Wish you all a Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year

Dear Eagles,
2012 is almost coming to an end, and what a phenomenal year we had. We achieved President's distinguished for the 11th consecutive year, and the past 6 months since I took on the role of President have been equally great. We always had a great turnout, we always had fantastic meetings thus far, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the members and all the officers. Thus far it has been a humbling experience, a rewarding experience and an enriching experience, and all of you with your commitment make the club successful. Thanks.

We had another great turnout this evening. It is always great to see the family members. We had 2 guests , Roger and our good friend Rose coming back after a long hiatus.

We started the night by holding a moment of silence honoring the victims of the Sandy Hook shooting. It was the least we could do as a community. Thanks to Kate and Ute ( our past club presidents) for suggesting this.

We had an extended table topics. All the 17 people in the room except for 2 spoke. That was fun. Thanks to all of you for bringing in the gifts and also socks/underwear, this is what the community needs and it means a lot.

Dan, husband of the CEO of Masters Manna , Cheryl, and also a volunteer by himself, gave a brief history of masters manna, the community they serve, their challenges and their next steps. I thought that was great.

We had 3 prepared speeches all touching the spirit of holidays. Sarah gave her icebreaker speech on "celebrating life," where she asked us to accept than discriminate. Sarah has incredible energy and it was the first icebreaker speech ever in the history ( of my experience) where the speaker had made all the members stand in a line and sing happy birthday song. It was confusing but hilarious. Sonia as evaluator rightly pointed her energy, but suggested her to hone the energy and lead the audience with a message. Sarah, you can do it, and looking forward for your next speech.

Jay gave his second speech from CC titled "the art of giving," where with clear examples explained the three classifications of gifts: gifts you expect, gifts you dont expect and the gifts you expect in return ( service gifts or bribery gifts). Jay's speeches are well-organized, well-thought and well-rounded. He always provides a clear mental picture for all of us to imagine, which is not that easy to accomplish. No notes, good eye contact for 2nd speech is incredible. Good job and keep it up.

Rich gave the third speech of the night titled "holidays dos and donts," where he provided us tips on how to be a good host and also to be a good guest. He told us to treat everyone with respect and also to be yourself as others were already taken. In addition to the content, what impressed me most, and was pointed by Kate as his evaluator, was the progress he has made, how Rich has stopped using notes, how Rich was using hand gestures, using the room etc etc, the little things toastmasters teaches us. We can clearly see great strides made by Rich over the course of a few speeches. Add vocal variety, Rich, you have the whole package. Great progress.

As the tradition, Tom P. gave colorful plants as an year-end holiday gift to all the members present at the meeting. Thanks Tom.

Our next meeting is in 3 weeks on Jan 7th of the new year, 2013. We will be meeting at our regular Park & Rec building. Please do sign up for the roles.

Wish you all a Merry Christmas, wish you all a happy holidays and wish you all a happy and a prosperous new year, 2013.

Goodnight and See you all in 3 weeks.

Chandra

It is the Commitment that pulls us through

Dear Eagles,
Sometimes you feel that nothing is in your favor and somehow you need to pull it through, and often times it is by the shear power of the Commitment that gets us through the task. Today was one of those days where we had to rely on the commitment more than the normal. For me it started at home when my two little ones were driving me nuts right before the meeting; once I salvaged the chaos situation at home and escaped, in anticipation of  bliss, to the toastmasters, we realized that park and rec is closed, and we had to meet in the snack room with the loud, annoying noise from the vending machines as the background, but that did not stop us from having fun. To top it all, even the Old Dublin place where we decided to meet for the drinks was having a play and was not open for the customers, oh, you should see my frustration, but then we did end up at Gaetanos and had a really good time. Yes, commitment was the common factor that pulled us through in all the above three minor obstacles that were laid in our path.

We had another fantastic meeting in an extremely hot room, amidst the constant loud humming, with more than 18 members including a guest. ( I felt at home to be honest :)). Lucy was our table topics master and the theme was the holidays with a twist - the topics ranged from "roof over the head holiday" to the "national ding-a-ling holiday " - the topics were different and that added fun. Sarah broke the record for table topics by giving almost a speech :). That was incredible, which means Sarah you are ready for your icebreaker. Richard as humorist also almost gave a speech which came close to breaking Andrew's record on time:)

We had three prepared speeches tonight. Sonia, with New Year fast approaching, started telling how only 8% of the people who make resolutions succeed and a vast majority fail in keeping the resolutions/promises with in a month. She asked all of us to Get SMART - Specific,Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely. BTW, people who make resolutions have 10x more chance of succeeding.

Carlin gave her second speech titled "living with purpose and passion" on how Art Bert through shear determination and will power overcame the quadriplegic state he had succumbed to after an unfortunate road accident right before his marriage. Her speech had several memorable quotes, a couple of them being - " you cannot control the events that happen, but can surely control the response" and the other being " focus on what you have and not focus on what you dont". It was a very good inspirational speech and recommend reading the book "impossible takes a little longer" by Art Bert. BTW, Art now gives public speeches, that i think is really cool.

The third speech for the day was given by Andrew titled " Holy fools" where he talked in great detail about Diogenes, their/his philosophy and how he believed in the minimalistic approach, a method perfected by the monks of the East and slowly spread to the West and by which Diogenes was very much influenced. The speech was good with humor and facts interlaced even though it went a few minutes over time.

After this we headed to Gaetanos for couple of drinks after being turned down by Old Dublin. With 11 members present,  we absolutely had a blast. Thanks to all for coming to the meeting and to the few who also joined for the drinks. It was great.

Our next meeting will be at Masters Manna on Dec 17th at our usual starting time of 7.15 pm.
Address: 46 North Plains Industrial Road, Wallingford, CT - 06492

Masters Manna is a non-profit organization catering for the people in need. More information can be found at www.mastersmanna.org. They are in need of underwear and socks for children and adults (especially for plus sizes), so please do bring if you can.

Please do come and please bring in your family members as this meeting is open for the family. Bring in a toy/gift wrapped for young children not more than $10 in value. This is more of a tradition and they become part of the table topics (a tip for the first-timers). Let me be clear, you are under no pressure to bring anything, your presence is most important.

Please do sign up for the roles at www.eagletoastmasters.com, and please do come.

Goodnight and see you all in 2  weeks.

Chandra