Great Friday, disappointing Saturday

Obviously, I've been quite down with the job prospects, or lack thereof. Friday changed that, at least for a day.

The bad part of the day is that I didn't make callbacks for the Cubs' PA job. Oh well. Nearly 3,000 people applied and only 25 got invited for the next step, so I'm not surprised, though I was happy with my audition tape and have few (if any) regrets.

But so many other things went well, making Friday a wonderful day. A local publishing company contacted me about a job as a Test Development Coordinator. I wouldn't consider the work overly exciting, and it would involve traveling about a quarter of the time, but there might be some life experiences to be gleaned about of it. This is the first callback I've gotten since not getting the math position at Montini, a close-by private high school. I'm still at a loss why I didn't get that job.

After the call, where the lady was saying great things about me and my potential and set-up an in-person interview for next Thursday, Margie and I went to lunch and watched her alma mater, Dayton, upset Xavier. A great win! Dayton then beat St. Joe's in the Atlantic 10 semi-finals, only to lose to Richmond today. But that's okay. Dayton won't get into the NCAA tourney, but they wouldn't have had a prayer. I'd rather see them in the NIT, where they have a chance. They won it last year, after all.

Then I got a call from Hinsdale Central. There are just a few high schools in the Chicago suburbs that stand out as excellent schools, where kids average ACTs in the 25 range: New Trier, Stevenson, the two main Naperville schools, and Hinsdale Central.

I'll be meeting with an assistant principal and the math chair on Wednesday.

In all honesty, I didn't think I would ever be a teacher again. But if HCHS wants to hire me, I'll work my butt off to be the best teacher I can be there. Teaching AP Stats and Discrete Math, my favorite classes, in a great high school that's not too far from me? Yes, please, sign me up.

And then, to top it all off, I pulled off a miraculous feat in the backyard. Our yard used to have grapevines, which were suspended by wood planks stabilized in the ground with concrete. For whatever reason, a previous neighbor tore them down and sawed off the planks but left the concrete in the ground, too high for anything else to grow on top of it. With a little help from Margie, I got one of them out. The other one isn't as bad and isn't in a location where people could trip on it, but maybe I'll try to extract that one later this week. Come on, though, why would anyone use concrete and fill it all the way to the top of the ground? Doesn't matter; I got it out anyway, using a semi-broken shovel and my bare hands. Test of physical strength and desire a success!

That was Friday, truly a great day. Life seemed a lot better on Friday. Things were balanced. My world was beautiful.

Saturday was different. It really wasn't that much of a contrast, as Margie and I had a good time at my Aunt Diane's 75th birthday party, but it didn't end well. My band played at what the bass player deemed to be a very important gig at our favorite venue in Arlington Heights. It was also his birthday, and people usually celebrate occasions with drink. But it was our worst performance in recent memory, and in my opinion, it was because of him.

Dave's a great guy and has been a good friend of mine for many years. Probably one of the top ten friends I've ever had. (Another one is Brett, a great musician with whom I've recently reunited. He's got a great girlfriend and had nice things to say about us, though he only saw my opening act and the band's first set.)

It'll be very hard to tell him, but something needs to change. He was missing bass notes left and right, often on some strange tangent or sounding as if he had no clue how the song went or if it was a new song to him and he was trying to play by ear. He missed a bunch of cues, including two on "American Girl" alone. He was oblivious to the rest of the band, even when on stage. His singing was completely off at times and way too loud at others. It was the worst I've ever heard him.

He's a self-made bass player. With smarts and hard work, he got to a level of respectability. Plus, he's funny and enjoys being our front man. But his overall performance has really started to slide in the last year. The biggest problem may be his purchase of a wireless unit, allowing him to venture away from the stage. Which is exactly what he does ALL of the time now. Even though we discussed it in the past and he agreed that it was distracting, he took it to a new level last night. I don't think there was a single song after the first set that saw him staying on stage, save the ones on which he sang lead. He even did that "yeah I'm playing now, go ahead and hit this string" flirtatious conversation that, as you can imagine, doesn't make the band sound very good.

Our rhythm guitarist, John, had bad moments when he first joined us, from lack of practice and lack of confidence. But he's worked on those things and has made great strides. I can't say anything negative about him from last night; he's becoming more fun as time rolls on. (Our other guitarist is consistently excellent.)

But still, we sounded like crap last night, and though I missed a beat once and the lead singer forgot a few lines, was because our bass guitar was a mess. If we were trying to impress groups of people last night - which Dave said we were - we undoubtedly failed.

For the first time, I've found myself wondering how good we could sound with another bass player. I don't have one in mind and wouldn't dream of trying to oust him; he's too much of our band's identity, and no one enjoys playing more than Digger. But man, was he sloppy. He's apologized about moments like this before, but it's getting worse.

The best thing would be for him to ditch the wireless unit. If he stayed on stage, he would concentrate more on his playing, miss fewer cues, and maybe reel in his ego a bit. The only nice thing about him leaving the stage is that it frees up space in front for Eileen and our two guitarists, John and Paul. (Beatlesque, eh?) They play off each other well and put in some enjoyable physical play. (Don't know how to describe that better. They don't grind or anything, but they have the ability to be entertaining that way.) So maybe he could stay a little more in the back. You know, where the drums are stuck.

I won't enjoy having that conversation with him, but since I'm not the only one feeling this way, maybe I won't have to. But I feel that something has to be said, as I don't see this being a phase. It's becoming a trend.

There's a slight chance that Dave will read this, as I once sent him the link to this blog. If so, no hard feelings, Dave. You just need to get your groove back.