The meeting last week was magical – energetic,
fun, and inspirational. Thinking it might be a hard act to
follow, we came up with the theme of Humour for this week to
keep up the momentum.
Interestingly the Chairman, Gerhard Rentsch, began the meeting
on a more serious note, giving a short, elucidating dissertation
on the definition of humour. Followed by … ta da … “What Tickles
Your Funny Bone”! Using this in his catchy introductions of our
members, you would have been amazed at the wide range of things
that make us laugh.
Believe it or not … one of the first things that made us laugh
this night was the Word of the Evening: “dysfunctional”. Imagine
choosing such a preposterous word for Humour? Well, it worked!
It made us laugh. Just looking at the phonetical way it was
written made us laugh, with a backward ‘k’ in place of the ‘c’.
This Word was not only worth a chuckle, it was also well used.
Thank you, Gerhard
Marlene Finlayson decided to ‘double your pleasure by giving you
two small jokes instead of one longer anecdote just for a
change’. The first one was pretty tricky, and the second one was
a laugh
Speaking of ‘tricky’, this Timer did not miss a trick, making
sure we stayed within our time limits. Stuart Manning was
particularly persnickety about our Table Topic timing, which
enabled us to linger a little over the snack table during the
Break. (Thank you, Dave, the veggies, crackers and dip were a
refreshing change.)
Dave Stewart not only brought the snacks for this meeting, he
also was our Table Topics Master. He had two innovative ideas
that were new to us: He had given every eligible Table Topics
Speaker a joke just before the meeting. When it was their turn
to speak, each person had to read or tell their given joke and
elaborate on it for two minutes. Since the timing was longer
than our usual 1 ½ minutes, Dave told us that if a Speaker ended
their joke with enough time to spare, he might give them yet
another topic just to be sure they had an opportunity to speak
to the red light!! Maybe a different website for the jokes was
suggested for ‘next time’ (but don’t get the wrong idea - they
were Clean!) The most commendable part of this exercise was
Dave’s confidence to try a new approach (knowing he could always
revise it if need be).
Innovation is a good thing, but it can be a challenge at times
too, especially if you are a Guest Evaluator, visiting from
another club. This was the situation in which Gillian Muir found
herself. We were delighted that she was able to give each of us
a fresh never-having-seen-us-before Table Topics Evaluation from
her point of view.
Don Ekroth warmed us up for the second half of the meeting with
his Toast about the 1, 2, 3s of how and why “Toastmasters is
good for your health!” He had the pleasure of introducing a
first speech (The Ice Breaker), and a humorous speech project
from one of the advanced manuals (“Make Them Laugh”).
The Ice Breaker, given by Heather Gunn, was titled “Me, Myself,
and I”. ‘They’ say that the easiest thing to talk about is
yourself, which is why they suggest that for the first very
first speech project our newest members give a short talk about
themselves, using this to introduce themselves to us in a more
formal way. This project has been approached from many different
angles. Heather’s was quite unique to our club, and very
successful. She chose to share with us “the best and beautiful
things in her life”, wisely opening and closing this with a
quote from Helen Keller which also reflected her own life; a
quote about following her own heart and her own convictions.
Li Ying Kao’s evaluation of this speech reflected her experience
in evaluating first speech projects. She gave Heather
enthusiastic and sincere praise for the strengths she already
has, and her one good suggestion let Heather know she genuinely
looks forward to helping her become an even better speaker. Li
Ying’s motivating conclusion was the best part of all.
Neville Cohen had a lot of fun imparting his love of the
“Extreme Sport” of lawn bowling – even dressed in a smart white
hat and shirt for the part! (What?? No white pants?? We’re
assuming that the white pants were better off left at home
because Neville never fails to come early to help set up the
meeting tables and help make the coffee for the refreshment
table – sometimes messy work!) He opened this humorous speech
with a joke about extreme sports. We had some good chuckles over
the obvious delight and enjoyment Neville finds in this game,
and in his enthusiasm to win us over to it.
Jill McCormick gave a well-paced, animated evaluation for
Neville’s presentation. She focused on the positives in her
feedback for Neville, with the best parts being the amusing
demonstrations and examples she gave us to reinforce what she
was saying.
In her ‘teaching role’ as General Evaluator, Pam Elliott gave a
little reinforcing, too – just a gentle reminder to everyone
that whenever we are introducing someone, whether it is a Guest,
or a Participant on the Agenda, it is important to that person
and to the audience that both their first and last names are
used at least once (even if everyone already knows who they are)
because it is good protocol and that’s one of the things we are
learning. She must have said a few other things, too, because
she won the ribbon for Best Evaluator, while Marlene Finlayson
enviably won the ribbon for the Best Table Topic Speaker once
again
NEXT MEETING will be OCTOBER 17th. NO MEETING
OCTOBER 10th. Wishing You All a Very Happy Thanksgiving Weekend.
Club 1085
