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The armoury--as of now, we have 7 (plus Simon's shield, which the club is planning to buy from him, I think) shields, at least a dozen swords, a couple flails and one javelin (the second was mine that I wasn't able to pick up until this summer), all stock Edhellens. All of the seniors and some of the juniors have enough to outfit at least themselves, and several of us have enough gear for several people. I probably have the most personal gear of anyone at Wash U. The problem with all of this, and especially if we were to start adding more, is storage space and transportation. As it stands, it has traditionally been stored in the back seat of my truck (I don't have a topper) and Ariel's apartment, but that really doesn't cut it any more, and will do so even less if we start adding to the armoury again. If we had a more consistant member base, we'd be able to issue group equipment to members to spread the load wider, but far too few members attend regularly to be able to do so. Lack of equipment is not our problem, lack of people is. Somewhat on that note, the current plan is to use next year's funding to offset event travel costs, not purchase additional equipment.

As far as construction goes--noting, again, and setting aside the above logistical issues with adding more gear to the armoury, I'm probably the most experienced foamsmith on campus, and considering that almost everyone at Arnor uses all stock Edhellen weapons, I'm probably one of the better ones in that group as well. I think that I could make a good spear (my first attempt was well done but too heavy and bulky for my tastes, but I've learned from that enough that if I were to try again, I'd be able to do much better), and I know that I can make better javs than Edhellen does--mine are far lighter, slimmer, and "rifled" so that they spin in flight for increased accuracy. In any case, I have an old pole sitting around that I need to rebuild into a spear, and was planning to trade it to the club for Simon's old shield, per Ariel's approval as current treasurer. I can also help you modify Edhellen swords to be more balanced and elegant, although I prefer to start from scratch and then use their reblade kits for the blade. Shields are easy, it's just that it's expensive to get enough foam. Arrows aren't really an issue at Wash U., but I can do those as well. So, feel free to get in touch with me about any construction stuff, and I'd love to have some gear-making parties in September or late August. Leather is not my thing, though, talk to Reho about that. In any case, the local leather supply store is Tandy in south county.

Wash. U. unit--if it's a primary tier unit (something along the lines of the Moredain, Uruk-hai, etc), then sorry, but I'm out, my loyalty is to the Fianna first and foremost, and that's not going to change. If it's something more in terms of a household for Wash. U. members to participate in secondary to their national units (in the case of those of us who belong to such units), then I'm all for it, and such a thing was actually part of the original plan when we started the Wash. U. Bel group, but fell by the wayside very quickly. I'd recommend a different name, though, or at least something a bit more complex, as most Wash U students primarily associate Ursa with Ursa's Cafe (one of the on-campus dining locations). Ursa is the latin word for bear, come up with a latin adjective that goes well. Or come up with some other sort of bear-themed name. It's 4 am, my brainstorming abilities are not what they might be otherwise. I'll think about it more later, and in general, want to be involved in this.

Time change--Sunday afternoons are obviously a failure as a practice time. Our member retention rate is dismal, and we constantly hear about all kinds of reasons that it's a bad day. Of course, we can't make everyone happy, but at this point we're not making anyone happy (except the people we already have, which is a bad way to do business), so some sort of change is in order, which is why I originally started floating the idea of Thursday afternoon. I'm still in favor, but I'd love to hear more reasons why we should or shouldn't change it, and if we should, which day we should change to. There are a few other organizational changes that might help, but I can get into those later.

Event on activities day--I'm not sure that the actual activities day is the day to do it. That's the day that we should be handing out information to people, getting people to come, trying to get people interested. Have people there with gear and sparring? Absolutely, but we should plan our event for the weekend afterwards. Perhaps have it on Saturday on the Swamp in lieu of Arnor practice, try to get in everyone we possibly can (including advertising on the national Bel boards and the Midwest Dag boards), and then have a regular Wash U practice the next day to try and solidify contact with and interest from potential recruits.

One more issue--there is an incoming freshman who is a Dag fighter from I forget where, who is dead-set-determined that she is going to be starting a Dag group on campus. I've already tried to talk her out of this idea and to just work with us, but she seems to be rather into the political side of things. She seems to be the type, though, that's really good at recruiting and getting people to come to things, so it might be worth some effort to try and get her over. If nothing else, she'd be one more fighter who we could count on being there, and if she can actually live up to how good of a recruiter she thinks she is, she might be worth more than that. In any case, we desperately need fresh blood.

I'm heading home Saturday morning, won't be able to go to practice. However, please keep in touch with me about this, and I'll do my best to be in contact with y'all. Grom, if you wanted to stop by my place tomorrow afternoon, I could show you a bit of construction stuff. Give me a call, my number is 859 576 9834 if you're interested.