Simply Speaking Minutes

08/09/2012

The word of the day “empower”, which means to be given authority or power to do a task. 
Our theme for the evening was “Turning your weaknesses into growth opportunities”.

What a fantastic meeting we had this Thursday night.  The meeting was opened with Joel Weismann filling in as sergeant-at-arms. Joel led us in the pledge of allegiance after the call to order and the reminder to turn off cell phones.   He then introduced the Toastmaster for the evening, Darryle Brown. 

Our Inspirator for the evening was Connie Akins, who told us to connect with our passion to empower ourselves to rise above our problems in this dog-eat-dog world.

Deborah Frauenfelder was our first speaker.  She described her skiing lessons in Tyrol, Austria and showed us the difference between going downhill in Europe and the United States.  After several falls she was told to sit and rest.  She was back at it the next day, and finally, on Thursday, she went down a ski ramp and had a perfect landing!  She definitely connected with her passion and determination to rise to that challenge!  Great speech, Deborah!

Second speaker, Mauricio Cortes, when asked to give advice told us he gives guidelines instead.  His examples were to trust yourself, create the type of individual you can live with; we act and believe, trust and believe; the key is to keep company with those who uplift you.  Great 3^rd speech from Mauricio!

Sherry Thomas was our third speaker and gave speech #2 from the Storytelling Manual.  It was a vivid retelling of a visit to her grandparents.  A call from an Aunt informed Sherry’s grandmother of Uncle Nod’s death.  Her grandmother screamed into the phone ”Hattie what happened?” and started  crying when told about the death but when someone reminded Grandma that she didn’t like Uncle Nod it was “like somebody turned the faucet off” in Sherry’s words.

Table Topics were presented by Anne Tacznosky with some great questions.  Participants included Ian Humphrey, Diane Nuss, Cliff Long, and Kreg Lyons.

Kathy Fortune was the General Evaluator.  She introduced the evaluators, as well as evaluating the meeting, which started on time and moved along very nicely.  She also evaluated the evaluators, commenting on the great job they all did.

Kreg Lyles was the evaluator for Deborah Frauenfelder.   She got high marks for dressing the part with a vest and gloves as if she was actually skiing.  She gave a very vivid speech with swooshing down the mountain and falling to show us her many falls.  Kreg also offered suggestions on how Deborah might do the speech differently.   Excellent job, Kreg!

Second evaluator Felicia Arambula commented on Mauricio Cortes’s speech with his subtlety in getting his proposals across.  He also used only three note cards, which had his proposals written on.  She also provided feedback on how he might do differently.  Great job, Felicia!

Evaluator Pete Hazlet was impressed with Sherry Thomas’s vivid retelling of the visit to her grandparent’s house.  Sherry had great projections and vocal changes during the speech.   We could easily picture the living room and imagine ourselves there with her.  Pete also offered ideas for Sherry’s next speech.

Ah counter Cybele Antonow counted all our ah’s and other filler words and double clutches.  She also related to us how she listened to a speaker at work who had 27 ah’s in his speech!  He needs Toastmasters!

David Bounds was our Grammarian, keeping track of who used the Word of the Day  

Margaret Seyer was our Quizmaster, testing our listening skills.

The awards were presented to :

Table Topics:  Ian Humphrey (Did I mention he’s in another speech contest, in Orlando?)

Best Evaluator:  Felicia Arambula

Best Speaker:  Deborah Frauenfelder

Members present:
Dale Jenkel, David Bounds, Margaret Seyer,  Kreg Lyons, Darryle Brown, Leo Chen, Pete Hazlet, Sherry Londo-Thomas, Zelimir Adamic, Anne Tacznosky,  Deborah Frauenfelder,  Felicia Arambula, Kathy Fortune, Connie Akins, Tom Marrs, Diane Nuss, Mauricio Cortes, Cybele Antonow, and Joel Weismann

Guests:  Cliff Long, Ed Pens, and Ian Humphrey.

Next meeting is August 16 and Deborah will be our Toastmaster.   Don’t miss signing up for a role!

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