Walking into the Bilodeau house is like walking into your own home. There are children to hug, people to embrace, friends to high five, cocktails to distribute and food to be grazed over. You feel right at home to lay your head in someone’s lap or just plain out sprawl out on the floor.
In my case, I felt perfectly at home picking fresh navel oranges off the tree and mixing up a delicious Sunday Brunch mimosa for the pre-game show. And when I got tired of doing it myself, I found a replacement juice squeezer (thank you MORGAN!) and wandered over to the food table.

Around drink number two, I overheard the following conversation that still makes me giggle.
Man 1: “It was 1972!”
Man 2: “No it was 1971. Look there’s Robert Daltry in that picture. See!”
Man 1: “No. It was ’71 and we saw Crosby Stills Nash & Young”
Man 2 : “No way! Look how passed out you were in these pictures. How would you know?”
Man 1 : “Look that’s Rick Baldwin”
Man 2 : “He was an animal”
Man 1 : “He WAS an animal”
Man 2 : “He threw my couches out on the street, for fun. It was around 1971”
Man 1 : “It was 1972!”

Pops is the king of this house and everyone in it adores watching and listening to his jokes and tales. He makes the best beef jerky this side of the Mississippi and he’s a big softie papa bear. He’s a tough guy softened by years of being surrounded by his two daughters and all their friends. I absolutely adore him. Adore. And for the record he’s a solid Colts fan. But I don’t feel bad yelling WHO DAT. At all. WHO DAT!!

The Saints/Colts game was exciting. It’s fun to yell “WHO DAT” and root for an underdog. It’s also delicious to watch Peyton Manning and root for him, learn his family history and ties to New Orleans. Just playing in the game was a big moral boost for the good people of New Orleans. Admittedly I didn’t end up watching much of the game. I was too busy blowing bubbles with the kids and distributing king cake.

What was more exciting was catching up with people I’ve known for nearly 15 years. Listening to Jim Moran tell the same humiliating story about me from our 10th grade Psychology Class. Dancing with Katy Bilodeau, and her sister in the kitchen, just as we might have done in high school. These are people who are used to me peppering them with questions about mundane subjects. There is the same football dish that holds something different each year (this year it was cheesy crostini, last year it was chicken wings).

And after the game was all over – the party continues in this dance of life. I’ll be back next year, same place, same time, same people for the Super Bowl Game.

Game Stats
– The New Orleans Saints’ 31-17 victory over the Indianapolis Colts in Super Bowl XLIV was watched by an average of more than 106 million people, surpassing the 1983 finale of “M-A-S-H” to become the most-watched program in U.S. television history, the Nielsen Company said on Monday.
– First Superbowl Win for the New Orleans Saints
– 106.5 million people watched the Super Bowl and 166 million pounds of snacks were eaten and 49.2 million cases of beer were consumed
– Surprise victory of the New Orleans Saints over the Indianapolis Colts caused a nine minute Twitter outage, according to Pingdom.com, as countless viewers tweeted like crazy when the Saints sealed the deal with a stunning interception by cornerback Tracy Porter.
– The 8 most engaging commercials of the Superbowl:
1. Doritos “House Rules” 2. Snickers “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry” 3. Focus on the Family “The Tebows Celebrate Family, Celebrate Life”
2. Doritos “Underdog”
3. 2010 Intel Core Processors “Jeoffrey the Robot Gets Hurt”
4. E*Trade Financial “Baby Love Triangle”
5. Bud Light “Observatory”
6. CareerBuilder “Casual Fridays”
7. TruTV’s NFL Full Contact “Punxsutawney Polamalu”
8. Hyundai Sonata “Brett Favre MVP and Still Playing at 50″