Eagles kicked off 2018 with a full house! 21 members and 1
guest attended the meeting.
Ute Brinkman opened by going around the
room and asking people how long and why they have been in Toastmasters.
Steve McGirr was the Toastmaster for the
evening. Robin Corrigan got us all laughing with a joke about an antique collector
who used a lucky bowl to lure people into buying cats. Tony Centorino gave the
quote of the day, from Dean Martin: "Good judgement comes from experience. And experience? Well that comes from poor judgement."
Sandra Centorino lead table topics with the
questions: What is your favorite brand or product? Or What was the last thing
you ought after seeing it on social media? Ian,
Melinda, Nilani and Robin all
participated.
Kate Kelly’s speech project was on impromptu
speaking. She brought with her a list of 5 potential topics, and Tom Corrigan chose which topic she should speak on. The chosen topic
was vacations, so Kate talked about her experience growing up with 5 siblings
and taking the yearly family trip to Brooklyn in their big station wagon.
Our next speaker was Markus
Schumacher, who spontaneously decided
to do an impromptu icebreaker speech. He titled his speech, Be More
Spontaneous, and spoke about spontaneously deciding to move to the US.
Speaker 3 was Chris
Gaffney, who also spoke about
vacations. In his speech, titled Repeat Vacations, Chris talked about the value
of taking vacations in places you’ve been to before, whether it be visiting
your old stomping grounds, or just having a place where you go year after year.
It can be fun to make a game of spotting differences, like new furniture or
coats of paint, and of course, reminiscing about previous trips with fond
memories.
Speaker 4 was yours truly, who spoke on the Radium Girls,
the true story of the women who worked as dial painters, and handled
radium-based paint with no knowledge of the dangers of radiation. Though their
story is a tragic one, we can thank them for bringing light to the issue of
health & safety in the workplace, something that has been vastly improved
in the 100 years since the Radium Girls.
Tony Centorino was the general evaluator,
and Tom Corrigan, Ian Brooks, Chris Gaffney and Robin Corrigan all served as speech evaluators. Functionary roles were
filled as follows: Paula Erardi – Ah-counter, Ian Brooks – Grammarian, Nilani
Shankar – Timer.
