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.

Let's Tell a Scary Story Again

It's easy to indulge in reruns on holidays (somewhat like they do on TV), but what could be better on Halloween than to post the one ghost story with which I'm intimately familiar?

So if you haven't seen it yet--or simply want to revisit it, much in the way that people will watch It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown on an annual basis--please direct yourself to The Legend of Smith Hall. And happy 41st birthday to KNTU, the last entity to call the haunted house its home.

Now That's the Way Baseball Go...

I wasn't able to watch any of tonight's World Series debut because of a gig, but I was discreetly checking updates on my phone once the playing portion was over, and I got to hear Eric Nadel call the final "HE STRUCK HIM OUT!" when Neftali Feliz got Jose Uribe to seal a 4-2 Rangers victory.

So what contributed most to the victory? The hitter-friendly confines of Rangers Ballpark in Arlington? The rabid home fans? The return of the DH to the game, in the form of Vlad Guerrero? My answer--from the sparse game accounts I was able to see and hear--would be "yes." But more than that, this team knew that it had to win tonight's game, or their collective backs would be so far up against the wall that it wasn't funny. Colby Lewis came through in the clutch again, and the bats started to reawaken.

Tonight's win guarantees yet another "first" in this magic season: A Rangers game in November. Who would have imagined that during spring training?

Let's do it again tomorrow night, guys!

And as for the weird saying that serves as the title of this post, it refers to a now-iconic utterance by Rangers manager Ron Washington that I evidently just missed being able to get on a T-shirt. Wash explains the phrase here.

A View from the Top...

...of my price range, if I'd actually been paying:


I was at the American Airlines Center tonight for the Mavericks' home opener. Well, OK, I was at the home opener, but I really wasn't there for that game. Rather, I was there to watch the Rangers' World Series opener on the TV in a luxury suite, from where the above picture was taken. (The basketball game--which the Mavs did win--was purely incidental.)

It all started when a friend and I decided to get together to watch the Rangers, but the locale shifted throughout the preceding days. It may have originally been set for my living room, then it seemed likely to migrate to somewhere with a lot of TVs, like Humperdink's. But said friend had a corporate hookup, so that was how we found ourselves in the lap of luxury this evening.

And how luxurious is it? The bathroom mirrors double as animated billboards, for crying out loud:


I've now been to one Mavs game and one Stars game at AAC, and, seeing as how the latter was also in the expensive seats at a reduced price, I still have yet to visit that place as a "regular Joe." I hope I can keep lucking into deals like this in the near future.

(And of course, it was a horrible night for the Rangers, so it's obviously bad luck for me to watch the game in this manner. I promise not to do it again for the duration of the World Series!)

This Idea Would Add Up For a Lot of People

Reading the op-ed page of the newspaper at lunch today, I came across a column that resonated with me. Here's a sample:

How much math do you really need in everyday life? Ask yourself that – and also the next 10 people you meet, say, your plumber, your lawyer, your grocer, your mechanic, your physician or even a math teacher.

Unlike literature, history, politics and music, math has little relevance to everyday life. That courses such as "Quantitative Reasoning" improve critical thinking is an unsubstantiated myth. All the mathematics one needs in real life can be learned in early years without much fuss. Most adults have no contact with math at work; nor do they curl up with an algebra book for relaxation.

The interesting part of all this is that the column was written by, of all people, a retired math professor. G.V. Ramanathan has also taught statistics and computer science at the University of Illinois' Chicago campus (and may still be teaching in semi-retirement, as he holds professor emeritus status with the school). He goes on:

Those who do love math and science have been doing very well. Our graduate schools are the best in the world. This "nation at risk" has produced about 140 Nobel laureates since 1983 (about as many as before 1983).

As for the rest, there is no obligation to love math any more than grammar, composition, curfew or washing up after dinner. Why create a need to make it palatable to all and spend taxpayers' money on pointless endeavors without demonstrable results or accountability?

Ramanathan makes a good point, as far as I'm concerned; there's a big debate going on as to whether high schools need to prepare their entire populations for college, or if some students should be steered towards a more vocational track. But it appears that everyone takes four years of math now, and for those who take Algebra I in eighth grade (which seems to be nearly everyone these days), that means they'll be spending part of their senior years dealing with calculus...and if we're asking if everyone needs this much math, then we really have to ask if everyone needs calculus (a class which I managed to avoid entirely in my pursuit of two-and-a-half college degrees).

Read the whole thing; it's interesting to see someone in academia who understands that his discipline may not be for everyone.

Questions of the day: How much math did you take in high school? And should everyone have to take four years of math? Please "add" your response to the comment page.