The Last Rose of Summer

Triskelion Toastmasters
Meeting Minutes
9-18-08
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After a great turnout last week, attendance was down again. Only five members and one guest showed up. Our guest was Suzanne. She recently returned to work for Shaw and wanted to see what Toastmasters was all about. It turned out to be a great little meeting as witnessed here:

Our Toastmaster, Don Lyman, kicked things off with a poem recital:

The Last Rose of Summer

'Tis the last rose of summer

Left blooming alone;
All her lovely companions
Are faded and gone;
No flower of her kindred,
No rosebud is nigh,
To reflect back her blushes,
To give sigh for sigh.

I'll not leave thee, thou lone one!
To pine on the stem;
Since the lovely are sleeping,
Go, sleep thou with them.
Thus kindly I scatter,
Thy leaves o'er the bed,
Where thy mates of the garden
Lie scentless and dead.

So soon may I follow,
When friendships decay,
From Love's shining circle
The gems drop away.
When true hearts lie withered
And fond ones are flown,
Oh! who would inhabit,
This bleak world alone?
Thomas Moore

Speaker
Eric Wales gave his fifth speech from the CC manual -- Your Body Speaks. Eric is a full time commercial real estate investor who began his career nearly 10 years ago. He began investing in single family homes, and roughly 4 years ago transitioned into commercial properties. Each day he become more passionate about this new found love and enjoys the hunt.

Eric's speech was titled "How to Identify A Commercial Real Estate Opportunity." He gave us some great advice:

• Locate a mentor
• Get educated
• Surround yourself with who know more than you
• Tell everyone you are a commercial real estate investor
• Meet every real estate agent you can
• Learn how to evaluate properties
• Have at least one lawyer on the team
• After following these steps, do it all again

Evaluator
Gary Fuller evaluated Eric's speech. In keeping with the goal of this speech, he observed that Eric's eye contact engaged everyone in the audience and Eric's use of hand gestures was excellent. Gary advised us that a speaker should move around and not be tied to the lectern. He also stated that in order to enunciate in the English language one should loosen the mouth.

Gary's general evaluation of the meeting was that attendance was low. It is the Toastmaster's job to do the best he can to encourage participation in the meeting. To that end, please bring a guest to the meeting next week!

Word of the Day
Our word of the day was "sublime".

1. Not to be excelled; supreme; majestic.
2. Causing deep emotions and feelings of wonder or joy
3. Of great moral, artistic, or spiritual value

Usage: Starting in 1980 Gary Larson became known the world over for giving us glimpses into sublime genius, with a liberal sprinkling of cows.

Quote: One step above the sublime, makes the ridiculous; and one step above the ridiculous, makes the sublime again. —Paine,Thomas

Table Topics
Our Table Topic Master for this week was Eric Peterson. His question for each of us: "Tell us about an amusing or interesting story from your school days."

Dan Pratt won table topics with a funny story about the time he tried to take ice to school for show-and-tell. As the ice sat in his sack lunch, he wished that it would have sublimated rather than what it did do in the warm classroom.

Roles for September 25, 2008
ToastMaster - Eric Peterson
Speaker 1 - Open
Speaker 2 - Open
Evaluator 1 - Dan Pratt*
Evaluator 2 - Open
General Evalutor - Open
Table Topics - Dan Pratt*
Timer - Open
Grammarian/Ah Counter - Open

Please sign up for a role by sending email to Eric!
Good meeting.
See you next week.