Capital City Toastmasters

Welcome to Capital City Toastmasters!!

If you are looking for a place to improve your communication and leadership skills you have found it.

Visitors are always welcome! Come join us any Wednesday from noon to 1:00 p.m. at the Waller Creek Center, 625 East 10th Street, in downtown Austin. See the Meetings page for more details.

Theme: Hair
Word of the Day: Um

Brian started the meeting by leading us in 30 seconds of reflection, prayer, silence, whatever we wanted, for all those involved and impacted by the wild fires.  We even learned how to close our eyes thanks to his example.

Toastmaster Keith jumped right into the meeting by discussing the HAIR theme.  His jokes fell flat as he spoke of his afro as a child then how he matured to the ‘Rachel’ in the 90’s. He wondered at the mystery of facial hair – why don’t women have it?  Why did his eyebrows have a sudden grow spurt?  Why do we look weird without eyebrows?

Wendy provided some great questions related to hair.  Robin said something about cutting his own hair but everyone was distracted by his early 80’s shorty shorts and camel toe. Carol talked about trying a new hair product and her hair falling out. Stuart convinced us he has the best hair in TMs without even trying to style it.  Maureen saw a local celebrity on TV who used to be a conservative politician and now has hippie hair.  If you ask Brian to go on the record, he prefers brunettes though a redhead stole his heart for nearly six weeks back in the day.

Amy jumped in at the last minute and gave a hilarious speech about bad customer service with numerous examples of rude, obnoxious, lazy, clueless and sometimes foreign accented people who provided less than acceptable service.  A very funny look at what Amy has had to deal with.

Chris gave an inspirational speech that used 9/11 as the backdrop to people persevering and even rising to great heights as a reaction to the traumatic event.  He then compared struggles that folks may be going through as their own personal 9/11’s and encouraged us to find the strength to overcome these life challenges.

Our Holy Duo – Stuart and Shane – evaluated and then blessed us all.  Amen.

Ribbon Winners

Table Topics – Carol/Brian (Carol won the arm wrestling match to break the tie)
Best Speaker – Chris
Best Evaluator – Shane
Most Enthusiastic – Carol
Best Humor – Amy

Amy took control of our small meeting. Our president has been in absentia for the last 2 weeks so we were in need of some deft and sure leadership which she definitely provided.  Corky stepped up as Toastmaster for the first time since I have been a member!  And he was full of excuses especially regarding the many speeding tickets he has talked his way out of.

Chris brought 16 plus questions as Table Topics Master and left your question up to fate as he asked each participant to select a number.  Bob spoke about what drove him batty.  Slow drivers in the fast lane! Shane would go back and meet Jesus if he could, specifically to ask for some clarifications on passages in the Bible (I think I would want a few too). Wendy went on vacation here in Austin when she attended a toga party recently. It sounded like a wild party with fire throwers unintentionally lighting themselves on fire. Katy’s worst subject in school was phys ed. We learned that she is not only intimidated by softball but also by the newest group exercise craze, ZUMBA. Our long lost member Maureen told us about the inspiring little girl on public television who sings like an angel.  I think she was talking about Jackie Evancho. I have seen her on Oprah. She is amazing!

Shundreka wowed us with her second speech from the competent communication manual titled “Just My Style.” Surprisingly she is an introvert, at least according to some of the personality assessments she has taken through her job. We also learned that she writes herself inspirational emails and watch true crime television program incessantly.  And she is completely comfortable with who she is.

Leif stepped up and gave an amazing impromptu speech. He introduced us to the idea of “faillessness” and challenged us to redefine our definition of success and failure.  We should cultivate an attitude of learning in our lives; as long as we are always learning we are moving a step closer to our goals.  Did you learn something today that made you better?  According to Heather he had a lot of Hutzpa and Cajones to give us such a great speech on the spot. I agree!

Awards:

Best Table Topics – Shane

Best Speaker – Shundreka

Best Evaluator – Steve

Most Enthusiasm – Carol

Best Use of Humor – Wendy

Our President was absent but Amy Samet did an amazing job working double duty as she called us to order and played the role of Toastmaster.  We have a new member, Tao, who joined during the meeting and was also called on for Table Topics.  However new-ish member Jennifer took top prize in Table Topics as she told us about her penchant for late night bad movies on the SyFy channel accompanied by alcohol.  The worst movie she ever saw was Mega-shark vs. Giant Octopus which even has a bad name. Notably Steve told us about a memorable Toastmasters meeting when the agenda was done in  reverse.  The evaluators go first and the speakers have to live up to that evaluation.  It was such a novel idea that Amy nominated Steve to lead us as Toastmaster later this month in the reverse format.  Corky has already volunteered to be General Evaluator so it should be fun!

Genevieve gave her second speech on how to be a good neighbor.  Among the sage advice was this gem: don’t move in at 7 AM and let the moving folks knock on your neighbors’ doors.  And if you do, you better have a party and invite them all.

Christopher used his speech as a platform to apologize to some of our Toastmasters for previous transgressions including calling Erin Eric and calling Kim a porn star. In his best Steve Urkel voice, he asked “Wow, did I just say that?”  But he managed to put himself in good company; with the likes of quotable celebrities such as Jessica Simpson and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Leif gave some great feedback for all of us: when getting up in front of an audience, try to match their energy level plus 10% and if you need to build up from that level do it bit by bit, taking your audience with you.  And Amy ended with a sweet bang by giving all of those who signed up for roles enormous candy bars!

The theme is “Debt,” apparently something with which Amy is
all too familiar.

Two guests from other Toastmasters Clubs attended our meeting and both spoke during Table Topics.  If you did not attend the meeting this may sounds surprising but in fact it is not when you take into consideration that Amy called on a record-breaking 8 people for Table Topics.  When asked about when he felt broke, Vince spoke about the saddest trip of his young life to Toys R Us when he had only $20 to spend (gasp!)  When asked about a time she felt broker (is this a word Amy?) than Vince, Maria (Guest #1) talked about how not broke she feels at the moment.  She is on the way to pick up a big check; the proceeds from the sale of her home here in Austin.  Amy then confessed she loves credit cards.  It was unclear if she likes to pay them though.  Taline spoke about her the dichotomy between her parents spending habits: t is either a match made in heaven or one made in hell as her father adores shopping with abandon on credit
cards and her mother is militant about paying them off on time and in full.  Amy told us about her freak of a friend who carries absolutely no debt (her words, not mine).  Kap Tan (Guest #2) then called Amy a freak in general.  When asked about a financially awkward situation, Shane told us that he and his wife were both unemployed when they were married but the happy ending is that they both had jobs by the end of the honeymoon.  The lesson we are to learn: if you are unhappy at your job, just quit, it will all work out.  Robin told us about his sojourn to both the Republican and Democratic National Conventions in 2008.  Although he had to borrow money from his brother to go, he insists it was the best party ever. Carol told us we are all going to hell and although I think Amy meant the figurative hell as a result of too much debt, Carol informed us that with this Austin heat we were already in hell.  Kim, AKA Stormy Love, told us what
she would do to a plumber for 700 dollars. Write a hot check!

With characteristic East Coast charm, Bob gave an impassioned speech about the state of public education today.  He regaled us with tales of teachers past including Simon Morris Cohen III who was a quite a character in his day.  We vacillated between laughter and seriousness as Becky explained the challenges of being a step-parent through the eyes of a child.  She gave us great pointers on bringing a new significant other home (let’s call her Bambi for illustrative
purposes) including easing that person into the children’s lives.  Our grammarian, Christopher, out did himself by accurately counting every uh, ah, so, etc.  He even taught us a new term!  The “uh-out.”  That is when you say more than 5 when speaking and he has to stop counting.   Great feedback Christopher!

It's big and it's black. If you were at the meeting this still might not make sense.

Theme: “Murphy’s Law”
Word of the Day: “Calamity”


Insults, slights and inappropriate language, this meeting had a little flava!  But you really had to be there because it was hilarious and I didn’t take notes and I drink a lot.

Brian meet Erin. Erin is a member and has been for 8 years or maybe it’s just been a couple of months.  Whatever it is, she was so insulted you didn’t recognize her, she quit…seriously, we will miss you Erin.  Come visit us when you can.  Brian (slowly shaking my head)…ugh…can’t. even. look. at. you.

Table Topic Master Keith likes to mow down innocents with his car and spend the night in jail.  But really, it was totally worth it.

Hey, let’s do something new!  I encourage Brenda, Wendy, Erin and Blake to put their personal spin on things and recap their own table topic questions and answers in the comments section below.  This suggestion has nothing to do with my poor notes or the fact some rude person was blabbing in my ear during table topics.  I’m just a really creative guy and this sounds like fun!!

We had 3 Ice Breakers!  3 awesome Ice Breakers!

Shundreka celebrates a milestone birthday this year so she decided to start living life, get her finances in order and run like the wind blows.  She took a cruise and took full advantage of her anonymity but that’s all she would say about that.  She ran a 10k and plans on going to Europe because she’s such a big soccer fan. She’s considering public speaking, too.

Jennifer began her speech with an admission, “I am awkward.”  It’s been a pattern her whole life – she’s quiet around others, tries to work up courage to speak and when she finally does speak she says something stupid.  How did she flirt in college? “This sandwich tastes like my Grandmother.”  Smooth.  Please forgive her if she says something dumb.  Whatever she says, it could be worse.

Our Toastmaster Chris channeled his inner Corky and introduced Kim as a porn star.  Kim took it in stride and told us about her family name. Her hippie parents fed her healthy food and she ate well her whole life but something was wrong!  Some foods just didn’t like her.  How could you not like Kim?  She fixed her diet which improved her health.  Now she can be a good example for her clients (ask her about her biz sometimes).  Kim is aggressively mastering public speaking by joining 3 TM groups and signing up for speeches.  She realized it’s a skill she needs.

The Evaluators said stuff.  It was encouraging and helpful.  We all nodded in agreement.

Ribbon Winners
Table Topics: Erin
Evaluator: Leif
***** Speaker, Enthusiasm, Humor: Jennifer *****