Bowled over once and for all

I am officially bowled out.You can have the Fiesta Bowl, the Siesta Bowl, the Polyester Bowl -- whatever else is coming up I don't want to know.Even that national championship thing they're playing in New Orleans on Jan. 7 doesn't interest me. With one team in the game having two losses and the other not having played since Reagan was president, it just seems pointless.It's now time for the NFL playoffs, college basketball and frozen pond action.My bowl overload began Monday in Atlanta with the Chick-fil-A Bowl. It was a good game (especially for Auburn), but like all bowl games it lasted way, way too long. And of course you have to deal with Atlanta traffic afterward.I'd just as soon be attacked by spider monkeys wielding tiny pitchforks than have to drive in Atlanta.So after wiping the sleep from my eyes New Year's Day, I flipped on the TV and Tennessee and Wisconsin were already playing in the Outback Bowl at an hour best reserved for eating brunch.And the bowls kept on coming.The Cotton ... the Capital One ... the Gator ... the Rose ... the Sugar.Had you opted to do so, you could've watched bowl games for 13 consecutive hours Tuesday.I did not opt to do so.I was interested in the Sugar Bowl because it featured Georgia and Hawaii, the nation's lone unbeaten team. The rest of them pretty much just served as background noise while I puttered around the house.Then I remembered the NHL was featuring its annual outdoor game at 1 p.m.Ah, the Buffalo Sabres and Pittsburgh Penguins skating on a temporary rink in a football stadium under blustery skies and 30 degree temps.That's entertainment, folks.So I watched that for a while until it was time to come to work, and as I was getting things organized at the office I grabbed the remote and found the hockey game. Unfortunately there was too much snow to see the puck.I'm not referring to real snow, but the kind of snow that screws up the picture. I'm not sure what the deal is with our office TV, but it has issues. I think maybe a rat chewed into the cable.Remind me to call the exterminator.At any rate, it's been a heck of a college football season and I enjoyed most of it, but it's time to watch the big boys who play for pay now, along with the kids who bounce that round ball and toothless guys with sticks.Maybe had all the bowls wrapped up on New Year's Day -- as the Good Lord and John Heisman intended -- I could've reveled in the grand finale of a grand season.Instead I found myself searching for ice hockey -- and that rat that messed up my cable.(Contact Scott Adamson of the Anderson Independent-Mail in Anderson, S.C., at www.andersonsc.com.)