(Via Jim Lytle/AP PHOTO)

Cleaning Up the Mess is here to make sense of what just happened at your weekend-long television party. Who put Goldfish in the blender? And why is the thermostat on 42?

This week: The furniture is on the roof, a screaming motorcycle crashed through the front door, someone played “Nessun Dorma” while the television was on mute and there may or may not have been a conversation about Tim Tebow. Yes, it’s 2014, and someone talked about Tim Tebow playing in the NFL. This all might seem strange and without regard for order, but it couldn’t be any weirder than Mississippi State earning the designation as the best team in the country. 

Surrealism defies logical explanation and justification. Why is that clock melting? How did that apple get there? Why is Louis C.K’s neighbor throwing a water jug out of the window? There is no explanation needed for these events because there is not meant to be one. You can try to explain Mississippi State’s 2014 season using empirical and anecdotal evidence of player development as well as recruitment evaluation. It doesn’t in any way make up for the fact that you feel like you’re in a college football fever dream punctuated by a septuagenarian ringing a cowbell and speaking in tongues.

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