A big thank you to everyone who came to our annual convention yesterday (July 21) at Letha House! We had a good cook-out and potluck dinner, lots of nice prizes for the raffle, and plenty of opportunity for socializing for the 50 or so members, spouses, and guests who attended.

We had sunny weather, but as we moved toward dusk we got partly cloudy skies that became mostly cloudy by about 11 PM or so. In spite of the increasing cloudiness, 17 optimistic members set up their scopes. By about midnight, however, everyone had packed up and left due to the clouds. We’ll have to hope for better luck next year!

Thanks to our Secretary Steve Spears, we had a great selection of door prizes, including a 70mm Vixen refractor that was won by Susan Petsche. Steve sent out a lot of letters and did a lot of work to line up the prizes. A good job as usual.

And a special thank you to our VP Mike Williams, who donated a two-inch eyepiece and a pair of Coronado solar binoculars to the collection of door prizes to help benefit our club. Mike also did the grilling for our supper.

Thanks to Tim Campbell and Marianne Wadsworth who brought all those great sausages and hot dogs–and to everyone who brought a potluck dish or dessert. I don’t think anyone went home hungry! Gail Korylak and Marianne Wadsworth helped set up the serving area and helped with the clean-up.

I was planning to give a slide presentation about Mars and the new NASA rover and science lab, named Curiosity, that is due to land on August 5. After the raffle, however, we decided to forgo the presentation.

I really appreciate the efforts of Tim Campbell, Jim Cofer, Jay Reynolds, and Praveena Lagudu who lined up a projector and laptop for my presentation. Too bad we didn’t see the presentation–I was all set to reveal the secret hiding place for flying saucers on Mars! My lips are sealed now, however!

Again, thanks to all. If I can get the reservation, next year’s convention will be on Saturday, August 3.
— William Murmann, CAA President