06-16-05 Meeting Summary

Wow! What a meeting today. Next week - Pizza, Soda Pop, Dessert, Awards,
and fun!

We had three guests. Gero "Gadder" F. [long a] of SFS, Stacia S. of
the Chamber of Commerce, and Bev H. of the Northstar 25 Club who worked
at Minnesota Mutual from 1952-1987.

The theme was pens and pencils.

Dave presented us with a rather blank agenda, but filled it in quickly at
the beginning of the meeting.

Bev H. stepped in as Speaker #1
Laura C. became our Wordmaster/Grammarian using the word "myriad" as
presented by Dave.

Bill, our timer, uses a #1 pencil for markings in books and underlining. He
uses pens for everything else.

Bev H., guest speaker, charter member of the Minnesota Mutual
Toastmasters club
Bev shared how much of a treat it was for her to join us at our meeting
today. She drove down from Grantsburg, WI, early today to be able to visit
with co-workers from her past (She had just finished visiting with Jim
Johnson) and specifically to attend a Toastmasters meeting. Bev will be
attending the Northstar 25 Club dinner this evening. Bev said that it felt
just like yesterday that she regularly attended Toastmasters. She talked
about how Toastmasters was a wonderful learning experience that taught her
skills that she still uses today. She enjoys reading a hardcopy of the
Excel newsletter that is sent to her at each publication. She is very
impressed that there are now three clubs here. She has lived on a farm
between Grantsburg and Siren, WI, for many years. Shortly after retiring,
her husband encountered a number of health maladies. He had suffered from
polio at 18 and had post effects, he had blood clots in his lungs, and
underwent open heart surgery following a heart attack. She was a 24 x 7
caregiver of her husband. He passed away last summer. She is now very
active with her church and has become their librarian. She meets once a
month with a writers group. A topic is picked that each person writes about
and then shares with the rest of the group the following month. The
writings are critiqued by the rest of the group. The most recent topic was
"my brain doesn't work." She said that organizations like this one keep her
standing in good stead. She has also joined the WI Writer's Association and
is looking forward to attending their conferences soon. Back in the day,
she served Toastmasters in many capacities. She was also selected as
Toastmaster of the Year at the club level and area level. It was a great
honor. She stated that we work at a great company and are part of great
organization. We will use what we learn for the rest of our lives, even
after we retire. Whatever organization you join, it will help you. We are
all smart to have joined Toastmasters.

After sitting down, Bev was asked was jobs she did while working here. She
worked in Individual ordinary (?), Group as a case underwriter (she noted
that when she worked in ordinary they referred to u/w as the 'funny farm'
due to their different practices than in ordinary), in actuary working on
morbidity/mortality information. She told her boss once that the work in
actuary was like knitting or crocheting, it was very detailed and rewarding
to see the final product at the end. She stated that a computer can very
quickly compute what used to take her one to two weeks to do. She said that
a computer was put on her desk right before she retired, but she didn't use
it. She recently got a computer at home. She has hired her two great
nieces who are 10 year old twins to help her learn all about the workings of
the computer this summer.

Kelly T., TableTopics Master, likes a Pilot fine point pen with a good
grip. Kelly shared a lot of interesting facts and figures about pens and
pencils. These two web sites were the sources she referenced:
http://www.pencils.com/ and
http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa101697.htm.

Laura G. discussed her favorite pen, the Pilot precise B5 with blue
ink and a 5mm tip. She also talked about her favorite pencil, a mechanical
one with a silver tip where the lead/graphite is stored. She likes being
able to increase the amount of lead from where the eraser is stored rather
than the newer style which rotates from the bottom.

Laura C. wasn't sure why pencils are yellow, but she talked about all
of the fancy pens and pencils that can be found everywhere today.

Jerry V., brand new member and first time table topics respondent, stated
his preference of fountain pens to ball point pens. He is self-proclaimed
as the person with the worst penmanship in the World. He likes fountain
pens because they flow more smoothly and allow for writing more like
calligraphy.

Lori G., first solo completion of Sergeant at Arms duties, will write
a novel about her four children ages 6 to 15 years old. She will write one
chapter on each child and then subsequent chapters will be about family
activities. This book would be very special to Lori.

Betsy Schaller, our second most newest member, prefers a mechanical pencil
to a wood pencil, but overall prefers pens. This preference is surprising
based on her math and accounting background. Betsy broke her hand over a
year ago and was prescribed a pen by her Physical Therapist that was wider
and had a nice grip so that she wouldn't push too hard on the paper. She
uses a Pilot Dr. Grip gel. Betsy Schaller's mom was good friends with the
Parker (of pens) family.

Kathy J.will be calling pencils "number 5s" from now on. Number 5
will be the new definition for pencil because she has to replace her pencil
every five minutes. The graphite goes down very quickly because of the
pressure she applies while writing and the eraser doesn't last much longer.

Laura C. likes pens that don't glob and has labeled her pencil as
"Laura's favorite pencil." If she accidentally leaves it somewhere, someone
always returns it to her desk.

Kim gave a long winded general evaluation with several tangents, but
eventually got around to giving the Spirit Award to Bev H for her very
inspiring speech about what Toastmasters has done for her.

We look forward to seeing all of you next week at our 'Get Down' (aka
Recognition) Party.