I arrived early, only to find the entire club grazing on the buffet laid out
for us by the Luskin Center. Lacking the time to be dainty, I scooped up one of
everything and found a friendly table in the meeting room. As soon as I got
my fork into protein, AP(IMP,PP) Diane the Good announced the meeting’s open
and noticing PP Aly Shoji was struggling to sit down with an enormous plate of
vittles, called on her to immediately lead us in the Flag Pledge.
Aly mumbled something about multitasking and did so, first asking for
Old Glory (a large version) on the screen, then completing the task. Finding no
one else to pick on, AP Diane called Jim Crane forward to deliver the Thought
of the Day if he had one. Jim did, indeed, and showed good judgment by sharing
a prayer for peace in the Ukraine, entreating the Maker of Peace and Prince of
Peace to stop the slaughter in that innocent nation.
AP Diane called PP Admiral Edwin Gauld front and center to raise our
spirits which he did by leading us in My Darling Clementine, a familiar tune with
not a single difficult note, even for us musically disadvantaged, making us all feel
like Irish tenors and altos.
Bringing our group of Covid shut-ins a weekly dose of Rotary news, AP
Diane shared with us:
- PP Nancy McCready’s Email has been hacked (welcome to the club)
- On 4/16, the Rotary Day of Service in Torrance will feature sewing Rags Into Rugs for Pets (no hands went up)
- Please don’t use the Club Email to solicit donations of any kind
- We have just one high-schooler enrolled in RYLA this year
- The Pageant of the Arts videos are available for judging-see Phil Gabriel
- WVRC now seems to have a “liquor account” --ask Terry White (or maybe AP Diane has trouble saying “Twitter”)
PP Nancy McCready handed out Certificates of Appreciation to the members
of the Long-Range Strategic Planning Committee who met on Zoom every
Friday for many months last year. She explained that such Certificates are
worth more when you receive them later (due to appreciation). Seriously,
those dedicated members persevered in finding a path forward for WVRC
after we stalled out during the Pandemic.
Next meeting, our speaker will be that famous real estate Rogo (Lynne)!
Our Speaker for the Day was Benjamin Fisher, delivering his Craft
Talk which he’s been composing for nine months since his initiation. And,
I might add, he gave us 9 months’ worth of Craft Talk. This guy had a
curated photo for every year of his life and his lovely wife Susan contributed
colorful comments. He is also an accomplished speaker (unless he spent
those nine months memorizing his talk). We must have seen every member of
his immediate family on most milestone happy occasions throughout his entire
life. It was THE most thorough craft talk ever. And to make it a “craft talk” in
another sense, he spent the last ten minutes on his current business: Super slow
LA Fitness, describing his methods which sound too good to be true, but may be.
He claims that his best results as a trainer have come with clients who spend
20-30 minutes in 1 slow workout/week and watch their diets.
I heard a lot of mumbling at our table about “30 minutes/week,” so
Ben may get a lot of chances doing makeovers on the membership. He does
have some credibility, though, having worked with our own Ann Samson (YMCA)
for years with Indian Guides. Also, like the preacher who lived a prior life of
debauchery, this is a man who had FIVE favorite doughnut shops who counted
him as a good customer at the same time-who can doubt him?
It was a thoroughly enjoyable presentation, except for those new members
who will be presenting their Craft Talks in the near future. Who wants to go after
Ben with all his evidence and smiling photos? And why didn’t Ben tell us why his
Baby picture said “Bruce Fisher” after he promised us that he would??
YOPP Dwight
