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Tomorrow’s meeting:
Steven Sedlock and Christin Greven, Herson-Wagner Funeral Home: “What to Know When Pre-Planning Your Final Wishes” March 6, 2019 This past week, the gavel was in the hands of Jean McPheeters, as President Mary Berens was still overseas. Jean opened with the Four-Way Test.
The Thought for the Day was given by Mary Beth Bunge, and fitting with her proclivity towards anything with a theatrical theme, Mary Beth shared three quotes: “I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being.” — Thornton Wilder
“If you want to help American theatre, don't be an actress, be an audience.” — Tallulah Bankhead
“The theater is a great equalizer: it is the only place where the poor can look down on the rich” — Will Rogers  Being the first meeting of the month (yes, it’s March already!), birthdays and Club anniversaries were celebrated. Hosts introduced invited guests, and everyone welcomed visiting Rotarians Evan and Tracy Kurtz from the Dryden Rotary Club, and Justinas Stanlius from Vilnius, Lithuania. Justinas has previously attended our club, and this time won the red ticket drawing, a set of four Lake Champlain Chocolate bars! (Note that the fine chocolate was snuck in when President Mary was far away!)
 As well as being a month with a first Wednesday, March is Women’s History Month (for all its Wednesdays) and to celebrate Jean McPheeters dusted off the Rotary meeting tradition of “Word of The Day.” In this spirit, Jean had worn an “integument” (natural covering) — in this case a t-shirt illustrated with Super Diva RBG showing fist and muscle in the style of Rosie the Riveter.
Also, in recognition of Ithaca's 21st Annual Adult Spelling Bee held on March 3, 2019, Jean called on Jeff True, who had been the word pronouncer and definer for the event. Jeff held a one word spelling bee with the word “Gnathonic” (with a silent “G,” meaning sycophantic or toadying). Rob Mckenzie spelt it right for an A+!
The 2019 Mac ’n Cheese Bowl is coming up on Saturday, March 23, and Heidi Goldstein is organizing Rotary volunteers to help with the event. A clipboard was circulated for sign-ups. Here are the event details: - Mac ’n Cheese Bowl, hosted by Foodnet Meals on Wheels
- March 23, 2019, 11:30 a.m.–2:00 p.m., Ithaca High School Cafeteria
- Tickets: Advance sales are $10 each, $8 for children age 5-12. Purchase at the door, add $2.
 Visiting Rotarian Justinas Stanlius reminded the group that the International Service Committee is collecting Windows laptops for an overseas computer classroom. Here are details for this activity:
- Have your machine picked up: Our contact is Justinas at Cornell's Kahin Center. Call or write to Justinas and he will make arrangements to pick up your machine. j.stankus@gmail.com or (607) 379-7049.
- Deliver your laptop: Drop-off the laptop at Justinas' office at Cornell's Kahin Center, 640 Stewart Ave, Ithaca. If he's not there, please feel free to walk in and leave it on the desk in the meeting room immediately to the left.
- Before you donate: Please wipe the hard drive clean before you release it (what? wipe it with a cloth?!) Go to this website, What to do before selling your old [Windows] PC, for full instructions on how to safely delete your personal data.
 Happy Dollars!
Frank Towner is going to be a grandfather for the first time. June Losurdo’s son, a college senior, is on spring break for the last time. Joe Giordino gave tribute to New Roots School for preparing his daughter for her first job — she recently started with Cayuga Medical Center. And Jean spoke about her Hawaii vacation, the last of the 50 states that her husband wanted to visit.
Do you know someone who would host an exchange student? The Youth Exchange Committee is always looking for good host families. Please let Marshall McCormick (marshall@fingerlakeswm.com) or Linda Brisson (ithacarotaryYEO@gmail.com) know if you have any suggestions.
 Catrina Decker introduced Elise Steele, Executive Director of Community Faith Partners (CFP), a local faith-based nonprofit organization with the mission of “Uniting Christians to meet the needs of our community.” Since 2008, CFP has held a coordinated work day called Care Day almost every spring and fall. On any given Care Day there are approximately 90 volunteers, more than 100 worksites arranged, and participation from more than 20 churches.
Care Day projects tend to be those that would normally “fall through the cracks,” and often completed within 4 hours. The examples Elise cited included renovating bathrooms for handicap accessibility, building a wheelchair ramp, repairing roofs, installing new exterior doors, building cottages at Second Wind, cleaning up the Jungle, and painting a section of a house.
 Community Faith Partners facilitates Holistic Hardware life-skills training classes to individuals who are incarcerated at the county jail, who utilize services provided by Cayuga Addiction Recovery Services (CARS), and /or use the services for the homeless. The course curriculum centers on tools for a successful life including vision, responsibility, self-esteem, faith, love, discipline, association, and planning.
For our community homeless, CFP was a catalyst for Second Wind Cottages (SWC). On a November 2013 Care Day, 150 volunteers from 30-40 churches came out to build the first 6 cottage structures. Now SWC is its own organization with 18 cottages.
CFP also collaborates with the Ithaca Homeless Crisis (IHC) team which is made up of local residents with the goals of “raising awareness and funds for Ithaca's homeless community.”
Rotarians may learn more about or sign up for CFP’s upcoming Care Day, scheduled for Saturday, May 4th from 8:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. by going to their website: communityfaithpartners.org.
Ambassadors: None
Visiting Rotarians: Evan & Tracy Kurtz from the Dryden Rotary Club & Justinas Stanlius from Vilnius, Lithuania
Students: None
Workers:
• Greeter, Catrina Decker
• Kettle, Matt Forney
• Thought for the Day, Mary Beth Bunge
• Introductions, Rotary hosts introduced their guests
Set-Up: Joe Giordano, Ron Provus, Dale Flinn, Steve Martin, & Steve Johnson
Bulletin Reporter: Gail Lyman
Photographer: Mike Brown
Bulletin Editor: Ted Schiele
Club Service Facilitators, Beverly Baker & Jeff True
Sunshine Chair, Kellyann O’Mara
Exchange student Madeline Turner’s blog, Ithaca to India, documenting her 2018-2019 experience with host Vapi Riverside Rotary Club in District 3060, India.
March 13, 2019
Coltivare, S. Cayuga at Clinton St., Downtown Ithaca
Steven Sedlock and Christin Greven, Herson-Wagner Funeral Home: “What to Know When Pre-Planning Your Final Wishes”
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