They Did It. They Really Did it!

This happy tweet from @MeanGreenSports made my day:

Mike Canales named Associate Head Coach of the Mean Green!

That's right, despite my concerns from the other day that Coach Canales was getting the shaft, if appears that the Mean Green brain trust has pulled off the unthinkable, getting the "name" coach with college experience that they desired in Dan McCarney, while also keeping the popular and inspiring interim coach of the past five weeks on board. And evidently, Associate Head Coach is not Canales' only title; he also retains his old job as offensive coordinator and will coach the quarterbacks as well.

As I noted on Facebook this afternoon, I was kind of lukewarm regarding the McCarney hire (and more than a little upset that Canales appeared headed elsewhere), but my enthusiasm just went up 500% with today's news, which undoubtedly sent a huge message to the Mean Green fan base.

So, welcome, Coach Mac! Congrats, Coach Canales! And let's hit the recruiting trail and give the new stadium (which is bound to be a sellout next September 10 against Houston, with yours truly in the stands for sure) a team that will be fun to watch and will pile up the wins in fairly quick fashion.

I Like Mike. Too Bad the Higher-Ups Don't Agree

As I mentioned yesterday, I have been quite impressed with the job that Mike Canales has done since being named interim head football coach at UNT last month. He added a couple of wins to an otherwise dismal season, and his energy and enthusiasm captured the hearts of the fans and the team itself. At Saturday's game, one of the biggest cheers being led from the student side was "MIKE-CA-NA-LES! (clap! clap! clap clap clap!)," and at game's end, several team members joined in and pointed toward the man as he headed to the sideline. Even if the wins weren't all there, the team played with a new sense of purpose and determination that hadn't been seen in a while. From this fan's standpoint, it sure seemed that Canales had done enough to earn the permanent job.

But the "powers that be" don't seem to see it that way. As I noted last night, some of us at the game had barely sat down to dinner when reports started to surface that former Iowa State coach Dan McCarney had been offered the job...which seemed to leave Canales, who had openly expressed his desire to be a head coach somewhere, out in the cold. I know that neither the fans nor the team can play too active of a role in the choice of the next coach, but it seemed that something was wrong here. And from reading the GoMeanGreen.com forums deep into the night last night, I was starting to see a troubling picture, if any of the following scenarios are true:

• Athletic Director Rick Villarreal wanted to give Canales the head job, but he was vetoed by university President Lane Rawlins and/or the Board of Regents.


• McCarney is an old crony of Chuck Neinas, the head of the consulting firm hired to assist with the head coaching search.

But that's the hearsay; here is what we know for sure: McCarney may have been the winningest coach in Iowa State's history, but his overall record was 56-85 in 12 seasons at the helm. (And an Iowa State fan on the forum said that McCarney should get the Mean Green to a bowl in 4-5 years, as if that was a good thing.)

Look, I understand that RV and company probably feel burned by what happened (or, more correctly, what didn't happen) in the Todd Dodge era, and I know that they wanted a proven college head coach. But still, I can't get past the 56-85 thing right now. Didn't Canales do enough to prove himself at this level over the past month? Isn't it time to keep the outstanding coach who's in your own backyard, rather than go for a retread who's sort of well-known?

There's only one way this could end happily at this point: If McCarney offers Canales the chance to stay--offensive coordinator again?--and Canales takes it. I don't know a thing about McCarney; is he a confident enough man to retain the most popular coach who's been at UNT in a long time, knowing that there would be calls for Canales to take over if McCarney can't right the ship in time? And would Canales settle for the consolation prize, knowing that he might have been able to get the top job at another school?

I'm still not a very happy alum right now, but I guess I need to suck it up and give "Coach Mac" a chance, if this deal does indeed go down in the next few days. And I wish Coach Canales (clap! clap! clap clap clap!) all the best, no matter what happens.

Farewell to Fouts

It may still be Thanksgiving break at UNT, but the campus was full of people today for a momentous occasion: The final football game ever to be played at Fouts Field.

It was also the site of a ginormous alumni reunion for the UNT marching band, the Green Brigade, of which I was a member for four years during undergrad school, and around 150 alumni showed up to that gathering. Even though we went through a whole season of weather today (from the upper 30s when I woke up to the 60s to--seriously--a sunburn in the stands during the first half of the game), it was a day I won't soon forget.

Was it weird to march again? You bet! Considering that I hadn't been in a marching band of any kind since late in grad school (and even that was a fake band, assembled for a movie that was shot on campus at the time), or marched for real since my first senior year of undergrad--yeah, it was quite an unusual experience. (And the march into the stadium has been greatly expanded, leading me to tell the guy next to me, "I see why they also get P.E. credit for this class.")

A lot of things have improved with regard to the game-day experience since I was in school: the evolution of tailgating has been a welcome change; the Hospitality Deck--to which a friend of mine always has access for himself and guests--is a great hangout for alumni which I will miss at the new place; and the support of alumni has grown immensely in the intervening years (when I was in school, the students would show up really late--they still do--but they used to outnumber the alumni by a large margin, but now, the only reason the alumni side isn't full is that some of the seat-holders are out on the Deck).

If you've read the various posts I've written in the past few years regarding the new stadium, you might be surprised at what I'll say next: There's a part of me that will really miss Fouts Field. Sure, in my enthusiasm for the new stadium, I've often described Fouts in less-than-glowing terms (the words "white elephant" and "eyesore" are frequent choices, and there's no denying that every 4A and 5A high school in Texas plays in a nicer venue), but I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel a pretty big twinge of sadness when the UNT alma mater, "Glory to the Green," was played within its walls for the last time tonight. It may well be a white elephant, but it's our white elephant, and a lot of memories were made inside a place that I've visited at least once a year since I was 18. The new place will be fun and classy and shiny, but it will take some getting used to, that's for sure.

Now, as for the game itself? Well, we lost. But not by a lot, especially considering the opponent was a Big 12 team with a winning record. Still, I was very impressed with the work of interim head coach Mike Canales, who would seem to have been a favorite to take over the permanent job after two more victories and a very impressive job against 7-5 Kansas State. The team played with more energy than I'd seen all season, and they have definitely bought into what he's doing. Yet it appears that it was decided a few days ago to the job has been offered to someone else (but I'll save that topic for tomorrow).

So long, Fouts; I've spent a lot of time within your walls. Next year's experience will be different (and quite possibly more expensive), and it will be a great thing for the program long-term. But the memories created for UNT fans for the past 59 seasons will not soon be forgotten.

Notes From the Road

I had a quick little trip to Austin to spend Thanksgiving at my sister's; as always, I have thoughts from my time behind the wheel:

• The designers of the interstate highway system, had they been more forward-thinking, should have designed separate, parallel roadways for cars and trucks; the two don't mix well a lot of the time.


• I-35 should be six lanes wide all the way from D/FW to San Antonio.


• The number of people I saw shivering on their shorts and flip-flops when I stopped for a break proved that it's always good to check the weather before you leave on your trip.


• Wednesday night in Dallas, it was in the 70s. When I left yesterday morning, it was in the 40s. I eventually got ahead of the cold front by the time I hit Round Rock, and it rejoined me in Austin shortly after the big meal. I felt like I'd been through a whole year of seasons in about 18 hours.


• In the Waco/Temple area, I saw a couple different locations of a used-car dealership called "Aaron's Autos." It's too bad they didn't use the double-A in both words; "Aaron's Aautos" would have been very catchy.


• Speaking of car dealers, there's a multi-brand dealer on the Round Rock/Georgetown border named Don Hewlett; it's too bad that some of the old nameplates from early last century aren't still on the market, because it would be awesome in this day and age if Hewlett sold Packards.


• Random occurrence of the trip: Running into one of my colleagues from school at Fazoli's in Waco. Evidently, he misses them being in the DFW area as much as I do.


• And finally, the Czech Stop still rules.

Tomorrow, I'll do something I've never done as a blogger: Talk about my experience that day in a marching band.

Thankful

Here are just a few things that I'm thankful for today:

• My Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ; I wouldn't be anywhere without Him.


• Family. My parents just left for a long-awaited trip to Germany, but I get to spend Thanksgiving with my sister and her family. And it's great that all of us are within a short day's drive of each other and don't have to mess with flying, buses, etc., to see each other.


• Friends. I have some of the greatest friends that anyone could ever want. Even though we're getting a bit more far-flung now (I'm pretty sure that, for two of them, this is the first Thanksgiving they won't be spending at home with their families), we're always in each other's hearts, and when we get together next, it will be like no time has passed at all. (And a special shout-out to my brothers in Sinfonia, an amazing extended family from coast to coast.)


• Health. A lot of people I know have had various health challenges this year; I'm grateful not to be one of them, since I spent a bit too much time in doctor's offices in '09.


• Mobility. A year ago, I was five months out from my knee surgery, having ditched the cane and brace and finished physical therapy. But I was still a little gimpy for a while, and I'm happy to have regained my full stride and to even be able to run if I needed to do so.


• Music. Few other things have the ability to uplift the spirit the way that music does. And I get to play and teach it for a living!


• America. With all her faults, she's still the greatest nation that's ever been in existence. Where else would you want to live?

May this be a blessed and joyful day for you and yours.

This May Not "Fit" My LIfestyle, But It's Intriguing

As has been noted in these pages, I'm very happy with Kevmobile 2.0, which is a 2008 Honda Fit. And since I tend to drive cars a long time (I had the original Kevmobile for 11 years and 338,000 miles and its pre-owned successor for five), I won't be in the market for a new one anytime soon. Still, I'm intrigued by the electric version of my car that Honda is developing, the Fit EV Concept, which the company introduced me last week in an email. There's more info about it here and here, including lots of pictures.

But besides the fact that I have miles and miles to go before even thinking about a new car, there's another reason why I'm not sure that one of these could be Kevmobile 3.0, and it's found in this paragraph from the company announcement:

The Fit EV will achieve an estimated 100 miles driving range per charge using the US EPA LA4 City cycle (70 miles when applying EPA's adjustment factor), well more than the average number of miles driven daily by most commuters.

And while I don't usually drive that much in a given workday, there are certainly times where I'd surpass the 100-mile range (especially when visiting one of my far-flung fraternity chapters), and the EPA-adjusted 70-miles wouldn't even get me to Denton and back (so when I visited UNT, I'd have to find a good parking place and a plug for the car? Not likely...). Still, the technology is intriguing to me, and I'll be following this car as it prepares to hit this country in 2012.

Youre Not Even Going To Think About It, UNT? That's WAC!

An open letter to UNT Athletic Director Rick Villarreal:

Dear Rick:

I"m a long-suffering UNT alum who has been attending football games for many, many years. I struggled along with the team during all kinds of losing seasons, and I rejoiced during the New Orleans Bowl years, making my way out to the festivities on two occasions. I've endured the ribbing of my friends who went to school in the old Southwest Conference about our anonymous opponents in the old Southland Conference ("We're playing Tech this week, Kev; who's UNT playing?" "Umm, I think it's Northeast Louisiana. Or maybe Northwestern State. Not sure."), only to have some of those same anonymous schools turn up again in the Sun Belt.

Like most alums, I'm psyched about the new stadium; I drove by it last night when I was in town, and I was pleased to see that the "wing" section of the north end zone has been framed (even if I can't imagine anyone sitting in that one seat up at the very tip). And one of the things I was really hoping for was a chance for UNT to join a more prominent conference--one where us Joe Average Fans have actually heard of the schools. Conferences are in flux right now, and an article a few months ago said that UNT could certainly benefit from this. The WAC, for example, has come calling a few times; that would certainly be an upgrade.

So needless to say, I was really disappointed to read today that the WAC has indeed approached you, but you flat-out turned them down right away. What's up with that? Don't they at least deserve a listen?

Let's look at their lineup for a second. Sure, Boise State is leaving next year (but who needs an annual pummeling anyway?), and they'll be followed a year later by Nevada, Fresno State and Hawaii (dang, no awesome away game!). But the conference still has San Jose State, Utah State, Idaho and New Mexico State, among others, and--here's the kicker--they're adding UT-San Antonio and Texas State in 2012. (Yes, never mind the irony of UNT playing Texas State--née Southwest Texas State--since "Texas State" was the name of the school "played" by UNT in the movie Necessary Roughness, and one of their opponents was Southwest Texas. Heh.)

Do you get that, Rick? We could have two in-state opponents instead of the closest one being in Louisiana! Don't you think some of our football recruits would like to play against their old high school friends at some other Texas schools? And some of the other WAC schools are at least places that most fans would recognize (sorry, we could be in the Sun Belt for another 20 years and I'd still get Florida Atlantic and Florida International mixed up.)

The article that I referenced quotes you as follows: “We made a commitment to a conference that we want to try to help continue to grow. We feel that there is a little more stability in the situation we are in today.” But Rick, doesn't stable equal boring sometimes? I don't see this as the same as leaving your stable, faithful spouse for a trophy wife or anything. And you talk about helping the conference grow; maybe it's time for the situation where the conference helps UNT a little more than the other way around. Do you know something we don't know about the WAC's future, or are you just afraid to make a bold move?

Sure, my pipe dream would be to have UNT in a conference with all Texas schools: SMU, Rice, Houston, etc. (TCU may well be out of reach now). But wouldn't a conference with at least some Texas schools be an upgrade?

I'm not sure how the fan base will react to this, Rick. I can only hope you know what you're doing in this regard, because, with the great steps forward being taken with the new stadium, not even giving the WAC the time of day sounds at best like spinning your wheels, and at worst perhaps a step backwards.

One final thing: I realize that it's possible that there is something even better on the horizon that you just can't talk about quite yet. If so, I'll retract the bulk of this letter in due time. But know that I'm not likely to be the only one who's frustrated right now.

Sincerely,
Kev
Just another concerned alum

Fraterniversary

On this day, lo these many years ago, I became a brother in Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia Fraternity. During that time, I've had some unforgettable personal and musical experiences, met some amazing people, and gained an extended family that stretches from coast to coast. Tonight, I'll celebrate my fraterniversary with my home-bros at Gamma Theta at my alma mater, the University of North Texas, but my salute goes out to Sinfonians everywhere who have impacted my life. All Hail!

Bad Memento = Good Art?

I played on a recording session yesterday afternoon, and, during the lulls in the proceedings, a lot of us were taking pictures with our phone-cams. I guess my camera hand must have been really shaky during the one I took, because this is how it turned out:


It may not have ended up as quite the treasured memento of yesterday afternoon that I had hoped it would be, but I think it scores extra points as a work of slightly avant-garde art.

Kids Say the Darnedest Things, Week After Week

More funny kid stuff:

It's starting to be the time of the year where I help the students pick out solos for Solo and Ensemble contest in February. One particular solo--a Baroque transcription--is marked at a tempo at which nobody would ever play it; even if it were physically possible, it wouldn't be in any way musical.

When introducing this solo, I often joke that either the too-fast tempo is a misprint, or the arranger had consumed an entire case of Red Bull before sitting down to do the arrangement. When I said that this morning, the kid for whom I was demo-ing the solo came up with this gem:

"I wonder what Mozart would be like if he sat down at the piano after drinking a Red Bull."

Again, maybe you had to be there. But people on Facebook really liked the quote, so I figured I'd share it here. (And for what it's worth, I bet Mozart on Red Bull would be similar to Beethoven on the mall organ in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure; go here if you've never seen it.)

At Day's End, The Waters Dance

The Shops at Legacy (North End), this evening. (I've photographed this fountain before...)

Kids Say the Darnedest Things, Vol. LVII

More lesson levity this morning:

ME: Ok, this piece is in half-time feel, which means that the value of every note is doubled. So how much is a half note tied to a dotted quarter note usually worth?
KID: Three and a half beats.
ME: And how much is it worth in half-time?
KID: Six and a half.
ME: I'm going to enjoy teaching you during your second senior year.

(To the kid's credit, their school pretty much had yesterday off because of trimester exams, so today qualified as a sort of honorary Monday in terms of how out-of-it everyone was. I'm sure his math is a bit better than that most of the time...)

Throw the Bum('s Son) Out? Yeah, I Guess It Had to Be Done

I was away from the radio for a long time today, but I caught the news through the next-best source--the Facebook posts of my friends--that Jerry Jones had done an about-face and let Wade Phillips go as Cowboys head coach today. Despite that one-word vote of confidence that Jones gave to KRLD-FM ("The Fan") last week, it was clear that something had to be done after last night's 45-7 pasting at the hands of the Green Bay Packers. And though it made sense not to bring in a new coach from outside the program with next year's possible labor troubles looming large, it appeared that Jones may have actually been listening to the one possible idea that would circumvent all that: Promote Garrett and see what he could do with the team; could it possibly be any worse?

It was only a few short years ago that Garrett was the hottest young assistant in the NFL, turning down head-coaching offers from other teams in favor of remaining with the Cowboys as offensive coordinator/heir apparent to the top job. And now he has his wish, though this is certainly not the scenario under which he'd like to take over the position. The chatter of the past few weeks has been that it would no longer make sense to promote Garrett when a lot of the fan base considered him a part of the problem (it's not like the offense was shining before Tony Romo went down), but after the past few games, it was obvious that something--anything--had to be done.

It's too bad the Wade Phillips era had to end as it did. I grew up in Houston as an Oilers fan in the days when Wade was an assistant to his legendary father, Bum Phillips, and I hoped that the son could succeed here. I'm still not sure why the same players who went 11-5 just a year ago are suddenly mired at 1-7 at the season's halfway point, but it was obviously more than Mr. Fix-It could fix.

So Jones made a bold (for him) move, changing coaches in midseason for the first time. But will he make the bolder move--firing himself as GM and hiring a knowledgeable football person? He's been great at things such as building an amazing facility and promoting the team; why can't he stick to the things he does best and leave the football decisions to the experts? Is his ego still too big to allow himself to do that, or has this season finally humbled him?

UPDATE: Tim Cowlishaw of the Dallas Morning News also promotes the Jones-should-fire-himself angle and states even more great reasons why this should happen.

Feel free to hit the comment button and chime in if you wish.

As We Are Reunited With Daylight Wasting Time

It's not that I didn't appreciate the extra hour of sleep last night; I did. And it's not that I didn't get the bulk of my afternoon errands (post-judging, post-meeting; there was no rest for the weary this weekend) done before it got dark. And it was a lovely sunset in my rear-view mirror as I drove down the highway.

But that being said, it still bugged me that it was dark by 6 p.m. Not so much for today, mind you; the productive part of my day was done, and all I had left was to eat dinner and watch the Cowboys game (and what a bad idea that was!). But I'm thinking about the rest of the week. Because you know what? I really, really dislike Daylight Wasting Time.

And why?, you may ask. I still can't say it any better than I did in the 2003 post that inaugurated this topic:

I think the really depressing part of DWT is that it almost always gets dark before I'm done teaching now. It seems to me that if you don't finish work until after dark, you've worked too long. In a way, I know my days are too long, but at least I can hide behind a little denial if I get home while the sun is still out. DWT blows that all out of the water, and I'm forced to come to terms with my workaholic self. Bleh.

It's still like this, of course; Mondays go till 6:00, Tuesdays till eight, and Wednesdays go till 6:30. (It's pretty much always dark when I'm done on Thursdays, but I teach a night class that ends at 9:45, so that's par for the course.) That leaves me with only Fridays to still have daylight when the teaching day is done, and even then, I'm within an hour of sunset.

I'm happy that DWT has been made shorter and shorter lately by the gradual expansion of Daylight Saving Time, but it's still too much for me. But what can I do about it? Well, complain--just like now. But it's only once a year; thanks for indulging me here, and I'll counter this with a bit of rejoicing every spring.

Lesson Levity

I'm not sure how I forgot this yesterday, as I always like to post "funny kid" stories. Here's one from this week:

ME: OK, let's move on to the etudes; we're done with scales...OK, we're not really done with scales forever--just for today.
KID: No, no, I like the first idea. I'm done with scales! I'm done with scales forever!
ME: So you're breaking up with scales?
KID: It's not them; it's me.

Again, maybe you had to be there, but I thought it was funny.

Let's Wrap Up This Week With a Golden Tune

It's been a long week for me, and the weekend will be busy as well. So rather than engage in any punditry tonight, I'll offer up the one thing I like to share even more than opinions or stories: Cool music. Just like last night, here's one from the Esbjörn Svensson Trio--a version of the tune "Goldwrap" (originally recorded on the Tuesday Wonderland CD) from the live CD recording done in Hamburg, Germany in '07. No visuals as such, but sit back, listen and enjoy:



I still wish I'd known of this group during Svensson's lifetime, so I could have tried to catch them during one of their rare U.S. appearances.

Still One of the B-E.S.T. Bands I Never Got to See

I often have listening breaks during my evening combo--both to rest people's chops during a three-hour rehearsal and to turn the members of the group--who range from their teens to their 50s--onto cool music that they might not have heard before. Tonight's band of choice was the Esbjörn Svensson Trio (E.S.T. for short), a group I had heard of over the years but didn't actually hear any of their music until a few weeks after Svensson's untimely passing three summers ago. Thankfully, the group left a large recorded legacy that can be enjoyed again and again.

I hadn't watched some of my favorite E.S.T. videos in a while, and I was disappointed to discover that a couple of them are no longer available on YouTube. But there's still a wealth of stuff out there, so enjoy this one, a live performance of "Dodge the Dodo" (I'm not sure how old it is, but Svensson had hair--lots of it, actually--in this video, as compared to the shaved-head look he favored later in life):



Listen, watch and enjoy. They don't make 'em like this too often.

This Legal Action Doesn't "Wash" with Me

The other day, I mentioned a clever T-shirt that a couple of Rangers fans had come up with a T-shirt that riffed on manager Ron Washington's signature mangled phrase, "That's the way baseball go." But the website that had been flooded with orders was suddenly forced to stop selling the shirts (right before I could order one, of course), and everyone suspected that--despite the fact that the T-shirt had nothing specifically referring to the Rangers or Major League Baseball on it, just the iconic catch phrase on one side and a caricature of Wash on the other--the fledgling company had somehow run afoul of the legal high sheriffs.

Unfortunately, everyone suspected correctly; they were given cease-and-desist orders by both MLB and Rangers attorneys. This threw the guys behind the company for a loop:

"It's bizarre that they would approach us at this point," said Seth Hayhurst, a co-creator of the shirt.

Hayhurst said his attorney plans to respond to the letters this morning and try to find a resolution.

"I hope for some kind of resolution where they aren't trying to squash the little guys who are trying to make the Rangers fans happy," he said.

The Rangers didn't return a call seeking comment, and an MLB spokesman said he was unaware of the situation.

If it were just the Rangers involved, I would hope that owner Chuck Greenberg--a lawyer himself--might include this in the "fan-friendly" moves that he's been making since acquiring the team. But if the league itself is involved, I'm not overly optimistic that an agreement can be reached.

But if they do, I'll be all over that T-shirt.

Ode to a Great Season

I won't lie--I'm really bummed at how Game 5 of the World Series ended tonight. I really thought that the lineup the Rangers sent up to the plate in the top of the ninth could come through like they had all season long, but in the end, the unexpected juggernaut that is the Giants' pitching staff proved to be too much. I'd never heard of most of these guys before the Series started, but I sure won't disrespect the National League again any time soon.

It's easy right now to wallow in defeat and think of what might have been, but let's not lose sight of all the great things that happened this season: The first playoff series victory; first trip to an ALCS and winning of same; finally vanquishing the hated Yankees; first World Series, and first Rangers game in November, ever. Who would have imagined even half of that at the start of the season?

Sure, there are some problems that need to be solved. Keeping Cliff Lee for next season is of paramount importance, and finding a way to keep key players healthy for bigger chunks of the year would really help (imagine what things would have been like if Nellie, Josh and Ian hadn't missed so many games due to injury). A top-three pitching rotation of Lee, CJ Wilson and Colby Lewis would put the team in good shape, but the other two are question marks (can Tommy Hunter gain some consistency?). The first baseman of the future has arrived in the person of Mitch Moreland, and I sure hope Bengie Molina wasn't serious the other day about retiring.

And I can't wait to see the team enjoy a full year under the ownership of Chuck Greenberg and Nolan Ryan. For the first time in years, the team is on solid financial footing, with one co-owner who has the money to upgrade not only the team but the entire fan experience, and another one who's not only a local icon but has already turned the team around as club president. The future's looking bright, and I don't think it'll be another 41 years before the Rangers are in the World Series again (and if it does take that long, I'll be really freakin' old, so they'd better be selling wheelchair section tickets on StubHub.)

Congrats, Rangers, on a great season. I'm sorry it had to end this way, but I can't wait to see what next year will bring.