This week's meeting began as usual, the club president, Mr. Pat Coakley, gave the opening remarks and introduced the evening's Toastmaster, *drum roll* himself! He welcomed the attending members and guests and announced each of the roles. The grammarian, Frances, set the word of the day, "Clandestine" meaning to be kept secret or done secretively. The Ah-counter and scribe was Maria, and the timekeeper and creative corner was Christine.
The evening's Topicsmaster, Alison, took the podium and began the topics-session. The focus was on recent events such as the Queen of England's passing, this years Irish financial budget, as well as general topics like "some people say a white lie is sometimes ok". Some humorous remarks from the topics session include "the headline should say: a 73 year old man finally gets a job" and "play silly games, win silly prizes".
Next up was the prepared speeches section, Brian took to the podium with his speech entitled "The joy of doing difficult things" where he began his speech comparing the luxuries of modern life to that of a past King of England, Henry VIII, specifically regarding his access to toilets and basic hygiene! The moral of the story being to put things into perspective, enjoy life and view obstacles as opportunities to learn and grow.
Ivica followed with his ice-breaker speech "Galway - love at first sight" where he brought us through his past, living in Germany and through to the first time he arrived in Galway. He explained he "saw the magical lights in Galway fog" and immediately fell in love. Here he also found his Galway girl and now has a son and enjoys going to Blackrock.
Avril was the third speaker of the evening, with a speech entitled "Increasing knowledge", and during which she invited two members, Pat and Martin, to join her and talk about their experiences with learning and teaching. Pat gave a great book recommendation too, "The art of thinking clearly" by Rolf Dobelli. Avril concluded her speech after describing several ways she finds it best to increase knowledge such as conceptualization, and challenging the audience to apply one of the methods over the next few weeks.
After the 15 minute break, the General Evaluator, Eugene, took control of the meeting via the virtual world of Zoom. The speech evaluators Luke, Jenny and Martin, gave their reviews and constructive feedback to the prepared speakers of the evening, and finally the officers reports were called upon. Maria declared the winner for the most-used crutch words throughout the night (aside from herself she states) was Brian, with 14 Ah's and 6 Um's. Frances humorously remarked that her word of the day was a complete flop but highlighted other creative use of language and imagery.
Finally, Christine presented her comparative study as part of her creative corner role. Luckily, she's agreed to share this piece with us here too:
Comparative Study
- Things Sonic the Hedgehog and King Henry VIII have in common: collecting gold rings.
- Things a ‘Love Island’ contestant would say and the first thing King Henry VIII might have said to each of his wives: “Can I pull you for a chat?”
- Inanimate things called ‘Lucille’ – B.B. King’s guitar/Neegan from The Walking Dead’s torture device.
- Some Bob Dylan lyrics and what a country mouse might say after moving to the town – “I was raised in the country, I’ve been working in the town, I’ve been in trouble ever since I set my suitcase down”.
- Things Morrissey and William Wordsworth have in common: a fondness for daffodils.
- Things an in1uencer and a member of Slipknot might say: “A lot of you have been asking how to achieve this look”.
- Philosophies The Ramones and Robin Hood live by: steal from the rich and give to the poor.
- Outlooks that Ice Cube and Robert Burns might have shared – one mews isn’t enough.
- Things Kate Bush and a long distance runner have in common: running up that hill with no problems.
- People with other realms in their closets: C.S. Lewis/Sabrina the Teenage Witch
- What Fr. Noel Furlong wrote in Fr. Ted and what Cleopatra might have written in her diary – “I really like Tony!”
- Places that are barren wastelands – Mordor/Tinder
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