While I love playing sports, I have never been a fan of watching them. I am openly a Fair Weather Fan. Like many controversial life choices, I catch quite a bit of flack for this, particularly around the high holidays: the Super Bowl, World Series, NBA Championship and Stanley Cup. Yet over the years, I’ve learned to coexist among sports fans despite our differing levels of enthusiasm. If you’re like me and want to enjoy Super Bowl Sunday without dedicating your life to a particular team, here are some tips I’ve found useful when hopping on the bandwagon.

Five Tips For Bandwagon Safety

1. Lay low. This is key to bandwagon travel. If you’re at a Super Bowl party obnoxiously cheering for a team without having seen a single game prior, you are surely going to piss someone off. This is a sacred day for a sports fan and should be respected as such… especially if their team is losing.

2. Pick your loyalty based on something more than mascot cuteness, uniform design or team colors. If you pick a team solely for superficial reasons, you’re not going to have any emotional connection to the game. Try to develop some sort of personal incentive toward the team you’re “rooting” for. I’m from Massachusetts, so my choice is fairly simple. I would be disowned if I rooted for the Giants. If that’s not your case, try rooting for the team your friends are rooting in order to avoid confrontation. Or, perhaps more fun, secretly root against the team of the person you hate and hope for tears. If all else fails, watch the human-interest pieces before the game and align yourself beside the team with the more sympathetic “rags to riches” stories.

3. Bring a great snack. Life-long fans will be less annoyed with your hopping on their bandwagon if you provide them with some sort of layered dip.

4. Be really interested in commercials. Most game analysis and conversation about “yardage” happens during commercials. To avoid this, be the person who demands absolute silence in order to hear what the Geico gecko has to say. This will also come in handy Monday morning when everyone is recapping the game and you steer the conversation toward the funny commercials.

5. Don’t ford the river in your wagon. You will get dysentery and die.

Hope everyone has a fantastic Super Bowl Sunday! Go Pats! Or Giants! Whatever, I just want cheese.

Feature image via Gary Varvel at indystar.com