Author Jonathan Clay
Photos Patsy Inouye
Well, this looks to be this reporter’s last article, but I thought that last time as well. One of the benefits on our Zoom world these days is that we can be halfway around the world, half naked, and still participating. Apparently, your reporter missed the fun at a previous meeting where Chuck Snipes took the “half naked” literally, stood up, and reveled less than a full outfit.
Speaking of standing up, the meeting commenced on-time with the usual singing. The reporter will note that John and Rose did a great rendition of a Gregorian Chant. This reporter thought we were supposed to all self-mute and let the professions like Chuck Snipes do the singing.
Hopefully, our singing prowess did not scare off our visitors. Elizabeth Ndungu joined us from half way around the world, while Frances McChesney and Barbara Philips Barrett joined us from closer to home. Meagan Like’s mom (and possibly grandma) joined us too.
Bob Poppenga introduced Aviyah, our would-be exchange student from Austria. Aviyah sent a very sweet note to the club after the meeting… a nice reminder of how great our Davis Club is.
From checking out the Zoom attendance record, it looks like we had 48 participants in the meeting. It is so great the level of participation that we have in our meetings. President Vanessa initiated a Zoom poll, something this reporter has not experienced before. This reporter wonders where this will lead… next thing will be Manny doing polls and fining people.
Larry Greene followed up the poll with Paul Harris Awards for Ken Firestein, David Foos and Chuck Snipes… Congrats! The Club has raised over $400,000 through the Paul Harris program – what an amazing accomplishment.
Lori Raineri took over at this point and did the Sergeant segment. Given the reporter was trying to multitask getting a small human ready to go to in-person school, things become a fuzzy at this point in the meeting. Clay Brandow gave happy bucks for something (most likely that the Postal Service is still delivering his postcards… our club’s version of Where’s Waldo), Tim Daleiden gave happy bucks while wearing a Polio t-shirt, Dick Bourne was Zooming in from Cape Cod and said some nice things about the reporter and ask for new reporters to sign up since this reporter has been deported to SoCal. Dave Murphy gave happy bucks because of a Recology Claw and the arrival of a 3rd grandchild. Gary Johns shared a harrowing tale of getting stuck in Shasta City while his wife had a hip replacement and met Mark Pratt’s brother… sounds about par for the course for 2020, a strange mix of bad and good.
Meagan Likes celebrated 10yrs of marriage, Lori Raineri showed off a pic of a dog in a bath, and Larry Greene had a close call with a car accident. The notes get even fuzzier at this point – seems that some half rate baseball team made the playoffs and Brian Sway was excited about this development. Seems that there might be some drug deals going on in the club… or something similar involving books and poetry, with David Copp, Irena Asmundson and Clay Brandow.
On a side note, the reporter seemed to see Patsy Inouye taking pictures of the Zoom call – could someone help the photographer out show them how to do screen shots?
At this point we transitioned to our speakers of the day, our very own Patsy, Meagan and David – the three musketeers of Africa! Unfortunately, this report had to sign off and drive a kiddo to in-person school at this point. There were definitely some benefits to distance learning, namely no crazy rushing around to prep for school and driving the kid to school. So this reporter will just imagine that Meagan, Patsy and David had a riveting presentation and will be hitting the Zoom Conference circus soon. That’s all!