I attended my final Laurel Highlands Toastmasters meeting this evening… as a guest. Before we started our program, founding club president Sharon Joseph addressed all our guests who were attending in person and virtually. She praised me for my personality and my blog and was excited about me joining very soon.
Sharon discussed the “Mission of a Toastmasters Club” and introduced the Toastmaster of tonight’s meeting, club secretary Lisa Shorter. Tonight was Lisa’s first go-round performing that meeting role. She went over the agenda for tonight’s meeting. It looked like it would be a great one with three speakers and a fun Table Topics session.
Nick Cecchetti, Laurel Highlands Tech Master, gave us the word of the day, which was fellowship. Ryan Jacobs gave us the invocation and it tied in with the theme of the meeting. He also paid homage to the late Betty White. Andrea Michaux made us laugh with the joke of the day, which was what the difference was between bird flu and swine flu.
Judy Eans, Chuck Hubbell, and Sharon Joseph were the three speakers for the night. Judy’s speech was about friendship. She talked about the best way to make friends. She also told us that not all friends are worth keeping. She also explained the different groups of friends we make. The message I took from this was to choose your friends wisely.
Chuck was the second speaker of the night. I met him in person at the red carpet event in November, with his red hat and red jacket. He talked to us in his speech about where the magic is. He told us never to quit, to find something you love doing, and to get paid for that.
Sharon capped off the speaking portion of the meeting by giving us a halftime report. She highlighted what Laurel Highlands is doing right and how they can improve. It takes the same energy to go back as it does to go forward. The takeaways I picked up from her speech were to be humble and teachable, and to be a good friend.
Janet Fraser was our Table Topics master, and her topics centered around Betty White. We had three speakers and all of them gave great answers. They honored the great legacy Betty White left for us, and that’s what the people of St. Olaf would have wanted. It gave me the inspo for a future blog honoring two great television icons, Betty White and Bob Saget.
Ryan Jacobs was our general evaluator and for the sake of the guests, explained what the GE does. We also got to meet his daughter, the youngest guest in the history of Toastmasters. Our evaluators all provided great feedback and gave great pointers for future speeches. I hope to have Andrea evaluate me when I give a speech in the future at Laurel Highlands. Ryan gave great feedback for the meeting and I took away a lot from my visit.
Contest season is here. Laurel Highlands Toastmasters will hold their contest at the their next meeting on January 25, and Area 23/24 will have a joint contest on February 19. Not sure on the location for that upcoming contest but I’ll let you know when I hear more. For now I know all contests in person as it will be easier to switch from in person to virtual if need be.
Stylish 🍒 