Speakeasy meeting

Speakeasy Toastmasters held their meeting on October 27th and after Club President Angela Sheehan’s opening remarks, control of the meeting was handed over to presiding Toastmaster Jerry O’ Callaghan. Jerry’s characteristic wit and humour contributed to the success of the meeting.

The first speaker was a visitor to our Club, Michael Broderick. Michael is a member of the Nice and Easy speaking club which is based at the COPE Foundation. Michael is an experienced public speaker, and this was evident in his assured delivery of his speech, “Tunnel Vision”. Michael described how a number of community groups and National Schools co-operated to launch a horticultural project. Michael’s speech was evaluated as a stage 2 project from the basic manual.

Following Michael was Kevin Walsh, a long-standing member of Fermoy Toastmasters. Kevin’s speech, “Elizabeth’s Letter”, began with a description of his Grandmothers’ excitement at the visit of Queen Victoria to Ireland in 1900. Kevin then traced his family’s varying relations with the British Crown, which culminated with Kevin writing to Queen Elizabeth on the occasion of her Golden Jubilee. Kevin showed us the reply he received from Buckingham Palace. After a century, Kevin’s family had achieved contact with the British Royal Family. Kevin delivered his speech as a stage 6 project from the basic manual.

The next speaker was Pat Sexton, who completed the impromptu speaking project from the speciality speeches manual. Pat replied to two topics of which he had no advance knowledge. The first topic was “Blood is thicker than water but boils quicker” and the second was “Beauty is….” Following Pat was Brian O’ Farrell, another member of Fermoy Toastmasters. Delivering a project from the Humorous Speech manual entitled “You’ve wasted your life”, Brian described, in a hilarious fashion, how we squander our time watching rubbish on the television rather than doing something useful. Finally Loretto Barry delivered an education session which described how to increase club membership.

After the speeches, Jerry Mulcahy delivered a range of interesting and entertaining topics. Finally Noel O’ Connor conducted a brisk and efficient general evaluation session. Speakeasy Toastmasters congratulate Pat Sexton and Michael Cronin for winning the Division Final of the Table Topics and Humorous Speech contests respectively. Both Pat and Michael will be competing in the District Finals which will be held in England on the 6th November. Speakeasy Toastmasters will meet again on the 10th November at the Hibernian Hotel Mallow at 8:00 pm. Non-members are welcome to attend and will not be asked to speak. Further details about the club are available at the Club Website, www.speakeasytoastmasters.com.