Meeting Feb. 14, 2008

February 14, 2008

Lucky 13! We had 13 members in attendance (again). It was a great meeting, and thanks to all that participated, and for those that couldn't make it, we look forward to seeing you next time!
Dues: Please submit $33 no later than March 15 to John KepplerPayment can be via cash or check made out to "Middlesex County Toastmasters"

$27.00 goes to International for dues April 1 through September 30th. The other $6.00 is used for club activities. You may forward $66.00 and that will pay for the period April 1, 2008, through March 31, 2009.For further information, contact John via e-mail: John.Keppler@milfordhospital.org or phone: (860) 841-9323 Mail payment to: John Keppler, 194 Avery Avenue, Meriden, CT 06460

Club Attendance:

Tom Alvord: Grammarian, Humorist, Evaluator
Nancy Green: Invocation, Work of the Day, Evaluator
John Keppler: Speaker # 1
Cheryl Mason: Speaker # 3
Kim Price: Evaluator
Rose Rita Riccitelli: Speaker # 2
Rob Schaff: Toastmaster, Speaker #4
Arun Sodani: General Evaluator, Sergeant at Arms,
Fred Swiderski: Ah Counter
Brenda Violette: Timer
Srinivas Voleti: Table Topics, Evaluator

Guests:

Cliff Straub - Works in Middletown, found us via the Internet
Ashley Mason

News

March 13 - Club Contest (same meeting location) - Tall Tales and International Speech. If you haven't signed up already, consider participating as a contestant or in any of the open roles.

March 27 - Area Contest at Holy Apostles, Cromwell, check District 53 website for more info.

May 17, 2008 - District 53 Spring Conference
Pioneering Leadership Spirit – Explore New Possibilities
The Delaney House, Holyoke, MA
http://www.district53toastmasters.org/conferences.html
Fred shared his thoughts with us on what a terrific opportunity the conference is to see some great speakers.

February 28th – Chris Lewis will be giving a 45-minute presentation to meet the goals of one of her projects. This is planned for the second half of the meeting.

Practice makes perfect! Words of encouragement from Tom, who reminded us about the great opportunity we have to practice speaking at each Toastmaster meeting – in any of the meeting roles we fill.

Invocation: Nancy talked about a favorite author, Corrie ten Boom, who wrote "The Hiding Place."

Information found on-line: Corrie ten Boom was a leader in the Dutch Underground during WWII. With the aid of her family, she hid scores of Jews from the Nazi invaders. She was arrested along with every member of her family, spending the remaining war years in concentration camps.

Nancy shared these favorite inspirational quotes by Corrie ten Boom:

"When a train goes through a tunnel and it gets dark, you don't throw away the ticket and jump off. You sit still and trust the engineer."
"Worry is a cycle of inefficient thoughts whirling around a center of fear."

These quotes are especially relevant when we think about our journey with Toastmasters, which tied right into the word-of-the-day from Nancy.

Word of the Day: TRUST

Humorist: Tom sang (yes he sang!) a wonderfully funny story about a man who married a woman 30 years older, and how everything was perfect until the wedding night! There was something about the wife removing teeth and hair, and something about a dainty glass eye, and something about sleeping in a chair, "Side by Side" !!!

Everyone was chuckling during Tom's rendition of this very humorous song!

Table Topics

Sreeni led the table topics and provided us with very interesting questions! We enjoyed stories about bumper stickers, "a dark and stormy night," the most important question to be answered, who you would want to meet (that is deceased), what you would do if you didn't have to work for a living, whether you would rather be without television or the internet, and which country you would visit and why.

Timbuktu – YES it really is a place! And Sreeni knew just where it was, too!

From Wikipedia:
Timbuktu is a city in Tombouctou Region, in the West African nation of Mali. Timbuktu is populated by Songhay, Tuareg, Fulani, and Mandé people, and is about 15 km north of the Niger River. It is also at the intersection of an east–west and a north–south Trans-Saharan trade across the Sahara to Araouane. It was important historically (and still is today) as an entrepot for rock-salt from Taoudenni.

Speeches

# 1 - John gave a speech (without a whole lot of preparation!) with a Valentine's Day theme. John talked about calling someone who doesn't get very many calls, and getting in touch with someone you haven't been in touch with in awhile. He also shared a couple of very humorous stories about some "expensive" Valentine's Day gifts (or so it seemed), and buying some kisses (which turned out to be chocolate). Very entertaining!

# 2 - Rose Rita completed speech # 5 from the CC manual, Your Body Speaks, title "Take a Bow." We heard about an ancient Indian greeting, deep respect, and the spirit in each and every one of us. She shared an interesting message about becoming flexible in mind, body, and spirit. Great speech!

# 3 - Cheryl completed speech # 7 from the CC manual, Research Your Topic. The topic of this speech was "50 Years Ago," and she shared memories of a recent cruise as well as some family history related to the Andrea Doria.

# 4 – Rob completed speech # 1 from the CC manual, the Ice Breaker, title "Something Personal." Rob shared a heartwarming story about how he was able to connect with others, share memories, and put his Toastmasters experiences to good use at an important family gathering. Very inspirational!

Evaluation portion of the meeting included feedback from each speech evaluator, the timer's report, ah counter report, grammarian report, and the overall general evaluation. Thanks to all our evaluators for all the valuable input!

Input from our guest, Cliff, was that he was pleased with the meeting and enjoyed himself.

Kim reported that his presentation in Florida went well; it was great to hear how the preparation and practice for this formal speech helped to make it a success!

Closing - Meeting was adjourned at 9:00 p.m.