Another day....

I'm still at the Southern Operations Command Center (South Ops) for another 12-hours handling hundreds of requests or "orders" and facilitating things. It's not that it's particulary mind-bending difficult, but it is intensive, especially when it gets busy. Filling a crucial need in one of the many spokes of the Fire Service. I was just commenting yesterday to my room full of captive audience members that when I first started dispatching for fire about 14 years ago, I had NO idea the full scope of the fire service. It is SO much more than just someone calling 911 and people coming to squirt the wet stuff on the hot stuff (which...really...sounds sort of...uhhh...odd). But seriously, it's amazing to me. It's what the general public has absolutely NO clue of. You read/hear/see the stories of the 2000+ fires in northern California and you know there are people up there fighting them. But what is NOT known is how those people got there, the incredible amount of coordination it takes, the money and politics involved, the technology, the training...it's all amazing to me. I don't understand a lot of it, but I KNOW about it. And just this morning, talking with one of the dispatchers here, apparently the LA Times will be starting a multipart series on "large fires" on July 27th. She worked the gigantic "Zaca Fire" last year, and stated that LA Times reporters were fishing around for stuff at that incident. She thinks this series coming up is going to be critical of the fire service here in southern California. On top of that, I know for a fact that the Orange County Register has been sniffing around the OCFA for info relating to salaries, because you know, we must make TOO much money.

This is what gets me--the media is able to zero in on one tiny portion of a GIGANTIC picture and make this tiny portion THE ISSUE of the year. Stupid. STUUUUUUUUUUUPID. I will DEFINITELY be sharpening my fangs for a rebuttal should either newspaper go down the route I think they'll be going down. "Ohhhhhh Ryan, what would we do without you and your rebuttals!!?"

Whatever...

In other news--my wife and 3 children have left me. Yep...I'm without my family. Or my Fam Damily as we like to refer to ourselves. Anyway, they're getting on a plane and flying to Seattle to go see G'Ma and G'Pa. Fun stuff. Good for them. And then in August, we're having a "family reunion" of sorts....in....what could possibly be considered the hottest spot on the planet during August. Yeah...LAS VEGAS. Geeeeeeee, let's have a reunion in August and go to the place where we can all spontaneous combust. Something about a timeshare condo deal that will make it all very very cheap. Sure. Cheap to house multiple piles of human ashes I'm sure.

In drum corps news...there is no news. Other than last night's seedings came out...

01 93.05 (3) - Blue Devils
02 91.60 (2) - The Cadets
03 91.25 (4) - The Cavaliers
04 90.40 (3) - Carolina Crown
05 89.90 (3) - Phantom Regiment
06 89.15 (1) - Santa Clara Vanguard
07 89.00 (2) - Bluecoats
08 86.00 (1) - Boston Crusaders
09 85.75 (2) - Blue Knights
10 83.40 (2) - Glassmen
11 82.90 (2) - Blue Stars
12 82.65 (1) - Crossmen
13 80.90 (1) - Colts
14 80.05 (3) - Spirit
15 79.70 (2) - Madison Scouts
16 78.55 (1) - Troopers
17 78.25 (3) - Pacific Crest
18 77.80 (1) - The Academy
19 75.45 (3) - Mandarins
20 71.15 (2) - Pioneer

I have seen a sum total of ZERO shows this year, although I did catch a run-through at a rehearsal by Pacific Crest in mid June. Blue Devils this year by all accounts is unbelievable with a show that is so unique and out of the norm that it's causing peoples' heads to explode. The next 6 corps are duking it out, and I'm very sorry to report that SCV is NOT doing what I hope it would do, and that's scare the crap out of everyone and turn on the afterburners. I have heard reports as I indicated yesterday that they have THE show this year, but it's a case of taking too big a bite, and the kids just aren't there yet. I LOVE SCV--and I only hope as I hope every year that they come out of the funk they're in and just WALLOP people. I've grown tired of Cadets pushing the envelope of what's acceptable in drum corps and tired of the Cavaliers. My other favorite corps, Phantom Regiment, whose "Spartacus" show is causing quite the stir what with a great hornline (as usual--16 CONTRAS!!--ohhhhhhhh my!), amazing drum line...AND KILLING SLAVES ON THE FIELD! You gotta love it. If SCV can't do what I want them to do, than I would bestow my desires with PR as my second favorite "spoiler" corps. But I'm thinking that Blue Devils are so far ahead of everyone that it's a foregone conclusion they'll take it. What I find sooooooooo refreshing and fantastic is Carolina Crown playing in the Top 6. Their hornline apparently is PHENOMENAL, which is understandable. When they did their "Angelus" show a few years back, they opened with a fanfare that had to me about 30 seconds of the VERY best brass sound I literally have ever heard on the field. It was comparable to Cavaliers 92 show at the end of "Waterloo" which I believe had the most in-tune major chord on G bugles I had ever heard up to and ever since!! It just SMACKED you in the face, and it was LOUD--but it was loud because it was IN TUNE!!! Anyway--I know by now any fire department people reading this have long since passed out from boredome--that's the drum corps scene for now.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhh yeah...there's Open Class to worry about too. I don't have much to talk about them other than I was SORELY disappointed to hear that Gold from Hawthorne, California was NOT going back to Nationals. THAT SUCKS!! I've been a fan of Gold's because they are a "model" of what drum corps CAN be, and that's an organization that receives support and funding from a school district. Interesting--something I've squawked about up on Drum Corps Planet as being a viable way to possibly start MORE corps giving MORE kids an opportunity to have what I had when I was in corps back in the mid-80's.

HOWEVER...and this is a BIG however...I've squawked about regionalization before regionalization became a buzz word in drum corps circles. I cannot for the life of me understand why an organization, Drum Corps International to be exact, would expect drum corps' to do gigantic national tours that are very very expensive and man-power INtensive. To get a group of 128-150 performers across the country to play at shows almost every night or every other night is a MONUMENTAL undertaking. When I was in Velvet Knights, we would leave the 2nd week of July, and finals would be the THIRD WEEK OF AUGUST!!! I was on the road for 6 weeks...and that was AFTER what we called "first tour" which was a California/Arizona and sometimes New Mexico "leg" to start the season off. Of course, gas was cheap. And DCI HAS done the "right thing" by decreasing the summer season and having finals the first weekend of August. BUT STILL...so here's Turner's plan for regionalization that would provide PLENTY of performance opportunities for corps, AND still have a World Championships.

You start by dividing the country back into 4 quadrants. DCI-Pacific (California, Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming, Oregon, Nevada, Washington, Utah, New Mexico, and Idaho), DCI-South (Texas, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Carolina-both, Oklahoma, Louisiana), DCI-Central (from Nebraska to Minnesota, down to Missouri, Kansas, Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa), DCI-East (Tennessee, Virginia, the east coast and north east). I won't break down the number of corps in each quad, but my cursory overview says that there's MORE than enough in each quadrant. Within those quadrants, you will have WEEKEND SHOWS ONLY for the first 4 weeks of the season, starting in June, and going until the middle of July. During the last two weeks, you have a "regional championship", with semis and finals, and whoever makes finals, will qualify for a national tour. During the next 2 weeks, those "qualifiers" than go on a "national tour" with maybe not so many shows, but BIGGER shows, ending with a national championship that will only have the very best in a simple, 2 day, semi final and final format. Allow the regions to be in effect the "quarterfinals", and take the financial pressure off of the corps to HAVE to go on a national tour only to do what? GO TO QUARTERS? That's silly.

I think my plan will also open the gates to allow MORE corps to be created because they won't have the huge cloud over their heads of national responsibilities, and give them obtainable, realistic, and WORTHY goals of going to their REGIONAL championships.

This is a bare bone idea, and no, I haven't scoped it out more. But in the parallel universe of all-age corps, Drum Corps Associates (DCA), where weekend shows ARE the norm, they are having an influx of new corps being created, there is FUN in the circuit, they're getting crowds, and hey...it's all about entertainment and competition, right? PLENTY of that in DCA without the huge financial burdens. Quality may not be at DCI level, but it sort of proves the notion that there's a strong fan base for good quality FUN drum corps that DOESN'T require the continual pushing of visual and musical envelopes.

So saith The H, so shall it be. I wonder if Dan Acheson reads my blog?