Today, the biggest reason I don't fly more for recreation is $6.00/gal avgas. Lots of cheap, readily available airplanes to choose from, insurance is cheap, maintaining/storing/access is reasonable, the regulations are occasionally onerous but not always so (with the exception of preflight duties, it's still as easy to fly today as it was in the '70's and I think I can still fly a NORDO airplane across the country without too much hassle). If silly TFR's were deleted, that would relieve 75% of the stress.

Before someone says auto fuel; (1) the plane I fly has other owners who are not interested in the the auto fuel option; (2) Auto fuel is not readily available at my home airport (i.e. there is no pump at the airport; handling fuel in jerry cans + the alcohol mandate kills the incentive); (3) The price of all fuel is squeezing my budget. Auto fuel where I live has surpassed the $4/gal threshold for the summer, so even a day of jet skiing at the lake has been cut back to 1/2 day.

Now, I know not much I can do about the price of fuel other than fly airplanes that have small engines. And if fuel prices were cut in half, something else would become the single biggest expense and that would be my excuse for not flying more. So for now I'll just suck it up and fly when I can. I would still choose a Fly Baby over a Honda Gold Wing for my recreation, although the choice is getting harder to sustain.