  We outline a method for dealing with the relaxation of optically excited NaI
F centers in terms of a single effective frequency along a multimode
coordinate. The 2s-2p mixing through coupling to a T_{1u} vibrational mode is
also discussed with optimistic conclusions. Equilibrium nonradiative
deexcitation rates are estimated and compared with intervibrational relaxations
so as to assess the efficiency of the nonequilibrium DKR deexcitation. They
show the former not to be competitive, due to the large number of phonons
exchanged.
