Hi Folks,

Our January planning meeting, held at The Englander in San Leandro went really well. Please review the 2004 event schedule in this newsletter to see what the group came up with. Everybody liked this facility and we will now hold all EAST BAY meetings here. The banquet room we will use here is a much better venue to hold meetings than Harry's. Thanks to everyone that came out and participated.

I can update you on a few details. The consensus at the meeting regarding our remaining to be an affiliated GTOAA chapter was that even though there is a benefit to be had with the availability of them providing event insurance, since we just don't make the required 33% of our membership belonging to GTOAA, GGG will no longer be an affiliated chapter. We can review again where we are at after dues collection at our Feb meeting to see if the numbers have changed .As many of you know, we have never taken advantage of their insurance but it certainly is a nice option to have. If we end up close, perhaps we can give away a few GTOAA memberships to members to make the number. In the meantime, those of you that are not currently GTOAA members, or are on the fence with joining, link to their website off of ours and check them out......

Bob Doten's drag racing event idea hit an insurance snafu and will not happen. There are some months during the year that are light event wise. Feb and March both are open. I would like to suggest we move the Golden Gate Park cruise from October to August to balance things out. We can discuss these options at our Feb 4th meeting at Harry's in Redwood City. Please plan to attend if you can and bring any ideas you may have to fill out our 04 calendar.

Jim Wangers has accepted our invitation to be our special guest for Steppin' Out with The Stipanov's, the weekend of April 17th. It was originally suggested a few months back by Russ Louthian that we combine Mr. Wangers visit with a scheduled event. The group liked that suggestion and at the January meeting we decided which event it would be. The invitation was extended and accepted within a few days. We have a totally open format for this event so lets plan on discussing it at our Feb meeting. He will arrive on the Friday afternoon and depart on the Sunday. I am sure we will put together a fun event. Please note that unless an event is added, except for meetings, this event will be our first for 2004.Mark your calendars. As in years past this is a rain or shine event........

Carole Sakamoto will have more details at our March meeting for our June 26th Poker Run with the Chevelle Club. She asked me to pass along a big Thank You to our members for stepping up to the plate and supporting this event. 

Other items, June Good Guys is a week later than it has been the last couple of years and our Tilden park picnic has been moved to July. Lots of diverse and fun events for all of you to enjoy have been scheduled for this year. Mark your calendars now and plan to come on out and join in the fun. That covers it for now.............

See ya in the fast lane..............

John

MEETING MINUTES

               Date: Saturday, January 10^th, 2004

               Note Taker:  Barb Davis

    Date/Location:     New Englander , San Leandro , CA. 11:00 AM

1. John Mekisich talked about the GTOAA. We do not have enough club participation to be part of the GTOAA. They want us to have at least 33% of our members to participate.  We will put the information in the newsletter. Skip Hendricks reminded us that the GTOAA does have insurance for club events. If we do not join we won’t be able to take advantage of the insurance if we need to. It was voted on and decided that the club would not be affiliated with GTOAA in 2004, due to lack of participation.

2.   Al Harris reported that as of January 10^th, 2004 our club account balance. Most of our expenses are for the Newsletter supplies.  For 2003 we paid $5,400 on the Newsletter, $2,000.00 on club picnic’s, and  $2,400.00 on license plates frames.

3.   John Phillips found a new meeting place in San Leandro.  The name of the restaurant is The Englander. This will be our new meeting place for future meetings in San Leandro, starting Wednesday, January 21, 2004 .

4.   Carol Sakamoto handed out information regarding the Nor-Cal Chevelle Camino club rally to benefit Children’s Hospital in Oakland. The club invited the GGGoats to participate in their poker run on June 26, 2004. More information to follow.

5.   John Mekisich,  talked about the possibility of having Jim Wangers come up for another Wangers event. It was decided that John would e-mail Jim Wangers and invite him to participate as a guest at one of our scheduled events. Mark and Deidre Stipanov volunteered to host the event in their area. More details to follow.

A Visit to Mars!

Join us as the Golden Gate Goats go on a tour of NASA?s new Mars Center. Saturday, March 13, 2004! This is a rain or shine event! This is going to be an excellent event for the entire family because it is fun, educational, and FREE! We will start by getting together for lunch from
11:30AM until about 1PM. We are still doing research on the restaurants in the Mt. View / Sunnyvale area and we will select one soon. Look for an e-mail announcement and final details in your March GGG Newsletter.

At 1PM we will caravan from the restaurant to NASA and the Mars Center. We will have our own parking area in the Mars Center 150-car lot. You can park there for as long as you wish, depart when you want and there is no charge. Inside the Mars Center, we will be met by a guide who will familiarize us with current information about Mars, about the Mars Exploration Rovers' missions and share ongoing research about future Mars missions.
The Mars Center features interactive displays and exhibits focused on Mars, the Mars Exploration Rover missions and NASA Ames' scientific and engineering support roles in missions to the red planet. Exhibits include:

- A Mars immersive theater, where visitors will see live transmissions of the
Mars Exploration Rover landings from mission control,
- Carnegie-Mellon University's interactive rover yard, where visitors can 'drive' robotic vehicles on a simulated Mars science mission,
- and a children's room where young people can take part in Mars-related activities.

For more information on the Mars Center, visit their Web site at:
http://www.arc.nasa.gov/aboutames-marscenter.cfm

Blueberry Snack Cake - 
from Lolly

Ingredients:

2 cups all purpose flour
1-1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup cold butter or margarine
1 tsp baking powder
1 cup milk
2 eggs separated
2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries (*)

Directions:

In a mixing bowl, combine flour and sugar. Cut in butter until crumbly. Set aside 3/4 cup for the topping. Add the baking powder, milk, egg yolks to remaining mixture: mix well. Beat egg whites until soft peaks form; fold into the batter.

Pour into a creased 13x9x2" baking dish. Sprinkle with blueberries and reserved crumb mixture. Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Yield 15-18 servings. 

(*) If using frozen blueberries, do not thaw before adding to the batter.