As you may know, Bethany and I are in the market for a new car, looking to add a crossover to our personal fleet.  We are looking to buy by the end of October, so as the month is half over, we probably should set out to test drive. Bethany had the day off of work, so I took a day of vacation and we set across the Front Range, visited 8 dealerships and ended up only driving 3 cars.

The test drive experience has been an interesting one. The environmentalist winds have blown into the auto industry, pushing fuel efficiency standards.  Unfortunately the result of that is that 4-cylinder engines rule the crossover class of cars, bringing fuel efficiency at the cost of power.  However, as Coloradoans know, the terrain of the Rocky Mountains isn’t very friendly for 4-cylinder engines.  If you’ve driven in Estes Park in a 4-cylinder car full of people – you know what I mean by being underpowered.  With our V-6 requirement, we’ve apparently limited our select – this is why we went 8 places and only got to drive 3 cars.  There was no shortage of 4-cylinders for us today, one of them which we drove.  I’ll admit that there was decent acceleration when I slammed the gas, but it still felt underpowered, especially when you consider going up a mountainous hill.

We don’t seem to be the only Coloradoans who think this, because the dealers for these cars that have V6 engines – they don’t have any of these cars in stock – yet they have plenty of 4-cylinders of that model on hand.

One pleasant surprise (at least or us): the salesmen weren’t as pushy as I remember from 6 years ago.  I’m not sure if it’s because they’ve unfortunately been beat down in this economy that they’re now changing their tactics, but it was nice to not have to fight our way out of the dealership. There were a few Jedi Mind Tricks thrown at us, but they were more comical than stressful.

We think we have it narrowed down, but we’re going to let some time and another test drive pass before we draw a conclusion.

Read This: Confessions of An Agent on Sports Illustrated

The Bottom Line: Josh Luchs used to be a sports agent for NFL prospects, and as part of being an agent he gave money and favors to players while they were in college. He names some of the players, some of the agents, and other co-conspirators. Cue controversy.

There are a lot of things you could argue from this article: Luch’s motive for writing this, the ethics of naming players, whether he is credible – these are all valid questions.  To me, what lies at the heart of this debate is the (possibly not surprising) issue of players getting money under the table from agents.

One thing that this article taught me. There are players that have a genuine need, but players can be as greedy as the agents giving them money.

The NCAA can sit on Mt. Pius and preach the purity of the student athlete and the corruption of evil agents, but the fact is that they are making hand-over-fist profit on the backs of these students that don’t get paid. Granted, the student athletes often receive scholarships, but given that NCAA Div-I schools graduate 54% of football players, there’s question to the value of the scholarships – which arises the question of whether paying student athletes would help curb this practice. This is definitely a controversial idea, and I’m not advocating that it would fix things, but what other suggestions are there to curb this practice?  The NCAA already threatens to suspend players, should criminal charges be filed against the students and agents for tax evasion?  Should players proved to have ben accepting money be suspended from the NFL?

At the end of the day, is any harm being done?  Is this simply the norm for agents trying to court student athletes – namely football players – to their representation?  Should we be willing to accept that dealings for high draft picks are synonymous with shady agents?

I’m not sure if I have any answers is, but this article has spawned some very interesting discussions throughout sports this week.

So to add to my NaBloWriMo failure, I ended up missing yesterday’s post as I spent the evening with my Greenfoot friends, having our last rehearsal.  After we decided last month to put an end to the project, we wanted to gather one last time and do some basic recording and play some of our songs for one last time.  Last night was a lot of fun, and hopefully I’ll be able to share those recordings soon.

I wanted to share some videos that Greenfoot has posted throughout the years, the first being one that we took after about 6 months after I joined the band:

After Julien joined the band, we started playing out again in the spring of 2008, and had the opportunity to have some more video taken at Smokin’ Joe’s in early 2009:

Over the years we played some really interesting places. One that comes to mind is getting up at 4am so that we could play at the Colfax Marathon, right on the street.

Over this summer we got to be the featured band at some farmers markets, which was a pretty fun experience as well:

Looking back, it was a really fun project and I’m really grateful to all of my friends who got our emails, came out to our shows and enjoyed our music! Now with the chapter on Greenfoot closed, I’m excited for what’s to come.

Over the last few days I’ve had my head down over my drum set, learning new song for Ken Stevens’ band. To expedite our timeline for being able to play out, we’re supplementing the originals with covers.  Part of the reason I’m so excited for this project is that it’s pushing my musical boundaries, but it also means learning some songs that I’m not familiar with.  To help, I’m mapping out each song into a 4×3 notebook.

While I could go out and either print out drum tabs or listen to the music or transcribe the songs into sheet music, but that would be a lot of work and could make me reliant on the sheets, especially when I’m playing in a genre that isn’t as accepting of music stands.  Instead, I’ve gone ahead and created a “cliff-notes” version of each song, writing some highlights.

Some things that I start off with some basic: What is the meter? 4/4, 6/8? What’s the tempo (In BPM, or may just a note a general feel)? Do I go with sticks or should I use brushes or the Rutes?

Next I move onto the structure of the song. What do the drums do during the intro (or is the intro drum-less)? How many repetitions are there in each part of the song? Is there a point where I drop out?  What are the dynamics? Is there anything else special to take note?

The intention is to be able to read through these notes right before I play this song, and in combination with concentration and muscle-memory, be able to work my way through the song.  Obviously with practice I should be able to commit these original and cover songs to memory, but this is a good way to cheat my way through an evening of music.

What other ways do you use to get through songs? For my friends who are not drummers, does a method like this work for you?  Do you have any other tips on how to learn new music in a relatively short period of time?

So it turns out that I need an extra day to recover for the week, so I basically need to cheat for NaBloWriMo a second day in a row and take another rain check. My apologies. Be back tomorrow!