I just can't help it....

... I have come to feel, over the course of the last 39 seasons, a passionate regard, respect, love for the Saints which despite all rational objections I cannot overcome. Football is a ridiculous sport costing billions of dollars, it is rampant with misogynistic marketing, the valorization of brawn over brains, and yet, and yet:

I love my New Orleans Saints. We won our first playoff game - EVER - and it was joyous. We, the New Orleanians of the world, needed this. If we can EVER beat the Bears in their own den, in freezing-ass Chicago winter temps, we can do it now.

I find myself amazed by the players and the game because their every single skill is absent in myself: extensive rote memorization, intense physical discipline, fearlessness, the ability to improvise within a highly controlled environment, grace under pressure.