Re: DML 10th Anniversary National Meet

From: Bill Pitz (dakota@billpitz.com)
Date: Fri Nov 19 2004 - 23:29:04 EST


Josh Battles wrote:
> ""Jason Bleazard"" <dml@bleazard.net> wrote in message
> True, the trucks are indeed made to be driven, however some people just
> plain have an oversion to long road trips. Personally, I'm not one of these
> people, but my now ex-girlfriend was. She couldn't be in a car more than 2
> hours (unless she was driving) at a time or she'd get motion sickness - even
> with dramamine. I'll start saving my pennies now so I won't have to put
> this trip on the CC and pay it off later, like I always seem to end up
> doing.

I don't necessarily have an aversion to driving long distances, but what
I don't like doing is driving for a whole day or more each way to get
someplace that I'm only going to for a day or two...

if($travel_time > $vacation_time);
$result = tehsuk;

:-)

>>Another thing I just remembered about the Moab area. There are several
>>companies in Moab where you can rent a Jeep decked out for off-roading.
>>That'd be kind of cool for anyone with a 2wd (or 4wd they don't want to
>>risk damaging) who wanted to try out some trail driving. Moab isn't
>>terribly central for people on the East coast, but it's a really cool
>>area. And Moab does have amenities for large events... just look at the
>>Easter Jeep Safari. I was about to suggest we could try invading that
>>event, but I think it would be more fun to have our own event separately
>>rather than piggyback on someone else's.
>
>
> I've always wanted to take a trip out east, I could probably even get a
> couple of friends to come along for the ride. It might be cool to take 2
> weeks off of work and drive all the way to the coast after the meet and
> visit the LA area again.

I assume you mean "out west" and not "out east." I think it'd be neat
to have a meet that's more towards the western side of the country for a
couple of reasons. First, the die-hard DML nuts will attend a meet just
about anywhere. Second, it would give some of the west coast folks a
chance to participate in some whole-DML meets that haven't been able to
before because of distance and the constraints that come with that. And
third, the most obvious, is that it would be closer for me. But I'm
basically in that second category..

>>I'd be *really* surprised to get more than 50 people, just based on
>>interest being expressed on the list. But, maybe I'm under estimating.
>>The only way to know for sure is to start an event profile and start
>>collecting names.
>
>
> Me too. Traditionally it seems as though everyone jumps on the bandwagon
> and commits to these things and ends up having to cancel at the last minute.
> Such is life.

Yep. This sounds like something I'd definitely like to make it to,
though. It seems to be more "special" than the usual DML meets because
it has some historical meaning too. I'm okay with driving in the
800-1000 mile range (one-way) to attend something like this if I know
far enough in advance and can arrange school and work schedules to
accomodate it. I might be convinced to go further, but it would
probably result in me flying to wherever the event would be. (I like
the idea of a desert-area meet a lot because I've been wanting to see a
lot of those areas anyway and could make a mini-vaction out of the trip
back home)

>>Next question... what dates? Do we want to take advantage of the 4th of
>>July? That might be easier for many people to get time off work, but it
>>also might interfere with other things people had planned. If there's any
>>actual interest in Four Corners, remember that it gets really hot there in
>>the summer, which is why the Jeep Safari is held in spring.
>
>
> That might be a good idea since everyone already gets the holiday for the
> 4th, however most people tend to spend the 4th with their friends/family and
> might be reluctant to attend a meet. I can't speak for everyone, but July
> is usually a good month for me. It's towards the end of the summer, but
> before the school year starts. That's when I've always taken my vacations
> anyway.

I think the 4th would probably result in lower turnout. Lots of people
have unspoken "plans" for the 4th to do things with family/friends. In
addition to that, the places we'd like to go would probably be packed
full of other people during those times which means less room for us to
play!!! :)

Also, regarding the idea of figuring out where everyone is, I could set
up a web form that will take that information and keep it. We could
then import it pretty easily into one of the freely available mapping
systems (I've recently discovered some pretty cool ones) that would give
us an idea of how things look.

-Bill



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