09/08/2026
🥇 That's the final whistle on another cracking night at Ipswich Toastmasters! Here's the play by play. 📣
🏅 The theme for the evening was the Commonwealth Games, and our Toastmaster for the night, John Hutchins, sprinkled games trivia throughout the meeting while keeping us all on track.
📖 Grammarian Linda Thomson set the challenge with her word of the day: eloquent. Final score, John Hutchins: 1, the rest of the club: 0. A humbling result for a room full of people who talk for fun!! 😅
🐘 Kerri Richards ran our warm up, a fortunate and unfortunate tale about a wild purple elephant named Pinky and a pink giraffe named Purply. Each member had 20 seconds to take the story somewhere new, so one speaker's stroke of good luck became the next speaker's disaster. The plot went to some wild and unexpected places. 🦒
😈 Ben McCormick, our dear Member, Secretary & District Director!! 🥵, delivered a hilarious step-by-step guide to crushing the souls of those pesky, enthusiastic new starters at the office. Because nothing ruins a good disgruntled mood quite like someone else's optimism.
🍽️ Shane Browne, fresh out of our Speechcraft course, proved just how fast new members grow. His funny and engaging speech tackled the analytical mind's greatest nemesis: "What should we have for dinner?" Sometimes you just have to decide from the gut. 😋
📝 Bill and Shawn delivered sharp, generous evaluations that everyone in the room walked away richer for. Two very 'eloquent' reminders of how much value sits in a good evaluation.
⚡ Table Topics Master Joanne Jackson threw some sports themed curve balls, and our participants did not disappoint. Long time member Marianne showed us exactly what decades of Toastmasters experience looks like, fielding one of Joanne's curlier deliveries with an 'eloquent' response that made it look easy. 🏏
📋 Kerri Richards was flat out. She ran a member questionnaire to make sure the club is genuinely helping every member hit their goals, then delivered an educational session on meeting roles and the executive committee. Thank you Kerri! 🙏
🏛️ Fred took the floor for club business, where motions were moved and discussions were had. Every good team has a hard working crew behind the scenes, and the commitment the whole committee to our members was on full display. Thank you committee! 🙌
🏆 We also had awards on the night! Shawn received his certificate for completing Level 1, congrats Shawn! And Ben McCormick went gold after gold, collecting all five levels plus his Completion Certificate for Presentation Mastery, off the back of a year of hard work running Speechcraft courses across two clubs. Huge effort. 🥇
⏱️ And shepherding the whole thing? Our Sergeant at Arms, Toastmaster and long-time member John Hutchins. It was a night of excitement and rowdiness, and John's skills kept us all in line and on schedule. Thanks John! 👏
✨ Want to come along as a guest? Guests are always welcome. Come a few times and see if it's the right fit for you. Reach out! 💬
P.S. That's two more points for me, Linda Thomson 😉
