bookworm stuff.
I've updated the books section of the website, since it was really falling behind. I'm hoping to get reviews of the recent books written on the plane tomorrow, but excuse the broken links in the meantime.

Speaking of books, I bought the world's most depressing book yesterday: National Geographic's Guide to Scenic Highways and Byways. They may as well have titled it "Gorgeous Places You Could Be Visiting If You Weren't Sitting There Rotting In Your Office".

I also bought a fun book called James Dean Died Here. It lists the locations of all sorts of pop culture landmarks -- Lizzie Borden's house, the corner where Hugh Grant picked up Divine Brown, and, of course, the intersection of highways 41 and 46, where James Dean died. I love fun little stuff like that. I figured it'd be cool to use on trips sometime. Y'know, "we have to pull over and take pictures here, honey; this is where some famous guy crashed his airplane and died a horribly painful death after 15 agonizing hours!" You can tell I'm really fun at parties.

clothes woes.
So, while on our shop ride last weekend, I decided to check out electric vests. I tried on some Widder and Gerbing vests (in womens' sizes) and to no one's surprise, even the smallest size was too large for me. Sigh. In my next life, I'm going to be a 5'10", 160-lb, man, and I'm going to just walk into stores and buy things that fit me.

I also chatted with Helmut down at Helimot, and when I get back from Wisconsin, I'm going to bring my jacket back in for some mods. They're going to put some zippered vents along the side seams in the back, to improve the air flow, which will be great. My helmet has also been rubbing some of the blue dye off of the shoulders, so I'm going to see if there's any way they can re-dye those patches.

I've had the suit for ten months now (maybe around 12,000 miles? I don't remember what my mileage was last October), and have nothing but great things to say about it. I think the Helimot crew is probably getting suspicious about my periodic glowing emails; every time I wear the suit anywhere, I email them. They probably wonder what the hell is wrong with me, that I get this unnaturally excited about colored dead cow skin.

WOW stuff.
So, our Wind Dancers Pacific Rally is just about a month away now. So far, we've had a whopping twelve registrations, and I believe that includes all of the committee members and our guests. I sent email to the group about it, and have had a few people email me back about it, so hopefully committee member Mary will start getting more registrations soon.

I think the main problem is that the newer riders are reluctant to ride as far as Jackson, and the club veterans are being blasé about going on rides lately. I'm not sure what's behind that latter issue. We've had fairly low turnout for rides in general lately...normally, I don't really mind, since huge group rides make me antsy and uncomfortable, but it's still something to look at. Perhaps the planned rides are too long? Too short? The same ol' roads we always ride? Hrm. I'll have to think about that a bit, and maybe write up something in the newsletter to get people thinking.

Speaking of the newsletter, it's time for my monthly "hey, write something up already" harassing email. I've been chock full of harassing emails lately, between the usual "hey, your newsletter subscription expired" emails and the "hey, write something for the newsletter" emails and the recent "hey, register for the damn rally" email. I'm going to end up with my tires slashed and snakes in my bed or something. :)

The next Wind Dancers meeting is next Tuesday, and we'll be doing nominations for chapter officers. I like doing the newsletter, and wouldn't mind continuing to do it. I may see if someone else wants to take over the membership director position, though. I've got all the form letters and spreadsheets up-to-date now, so I think it'd be a pretty easy position for someone who wants to help out a little. I'm enjoying doing the work for the chapter, but I don't want to burn out on it, and I can always choose to sign up again next year if I miss doing the membership stuff. 'Course, this is assuming that we can find someone else who even wants to do it this year. ;)