President’s Piffle

I am finding it is enjoyable to be a Melbourne supporter this week! It may be a fleeting moment, but enjoyable none the less.

Our Club contributes to Shelterbox each year, and I enclose a snippet from Rotary eNews about Lombok:

 “I can advise ShelterBox has a Response Team in Indonesia, working with local government and local Rotarians.  The Rotary support is being led by Past Governors Eva Kurniarty and Al Purwa.  Together, we are delivering aid to families in Lombok who have lost entire homes and we hope to be able to add to this with tents and tarpaulins.  This aid will assist local families to start to rebuild their lives.  On the ground, Rotary teams will be helping our ShelterBox Response Team to deliver relief to those families in desperate need”.

This continues to be a worthy International project.

Cheers

Lew

Minutes

Robbo reports;

Immediate past President, the Very Vindictive Philip Ritchie, took great delight in noting a relatively light yarding of 27 members, one visiting Rotarian namely Tim McLeod from Warrnambool East, and one club guest namely Leah from France. But those in attendance were treated to a delightful cheesy chicken vol- au- vent with a simple fresh salad, and some very tasty chicken chips which diners were free to leave if they wished. Although this correspondent does not have French Fast Facts under his purview, members will no doubt be fascinated to learn that the pastry and its catchy name originated in Paris, and are generally credited to Antonin Careme. However, mention of a vol-au-vent is made in François Marin’s 1713 cookbook Les Dons de Comus years before Careme’s birth, so who knows? In France, it is usually served as an appetiser or a small snack, filled with chicken or fish. In Belgium, it is a common main dish that can be found on the menus of most restaurants, and is nearly always filled with a combination of chicken, mushrooms and small meatballs, served with either mashed potatoes or fries. Our man has clearly been trained abroad, knowing that fries were the correct accompaniment.

Malcolm MacPherson reported that six members of the somewhat larger auction committee met last night, and will shortly be chasing for auction items. One of our new members Peter Ward was so keen he had to be restrained, so watch out! The next meeting is on the 20^th September at Brendon O'Neill's place.

Bob McMillan reported that he is still leading the footie tipping. Bruce has now moved up to equal leader on 132, with Sam and Dicko on 131.

Leah met all of the other District Exchange Students at Horsham on the weekend and was delighted to find there is another French boy who acted as "my translator". You don't need one Leah. Your English is good, and getting better. Excellent that you get up and give us your reports. She is registering with Aqua zone, and was heading off after our meeting to go riding with Pip and Jill. Several members asked her to take photographs once Pip has come off. Meantime Janick had attended another Rotary Club meeting the night before, and so wasn't at our meeting. He was also in Horsham on Sunday, is kicking and marking the Australian Rules Football beautifully, and enjoyed soccer with a bunch of professionals (that is, doctors, optometrists et cetera… not football professionals) last Monday night. He pulled up untroubled, unlike this correspondent who has added a hamstring from soccer to his strained quad from kicking the footy. Hosting exchange students can prove dangerous.

We enjoyed some nice O'Brien time, followed by an eclectic sporting fines session by Dillo, and a brief motoring report at the insistence of the President.

Janick's weekend.