Atlanta Superbowl
It was our fourth Super Bowl in Atlanta. They were playing the Dallas Cowboys for the second time after getting whipped in Pasadena. There was no shot the Buffalo Bills would lose again. "Detitta, John De Titta", what the hell you doing"! It was my friend Dave who had just flown in and got to the airport. I was living in North Carolina so it was an easy drive to get to Atlanta. Dave was coming from New York along with his brother Ronnie and Jim who was trailing behind was now living in Kansas. As a group, we had witnessed three losses of our favorite team and we knew the odds were for us that this was going to be it.
It was never about the game for us, it was all about getting together once a year and sucking up every once of life during that week together and seeing what adventure we could bring our self to. It didn't take long for the event to begin, a large crowd had gathered in the streets at a concert going on. Most likely several thousand people and we knew it was our job to get into the middle of it all.
I had given up drinking but the other guys had been drinking steadily from several days before. There was a guy up on the stage introducing the songs and a friend that Ronnie had brought ran up on the stage and took the microphone away and started talking about some high school football game. We all got it and were laughing but the audience was getting impatient and he was booted off the stage.
The next song that came on was a Michael Jackson song from early days with the great dancing style. Dave and Jim started to move people away from me and I started dancing with a group of beautiful black women dancing like the old Lockets while the rest of the crowd was shouting at me and the girls to keep it going. It didn't take long to grab hold of that energy and get the place going nuts.
I was exhausted after about four songs and we all went into a restaurant that was having a chugging contest. I wasn't drinking but Dave volunteered me by standing on the table and taking bets that I would drink the entire Texas Pete bottle straight in one chug. Soon, people were throwing money unto our table that i would get if i would drink the entire bottle. Not sure why this happened, i wasn't drinking, I simple wanted to have a fun relaxed time and now I had about four hundred dollars in front of me and a crowded bar screaming at me to chug the texas pete.
That's how it always happened, one minute your walking into a bar minding your own business and in a matter of minutes you have an entire bar screaming at you to drink a full bottle of texas pete, so I did what any rational person would do, I grabbed the bottle and pretended it was a beer and chugged it down, grabbed the four hundred dollars and jumped on the table when done to a standing clapping audience.
"Detitta, your the man" Dave screamed while hitting me on my back. Well, it didn't long to make it to the bathroom after the attention was turned away from me and I can tell you there it was a long painful experience but hey I got four hundred bucks and had an easy time relating to childbirth.
John Detitta |