We Had a Busy Day Today

Where to start... well, let's begin at the beginning and see where it leads us.  For the Governor's visit, we moved back to our old haunts at City Hall (yes, dear reader, we're back at the Spaghetti Factory next week.)

 

 

  President Brett had taken a day off from fatherly duties and led the traditional bored meeting before the real meeting and when the real meeting began, we almost had our designated greeter, Ray Wyatt, at the door. 

 

 

Paul Schubert was tasked with reading the 4 Way Test from the slide, a job he has perfected since completing that remedial reading course he signed up for last summer.  Well done.  Jerry Smuts was the designated pledge leader but was not in attendance, so the job went to Ross MacCarty, who did a fine job.  Song leader?  Gary Spainhower had not yet made his appearance, so President Brett called on Ray Wyatt's dulcet tones to lead us in God Bless America and Ray once again excelled at his assignment.

 

 

  The quote for the day came from Babe Ruth, who once apparently said, "When you come to a fork in the road, take it..."  (Yogi stole it from him...)

 

With the conclusion of the preliminaries, the Club and its guests sat down to a fine repast of roast chicken and baked beans, with salad and trimmings, including 'punkin pie' with whipped cream. 

 

 

Another terrific meal by Dave and Jan. 

 

 

Naturally, any president worth his stripes can't allow amicable conversation go on too long and so Brett got up after a few minutes and threw up.... some announcements on the screen, including the one where he reminds everyone that we have the District Governor visiting today (duh...)  See the pic to suss out any announcements you may be interested in.  

 

 

Of course, following said announcements it was time for the weekly drawing and this week's pot almost went to Bob Adam, whose number was drawn by DG Sandy.  Sadly for Bob, the $193 continued on its merry way, waiting for Ray Wyatt to show up at a future meeting and stake his claim.

 

 

 

 Oh crap...

 

Under the heading of "I Love It When a Plan Comes Together", we were treated to surprise Sarge Ross Johnson, aided by bagman Paul Schubert, who lightened more than a few wallets today.  (I understand that Ross was just as surprised as anyone in the room.)  Paul was the first to get nicked when, surprise of surprises, he had been out in public without his Rotary pin!  Sergeant Ross chipped in when he related that his son and his unit had deployed to Afghanistan.  We all join Ross in wishing him Godspeed.  Next Clarence was identified as a proud alumnus of Marshall University whose football team had to overcome a lot of CTE to triumph this past weekend over a team from a local car repair chain.  The Sarge then adeptly noted that both Ross MacCarty and Marvelene Weier were late to the meeting, and always the gentleman, Ross paid for half of Marvelene's fine.  What a .... guy...  Brud was next on the hit parade, noting that one of his daughters who lives in Napa had one of her houses burn in the recent fires in that area of the state.  It turns out that Neil Orchard graduated from elementary/high/reform school 60 years ago and had recently attended his class reunion.  Next Bob Adam volunteered that he had attended a reunion of his medical school class over in Sonoma (and probably not a day too soon, given the recent events there.) 

 

 

Merlin was next to donate, followed by Steve Forseth who recently had the initial 50% of his scheduled cataract surgeries.  Ray Wyatt paid for uncharacteristically losing the weekly drawing, and the bleeding finally stopped when PDG Clarence decided to embarrass his friend from the Midwest about the recent sad showings of some athletic teams from that vicinity.  Since cheapo Clarence was only throwing in a buck, his former friend made up the difference by letting fly a ten spot,and that was it...

 

In a last minute effort to steal minutes from the District governor, Chapman stood up and made some kind of big deal about a banner that Beler had presented the week before , and then before you knew it, President Brett got up to introduce our Assistant Governor (AG for the uninitiated) Ray Ward who arose to introduce District Governor Sandy Sava from the Rotary Club of Sacramento Breakfast. 

 

 

Accompanying Sandy today was PDG Barry Kalar from the Rotary Club of West Sacramento.  Sandy opened her presentation with a brief reminiscence about how her car had a tree fall on it the last time she attended our Club and she pleaded with us to leave the dang thing alone this time.  She also related how she had been contacted by RI this morning and asked what kind of help they might provide in addressing the needs of the victims of the Napa/Sonoma country fires this past week.  She will be letting us know what we can do to help our friends who are in need as soon as the picture clarifies itself.

 

 

She opened her talk with a recap of RI President Ian Risely's three part goal for Rotary this year: 1. Plant a tree, 2. Promote Peace, and 3. Increase the number of women in Rotary.  She also told us about this year's District theme: 'Reflect back, Embrace the Future.'   After introducing Rotary's new branding (the new gold wheel), she surprised more than a few of us by outing PDG Clarence, whose birthday was today (anyone who can guess Clarence's age within 10 years gets  prominent mention in some publication... somewhere...)

 

 

  DG Sandy then looked back into Rotary history, noting the upheavals in Rotary character that seem to occur about every 30 years, including the addition of women to Rotary membership rolls back in the late 80's as well as the recent initiatives to develop a more flexible posture in the Clubs in terms of hard and fast requirements: attendance, meeting frequency, meeting type, etc.  Finally she hyped the upcoming District Conference, which is going to be held at the Hyatt Regency at Incline Village from May 11 - 13.  This was one of the better DG tallk this reporter has had the privilege to hear.  At the end, it was up to President Brett to ask DG Sandy to sign the book and then he announced that the Club would be making a $100 donation to the Rotary Foundation in her name.

 

 

With that, the meeting came to a skidding halt as Club members headed for the door as if Attila the Hun had just showed up in the parking lot.

DON'T STOP READING - THERE'S MORE!!!   

 

First, we are back at Spaghetti Factory next week.  Don't go to City Hall!

Next, we've been invited to a social event at the Fort Rock Brewing Company by our sister Club, the Rancho Cordova Sunrise Rotary Club.  It's next Wednesday; see the flyer.  This can be a good recruiting tool for us, so if you can go and even bring a guest, that would be terrific.  Best bet: contact President Brett.

 

Finally. last week's bulletin had a quiz question in it, the correct answer to which could earn the first responder a $10 Starbucks card.  The quiz question was, "According to the 1991-92 Club directory, how members were there in the Rancho Cordova Rotary Club?"  The contest is still on; the 3 or 4 responses received were off by more than a few members.