Written by Patrick Hart
Tom Zengeler opened this week’s meeting with a pledge and a prayer, but we once again went without a song.
BRAGS:
Elliott Pinsel shared his joy this week that his whole family will be home for Thanksgiving this year.
Ron Lapin bragged that he had just spent three weeks in Florida celebrating his seventh wedding anniversary.
A couple of his fellow Rotarians bragged on behalf of John McDonald who was too shy to speak out on his own behalf. It sounds like John was very instrumental in raising $47,000.00 for a Rotary project to help preschools in Africa.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
There will be a Zoom meeting on the winter fundraiser on November 30 at 6:00 p.m.
Elliott has announced that he has gotten promises of more than 400 gifts to the needy this year.
Jeff Harger informed the club that the township food pantry gave out fewer turkey dinners for Thanksgiving this year than usual, but they are expecting a larger crowd at Christmas, and he is still looking for donations at $45.00 a basket to help support this project.
Tom Miller reported that we are still working on the club’s effort to reach out to young adults. Tom again expressed hope that these youthful folks will want to volunteer for club service projects.
Tom Zengeler said we received a certificate from the district governor in recognition of our contribution to End Polio Now.
FUN AND FROLICS:
Bob Zamor conducted a word unscrambling game with a Thanksgiving theme. It was very educational, since I learned that there are online programs for unscrambling words, which some of our members visited to help them do well in this contest. I guess you can find anything on the internet, if you are willing to look.
PROGRAM:
Our speaker this week was our own Robin O’Connor, the clerk of Lake County who provided us an update on how the recent election had looked from the perspective of those responsible for counting the vote.
Lake County had a record turnout of voters in our recent election, which included approximately 100,000 more people voting by mail than before. Unlike some counties Lake County does not have the equipment to do an automated count of votes by mail, and they all had to be counted by hand. Some people were disappointed by the delay, especially the candidates who were anxious to find out if they had won.
One challenge in counting the ballots quickly was that most of the election judges are retired, and wanting a larger pool to tap to get the job done, Robin recruited a number of nighttime or weekend judges, who could work around their full time jobs in helping to get the job done.
Robin is hoping to have mail counting automated by the time of the next election. The equipment she needs will cost approximately $600,000.00 and she is looking for grants to pay this price.
RAFFLE:
This week we had $22.00 in our regular drawing and $154.00 in the progressive pot with 47 cards remaining. Elliott Pinsel’s ticket came up first, but since he had left early several people insisted that he take the cards, which he lost at. John McDonald then won the daily prize.
WHEEL TIME:
Our sergeant at arms wanted to make Bill Taranowski spin the wheel for overlooking his responsibilities for Fun & Frolics two weeks ago. However, no one knew how to spin the wheel over Zoom, so Ron Lapin just imposed a $10.00 fine on Bill.
NEXT WEEK:
Greeter and Prayer: Tucker Olson
Fun and Frolics: Scott Adams
QUOTE FOR THE DAY:
“Not what we say about our blessings, but how we use them, is the true measure of our thanksgiving.” – W.T. Purkiser
