We’re going to be…

…rained out for Saturday, May 6. Nothing worse than runny mascara without some good drama to back it up. We'll try again next week Saturday, May 13.

After such a spectacular opener, we're all a little worn out from that fantastic opening day, but we'll be fired up next week if it doesn't rain again. What has us so thrilled wasn't just the cars and the people, but the overall energy from all of you that made it so much fun. I've not laughed this much since the Zune! You brought the very spirit that started this whole thing, and we had a lot of laughs and great conversations with so many of you. We also had very little bad behavior to contend with, thanks to all of you.

It was good to see so many old friends and lots of happiness as people showed up in spite of the long line. I've not seen John Fowler, one of our very early dedicated volunteers, in a long time, and we got right back to some old laughs about the time we sewed a large label on a tiny jacket and gave it to one of our favorite volunteers. We bet the engineer in him would trust the label more than the fit. He did, like a boss. The poor guy walked around E@RTC like he got caught in the sausage casing machine at Oscar Mayer.

Speaking of sausage-fests, it's nice to see more women owning exotics and rare cars participating in E@RTC. I keep telling single women, if they want to meet great men, come to E@RTC and mingle. What, you think you're going to find that dreamy guy at the crafts shop gluing leather?

A favorite old gag on new volunteers was to tell them you couldn't see them in the crowd and ask them to jump up and down and wave their arms, even though they were plain as day. Childish, yes, but funny.

Opening Day was an especially proud moment for all of us volunteers who work all winter towards the new season. We started to think we'd have a record day when we saw so many unique visitors on our website with so many of you reading the blog. We get all of this enthusiasm for opening day without a dime in advertising, outside of what Redmond Town Center spends to help promote the event at the mall. Thank you, Redmond Town Center, for all your support in this new season!

We hope you shop at RTC whenever possible and thank the store managers for supporting us. Come on, you need soap. Everyone needs soap! Buy some for the swamp donkey you met at the bar. Buy a set of drums for midnight practice! How about a piano to shove in the back seat of your car?

This time I stayed at the Archer along with some other E@RTC participants and spectators, and it made for a nice weekend. I highly recommend the experience, and you don't have far to roll in the morning if you went out clogging until 2 AM and your feet hurt. They have a special rate for us in case you didn't know.

Rule Stuff

We do have a few reminders for participants about some rules we all need to follow. Your mom is not special, even though we all know her “well.” Really-really well. At 11 AM, the show is over, and we have to clear the center of RTC and get things in order for shoppers. This won't be a problem until our next theme day because we’re back to our regular lots until German Car Day.

We need cars parked at angles to move into regular parking stalls at 11 and not leave their cars show parked and go somewhere else. Angle parked after the show makes you look like you prick-parked, and that will make you very unpopular. Just remember to straighten it up at 11 AM, and we're good.

We had one bad actor driving a black Mustang convertible who left his car blocking others well past 11:30 AM, along with a black/dark grey Cadillac. That was as unwelcome as a rumble fart in a crowded elevator. If you're in the center of an aisle, it's important that you be at your car at 11 AM, or it's a real mess for us to clean up. You're like the airline passenger who blocks the aisle and can't get off the plane until you put away your soup. You're like the person in the food line who doesn't look at the menu until it's time to order.

Cars leaving early without letting us know is still a problem, and unless you tell us, you could end up stuck. Try to leave without an escort, and that will get you banned. Some cars decided to park in front of the Archer and walk away, preventing them from using their own circle, and that's harmful to the whole event. If you know who was doing that, tell them to stop, or they will be escorted off the property by security. People will be clapping too!

Overall, we had a minimum of bad behavior, and the banning of cars has helped a lot. We now keep a photo list of which cars were banned so they can't sneak back in. That will be in use starting with our next event.

We had those self-entitled folks in the Smart Car convertible show up and let themselves in somehow while we were busy. If you know who they are, they are not welcome at our show ever again. If you have a picture of who they are, send it to us so we can let security know.

Now about turning away so many cars

Because of recent center square reconfigurations, we're maxed out at somewhere between 500 and 530 cars. We apologize profusely to all of you who couldn't get in, but there wasn't much we could do. It was already car Tetris for us by 7:30 AM. We worked with all the space we had allocated to us, and we will work on getting more. The lots were full by 8:30 AM, and cars were waiting at 6:00 AM, and we had well over another 100 cars that just couldn't get in before 9 AM. Some didn't try, and we later got word that organized groups moved to other lots and walked over. We think there were well over 700 cars that fit the show criteria that came out. The problem is, what do we do? You made us more popular than Livvy Dunne swinging from, well, just about anything.

We have a few options. One is, we're going to tighten down show criteria on opening day. We have no choice, and it's what you all want. We can't take every Cadillac and Porsche ever made, but we can take some. We had a lot of cars that people wanted to see that couldn't get in, and we want to fix that. We will have room for everyone most Saturdays, but we'll see how the non-theme Saturdays go this early season and make adjustments accordingly. We need bigger underwear, we get it.

Even on theme days, we usually have some room, even though we're close to full. We're working on solutions and should have it sorted out by our next Saturday morning. We will be closing the gates at 10:00, no matter what.

Thanks to all of you for our best opening day in our history. Hopefully we see you next week!