games in the most depressing manner.
Welcome, to our nightmare Atlanta — there’s room on the loser’s bus!
* * *
I am not a big gambler. I am too cheap and money is too hard to come by these days . . . . . . however, when Super Bowl time rolls around I do manage to find complete strangers out on the streets willing to take my donation to be in their “squares” games. (Hmm? Do I find them, or do they find me?) Some times I get a little diagram of where my square is and what numbers would pad my wallet. All of the time, I never consult said diagrams and my wallet has never been padded. Doesn’t mean I didn’t “win” just means I don’t know. Which is why, as I am not a gambling kinda’ guy, I justify this yearly folly as making “donations.”
I think my “sucker” light shines brightly this time of the year — a beacon of hope to those who would take my donation.
* * *
There was much chatter during the days leading up to Super Bowl Sunday. The half time show, performed by the ever-lovin’ Lady Gaga, was the topic of said chatter. Heard I from multiple sources, “Lady Gaga is going to make a political statement during the half time show!”

Heavens to murgatroyd!
No!
Not that!

On the internet’s social media, the buzz for days leading up to long-anticipated halftime show was loud from those folks right side of center, “How Dare She!?”
I confess, I was ready to hit the mute button on my very own low-def, circa 1996, 32-inch, 100-pound television set if any such political statement commenced. The world waited with bated breath . . . and then she, Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (aka, Lady Gaga), flew in from high atop the stadium to center stage and strutted her stuff.
No political statements.
Pure entertainment.
Exciting.
I closed my eyes and I didn’t even dislike the music (by the way, double negatives are one of my specialities, so don’t try this on your high school English papers, kiddies, your English teachers will not like it.).
* * *

For those not in the know, “Heavens to murgatroyd” was a line the pink mountain lion cartoon character Snagglepuss used to use on the Saturday morning cartoons. His other line was, “Exit, stage left.”
* * *
Ever Donny-on-the spot, and with full disclosure, I will also confess to this: I didn’t watch the entire game. The first half, the blowout half where Atlanta could do no wrong and the Patriots could not find the end zone, was boring. Even the commercials kinda were “wah, wah, wah” non-exciting. Call me a pink-o socialist if you must, but, I found myself switching back and forth from “The” game to Comet TV’s Mystery Science Theater 3,000 marathon.

As I am the cheapest guy in town, I have not had cable or dish or any other paid television service in my house since about 2008. I have FREE! TV and one of the digital stations is Comet TV, a “sci-fi” station with crappy, cheesy, classic old tv shows and movies. So, in between Pats’ QB Tom Brady getting sacked and Atlanta scoring, I watched such “classic” B (or less) movies as, “Manos, the Hands of Fate,” “The Beginning of the End” (a movie with Peter Graves and giant grasshoppers invading Chicago), and “Last of The Wild Horses.”
So, please don’t hate me. I am not a socialist and I am not a fan of European football. I was just bored.
Send your comments to DontRushDon@gmail.com

  Detroit Lions, don rush, don’t rush me, Lady Gaga, Superbowl, Tom Brady