These days, I watch the Super Bowl more for the commercials than for the game itself.

Some of them are pretty funny and very creative. Lately, though, some are way too political for my taste.

I used to be a Dallas Cowboy fan but my interest has waned. The Cowboys did win a playoff game this year but they are not in the Super Bowl and they don’t have any players that I particularly follow.

From 1993 to 1996, Dallas won three out of four Super Bowls and that was exciting. Back then, San Francisco and Green Bay were arguably the best teams. Dallas had quarterback Troy Aikman, who played high school ball at Henryetta and was at Oklahoma for one year before transferring to UCLA. Super Bowl LIII (53) will be played February 3 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, home of the Falcons. Kickoff is set for 5:30 p.m.

It’ll be the first Super Bowl at that stadium, which opened in 2017. This will be the third Super Bowl played in Atlanta.

The Dallas Cowboys beat the Buffalo Bills in the Georgia Dome in Super Bowl XXVIII (38) in 1994, while the St. Louis Rams topped the Tennessee Titans in 2000 in Super Bowl XXXIV.

New England has been in four of the last seven Super Bowls and they won it in 2015 and 2017. Last year’s game between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Patriots was about as exciting as a game can get. Philly won 41-33. New England won in 2017 with a miraculous comeback over the Atlanta Falcons, 34-38.

Sometimes, I have watched the Super Bowl at a party. That can be a lot of fun or a headache. If you don’t care a bit about the game itself, it’s fun to be with a bunch of party animals. But if you want to study the game and enjoy the commercials, the smaller the crowd, the better.

Also, in a big crowd there may be some fans of a team that you don’t like. That is, you don’t like their team. I don’t go to parties that serve alcohol but some people can still be obnoxious – especially when their team is beating your team.

You have to have tasty snacks when you watch the Super Bowl. I like to have some ranch dressing or onion dip with plain Tostitos and some little smokies baked in crescent dough and dipped in barbecue sauce. Some homemade pinwheels are nice and I usually drink some Canada Dry Ginger Ale. If it’s really cold, a bowl of chili is nice. And you can’t beat some nachos draped in chili and covered with cheese. In the past, we have served peanut butter cookies or chocolate chip cookies.

The annual diet begins on the Monday after the Super Bowl.

You don’t need a giant TV to watch the Super Bowl but you don’t want a tiny screen, either. Our Sony Smart TV is big enough to read the ongoing statistics that pop up during the game. You don’t want a really old TV because an outage during the game is disasterous.

Back when most churches had Sunday night services, there was an annual fuss over whether they should call off night services on Super Bowl Sunday. I could understand why some parishioners (most of whom didn’t like football anyway) thought it was sacrilegious to cancel a Sunday service to watch a football game.

On the other hand, attendance was sparse at those churches that did hold services on the night of Super Bowl Sunday.

(By the way, many churches in Dallas make sure their Sunday morning services are over well before noon in case the Cowboys kick off at noon).

Many churches coped with the problem by having Super Bowl parties in people’s homes or showing the game at church for the youth group.

The pregame coverage for the Super Bowl begins like eight hours before kickoff. Does anyone watch that? That’s just too much programming.

It’s like the Kentucky Derby. There are hours of coverage for a race that lasts a few minutes. It gets to be a little anticlimactic.

Speaking of programming, whatever network is airing the Super Bowl (CBS this year) will slip in a new show at the end of the Super Bowl broadcast. I don’t know what the track record is, but the shows they have had seem to be losers.

Gladys Knight is singing the National Anthem for this year’s Super Bowl and that is just great. I wish she was doing the half-time show. The half-time shows seem to be either great or terrible. My favorites were former Beatle Paul McCartney and the late Michael Jackson. Lately, the shows are by artists I have never heard of singing songs I have never heard.

If the Cowboys want me back as a fan, all they have to do is get to the Super Bowl and win it.