Likes, Nomads and Poetry in Motion - the EarlyBirds meeting was not vexing!!

Dear Members, Guests and Friends,

We had a heartfelt invocation in the Christian tradition by TM Manny.

TM Jim G. thanked the outgoing panel of officers for their service and formally welcomed the new panel of officers:

President - TM Aleta

VP Ed - TM Ana

Treasurer - DTM Jim D.

VP Membership - DTM Mary Helen 

VP Public Relations - TM BeckyJo

Secretary - TM Terri

Sargeant - at - Arms - TM Jim G.

TM Chris led us in personal table topics about our likes.  We found out that...

* TM Terri played Old Maid as a child but much, much prefers dancing salsa and bachata to her heart's delight.

* TM Paolo likes driving if he has good sales results and while transporting a carload of screaming children in the Italian countryside.  He Won Best Table Topics Award.

* TM Manny will do any chore in the house except cooking - but he definitely signs up for tasting and eating the end result!!

* TM Gail loooves to sing since she was a child and once sang a solo in front of Rev. Billy Graham and a congregation of 2,000.

* TM Jarrett likes to have house guests, except when they make loud clanging noises as his current one does but he's looking forward to his Mom joining in the external firework noises for the 4th of July.

* TM Aleta has grown to like giving speeches, inspired by our buddy Kip and mapping every speech to a specific project.  She is a woman on a Pathways mission!

Along came two excellent prepared speeches...

* TM Jose inspired some of us to become nomads like him and select travel destinations where food is of the essence (ie Basque Country in the Spanish Pyrenees).  

* TM Marie awed us with her very descriptive language of love expressed to her little granddaughter while riding the ocean waves. She Won Best Speaker Award.

As far as evaluations go...

* TM Aleta praised TM Jose for his professional slides, his listenable voice and his ability to inspire us to become travel gourmet nomads.  

* TM Jarrett was exhilarated with TM Marie's wealth of descriptive language and heartfelt command as a wordsmith.  He Won Best Evaluator Award.

TM BeckyJo General Evaluated the meeting with outstanding powers of improvisation while keeping track of gonnas.

The Word of the Day was

VEX, verb or adjective

To annoy or worry someone, usually over something relatively trivial.

Example:  Most of us are blessed to have vexing problems of an affluent lifestyle.  

Here's the link to the recording:

https://youtube.com/live/Un8NAUoJTaE?feature=share

See you next week on Independence Day!

Ana I.

Recap Writer

Summertime, Milei and Letter to My Son - no fake news at EarlyBirds today!

Dear Members, Guests and Friends,

TM Pam's Solstice Invocation in memory of DTM Kip started us off.

I, Ana, led with summer-themed table topics.  We realized that...

* TM Paolo's favorite summer activity as a teenager was chasing girls, and his favorite summer activity as a father of teenagers is watching the teenagers without blinking.

* TM Marie was spat upon by a large fish in Universal theme park which grossed her out but managed to keep her cool.  She Won Best Table Topics Award.

* TM Tim loves all food but his favorite summer food is eating watermelon near the Ohio River and having seed-spitting competitions with his brother.

* TM Jose's favorite summer song is Alice Cooper's School's Out, school's out for the summer, school's out forever, I'm bored to pieces - and then he chased the girls....

* TM Aleta wore a skimpy itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow polkadot bikini... and in the water, she wanted to stay...One, Two, Three, Four, Tell the People What She Wore!

* TM The Tom's favorite summer childhood memory was staying cool with the Maid of the MIst waterfall in Niagara Falls.  Oh what a summer that was!

Along came the prepared speeches...

* TM Ricardo shared the sad decline of Argentina as the top country in the world to the 70th - or 140th by some accounts - due to generations of widespread corruption and how the current President, Javier Milei, is attempting to right that ship of state.  Viva la Libertad, Carajo!!

* TM Randolph read us a heartfelt letter to his son, where Randolph now has allowed space for his son's dreams to play into his son's life, and he, Randolph, is just a loving father.  He Won Best Speaker Award.

Regarding the evaluations...

* TM Aleta praised TM Ricardo for the educational nature of his speech where we learned that a President's hair does not need to be coiffed to decrease inflation and eliminate corruption.

* TM The Tom totally related to TM Randolph's letter to his son and agreed that parenting does not come with a User's Manual.  He Won Best Evaluator Award.

The Word of the Day was

FAKE NEWS, noun

False stories that appear as news, spread on internet and other media, and are created to influence political views or intended as a joke.

Example:  In this day and age of instant communication and Artificial Intelligence, everything is technically fake news.  That's the story - and we're sticking to it!

Here's the link to the recording

https://youtube.com/live/q3b2zhgUjpY?feature=share

See you next week!

Ana I.

Recap Writer

Eclectic topics, Musical Gasps, Tales of the South Pacific - an undiscombobulated morning at Early Birds!

Dear Members, Guests, Friends:

TM The Tom led us with eclectic topics, from whence we gathered that...

* TM Terri would invent "Rest Your Bones Day" as a national holiday, when you simply do nothing, nada, niente, or if you're really dynamic, you take yourself to the beach.

* TM BeckyJo would fly around Epcot with a drunken space alien and ride Space Mountain, again and again.  She Won Best Table Topics Award.

* TM Ricardo was petrified - and made the rest of us petrified by association - by reading the bathroom scene in The Shining, second only to the bathroom scene in Psycho.

* DTM Mary Helen, calling in from Babylon Berlin, is no longer a mere lurker in FB Aldi's Aisle of Shame but a full fledged participant.

* TM Marie faced the majestic ocean in Atlantic City after spending days at her father's quarry in her rural home - and her life has just never been the same again.

* TM Paolo would become Domenico Modugno or preferably Rodolfo Valentino (both Apulia's favorite sons) if he could be the Master of Disguise.  For now, he's flying back to meet Chair Giorgia Meloni at the G7 summit.

We had 2 prepared speeches...

* TM Pam took us all down memory lane in a humorous speech about becoming concert singer groupies in the chapter of our lives called The Last Gasp... of our octogenarian favorite bands.  She Won Best Speaker Award.

* I, Ana, shared how overwater bungalows in French Polynesia came into existence and how Tahitian television has spread to Jamaica, Maldives, Mexico, hither and thither.

And along came evaluations....

* TM Randolph praised TM Pam for her funny, funnier, funniest speech about old musical glories that are literally taking their last gasps.

* TM Jose enjoyed learning the history of overwater bungalows and was glad there were no shark encounters - especially since there were 3 attacks in the Florida Panhandle in knee-deep water over the last week.  Yikes!  He Won Best Evaluator Award.

The Word of the Day was

DISCOMBOBULATED, adj.

Confused, disconcerted.

Example:  Discombobulated is the natural state - most of the time - of some of our EarlyBird members, who shall remain nameless....

Here's the link to the recording

https://youtube.com/live/376Btvobelo?feature=share

See you next week!

Ana I.

Recap Writer

Vacations, Bahiamar and Bitcoin - a lucrative morning at EarlyBirds!

Dear Members, Guests and Friends,

TM Aleta inspired us with enlightening thoughts from President Theodore Roosevelt.

TM Marie led us with fun, lighthearted topics.  We found out that...

* TM Emmanuel's daughter's recurring dream is to go see lanterns in China. Let's go! Let's go! Let's Go!  He Won Best Table Topics Award.

* TM BeckyJo packs her entire worldly belongings in case winter, summer, spring, fall, thirst, hunger happen in her 5-hour road trip. She Won Best Table Topics Award.

* TM Pam is the only person in America who has not been fingerprinted so if she starts a life of crime she will not easily be tracked down.  She votes for security screening MRIs at the airport.

* TM The Tom fondly reminisced about unforgettable road trips with 4 young 'uns one year apart constantly asking "Are we there yet?" and fortuitously finding a drill sargeant to tell them they're not there yet.

* TM Jim G. has mastered phone photography from the best phone lens by urging people to say "Sex" instead of "Cheese" which expands their smiles to unforeseen limits.

As far as prepared speeches go...

* I, self-appointed sagacious reporter on the Broward Beat, revealed the lucrative deals happening downtown concerning our former landmark soon to be demolished, Bahia Mar.  I Won Best Speaker Award.

* TM Chris revealed her BitCoin seed phrase so let's take advantage of the blockchain interconnected public ledgers and trace her cryptocurrency wallet to make a lucrative digital transfer.

Along came evaluations...

* TM Pam was dismayed to hear what city hotshots do with our tax dollars but at least she did not see my notes anywhere so that's a relief.  She Won Best Evaluator Award.

*TM The Tom’s evaluation of TM Chris Bitcoin.  He has converted and is moving to El Salvador, where Bitcoin is Legal Tender.  He’s tired of worthless and bulky wads of dollar bills lining his pockets….

The Word of the Day was

LUCRATIVE, adj. 

producing a lot of money; especially of a business, job or activity.

Video games are one of the most lucrative industries on Planet Earth.

Here is the link to the recording:

https://youtube.com/live/1tahS5hFFhc?feature=share

See you next week!

Ana I.

Recap Writer