Tailgating: Expand A Great American Tradition

This is the season for tailgating, which for some fans is the only reason to attend a football game.  Smoke from grills wafting through a parking lot.  Adult beverages flowing from kegs and cans. Food piled on card tables and in the back of pickups and in motor homes.  It's an American tradition.

As soon as the last football game is played in bone chilling weather, tailgating goes into hibernation until next season.  It seems like an eternity for die hard fans.  Why can't tailgating last all year?  There is no law that sanctions tailgating only at football games.  This calls for some creative thinking.

A perfect occasion for tailgating would be right after your colonoscopy.  You emerge woozy from your procedure and waddle into the parking lot on the arm of your spouse.  Cheers erupt from people in flimsy paper gowns, their bottoms exposed.  It's a celebration like none other.

After fasting and gulping foul liquids, you are ready for food.  Your fellow colonoscopy victims wrap you in blankets and hand you a plate filled with breakfast tacos.  Someone begins a chant: "C-O-L-O-N! C-O-L-O-N! Go Colon Go!"  Suddenly, you have forgotten the previous day's noxious prep.

A week passes and you arrive for your dental appointment for a cleaning.  The parking lot is packed with cheering people carrying festive signs such as, "My Dentist Is Long In The Tooth!"  You cautiously approach a dental hygienist handing out blue plumes of cotton candy.

"Should I eat this before my cleaning?" you ask skeptically.  She grins, "Of course, that will make it more fun to scrape, chisel and scrub brush your teeth."  As you move toward the dental office, someone presses a bag of corn nuts in your hand.  "Chew these before your cleaning," she cackles.

As you gaze around, you see booths offering chewy caramel candies, popcorn, chocolate blueberries and red wine.  You graze along with the other dental patients until your teeth look like the bottom of a sewer drain.  Your dental cleaning takes four hours and the cost is double the normal fee.

A month later your arrive a the Department of Motor Vehicles to renew your driver's license.  Instead of the usual line snaking around the building, you see hundreds of people milling around pickup trucks, campers and recreational vehicles.  A band is marching and playing the DMV Fight Song:

"We'll do our best,
So you'll fail the test,
And treat you badly,
so you'll leave sadly!"

State troopers are offering massages in the RV's.  The pickups are stuffed with kegs of beer.  Campers are crammed with people watching television.  You gulp liquid refreshment and celebrate. After waiting five hours, you enter the DMV office and flunk the test because of your blood alcohol level.

Next day you chauffeur your spouse to the Symphony Hall for a performance of Beethoven's Ninth in C Minor. The usual stuffy crowd sheds their suit coats and fur wraps to huddle around grills with lobster tails sizzling over a fire.  There's a sushi bar and a caviar tent in the parking lot.

A tuba player and violinist are belting out tunes from your college alma mater. Some symphony patrons are wearing jerseys with the name of their favorite wind instrument.  There is a giant television showing replays of last year's award winning performance of a Mozart concerto.

The well coiffed crowd, humming with excitement, enters the Symphony Hall in a rowdy mood.  As the orchestra begins its first piece the audience starts the wave.  The conductor drops his baton.  A few patrons begin bellowing, "We Want Mozart." The orchestra storms off the stage in protest.

Actually, all this daydreaming about tailgating sparks an idea.  Given the number of birthdays I have celebrated, perhaps, it is time I start making plans for a tailgate party for my funeral.  Pardon me if it sounds a bit macabre, but what better way to celebrate a rabid sports fan's final game?

Picture this: Outside the funeral home my friends (both of them) and my creditors (2,000) are grilling my favorite food group, barbecue.  Huge vats of potato salad and coleslaw are strategically located in the parking lot.  Baked beans are forbidden out of respect for the deceased.

A putting green and a driving range have been installed in the cemetery.  People are whacking golf balls off headstones on graves. There are contests for hitting the ball closest to my burial plot.  The prize is a truckload of all the used golf balls I found in the woods during searches for my own ProV1.

As a tribute to my love for college football, there are goal posts leading into the funeral home.  Admission is granted only to those who can kick a field goal from 15 yards.  Pom poms and face paint are distributed to attendees.  Cheerleaders lead everyone in a rendition of "Amazing Grace."

Tailgating extends well into the evening.  Everyone agrees it is the most enjoyable send off they have ever attended.  Some predict tailgate funerals will become an overnight sensation.  No sense in limiting merriment to the football season when other opportunities abound for tailgating.