Its that time of the year again - 25 October

On Tuesday, 18 of our stalwarts turned out. We had many apologies, especially from our teacher members– I guess it’s that time of year again!
A special welcome to our 2 guests: Irna van Zyl and Deon Basson. Hats off to Erna who went to the ends of the earth to track us down. We hope we made it worth your while.

We were particularly happy to see Michael Warren again. In essence we were guests at his stag party because in 10 days, 20 hours and some minutes Michael Warren becomes a SMUG MARRIED PERSON. We expect lots of fireworks on the 5th November, Michael!

BIRTHDAY WISHES this week go to Toastmasters International, which celebrated its 87th birthday this week. Sharing that milestone was Alison Immelman, who reached her HALF-CENTURY!!!!
Also celebrating in the next fortnight are Barry Serfontein on the 3rd and Denise Pudney on the 7th of November.

Some business mattersQuinton Jacobs is organising the programme at the moment. Please contact him with your speaking needs (His number is 0828194445, or email him on Quinton.Jacobs@weathersa.co.za). Remember our quest for a third year of distinguished club status – and your own personal growth plan.
Don’t forget that everything that you do during the evening, quite apart from your speeches, can be evaluated towards your COMPETENT LEADER standing (for our new members, that’s the other manual you received when you joined Algoa).

Do you want to win aAll you have to do is design a header for the Blog, or suggest a catchy slogan. For the official entry form, mail Alison Immelman on alistaude@yahoo.com, and she will send you one. Send your entries to this address, too, or bring them to the next meeting.
Entries close on 8 November

Who’s up for a challenge? Wethinks that ANDREW THE TRAVELLING GAVEL
has been at Madiba Bay for far too long. All we need to do is to visit their club with five of
our members to claim him for Algoa. Let’s go, guys. Listen out for the looting plans.

Toastmaster for the evening was the ever-cheerful Nicholas Mitchell. We know he is busy with his 4 children and his newish law partnership, but he never turns down a job, lending truth to the suggestion that one needs to ask a busy man if one wants something done. Nicholas has been appointed a club coach for USpeak to help them to get back to charter strength (at least 20 paid up members) meetings are between 8 and 9 on the 1st and 3rd Friday of the month. Please support them if you are able. Meetings are short and to the point.

Just when Michael Warren was greeted joyously, and felt it was a case of “Honey, I’m home”, he received an impassioned plea: “We need a timekeeper!” He pointed out that this is one of the most important lessons that we learn at Toastmasters. Imagine if everyone spoke for just one extra minute. We would be here for an extra ½ hour. Which is why Michael was so excited to use our new alien invasion, zooty time machine – his very own “concorder” (with apologies to Star Wars and their “tricorder”). He said he would have come back sooner if he’d known he’d have such fun!

Grammarian for the evening was Jessamy Kromhout. As Word of the Day she chose “imbroglio” – Italian in origin – meaning mess, or entanglement. Four members used it in their offerings.
Um and ah counter was Liandra Schoultz. She identified only 6 uses of those pesky verbal crutches – quite an improvement on last week. Perhaps there is hope!

Table Topics master was Tanja Gauss. She elected to keep the planet green by presenting a LUCKY DIP, wrapped in recycled paper. What an original, entertaining set of items – from stripy socks to mini fans, and a personal mini magic carpet to a tasteful, bright orange, plastic jack o’ lantern. Our job was to promote the item in-store. The whole house took part, and did we have fun! Perhaps the best sales pitch came from Nicholas, who suggested that if all else fails, re-gift – to your mother-in-law!!

Prepared Speeches

Barry De Klerk undertook his CC3 (Get to the point – try to avoid using notes) with a speech entitled “Energy Anyone?” He told us about a product initially designed to cure jetlag: Red Bull. The cute cartoon ads emanated from a lack of marketing budget. And they had quite a job to do: imagine trying to sell 100 ml less of a drink for double the price of a normal soft drink – and it tasted vile. In clinical trials it has been established that the only harmful substances are sugar (less than a can of cooldrink) and caffeine (about the same as one cup of coffee).

Belita von Steiger delivered her CC4 (Select the right words to communicate the message effectively; avoid jargon) with a “dream” of a speech about “The World Cup that Wasn’t”. Striking images included the sickening “Body hits body, bone hits bone and cauliflower ears get a little more scrunched”. But, alas, it was only a dream because we didn’t even get to the stadium.

Marianah Lourens is moving on apace with her Advanced Communicator projects. Tonight, she presented her AC4 (use principles of voice and inflection to convey a story) from the reading manual. Marianah delighted us with her animated interpretation of an extract from Risk by Dick Francis.

The Toast of the day was offered by Alison Immelman to “growing old humorously”. She quoted Francis Bacon who put it this way: “I will never be an old man. To me, old age is always 15 years older than I am.” And perhaps that’s the secret: to live, laugh, love, and be happy.

Evaluators for the evening were Mimi Makapula, Denise Pudney and Quinton Jacobs. All gave extremely positive, helpful evaluations, bearing out the truth that we learn by doing, and grow by learning. General evaluator was Antoinette Baatjies who pointed out that we are all at different levels of confidence, which is one of the things that makes us so interesting. She reminded us that Tom Horne was the guest speaker at the Westering Prize-giving, while another Toastmaster spoke at Lawson Brown, the first guest speaker ever to receive a standing ovation (27 yrs after she matriculated from Lawson). Antoinette herself found herself delivering an impromptu devotions session which she had forgotten to prep, which is why she’s proud to be a Toastmaster.

The Best Table Topics was awarded to Chenielle Jefferies Badenhorst with her spray gun which she suggested could be used to control unruly exam candidates!

Top toastie of the evening was awarded to the King of Table Topics, Michael Warren, because he’s only going to be king for the next 10 days, and then Lindi takes over!!