Meeting, Thursday, April 22, 2010 - Middlesex Community College, Room 808 D, Middletown, CT Middlesex Toastmasters Club #8340



Members present: Tom Alvord, Anne-Marie Cannata, Jennifer Cimilluca, Charnaie Gordon, Lawrence Gore, Kay Jeyapalan, Jonathan Martin, Cheryl Mason, Erin Mulhern, Deb Nason, Emily O’Brien, Michael O’Brien, Ramesh Padavala, Murali Pemmaraju, Kim Price, Pete Plotica, Eric Roise, and Rob Schaff.

Guest: Siva Digavalli

Our Sergeant-at-Arms, Peter Plotica called the meeting to order with a Pledge of Allegiance.

President Cheryl Mason started the meeting with the announcement of Tom Alvord and Charnaie Gordon competing in the Division C Contest held on April 20, 2010 in Marlborough, CT, and CONGRATULATING both participants

Cheryl presented Charnaie with flowers for winning the second place in the International Contest.

Cheryl brought a homemade cake (so delicious!) and other refreshments to celebrate Tom’s and Charnaie’s participation in the Division C contest and Charnaie’s accomplishment of winning the second place. A “GREAT BIG THANKS” to Cheryl.


Our Toastmaster for the evening was Anne-Marie Cannata. This was her first time being the Toastmaster of the club and she did an excellent job with a touch of humor.


Charnaie Gordon was the Table Topics Master with a theme fitting the anniversary of Earth Day. She read the topics first and asked the audience to volunteer. Deborah, Ramesh, Emily, Jen, Siva (our guest), Pete and Kim took the challenge and did a great job of impromptu speaking.

Speeches
Five wonderful speeches were given as follows:

#1 – Erin Mulhern, “Ice Breaker” evaluated by Rob Schaff.
#2 – Jonathan Martin, “Ice Breaker” evaluated by Charnaie Gordon.
#3 – Lawrence Gore, “Ice Breaker” evaluated by Deborah Nason.
#4 – Murali Krishna Pemmaraju, Speech # 5 of CC, “Climbing up to the Crown of Statue of Liberty” evaluated by Kay Jeyapalan.
#5 – Rob Schaff, Speech # 3 of CC (second round), “Toastmasters Club Officers” evaluated by Ann-Marie Cannata.


All the speeches and evaluations were fabulous. The speeches were either informative or informative and humorous. Our Past President, Rob Schaff, did a great job of educating everyone about the roles each officer plays and pepped up all to volunteer for next year.

Murali has now completed five speeches in the Competent Communications Manual to be entitled for his half CC certificate.


Our General Evaluator for the night was Tom Alvord.

Other Roles:
Invocation: Ramesh Padavala
Humorist: Eric Roise
Word Master: Peter Plotica. Word of the Day, “Wastrel” (it is a noun) idler, good for nothing, or spendthrift
Grammarian: Erin Mulhern
Ah-counter: Deborah Nason
Timer: Pete Plotica

Charnaie Gordon, VPE, recognized Erin, Jonathan, and Lawrence for breaking the ice by presenting the mints.

Other announcements:

· 5/13 - Our next meeting will be held at MXCC, Room 630
· 5/27 - Election of Officers for the upcoming year
· 6/10 - Regular Meeting
· 6/24 - Last meeting of the Toastmaster Year 2009-2010
· 5/2 - Jennifer announced that the Food share 27th Annual Walk will go on in spite of the fact that she will not be able to attend
Contributions can be made online www.foodshare.org
· 6/2 - Charnaie announced that the picnic will be at the Wadsworth Park, more details to follow
· 5/22 - District 53 Spring Conference, International & Tall Tales Contest, St. Thomas Seminary, Bloomfield

Anne-Marie asked our guest, Siva, to speak of his opinion about our club. Siva said that this is the best club of all the ones he has attended to date and his scouting search is over.

Anne-Marie Cannata thanked all who stepped up at the last minute to fill in the roles: Eric, Ramesh, Charnaie, Deborah, Pete, Tom, and Kay.
She ended the meeting at 8:55 p.m.

Great job Anne-Marie with all the 11th minute changes.

Kay Jeyapalan, VPPR

Area C5 Contest Report

Middlesex County hosted the Area C5 Speech contest on April 8. We had a great turnout, with 28 people in attendance, including representatives from all 5 area clubs. Division C Governor Nathan Jaycox and District 53 Photographer Don Logie were among the guests.

Special thanks to:
- Kay Jeyapalan, Contest Master
- Michael O'Brien, Chief Judge

Here are the results:

Tall Tales Contest
1st - Joseph M. Katucki, Eagle Toastmasters
2nd - Tom Alvord, Middlesex County Toastmasters
3rd - Dave Foster, Cheshire Toastmasters

International Contest
1st - Charnaie Gordon, Middlesex County Toastmasters
2nd - Andy Cravalho, Holy Apostles Toastmasters
3rd - Udaya B. Neelam, Eagle Toastmasters

Also competing, Sharon Roth (Cheshire) and Joe Lenart (Cromwell).

The winners from last night's contest will be competing at the Division C contest:

Tuesday, April 20, 7-9 PM
Fellowship Community Church
24 South Road, Marlborough, CT

April 01, 2010 (Extra Meeting held at The Village of South Farms)
Middlesex Toastmasters Club #8340

Members present: Tom Alvord, Anne-Marie Cannata, Charnaie Gordon, Lawrence Gore, Kay Jeyapalan, Cheryl Mason, Pam Mulready, Deb Nason, Sally Nicastre, Dianne Olsen, Ramesh Padavala, Murali Pemmaraju, and Arun Sodani.

Other Guests: Don Logie (District 53 Photographer) and Mike Nicastre (Sally’s husband).

President Cheryl Mason started the meeting with business by giving 2 of our newest members their Toastmasters pins. Congratulations to Lawrence Gore and Sally Nicastre!
Other news:
· 3/26 – Charnaie Gordon has completed her Competent Leadership Manual!
· 3/30 – Kay Jeyapalan has completed her Competent Communicator Manual!
· 4/01 - Our Club has already reached all 10 of the 10 goals required (and beyond) for Distinguished Club Status 1st! What an outstanding Club we have under the direction of these great leaders: Cheryl, Charnaie and Kay!

Toastmaster Tom Alvord was a terrific host for the evening.

Dianne Olsen was Table Topics Master with a theme fitting for April Fool’s Day. Participants were asked to respond to a quote about a fool or a joke. Taking a try with their wit were: Arun, Pam, Don (guest), Murali, Ramesh, Lawrence and Sally.

Speeches
Four superb speeches were given as follows:
#1 – Deb Nason, Research, “The Sleeping Giant Wakes Up”
#2 – Pam Mulready, Your Body Speaks, “Moving”
#3 – Anne-Marie Cannata, Entertaining Tale, “The 3 Menehune of Ainahou”
#4 – Cheryl Mason, Storytelling Advanced, “A Folktale from India”

Evaluators
General Evaluator: Kay Jeyapalan
Evaluators:
Anne-Marie Cannata for Deb’s speech #1
Deb Nason for Pam’s speech #2
Charnaie Gordon for Anne-Marie’s speech #3
Don Logie for Cheryl’s speech #4
There was a noticeable difference in the progress of our evaluators after our “coaching” by Jerry Aiyathurai at our last meeting. Terrific job by all!

Other Roles:
Invocation: Charnaie Gordon
Humorist: Anne-Marie Cannata
Word Master: Anne-Marie, “grok”, to intuitively understand or understand profoundly
Grammarian: Murali Pemmaraju
Ah-counter: Kay Jeyapalan
Timer: Ramesh Padavala

Other announcements:
· 4/8 - Our next meeting will be held at MXCC, we are hosting the Area C5 International & Tall Tales Contests
· 4/20 Division C International & Tall Tales Contest, 7-9 p.m., Fellowship Community Church, 24 South Road, Marlborough
· 5/2 – Foodshare 27th Annual Walk, Jen Cimilluca is forming a team of our Toastmasters, see Jen for more details
· 5/22 – District 53 Spring Conference, International & Tall Tales Contest, St. Thomas Seminary, Bloomfield


Respectfully,
Dianne Olsen, SecretaryMiddlesex County Toastmasters Club