Club Meeting No. 145, Wednesday 15th Feb 2012
Wednesday’s meeting saw another great turnout with 20 members braving a night of Toastmasters’ challenges. The night’s 30 second introduction on a theme was all about “saying no” and members were challenged to use the word “eschew” in their delivery. The night’s joke was a hilarious tale about a comparison between a business man and his wife, despite it somewhat bordering on the club’s “clean joke” policy. After the members were warmed up, the night shifted into the prepared speeches section with two speeches; one on a cute pet dog named Indy and the other questioning the merits of Occupational Health and Safety laws. Following the speeches came a 15 minute Entertainment section which demanded members to read aloud a paragraph from a famous speech and test whether the audience could guess the author. Table Topics once again managed to draw out creative minds with 30 second responses to challenging questions. The night concluded with verbal reports from first time Um Counters, Listerner Grammarians, and Timers and of course the much appreciated General Evaluation by the Vice President of Education. Meeting closed at 8:30pm.
Club Meeting No. 144, Wednesday 1st Feb 2012
Commencing right on 6:45pm, Lane Cove Toastmasters meeting no. 144 was attended by 19 members and guests who were immediately asked to stand up and complete within 45 seconds the sentence, “The seed that I plant tomorrow will…”. The joke for the night was delivered via a very funny story of a fisherman catching a platypus by mistake and having to front a court to explain why he should not be fined for eating an endangered species. The meeting then transitioned into the prepared speeches section with two members braving the audience; one speech being on the inequalities of gender in the workforce while the other a personal reflection of life from child to adulthood and the lessons learned in between. Our ten minute Entertainment section was comprised of a hilarious game of part charades, part “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” and managed to get the audience to act out some very amusing behaviours. Following the formal speech evaluations came Table Topics which once again put everyone on the spot for 45 seconds to respond to a somewhat random, and in some cases, somewhat awkward question. The night closed with a General evaluation from the club Vice President of Education and two member stories on how Toastmasters has helped them recently. Another fantastic meeting which closed around 8:30pm.
First Meeting of 2012
Lane Cove Toastmasters kicked off 2012 on Wednesday 18th January with a turnout of around 15 eager members and guests. The 30 second introductions on the theme of “What I found impossible before was…” highlighted some hilarious insights into peoples’ behaviours. From navigating through an Xbox game, visiting a naturist beach to training a barking dog to be quiet; all members and guests managed to muster up the courage and overcome their nerves to share a little more about themselves. The night’s Pet Peeve centered around the Australian Open tennis with particular aim at the over-commentary given by Jim Courier and how he may benefit the game with a little less of his over-analysis of each point. The prepared speech section of the meeting comprised three speakers on topics as diverse as “Summer Lovin…Where are all the flies?”, to “How Social Media Can Work for You”, to the unimaginable hardship of growing up in a politically unstable Iran. All three speeches were very well received and ran for the most part on time. Immediately following was a ten minute workshop on mind mapping and how it can be used as a powerful tool in generating structure for speeches. Table Topics, the impromptu and often nerve-wracking part of the night, posed individual questions to each member or guest and asked for their response in a 45 second time frame. The responses generated a lot of laughter and helped to ease up peoples’ nerves. The meeting closed slightly overtime, but all in all it was a wonderful start to 2012!