• We gathered for conversation and fellowship prior to the official start of the meeting at 12:02 PM.
• David rang the bell to call the meeting to order.
• We welcomed our guests our speaker, Cindy Heath and Erin Smith, Assistant Director, Music Center
• Ernst Oidtmann played our Rotary Welcome song and The Fox Went Out on a Chilly Night.
• Joy Gobin lead us in the 4-Way...with the help of our members we got this done. 

• David Crandall and John Yacavone provide the jokes of the day that were all gardening theme related.
  • What do you call a country that grows on pink flowers?  Pink Carnation.
  • What do you get when you cross a 4-leaf clover with poison ivy? A rash of good luck.
  • Why did the scarecrow win the Nobel Prize? She was outstanding in her flield.
• Then it was off to the lunch buffet.
• David then introduced our speaker, Cindy Heath.  See story above.
• Announcements
  • Next weeks meeting will be at Service Credit Union.  DO NOT ARRIVE PRIOR TO 11:45.  We can't be in the meeting room until Phil can be with us.  Helper will be needed to set up and clean up the room.
  • David will be re-sending out the draft strategic plan with the agenda for next weeks meeting. Please read/re-read the document and come ready to discuss it at our meeting.
  • Bruce Bergeron stated we were well represented at the Enfield Flu Vaccine Clinic.  Over 200 vaccinations were administered. There are two more clinics to go...one in Orford and one at the Mascoma Health Clinic.  See info below.
  • Ron Bedell had the pleasure of presenting Bruce Bergeron his Paul Harris +5 pin.  Bruce is the newest member of our club to join the Paul Harris Society.

• Steve Whitman went to see Selling Kabul at Northern Stage.  He described it as moving story about Afghanistan after our troops withdrew from Afghanistan.  He had two more tickets he offered to our members for free.
• See Happy/Sad Dollars below.

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• Holiday Party

Ron Bedell sent out information about our holiday party which will be help at the Quechee Inn on TUESDAY, December 12, 2023 at 5:30 PM with our famous Yankee Swap! Please RSVP, Yes or No to r.j.bedell@comcast.net

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Queen of Hearts Draw

 

Phil Rentz pulled the 9 of hearts...We will continue to search for the Queen of  Hearts. 

 

Car Wash

 

Car Wash won by Rich Wallace

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Members at meeting:

Ron Bedell, Marilyn Bedell, Bruce Bergeron, Phil Bush* (tried to join by WebEx, but his link didn't work ), Dean Cashman, Hank Clarke. Dave Crandall, Jim Damren, Tim Guaraldi, Joy Gobin, Ahmad Haidari*, Ernst Oidtmann, Phil Rentz, Bill Secord, Rich Wallace, Steve Whitman, Cal Wolfe, John Yacavone

 

Guest: Cindy Heath, our speaker & Erin Smith, Upper Valley Music Center

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Projects and Fundraisers

 

• 2023 Flu Shot Clinics Can you help Ernst at the Mascoma Clinic?

 

2023 Public Health Council of the Upper Valley Vaccination Clinic Support

These are all walk-through clinics, so the work is much simpler. Volunteers help pass out clipboards and direct foot traffic through the clinic. Alice Ely alice.ely@uvpublichealth.org would like to have a few folks able to arrive about 45 minutes before the clinics open, but most volunteers would be able to leave by the end time (or earlier). We would need no more than 2 to 4 volunteers for each clinic, and I do have a few other sources for volunteers, so this is not all on you.

LOCATION	2-4 Volunteers Needed
Mascoma Community Health Center 18 Roberts Road, Canaan, NH Friday, October 27, 4 to 7 pm	Ernst Oidtmann     Dan Russell drussell@geokon.com

 

 

Ron and Marilyn Bedell at the Orford Flu Shot Clinic

• Next  Listen Dinner December 14 , 2022, (If we decide we want to continue making dinners. To be discussed at our strategic planning meeting.

 

ONLINE SIGN UP HAS BEEN DISCONTINUED.

 

Let Dean Cashman know if you can help and he can email Larry the names of members who will help at the dinner. 

 

We will talk about ongoing support for dinners at our Club Business meeting this month.

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• Polystyrene Recycling

Sustainable Lebanon is once again partnering with the Lebanon Rotary Club to offer a polystyrene (styrofoam) collection day on Saturday, October 28th, from 9-11am at 227 Mechanic Street in Lebanon (behind Jake’s Coffee). The event will take place rain or shine and is open to all members of the public. Can someone volunteer to drive one of the trucks to Gilford, NH? Let Phil Bush know if you can do this.

We will be collecting CLEAN rigid expanded polystyrene #6 (EPS) and #6 food service foam which will be driven to the Gilford, NH recycling facility. Examples of EPS include rigid packaging foam used for TVs and appliances as well as styrofoam coolers. Examples of food service foam include food containers, trays, cups, and egg cartons. It is IMPORTANT that all tape and labels be removed and all collected foam is clean, dry, and free of food residue or other debris.

For picture examples of accepted and not accepted foam, please view this flyer from the Gilford facility:
www.gilfordnh.org/file/2627/Flyer_-_GSWC_Foam_101.pdf

There is no fee to participate, but donations are welcome to support the costs associated with this and future Sustainable Lebanon events. Donations can be made at the event via cash or check (payable to Sustainable Lebanon), or online via the Sustainable Lebanon Facebook page. Thanks in advance for considering a donation! 

If you are finding yourself with too much foam between collections, please note that anyone is allowed to visit the public drop-off bin available at Gilford DPW, 55 Cherry Valley Road.

For more information and to volunteer, please contact Liane Avery: L99Liane@aol.com or call 860-556-3114.

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• Listen Holiday Baskets

Stay turned for info about Listen Holiday Basket Helper 2023.

 

As in past years, holiday basket sponsors will purchase gifts for children and seniors.  Each sponsor will purchase 3 warm winter clothing items and a $50 grocery gift card.  Other items to purchase will be optional .  Community members are also invited to donate their time to help assemble and distribute holiday baskets.  However we participate, Listen will be grateful for any help we can give them to bring cheer to Upper Valley families this holiday season.

 

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Now on to Golf and Brew Fest 2024

CHEERS!!

 

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• Time to order your Rotary Wear for Fall!

• Top Stitch Rotary Vests and Jackets 

   

John Yacavone has arranged for members to order light and heavier weight jackets and vest for us to wear when doing service projects...for days when our tees shirts just aren't enough to keep us comfortable and warm.

 

If you click the link below, Top Stitch has created a special website for Lebanon Rotary Club members to order the following clothing items.

 

1. Men’s and Women’s light weight jackets

2. Men’s and Women’s fleece vests

3. Men’s and Women’s fleece jackets

 

All jackets and vests will have Rotary Logo and club name.

 

Here is the link for the store: https://rotarycluboflebanonapparel2022.itemorder.com/shop/home/

 

Just pick your item and follow the instructions for ordering.  If you decide to pick up your item at Top Stitch located at 233 Mascoma Street Lebanon, NH 03766 there will be no charge for shipping, otherwise shipping will be charged.  If you have any questions about your order please contact Cody at Top Stitch at 603-448-2931.  Turn around time is 3.5 - 4 weeks.  Once you place your order your order will be processed no waiting on other orders to be fulfilled.

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A new anthology of crime fiction raises funds for polio eradication

By Etelka Lehoczky

The cover of ‘An Unnecessary Assassin,’ a collection of crime fiction sold to raise money for polio eradication.

A former librarian who regularly attends crime-writing festivals, Stevens knew her friend was right. This was something she could do. She began asking authors she knew to donate stories for the book. Her first recruit was David Penny, the author of a well-regarded series of historical mysteries. He was eager to fight polio.

“Growing up in Wales in the ’50s, polio was a major issue for us,” Penny says. “This was just prior to the vaccine coming out, and it was pretty much everywhere. As a kid of six or seven, it was always on your mind. I knew people who were in leg braces or iron lungs — or who died from the disease. That stays with you. It becomes almost an embedded fear in you.”

Penny helped Stevens assemble a diverse group of short stories and arranged to self-publish the book using Amazon’s print-on-demand program. The pair were excited to receive two submissions specifically about polio. Gerralyn Ingram, who writes under the name G.L. Waring, used her story to channel her anger at both vaccine deniers and arrogant doctors. A former pediatric nurse, Ingram based the villain of “It Takes Three Drops” on doctors she’d encountered.

“They think they know everything, and their opinion is the only opinion that counts,” she says. “In the story, basically, here’s a doctor who thinks he’s God… [and] who doesn’t think that a woman can be equally as qualified and actually know better.”

Among the book’s highlights are stories by Ann Cleeves and Lee Child. Cleeves’ contribution, “The Habit of Silence,” is a detective story set in a distinguished library. In Child’s “Safe Enough,” a contractor working on a suburban lot begins stalking the lot’s previous owner. Child interweaves his menacing tale with a critique of economic policies that hurt the working class.

Other stories feature a wide range of situations. Chris McGeorge’s “Box” is a locked-room mystery set in a glass box 820 feet (250 meters) underwater. Robert Scragg’s “Revenge is Best Served Hot” and F.D. Quinn’s “Best Served Cold” each give a culinary twist to crime. Judith O’Reilly’s “A Face for Murder” combines a whodunit with a satire of YouTube makeup tutorials.

Penny was delighted by the diversity of the stories.

“You don’t want all the same thing,” he says. “There’s some funny stories, and there’s some poignant ones in there.”

Penny’s own contribution, written as DG Penny, was based on an idea he’d been thinking about for several years: What are the consequences of trying to do the right thing? In “Drive By,” Penny’s protagonist tries to protect a victim of human trafficking and soon comes to regret it.

“An Unnecessary Assassin” also includes two poems. That’s unusual for a crime anthology, but one of them further cements the book’s link to polio. In “Surviving Relations,” Jim Taylor describes a man who had polio as a child and now embraces a succession of dangerous pastimes. “He would never run. It didn’t stop him doing what he wanted,” Taylor writes. “Look him in the eyes, and he would look straight back, unwavering.”

The anthology also references polio in its cover art, which is shaded purple, and in an afterword explaining the significance of the color. It’s what is used to tint children’s fingers at mass vaccination events to show that they’ve received the vaccine. The title refers to the fact that polio is preventable with a vaccine.

“We came up with all sorts of different ideas. There were probably over a dozen potential titles,” Penny says. “This one won because of the alliteration.”

The book is available in paperback and Kindle formats on Amazon. Stevens has also sold it at Rotary club meetings and crime-writing festivals all over Great Britain. It’s raised more than US$3,000 so far, and its proceeds will be matched 2-to-1 by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

“The phrase ‘An Unnecessary Assassin’ kind of sums up the thing,” Penny says. “Polio is totally an avoidable disease, provided there is enough money to immunize each child.”

Purchase “An Unnecessary Assassin.”

Visit endpolio.org to find videos and other content about the global effort to eradicate polio.

- October 2023

World Polio Day

24 October is World Polio Day, a global day to raise awareness and resources for the worldwide effort to eradicate polio.  Communities, Rotarians, civil society, governments and partners around the world are organizing events to mark the occasion and draw attention to the opportunity to rid the world of an infectious disease once and for all, including at a special event at WHO’s European Regional Office with keynote speakers from partners and the Global Certification Commission for Polio Eradication.

On 21-22 October, Rotarians and WHO are meeting to examine how their joint collaboration on polio eradication can be applied to broader public health efforts, at an event called:  World Polio Day and Beyond:  a healthier future for mothers and children.  Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and Rotary International President for 2022-2023 Jennifer Jones will discuss the work the two organizations have done together for decades to eradicate polio and how they will continue to work together on a healthier future for mothers and children