Capital City Toastmasters

Amazing things can happen when you come to a Toastmasters Meeting!

You might learn something. You may hear a speech about poisonous snakes, or a presentation on which female Disney character is the hottest babe.

You may get a lesson on selecting the right wine or how to become a better liar. You might see people from Nepal and Germany and Sweden and Russia. And Rollingwood.

You may meet creative, intelligent, generous people who are focused on self-improvement, and on serving others. And these people might make you feel so welcome and so supported that you become motivated to become a better speaker yourself!

Capital City Friends,

Can a theme make a meeting or what? Toastmaster Jason Callendar chose “Music of the 80’s” - an AWESOME theme that seemed to resonate with everyone: from love songs (think Lionel Richie and Journey) to inspirational anthems (think Survivor and Queen) to Disco hits (Donna Summer) to the music of Madonna, Boy George, George Michael, and Michael Jackson.

Brendan Owens has still got it, and he proved it in a memorable speech that included everything we have come to expect from Brendan: humor, charm, great stories, and he even snuck in a point. In a six minute speech that included a solid minute of silence, Brendan reminded us of the good old days when things mattered more because people did one thing at a time.

Our second speaker, Maria, wore adorable shoes that matched a killer outfit and by the way she also talked about exercise and how we should all help ourselves.

General Evaluator Eric “Eye of the Tiger” Peterson wished he could have answered all the Table Topics, but instead they were fielded by Corky “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” Logue, David “Shiny Happy” Jorgensen, Carol “Last Dance” Conner, Taline “Walk Like an Egyptian” Manassian, and Stuart “Rocky” Cook.

Congratulations to our Winners:

Best Speaker: Brendan
Best Evaluator: Rey
Best Table Topic: Stuart
Best Humor: Brendan + Corky because Keith wasn’t there
Most Enthusiasm: Carol

Remember we’re ALL winners, as long as “Eye of the Tiger” is playing in our hearts:

Risin’ up, straight to the top
Have the guts, got the glory
Went the distance, now I’m not gonna stop
Just a man and his will to survive

It’s the eye of the tiger, it’s the thrill of the fight
Risin’ up to the challenge of our rival
And the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night
And he’s watchin’ us all in the eye of the tiger

Amy

PS and how could I forget Taline’s Invocation: an ode to the lovelorn Eric over the news of Scarlett Johansson’s engagement to another, made up entirely of 80’s song titles.  Taline threw down the gauntlet for all future Cap City Invocators.  Way to kick off a meeting, Taline!

We have a new 16 min video on club roles and responsibilities on our Helpful Videos page.

If you’d like to view it directly, go to Club Roles.

Fellow Toastmasters,

I saw a couple of cool new features and went ahead and installed them. The first is called KeywordLuv. It allows you to put the keywords of a site of your choice in the name field to improve your SEO. If you have a personal or company website, you can include the keywords with this feature.

The second is a “subscribe to comments” feature. We haven’t had any comments yet aside from the ones we copied from our yahoo group. Maybe that was because it can be tedious to comment and then have to keep checking back to see if anyone else commented. Well, now you don’t have to check. If you check that box, you’ll be automatically notified if someone else comments.

Of course if you’re commenting for the first time, your comment will have to be moderated. You’d be surprised how much spam we get.

So comment away. Not everybody at once though.

This meeting theme was UNPRECEDENTED!! Jackie Robinson just broke yet another barrier.. a PERSON can be a theme now. Next week, I propose the theme be “Eric Peterson” in honor of his Toastmaster skills this week.

Louis knocked table topics out of the park with incredibly on-topic yet fun to answer questions. As general evaluator, I forgot to mention that Louis should have warned our guests what table topics was before you got into it… but at least one of the two already knew. Guest Rob who has been a few times before even had the gall to answer one, and then WIN! Maria, Carol, and Maureen also were exceptionally entertaining today on their turns.

Coach Rey “POGO” DeVeau blasted us with energy in her second Successful Club speech, which was the last step to getting her Competent Leader Award!!!!! Woohoo, congrats Rey! And thanks for doing the club a solid. We all learned a lot about about what meeting role players do, and what club officers should be doing. Oh, and I saw Taline pop in at the end of the speech — great to see you Taline, even briefly!

Patrick put on his Albert mask and did an interpretive reading of Langston Hughes’ poem “Let America Be America Again”. Inspiring on many levels.

Keith and Amy also set the precedent that all evaluations must also be hilarious. Good luck to the evaluators next week!

Best Table Topic: Rob, a guest!
Best Speaker & Most Enthusiasm: Rey!!!!!
Best Evaluator: Keith (but he was counting the votes…) so maybe Amy
Best Humor: Keith (again…)

Extras, Extras!

Our meeting this week STARTED with a standing ovation for Stuart’s well-performed invocation.  But Rey was the (really bright neon green) star of the show as Toastmaster.  Or was it Maria, who dramatically acted out scenes from Titanic, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, and more to introduce her table topic questions.

Brenda, a previous capital city member, made a special guest appearance during the table topics.  We were all glad to see Corky’s lovely wife at the meeting (especially Corky)!!!

David Jorgensen gave his second speech which started out with Amy’s voice in his head, and ended with his singing voice and guitar in ours.  Bravo!   Then Louis came up and gave his second icebreaker speech!!  Starting the CC manual over again is such a great idea — I just hope he doesn’t lap me before I finish mine!!

Best Table Topic & Humor: Jason “Cuckoo” Callender
Best Speaker: David “Guitar Hero” Jorgensen
Best Evaluator: Jenny “Still evaluatin” Brookover
Most Enthusiasm:  Rey “POGO” DeVeau!!

Capital City Toastmasters shine at back-to-back Area Contests!

Keith Smith did a terrific job as Toastmaster of the Area L-40 Contest yesterday.  He was polished as well as entertaining. Most attendees did not realize how hard they were going to laugh at 9:30 in the morning.

Reynetta Deveau did us proud by taking home a trophy from the L-41 contest where she represented Capital City Toastmasters – second place.  She looked great, she had humor and inspiration, and even added a Power Point presentation.  Rey’s got skills!

Amy Samet won the L-42 Contest. She will move forward to the Division L Contest on May 3.

Louis Burns served as timer and all-purpose support role player at all three contests.

Carol Conner and Leeanne Pacatte came out to support Rey and Amy.  There is nothing a speaker likes more than seeing some smiling faces in the audience!!  Thank you Carol and Leeanne!

Long-lost Capital City Toastmaster Taline Manassian was also there to support Rey.  Come back to the club, Taline, we miss you!

John Schmidt, Capital City member, who is also the L-42 Area Governor was also instrumental in making all three contests a success. And kudos to our own new Area Governor Steve Lockwood who has been serving us so well since his recent appointment to that position.

Thanks to everyone!  We have a club you can all be proud of.

Amy

Fellow Toastmasters,

There was a fairly good post on The Blog of Timothy Ferriss yesterday. It was tips from Al Gore’s Speechwriter. It covers the essentials very well and even has Tim breakdancing at SXSW.

From Al Gore’s Speechwriter: Simple Tips for a Damn Good Presentation (Plus Breakdancing)

Enjoy!

Louis

Our last-minute toastmaster volunteer Louis was second to none in this timely meeting.  And with just one speaker time was definitely on Sheena’s side today, waiting patiently for all nine table topic-ers to answer her questions.  Eric, Gene and Carol were at the top of the hour: They went on a wild adventure from San Antonio to Austin with Scarlett Johannsen at SXSW, who never gets around to exercising!  (That was a table topic mash-up, like a song mash-up where they put two songs together and Oh, you get the point - they’re mashed!)

Bert, Corky and I talked about vacationing in Aruba, driving around a beat-up car and getting senior discounts.  The final hour brought three ladies, Rey, Maureen, and Maria up, all admitting their poor time management skills — but it’s not Rey’s fault… she has DIAL UP!

One and only speaker Wendy is getting closer to her CC award after clocking out speech #9 today - a gentle nudge to get out and volunteer all that time you’re wasting!   And Maria, with only a few moments to prepare, gave her first evaluation, hopefully inspiring other members to take on the challenge soon, too.

The Winners:
Best Table Topic: Maureen
Best Speaker: Wendy
Best Evaluator & Most Enthusiasm: Maria!
Best Humor: Corky
Best Club in the District:  Capital City (according to the area gov Steve Lockwood who visited us today!)

Hey batter-batter-batter-batter…

Ace hitter Brendan Owens stepped up to the plate as today’s Toastmaster and wow - if I knew how to use the term “wheelhouse” correctly in a sentence, I’d be doing it right now.

Table Topics Master Maureen McReynolds threw out her best sinkers, sliders and spitballs.  Wendy showed us her CURVE, Corky corked his bat, Jason hit a GRAND SLAM, Louis proved his worth as a utility player, and Albert was the CLEAN-UP HITTER.  Performances were spectacular because everybody was on steroids. Hey it makes for a more exciting game, despite the fact it messes with a time-honored American tradition.

Rookie David Jorgensen was first in the speaking lineup with his IceBreaker. It was a line drive: powerful, memorable, heartfelt, and funny too. First base coach Rey Deveau was there to provide guidance and direction and she did a great job evaluating him too.  Veteran Patrick Reznik hit one out of the park with his speech, a reading of “Tile M for Murder,” a story of marital animosity and death by Scrabble.

Congratulations to our Opening Day Ribbon Winners:

Best Table Topic: Jason Callendar
Best Speaker: Patrick Reznik
Best Evaluator: Rey Deveau
Most Enthusiastic: David Jorgensen
Best Humor: Patrick Reznik

Those of you who could not make the game  - we’d love to see you back in the stands next week.

Capital City Stadium Peanut Vendor
Amy Samet

He already gave a table topic as a guest, and is signed up to give his icebreaker next week!  We voted him in unanimously based on his 3 answers:

fav color:  Orange

fav cartoon: Beavis and Butthead?!

AND he knew that Bob Denver played Gilligan!  bonus!

Welcome, David!