(Summary contributed by Andy.)

Seattle Sunrise Toastmasters held a mini speech-a-thon on Saturday morning. While our speech-a-thons normally feature five speakers, an abbreviated session was held so that members attending the District 2 Speak2Lead conference in Redmond could get through Seattle’s famously bad traffic and make it on time for the opening session.

Toastmaster Seva warmly presided over the meeting, working in quotations from his close, personal friend Mark Twain, and then adding his own recast versions of those quotations to humorous effect. Note for those who were at the meeting, Seva’s condition has worsened. Unfortunately, he has gone completely fullblown Smurf. He’s in the ICU but the doctors smurf that he’ll smurf. From all of us, Seva, smurf better smurf.

Our three speakers for the morning were Sharon, Porscha, and Preston.

Sharon gave her second speech to the club. It told a story of how she overcame her childhood fear of water, intermingled with the mystery of a seemingly unsolvable puzzle box her parents bought her at Disneyland. Sharon also added her own Foley effects!

Porscha then took the lectern to describe some useful techniques for better listening and verbal comprehension which she derived from the research for her project 7 speech. She also cited examples of how to apply these techniques in daily life.

Finally, in his Ice-Breaker speech, “A Webinar Gone Bad,” Preston described the disastrous results of his first solo foray as a presenter, giving a webinar to customers at a new job. His disaster is our good fortune, though, as he was encouraged to join Toastmasters as a result.

Scott, Mary, and Aanya all ably evaluated our three speakers, and Michelle gallantly took over the role of General Evaluator because yours truly, your humble assistant club secretary–oops, Mark says that’s assistant TO the club secretary–was unable to perform the assigned role due to being called away on a secret mission for the CIA. Or because he just had oral surgery on Thursday. Who knows what really happened? He sure doesn’t. These painkillers are awesome!

Aanya took the ribbon for best evaluator for her critique of Preston’s speech. Congratulations, Aanya!

Junlei was grammarian, bringing us the Youtube-slang phrase “On fleek,” and David K. kept everyone on time. Shen opened and closed out the session, and then several Sunrisers extended their day of speechmaking and speech-listening by braving the wilds of Redmond Washington’s Microsoft East Campus to attend the District 2 conference.

At the conference, Marti was among the invited speakers and gave a terrific presentation on her specialty, overcoming stage fright.

Peter competed admirably against six other top speakers from other clubs in the district-level International Speech Competition. He delivered his speech, “Shadow’s Magic,” which he’s workshopped in our club meetings. It’s a testament to the power of our Toastmasters that with the feedback he received, he took a very strong speech and made it brilliant.

All of us at Seattle Sunrise can be proud to have been so strongly represented at the conference by Marti and Peter, and both of them have expressed their gratitude for the support the club has provided.

Also, Paul was seemingly everywhere with his camera, snapping shots. Check them out on our Facebook Page!

On a personal note, I was really inspired by the conference–so much so that I found myself lying awake at 4am this morning composing the first draft of a speech. Toastmasters: It gets into your dreams. And then gets you into your dreams. Totally claiming that slogan. That’s money right there. (™ ™ ™)

Seattle Sunrisers will meet again next Saturday, May 23 at our usual place at Northwest Hospital cafeteria, with another terrific lineup of speakers and evaluators and table topics. See you then!

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I had the honor and the privilege of being the general evaluator this past Saturday for what turned out to be one of the more energetic and fun Seattle Sunrise Toastmaster meetings of the year.

Between some powerful (and controversial) speeches, a hilarious story, and a new spin on the Table Topics, this was a meeting you did not want to miss.

Peter, who is representing Division B in the District 2 Speech Contest, led the meeting as Toasmaster and brought his signature passion and intensity to the fray.

Paul opened the speeches with an impassioned “What I’ve Learned About ‘Success’” from the Competent Communicator project, “Persuade with Power.”

Katey drew from the Storytelling Manual with a hilarious story “Odd Jobs.” Every (male) homeowner who owns a power tool (including myself) cringed as she walked us through a slapstick account of a home improvement project.

Seva brought a thermos of hot tea with milk to assist in his “The Magic Bottle,” a speech from Competent Communicator project “Visual Aids.”

In the final speech of the meeting, David E. argued persuasively in his “Washington Needs a State Income Tax,” an argument that drew many references throughout the remainder of the meeting.

As if the speeches were not enough to consider Saturday’s meeting as one of 2015 high points as Sunrise, Shen led us through a “Round Robin” Table Topics, in which two teams of four wove improvisations into a single narrative. This led to vibrant and laughter-filled 10 minutes as we created narratives on the fly around the themes of “hiking” and the “Seahawks.”

Tom took on Timer duties and David S. was our Grammarian.

Andy walked away with ribbons for Best Evaluator and Best Table Topics.