SUPERBOWL SUNDAY

As I've said before, the Superbowl is like the Cup Final with bells on.  Walmart has been displaying the watery beers and nachos, dips etc. and for the past week the Food Network has been full of the snacks to make and serve at the party. 

A friend in North Carolina asked if I was going to a party and I said that sadly, no I wasn't, I hadn't had an invite anywhere.  I was feeling like the relative no one wants at Christmas but as it happened I went to Emmanuel for a Lent course Tim Sean is starting on praying the Daily Office;  it was at the same time that the Superbowl was on and I was somewhat surprised that all the people with lovely homes I thought would be having parties were all there.  So perhaps I wasn't missing out on anything after all.


I asked Bruce and Rosalyn the other day which team they were supporting and they didn't even know who was playing; my jaw dropped and I said they must be the only people in the nation who don't know.  So I wasn't expecting an invite there.


There is a Mardi Gras party at the church on the 18th, I don't want to go to that though as it is fancy dress.  You probably know that Mardi Gras takes place in Louisiana on the day before Ash Wednesday, and I guess our proximity to LA is an excuse to have one here.


An item on the news which caught my attention was about a sniffer dog at JFK airport.  When I have seen sniffer dogs in airport baggage halls I've assumed they were looking for explosives, but actually they are looking (or these were) for contraband agricultural products, which is a major problem here as they can cause millions of dollars in damage to crops.

The contraband they seize is ground down and incinerated.  And they do tons of it in a day.

Dogs apparently have a sense of smell 2000 times stronger than humans.