From Today's Times and News-Star
If
the Mayan culture were thriving today as it did more than 1,000 years ago, no
doubt their spokesperson would be on CNN saying, “Y’all are making, like, WAY
too big of a deal over this calendar thing. We are just ending one calendar and
beginning another! It’s a profit deal! We rotate ads out. That kind of thing.
By the way, we have some great rates next month – if there is a next month!,
HA! – on visits to Mirador. Don’t pass up this Late Preclassic, Postworld
Special!”
Then
they would laugh all the way to the First Rainforest Building & Loan.
We
modern grownups can really mess things up. Just because a guy can build a
pyramid without a tractor in South America doesn’t mean he knows when the world
will end.
Because
the Mayan Calendar has “an era” of the world ending Friday, many people think
the world itself will end that day, which is, to quote the ancient Mayan
philosophers, “baloney.” If you will simply look in your TV Guide, you will see
that Ball State will play the University of Central Florida in St. Petersburg
Friday in the Beef ‘O’ Brady Bowl, and the world has never ended during any of
the previous playings of the Beef ‘O’ Brady Bowl, despite its heavy Mayan fan
base.
(The
University of Memphis would disagree, having had their helmets handed to them
to the tune of 41-14 by the University of South Florida in the inaugural ’08
bowl, but that is a different story. And if we were subjected to a replay of
that, then hey, I’m all for the world ending.)
|
|
|
|
Mayans
never professed to be good at calendar. The whole reason the culture collapsed
is because half the population started taking Casual Friday on Tuesday due to – no surprise here -- faulty calendars.
Try building a stone city on Monday when half the population thinks it’s
Saturday and see how far you get.
Besides,
there is much too much going on in the world for it to end Friday. Having
completely missed the presidential election in November, the American college
football sporting public is making up for lost time by feasting on a cornucopia
of head coaching changes at universities the land over. This is a carousel that
would make even the mathematically adroit Mayans take off their socks and start
counting with their toes.
Even
as I am writing this, back rooms from Atlanta to Vegas are filled with cigar
chomping boosters, accountants, administrators and friends of the program trying
to connect the dots and find “the perfect coach.” They are encased in a
whirlwind of “what ifs” and “but whats.” It is a dicey process as other coaches
get pink slips and dominoes fall.
What
these committees (and vocal sub-committees of faithful fans) are looking for,
of course, is “a fit,” as they say in the biz. What works in Ruston or
Natchitoches might not work in Lubbock or Bowling Green. Finding the right fit
is not as hard as calculus, but it’s in the same ballpark.
Now
the coaching, that’s the easy part. If you are thinking of “trying out” for
head coach, you’ve got to be able to do these two things. One, you’ve got to be
able to hold a big laminated sheet in front of your mouth while speaking. And
two, you’ve got to be able to negotiate a spectacular buyout clause in case it’s
you, and not the football, that’s punted. First things first.
-30-
