For a bunch of ferals we are doing pretty darn well at the moment and I am so excited to have our Inbound Exchange Student Maria flying into Oz this Thursday.
It is hard to believe that after all these post Covid years of not being able to run the Youth Exchange program that we are finally in a position to not only have sent an Outbound student in Lexi but welcome Maria to Warrnambool as an Inbound. Huge thanks to our Youth Director Greg has worked tirelessly to arrange this and will have to continue to work hard as he is required to pick Maria up from her flight at 5.25 AM!!!!!!! on Thursday morning.
Just a reminder ( around about the fifth I think) could all members please update their Working With Children Card prior to Maria attending her first meeting on the 5th March. This is really important so please GET IT DONE!
Looking forward to the Trivia Night this Friday night at the Warrnambool Tennis Club rooms commencing at 6.15pm. Thanks to Ian for all his hard work and looking forward to hearing the soft and sexy dulcet tones of our very own Jon Vertigan as our quizmaster.
Bob McMillan has been hard at it organising the Community Raffle which is about to kick off in the next couple of weeks. This raffle injects around $40,000.00 into community groups throughout the Southwest and I urge you to start talking to any charity/group that may wish to sell some tickets.
Finally, I attended “Wunta” on Liebig on Friday night! I thought was a huge success with great food, great music and everyone I spoke to seemed thrilled to have “Wunta” back and hopefully see it become even bigger next year. Our very own Sam Baulch was our club’s only volunteer so a big thanks to Sam for representing the ferals on the night. Maybe next year we arrange for a bit more support.
Some people believe in medical miracles. For example, it is common for people with terminal illnesses to visit the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes in France seeking a divine, miraculous cure. A group of researchers studied seriously ill people who sought miracles in Lourdes, and compared their survival to people with similar medical conditions who did not visit Lourdes, to discover what level of miracles was being achieved. They found that people visiting Lourdes had a slightly worse survival rate than those who did not visit Lourdes (the difference was attributed to the physical effort of seriously ill people visiting the remote location).
A similar rate of divine miracles was observed at the consecration of Bishop Lowrey. Several attendees collapsed during the ceremony and were only revived by the more temporal assistance provided by the St John's Ambulance volunteers. Pip noted this was surprising because they were in St Paul's at the time. Fortunately Boré was there to witness God working in mysterious ways.
We thank Boré for another wonderful cartoon.
Minutes
Attendance: Nooka advised that ‘I reckon we have about 22’ members in attendance. We did too until the Bishop turned up with his lovely daughter Celia.
Meal: Schnitzel, chips and salad.
Sarg. David Jelie kicked off proceedings by introducing President Matt. Matt observed we have 55-60 booked in for the trivia night so we are only looking for a few more numbers.
In reports;
Tony D gave us an update on the nearly completed pharmaceutical blister pack project.
Greg advised that Maria’s visa application is all in order now (thanks Greg), and hopefully she will be here in the next month or two.
Bono asked all members not to vote for him at the upcoming presidential elections at the Annual General Meeting. You can vote for whomever you prefer, but there will be only one name on the ballot, North Korea style. Voting is compulsory.
Brendan also advised that board positions are ‘filling fast’. If you would like to join the board, for example as environment director, talk to Bono.
Bishop Lowrey thanked Brendan for making his Pilgrim Staff. Scott also spoke about his cross, which was hand made by Chris Howe from locally cast brass and recovered blacksmith-made nails. The cross was donated to Scott by Christine Howe.
David Jellie told two excellent ecclesiastical jokes. The meeting concluded with a lively fines from the floor session before Les’ number was pulled out of the barrel scoring him a free seniors’ schnitzel and gravy.
This is a photo I have saved in our ClubRunner image file with the simple title ‘The Bishop and KY Jelly’. Hopefully this is what people now get when they Google this exact phrase.
Brendon does amazing work with timber. Your correspondent has the fortune of owning the chess table he constructed and can attest to Bono’s incredible workmanship. However, I must say this ‘pick up a tree branch and cut the ends off’ technique to create Bishop Lowrey’s staff is about at my level of woodworking skills.
Bishop’s Pew.
This week we got to see Bishop Lowrey's hand crafted pilgrims’ staff, cross, and elaborate custom garments. Readers are not doubt asking themselves what bespoke, hand carved artifact is provide to the Bishop as an appropriate ecclesiastical throne? Fortunately Lew brings us this timely update.
Shark Photobombs RC of Warrnambool Daybreak.
The Rotary Club of Warrnambool Daybreak posted this photo on their Facebook page of some Rotarians boxing up pharmaceutical blister packs last week. Eagle eyed readers will be pleased to see our shark billycart making a sneaky little appearance. We are about to be joined by another motor-racing fanatic Brazilian exchange student, so it may be time to dust of the shark and give it another run. I believe the last time it ran competitively it nearly killed our previous Brazilian exchange student.
The second most famous bishop in Warrnambool.
Hi Tony.
While we are all celebrating Scott’s ascension to the position of Bishop, in Warrnambool we celebrate the birthday of bishop St Nicholas every year at around 5th of December. Sinterklaas is the Dutch version of Santa Claus but with a different story. He is said to arrive from Spain by boat, rides a white horse that can walk on roof tops, and leaves presents in children’s shoes that they leave overnight in front of the chimney on December 5th, accompanied by his helper “Zwarte Piet”( Black Pete), who traditionally has a black face due to the chimney soot; this aspect of the tradition is currently being debated for its racial connotations. Sinterklaas is based on a legendary figure called St. Nicholas, the bishop of Myra (Turkey) and patron saint of children.
These photos show Sinterklaas giving presents to children who have been “good”. As our club at times demonstrates some feral and childlike behaviour, I could ask him to visit the Rotary Club of Warrnambool Central when he visits Warrnambool, to deliver some punishment with the “rod” for the bad ones and handing out some candy for the good ones.
Cheers
Boré
Traditional Dutch Christmas celebration.
It is difficult to know what is more inappropriate;
Sinterklaas wearing desert boots or his assistant in black face.
You know it is only a matter of time.
Rotary Horse Racing report.
Last week we farewelled Overflow Miss, our mediocre equine conveyance who paraded Wilde Racing’s alternative green and white strip with pom pom around Victorian country racetracks with metronomic consistency. This week Chipilly stepped out again, sporting the now familiar green and white strip with pom pom in a moving tribute to Overflow Miss.
Punters backed Chipilly into favourate. They just love any horse connected to us. Chipilly was also tipped to win by the two experts on Racing.com. Surely our luck was changing. This was our chance to put past disappointments behind us and get back on the winner’s dais.
Chipilly got away poorly, another moving tribute to Overflow Miss, but then rapidly made up ground to settle mid-field for the trip. As they entered the home straight two horses got well clear of the field and were never challenged. Chipilly battled on to finish fifth and never looked likely. It was like Overflow Miss had never left us. Warrnambool Central Racing could sit Andre the Giant on a Shetland pony at the moment and punters would back it into favourite.
More exciting updates as they come to hand.
Ten Thousand Years Ago
Our club has a lot of Melbourne supporters and a lot of Essendon supporters. This week Lew sends us old photo for us to reminisce. It seems to be a photo of happy customers from Max Gawn’s barber, but Lew has a different explanation.
This year Essendon has Melbourne’s first round draft pick (they also have St Kilda’s second round pick). No doubt Melbourne supporters will be celebrating every Essendon loss this year, but rest assured the Central Spoke will be celebrating every Melbourne loss with fellow Essendon supporters. Bring on season 2025!
Thirty Three Years Ago.
Matt kindly sends us this snap of young INXS fan, Jon Vertigan, at his first job in radio in Swan Hill in 1992. We will have to explain to our younger readers what that thing in his hand is.
