December 8, 2008 Minutes

From Austin Toastmasters (Balcones, Club #3407)

Priscilla Oehlert blithesomely served as Toastmaster of the day. Her theme, “favorite holiday decorations” brought back many memories.

• Prayer & Pledge was led by Anne Child.
• Antoinette Griffin filled in as Timekeeper and kept us as close to schedule as possible given a few long speeches.
• Glenn Nielsen filled in as Grammarian using “blithesome” (merry) as the word of the day. He reported out struggles for each participant.
• Sonny Sonntag’s One Minute Toastmaster speech pointed out that the Balcones Toastmasters Holiday Party, with good food, is a good example of what Toastmasters can do… warm, meaningful, well-spoken sharing.

Steve Gonzales, Table Topics Master, enticed participants to share various epiphanies they have experienced.

• Harry Savio – Best Table Topic – 1:43 – The prettiest Christmas tree they ever had was one they found by the side of the road when they had no money for a tree. There is a Christmas God and Christmas is means more than what you can give.
• Dugg Tankersley – 1:43 – Dugg went to school to study electrical engineering. One summer he worked for Trane. He was so impressed by an engineer who had 8 patents and knew everything about air conditioning. But it was after he met the manager that he realized that the smartest people don’t make the most money.
• Dan Naden - 1:24 – related the wisdom he learned from John Maxwell’s: Leadership Goal” book. We have a finite time in life. Shift from worrying about time to focus on what you want to do in your life.

Jane Sanford – tied Most Improved – 7:49 – “Ho Ho Ho the Art of Living Joyfully” - The average adult laughs 15 times/day, a kid laughs 300-400 times/day. Life happens and we become inhibited. Laughter is the best medicine so bring laughter back into your life. Find someone that is funny, read funny books (Art Linkletter’s “Kids Say the Darndest Things”). Dr. Kataria started a laughter club. After quickly running out of jokes and funny stories, they started laughing for no reason, using fake laughter and yoga movements. A merry heart doeth good.

Cathy Lovelady – 8:16 – “The Big House in Texas “– Barney Fife tried to teach Opie what life was like in the big house, there’s no peanut butter and jelly sandwiches there. Texas has more prisons than any other state. We house prisoners from other states because land is cheap here, we have plenty of small towns with good work force, and it costs us less to heat a prison in the winter. It’s a moneymaker for the state. Cathy read 1400 travel cards (history of why the prisoner is where they are) in one year. There are many reasons people are in prison. One person, a 70-year-old man was imprisoned on his 5th DWI. When it was almost time for his pre-release, he said, “you bet, honey” to a guard asking him to do something and was slammed with more time for solicitation.

Jim Comer – Best Speaker – “Separate and Unequal – Growing up in the South” – icebreaker – Jim is a verifiable southerner having a grandmother who had a picture of Confederate generals on horseback over her bed until she died. Unlike many southern families, bigotry was not a trait exhibited nor handed down from his parents. In New Orleans, Jim was dragged from his prize location at the back of the streetcar because that was not where the white people were supposed to sit. In Atlanta, his school’s team was the Rebels and they sang Dixie when they scored. It was the first school in the state to be desegregated. Jim finds joy with the recent election of an African-American president.

Mary Buker, our gracious General Evaluator commented that Steve forgot to call for a vote of Table Topics but Priscilla did and that Jim forgot to shake hands after his speech.

• Charlie Cole was Table Topics Evaluator – 4:39 – Steve’s delivery and definition of the questions was clear and crisp. Harry’s personal stories got us to laugh. He used good imagery and a strong conclusion. He could hold eye contact a bit longer. Dugg had a strong intro, great details and vocal variety and blithesome conclusion. He held one had behind his back. Dan was organized and gave personal examples. He could have used more vocal variety.
• Gordon Baker evaluated Jane – Best Evaluator – 3:21 – Jane’s project was organization and she was organized: she involved us, explained how laughter is good and hot to get it into our lives. Her gestures started small but appropriate as was her movement. Her eye contact and her fake laughs were good. She had some finger touching and when she stumbled on finding the right word, her eyes went up.
• Jon Beall evaluated Cathy – 2:53 – Cathy as been there. She used humor as a great opening to a serious topic. Her ending didn’t have an equally good story. She brought home that she knew of what she was speaking. His favorite transition was when she said there are many people in the prisons but she was going to tell us about one.
• Fred Maynard evaluated Jim – tied Most Improved – 2:35 - Jim said he wanted to convey a feeling and he did. It was good to hear from someone who was been there. At the beginning Jim showed he was a qualified southerner. He had good use of the chair and the aisle to depict the streetcar. Fred would have liked to hear about that first day of an integrated school and how it felt to Jim.

• Guoen Wang – One laugh at at time.
• Michael Giles – When you don’t know what to do, express gratitude.
• Jason Boehle – The meeting went well. He really wants to hear others speeches in Toastmasters.