I’m not a huge football fan but I have to admit the Super Bowl is a fun game to watch. It’s the party atmosphere, hanging out with friends eating deliciously fattening snacks and drinking good drinks. It’s a fun time and hard to turn down. Here are a few interesting facts about the Super Bowl to impress (or annoy) your fellow partiers this weekend:

1.      Roman numerals are used to indicate each Super Bowl because a football season takes place over two calendar years.

2.      A seahawk is actually an osprey.

3.      The only teams to have never played in a Super Bowl include the Detroit Lions, Houston Texans, Jacksonville Jaguars, and the Cleveland Browns.

4.      According to Wikipedia, the Pittsburgh Steelers have won the most Super Bowls with 6 wins.

5.      There has never been overtime or a shutout in a Super Bowl.

6.      A 30 second commercial will cost over $4 million for the air time alone.

7.      People worldwide wager over $8.2 billion on the game (not sure if this includes the Super Bowl squares game that takes place at most parties!). You can even bet on the color of Gatorade that will be dumped on the winning coach.

8.      The big celebrities that perform during the half time show are not paid for their performance. Their expenses are paid but they do not receive a fee.

9.      This is the first time that the Super Bowl has been played outside AND in the north.

10.   If you can get 30 of your closest friends to each shell out $16,942.17, for a total of $508,265, you can have a climate controlled, 30 person suite complete with food and drinks for the duration of the game.  Or, for one of the cheap seats in the stadium you can pay a mere $1,600 to freeze your hiney off outside.

11.   This year about 8 million pounds of guacamole, 15 tons of chips, and 1.25 billion chicken wings will be scarfed.

12.   More than 700,000 employees will call in “sick” the Monday after the Super Bowl. (Big surprise!)

I’m going to root for the Seahawks only because my Aunt and Uncle live in Seattle and it is such a great city. I’m looking forward to being with friends and family and I promise not to call in “sick” on Monday!  Have a fun and safe Super Bowl weekend everybody!

(Sources:  http://www.forbes.com/sites/chrissmith/2013/02/03/super-bowl-xlvii-fun-facts-and-trivia/, http://lite987.com/10-superbowl-fun-facts-to-share-on-sunday/, http://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2014/01/super_bowl_xlviii_seattle-denv.html, http://www.kidzworld.com/article/25277-super-bowl-fun-facts-and-trivia)