Tonight I attended my first Toastmasters meeting. What a blast!

As a child I had an uncle who was very active in his local club but I had never gotten around to going, and even now I need to drive quite a ways to get to even the closest one.

This season I’m not taking any classes and Tuesday evenings are free, So there I was one of three guests and the only one that had never been to a toastmasters’ meeting. Everyone was welcoming and the “Toastmaster” Victor, went over anyything that the directing officer, Joey, had not touched on in her speech. Then off we went, the meeting pace was set by a great intro speech by Victor on “Ending Strong” then after a few quickies, it was Table Topics Time!

As one of the guests, I was asked to speak on one of these ‘one to two minute of the cuff topics.’ GULP!

The first couple didn’t sound all that hard, well I guess, “What would you do if you came home to find your neighbor sitting in your house watching your TV, wearing your robe and eating your food?” Is hard, but “What would you do with a million dollars?” isn’t that bad. I got “You have just won a body building competition, who will you thank and how?” GULP, GULP!

Well I plodded on through it. I think I “AH’ed” about a half dozen times, but it wasn’t too bad.

We then listened to a bunch of people that actually knew what they were going to talk about. Great stuff, a five to seven minute talk about the love of Don’s life, and a rousing speech from Sam about how Toastmasters has helped him in his life.


Towards the end we had voting and comments, very educational, warm and helpful. And just before wrapping it all up the awards…

Woo Hoo! The first award was for Table Topics and guess who won…

Me! I actually got a ribbon for my speech, um’s and ah’s and all!

Will I go back? Yeah, I think I’m hooked. It’s kind’ a like blogging, only even more live than video…

Find your local Club! It's a blast!