Having broached these subjects previously, I thought I'd offer an update, hoping a few would find it interesting or valuable.

My forhead hotspot lead me to conclude that my head is too oval, or my previouse helmet too round, for comfort. Armed with that notion, I re-visited the vast amount of helmet info at webbikeworld.com, and concluded that a neutral or slightly oval helmet would work. And that the very reasonably priced and well-regarded AFX FX95, Hi-Viz yellow, DOT & ECE rated helmet would do the job for me. A very helpful young guy named Chris at Revzilla.com concurred with my shape conclusions, agreed that the above helmet looked appropriate, and UPS'd me one for $89.95, freight included. (I should note that he declined to include a Philly cheese steak sandwich with my order. Customer service has its limits, I guess).

100 miles later I can report that I'm VERY pleased with the helmet. I was comfortable buying online from RevZilla because of their strong reputation, despite the fact that my head measures at the very upper end of medium on most scales (RevZilla also pays freight both ways on the first exchange). Fit is perfect, the helmet is very comfortable. But an unexpected bonus is that, with a lower and slightly more distant-from-chin chinbar, and the breath guard removed, my fogging issues seem to be virtually eliminated. Whoda thunk?

A major point here is that if you do your research, gain some knowledge and work with an outfit like RevZilla, even buying a helmet online can be a workable proposition. I have a snug-yet-comfortable, very competitively-priced helmet I could have exchanged with no shipping or restocking fees, had that been necessary. I'd have been uncomfortable trying on a bunch of helmets for 30-40 minutes each in a store and almost certainly would have spent more in the end. And at the risk of sounding like a shill for RevZilla, I'll certainly be doing business with them in the future.

I'll definately make a note to update on color durability. My sense is that the somewhat lime-yellow color is much more prone to fading than the yellow of this one, and as webbikeworld notes tends to wash out in bright sun light. AFX guarantees their helmets for five years, and if it's gonna fade it'll certainly do so in the Arizona sun.