Wouldn’t it be loverly – 18 August 2020

Chairperson Jacqui’s theme of “Wouldn’t it be loverly” struck a chord with everyone at our meeting, with lots of laughter and interaction.

Despite the Covid restrictions, it was a warm, friendly and interesting meeting. Grammarian Peter’s word of the day “gobbledegook” was used so many times he lost track and the winner Darrell received his prize for using it the most – a lemon.

Paul in Speech 1 used storytelling to explain the founding of Toastmasters by a boy named Ralph. Evaluator Johanna praised Paul’s use of structure which allowed the connection with the characters in the story.

Speech 2 by Dave was a classic icebreaker. Dave used the theme of explaining what three words meant to him – travel, holidays and trips. Evaluator Ian said it was very thought-provoking and he might use that idea in his next speech.

Ron followed up his previous speech with “Guarding your castle”, opening with “We live in weird times! What are you going to do about it?” He then went on to explain what we needed to do to protect ourselves, our households and our community in times of crisis and emergency. Evaluator Darrell compared this speech to Ron’s previous speech and went through each point explaining what had changed or improved. Ron is modelling his PERT gear in the photo above!

Gary ran table topics with the theme “positive, optimistic, all things non-Covid”. He said it was time he got revenge on some speakers and duly provided topics they could work with. Evaluator Dale said it was a positive, upbeat session. Best Table Topics award went to Johanna.

Our Area Director, Pauline Cook, introduced herself and explained her Toastmasters journey and role of area director. She also made some announcements and gave us the latest news.

General Evaluator Gary praised Jacqui for chairing a professional meeting considering all the changes that occurred. He complimented all the evaluators and awarded Johanna the Best Evaluator, and Paul the Best Speaker.