Northwind April 7, 2011

MEETING TO ORDER:    Marlene called the meeting to order at 12:30 and led us in the Pledge of Allegiance. Rick gave the invocation.
 
VISITING ROTARIANS:  Sue Sharpe - Bellingham Bay; George Tsakumis - Vancouver; Peter Self - Bellingham.
 
GUESTS: None
 
BIRTHDAYS & ANNIVERSARIES:  Julie - March 31; Winton - April 1
 
RETURNING ROTARIANS: Rome is returning from Arizona
 
ANNOUNCMENTS: (1) Laurie - Saturday is District Assembly; (2) Rotary District Conference in May 5^th - 8^th in Canada; (3) Tim V discussed the Youth Fair this weekend; (4) Tim V also said that there would be a final auction meeting in a week or so; (5) April 14^th will be the GSE team from Ireland; (6) Dick Donahue said that plans for the new club are coming along; (7) We received a thank you note from the folks from Bellingham Technical College; (8) Youth Service Awards will be May 19^th.
 
NEW MEMBER INDUCTION AND PERMANENT BADGES PASSED OUT: Bill Grace introduced our newest member, Derrick Thornton, Branch Manager for Banner Bank. Ray was Derrick's sponsor into the club. Way to go Ray. Bill also passed out permanent member badges to Jim Blaney, Jim Sands and Rocky Richardson. Congratulations all!!!
 
HAPPY BUCKS:   Marlene - Happy for 32 years of marriage; Brian Finnegan passed along $200 from Les Sealey for some great legal work performed by Greg Thulin for which he didn't charge Les anything; Tim V $2 happy for the Career Fair and Tyler's great efforts; Scott Wallace and happy about Bill Grace's expert assistance in helping him finish a deck; Rome was $2 happy about folks at the Mesa Arizona airport who pitched in and helped a mom with a handful of kids and stuff; Bill Grace was happy to help Scott, for Derrick as a new member, a great Career Fair outcome and being able to take leftovers to the Lighthouse Mission; Maureen was $2 happy for the Career Fair and for Derrick coming into the club; Paul was $2 happy for the Career Fair and a successful Florida skydiving trip; Jerry Landcastle was waiting to be happy over some surgery he is recovering from; Ray was happy about the Career Fair, the Youth Fair and Derrick coming into the club; Laurie was sad that her father-in-law passed away; Stan gave $10 for some survivors in his pond that he thought were completely wiped out; Dan Parsons was $10 happy for his participation in the Friday Trivia B for the Literacy Council; Jim Sands was happy about some beef I believe, needing to leave early and for Derrick as a new member; Dick Donahue was a few dollars happy for a trip including visits to Orlando, St Thomas and St Kitts; Chuck Tull $2 happy for 2 weeks in Arizona and a week with his granddaughter in San Francisco; Maureen was happy for Derrick coming into the club.
 
FINEMASTER:     Scott Wallace was the finemaster. Brian Finnegan $2 just because. $2 for those eating more than 1 cookie. $2 for anyone wearing a tie. $10 for anyone texting while driving and $20 for anyone web surfing while driving. $1 for those who didn't help at the Career Fair. Norm was tagged for $5 for not announcing an award received by Brambleberry. Jake then piped up and paid in $50 to get the hook to get Scott to end his session.
 
QUICK AUCTION: Gary Tomsic auctioned off some Mt Baker ski passes to Sue Sharpe and Sharon Robinson.
 
BANNERS: Banners with maps of states and provinces. Nice Stan.
 
PROGRAM: Don Easterbrook was our speaker introduced by Sharon Robinson. Don is 4^th generation Whatcom County and a retired WWU professor of Geology whose topic today was Global/Climate Change. He said that 2010 was the 2^nd coldest year other than 1659 for records being kept. The global warming issue is wrapped up too much in politics. Cooling will actually exist for the next 25-30 years. In the last century there have been 4 changes - 2 warm cycles and 2 cold cycles. 1934 was the warmest year in the last century and 1998 was the 2^nd warmest year. Glaciers melt and this is expected. This is not a phenomenon. The Co2 issue is not tied to melting glaciers. Regarding polar bears, there were ~5,000 in 1970 and there are ~25,000 today. Go figure. To get the Antarctic Ice Sheet to melt the temperature would have to increase by over 100 degrees. Don said that Co2 is incapable of causing climate changes. He reiterated that folks need to follow the science and be wary of the manipulations that have and are continuing to go on with climate data. He also said that researchers are somewhat influenced by grant money provided to find more Co2 issues, and this causes results in many cases to be skewed. Thanks to Don for sharing his years of knowledge and experience with us. 
 
DRAWINGS: Stan was unlucky in drawing the Seven of Hearts.