Good things come in small packages…

1 02 2010

Or… Small meetings yield great results. Our first meeting of 2010 had a slightly smaller than usual attendance, but the meeting was very enjoyable regardless of the numbers. We were delighted to be joined by two guests, Chris and Ciara who we hope we’ll see again.

Guests are always welcome and they don’t have to say a thing – There is no pressure to speak in Toastmasters!

Céad Mile Fáilte
Photo owned by bigpresh (cc)

Michael Murphy gave a great speech on the fickle nature of perception entitled “The Gold Rush”. Both the speech evaluator Michael Lynch, and the meeting’s General Evaluator, Kieran Coffey were impressed by the humour in the speech.

John Skeates also presented a very enjoyable topics session which drew on everything from history to transport.

Our next meeting will be on Thursday 11th of February, 7:50PM at the Macroom-E centre as usual. In case you were wondering where that is, here is a map. We look forward to seeing you there.





Meeting on 14th Postponed. Next Meeting 28th January.

11 01 2010

The weather is just too bad! With safety in mind, we have decided to put off this weeks meeting.

Sorry about this… We may reschedule an extra meeting at the end of the year.

Finished snowmen
Photo owned by Haxxah and KraZug (cc)

So we hope we will see you on the 28th January at 7:50pm in the Macroom-E centre.





Another great night at Toastmaster Macroom

27 11 2009

Another successful night at Macroom Toastmasters last night. President Anthony Galvin opened the night before handing over to myself who was Toastmaster of the night. I then introduced the program for the night  which began with the sergeant at arms report from John Skeates.

Following on from this was recent member Mark Loughrey who produced a very enjoyable and original Topics Session. Ill never look at Kermit the Frog the same way again!

After this we had the first speech of the night from none other than El Presidente himself, Anthony Galvin with his stage 8 speech. And what a speech it was, entitled “The Mean Macroom Toastmaster”. From the start he not only grabbed our attention with a very interesting slide from his presentation but continued to make us laugh throughout. I might add my ‘mean’ it turns out he meant the ‘average’ Macroom toastmaster!

Our second speech of the night came from the legendary John Skeates. John’s speech was entitled “Just a short note” and it was a very touching, seasonal and appropriate speech about remembering the lost art of note writing when we send Christmas cards to loved ones.

After the break we had a very interesting read from Pat Connolly on the speeches of Winston Churchill. A man who was legendary at speeches and wrote some of the best in history. Churchill wasn’t bad at them either.

Following this, control was handed to the general evaluator of the night Michael Murphy who did a great job at this his first time as GE. We then had the speech evaluations, again finely done by Fiona Cotter and Celsus O’Leary.  Michael then gave his General Evaluation of the night before I handed control to Anthony who closed the night as usual.

We look forward to the next meeting on the 10th of December and all are welcome.

Also the next meeting after that on the 17th December will be our Christmas Party and again, anyone is welcome to attend for what should be great craic at the usual spot, Macroom E-Business Centre at 7.45pm.

John Sheahan.





Next Meeting: Thursday 26th November 2009, 7:50PM

25 11 2009

Hope we see you there. And if you are at all nervous about coming, please bear in mind that you won’t have to say a word!

LESS NOISE PLEASE - CONSIDER OFFICES ABOVE
Photo owned by Metro Centric (cc)





Great craic at Toastmaster’s meeting.

23 10 2009

Last night’s Toastmaster’s meeting in Macroom was a howl. Mostly due to the Table Topics session which was presented by Celsus O’Leary. This was Celsus’ first time to oversee a topics session and immediately established himself as a master of the area. The most contentious topic being “Would you rather be born Intelligent or Beautiful?”

Violence was narrowly avoided during the heated debate.

Two speeches were delivered. “Fear of Fear” by Sarah McGuiness. This was an extremely thought-provoking  speech which exposed the irrationality of a lot of our reactions to big scares such as Swine Flu or 911. The second speech was given by Kieran Coffey who ambitiously and successfully attempted to explain the equation E=MC^2. The meeting finished up with Fiona Cotter filling the role of General Evaluator – and she did an excellent job on her first time in the role.
Albert
Photo owned by gheitore (cc)

Our next meeting is Thursday, November 12th at the Macroom E center.