Contest – Laughing all the way!

Tuesday the 5th of August was Humorous Speech and Tall Tales Contest day at Plano Talkers.

Andrew opened the meeting right on time and Carol led us in the invocation and pledge.

Chuck was the Contest Master. He was assisted by the Chief Judge Bill S., the Timers Paul and Rick, and Jerry was the Sergeant at Arms. Jerry and Bill counted the ballots.

After a brief introduction of the contest rules and instruction on the proper use of the ballot form, the speaking began. Our humorous speakers were:

Mike: “How to Succed in College without Really Trying” where we learned that honesty is the best policy.

Mary was the “Big Rig Mama” who learned that you can put up with almost anything (even bugs in the shower) if you have an experienced guide who becomes your friend.

Gene continues to cheer for the Rangers which is funny in itself but he told us many reasons why “Baseball is a Funny Game.” We didn’t even know there was a “Bench Coach.”

After all the laughing, the silence while the judges completed their work was almost deafening. Finally the Chief Judge left and we learned that Mike and Mary had told us real-life experiences and that Gene had always found the Bench Coach funny.

Once the Chief Judge returned, we began the Tall Tales competition.

Stephen J. told the “Tale of Two Hairs” and had us all all spellbound right to the very last.

Bill told of his experience with a UFO.

The Chief Judge left to count the ballots and we determind that Stephen tells stories to his daughter when they ride in the car and Bill had described a real-life scenario, except for the UFO part.

The Winners will represent the Club in the Area 46 Contest on September 5th (location to be announced):

Best Humorous Speech: Mike

Runner-up: Mary

Best Tall Tale: Stephen J.

Congratulations to the winners! The flyer for the Area Contest will be distributed as soon as it is available. Hope to see the entire Club come out to cheer on our contestants.

We adjourned a few minutes late so earned one detractor.

Club Officer’s Training – Summer 2008

While most of our Officers attended training on June 28th, I attended on July 12th. So I didn’t get to share notes with everyone. However, I took some notes on the ideas presented and felt these were ones that should be shared with membership.

1. President’s Distinguished Club: This is a great program for ensuring that the club is being responsive to Toastmaster’s International and their mission for the organization. But as club officers it’s our job to ensure that we keep an eye on the mission and goals of the individual members. To maintain a vibrant club where our members are achieving their goals needs to be very high on the list of club priorities.

2. We are approaching our Fall speech contests (Tall Tales and Humor). We should be looking for ways to publicize this event to draw attention and possibly new members. We can also make manual completions and other events into news articles for local publication.

3. Membership contest idea: The District will have four membership contests this year (see the District50Toastmaster.org site for more details). We might divide the membership into teams of four to six people and have a competition within the club, with suitable rewards for “most” or “quota achievement”.

4. Another way to get more members is to make each meeting so much fun that all the members go to work and talk about it. Others may get the good idea to visit us.

5. Our club meeting need to be seen as a safe place to practice presentations we make as a part of our working life. Even if you use only the opening of your presentation as a Toastmaster speech, you get to practice and get feedback (evaluation).

6. Remember that Evaluation includes both “I liked ….” and “I thought you could have done _____ better.”

7. Invite someone “interesting” to the club to make a speech and then publicize it to draw prospective members.

8. Ours is not a company-sponsored club but that doesn’t mean that you can’t invite people from your company. Try saying,” Hi Joe, I’m making a speech about ____ and I know you have an interest in that. Will you join me at Toastmasters?” Another idea is to invite your boss to come and see you when you make a speech that completes a manual.

I encourage any member who wants more ideas on Toastmasters to attend any of the District Officer Trainings. They have sessions for Officers, of course. But they also have other sessions, such as: “Advanced Officers (working as a Team for club success); “A Holistic Approach to Effective TM Meetings”; “The Long and SHort of Tall Tales”; “Masterful Contest Master Training”; and “Using Stories for Influential Speeches.”