The Super Bowl is the Hajj of the sports world.

Held once a year, it's a religious experience for a lot of people. It's also the greatest gathering of sports celebrities, media, executives, and even hookers. Forget the game, it's all about parties hosted by Playboy, Maxim, and about a dozen other major corporate players.

With that in mind, this LAister is going to venture into the desert and see what happens.

Nope, no tickets. They're a little too expensive. In fact, everything's uber-expensive this year. Commercials cost $2.7 million for 30 seconds, and that's not counting the production costs. Heck, some companies, like Go Daddy, had to make alternate commercials after their original was nixed by censors.

Anyway, this will be an old-school road trip -- complete with couch surfing -- into the heart of America's premier sports-a-palooza. A phone call here, an email there, a shot-in-the-dark-blog-post (hint, hint ... anybody?) and a whole lot of schmoozing may add up to some crazy tales. It may also end up a total bust. Unlike the NFL, I'm not making plans, much less backup plans.

One thing I should do on the road is watch some college hoops. Seriously. While most people focus on the Super Bowl or the FBR Open (which will actually draw more people to Phoenix than the big game -- as many as 200,000 on Saturday), I need to keep tabs on the Trojans for my USC blog. Ironically, they're hosting Arizona and Arizona State back in LA (I'll make a return trip to the desert later in the month when USC plays the Wildcats and Sun Devils on the road). Hopefully I'll find a good bar with lots of local fans and test how much spilled beer a USC jacket can absorb. So far I've had one suggestion: Oregano's in Tempe.

As long as I steer clear of Grey Ruegamer, I figure everything will be OK, even if I just wind up watching great football movies in a hotel room somewhere. Of course, I'm hoping for more. If you have any suggestions, feel free to comment or email adam@laist.com.