Rotary Club of Norwich
December 23rd, 2020
Location-ZOOM Meeting
THE RONE
Presiding: President Mary Richardson
Invocation: Keith Caplet (Now Retired-Lucky Guy!)
Fellowship: Nancy Gentes
Birthdays: None
Anniversaries: None.
Visiting Rotarians: None
Guests: None
Nancy gave a fellowship explaining the many Christmas tradition from around the world. Featured were Wales, Scotland Romania, Dominican Republic, South Africa, Venezuela, Mexico Japan and the US! Some of the most interesting were in Wales people go door to door with decorated horse sculls and hope to get some food or drink! In Japan it popular to eat Kentucky Fried Chicken!
Announcements:
*If you know of anyone who would be a good speaker at one of our Rotary Meetings contact Bob Farwell or Kevin Wickless. Speakers can be done virtual (ZOOM) as well if needed.
*President Mary informed the club that meeting for the foreseeable future will be held via ZOOM and no “In Person” meeting will take place at the Marriott until further notice. A link will be emailed to all members to log on to for the Wednesday Meetings.
*The Norwich Rotary Club will hold the Annual Meeting on December 31st to approve nominations for club officers and directors.
*Mary Richardson said that there are a couple of members that are eligible for “Senior Active” status which means if they are absent for a meeting it will not count against the club’s attendance figures and will not have to pay a $10.00 penalty for absences. If the number of years in the club and your age add up to 85 or greater you are eligible for Senior Active Status. The By-Laws will have to be reviewed as well.
Happy Dollars: Barry Shead:
Barry said this will be the first time in years that he will be at home for the Christmas holidays. He also enjoyed a great breakfast at Olde Tymes today with President Mary Richardson and bought some Gift Certificates for his wife while he was there. He sheepishly admitted he will enjoy his wife’s gift as well!
Mary Richardson also gave for the nice breakfast at Olde Tymes with Barry and she also bought Gift Certificates for he son and his girlfriend to use. She also displayed a winter hat with rabbit fur! She is not sure how her cats Bob & Alan will react! Mary also said he heard from Jim Konrad and he thanked the club for the support for the Tommy Toy Fund toy wrapping. Stan Lucas and a few of his family members as well as Andy Grant helped out! Lottie Scott also emailed her that she was having an issue logging on and sends her best!
Joel Etra had happy dollars in honor of he and Roz’s 45th wedding anniversary! He also said he had surgery yesterday and said he would spare everyone the details! He did add it was his Urologist who did the surgery! Joel also gave the details of the history of the Jewish holidays of Hanukkah.
Bob Farwell said one of his families Christmas traditions is for them to give him money NOT to attend their homes! He is more than happy to accept the cash and settle for no pickle in the tree! He gave everyone on the Zoom meeting a heartfelt wish for Happy Holidays!
Susy Hurlbert liked the idea of the KFC that Japan celebrates for Christmas! She also told the story of a news item of a neighborhood association that complained that someone had put a cross up in their yard for the Christmas! Made no sense to her! She gave in honor of Keith Caplet on his recent retirement from the bank. She finished with a very happy dollar for this year’s ECAR Virtual fundraiser that netted $14,900.00! All the money benefited area charities!
Bill Champagne gave to say that his wife Patrice sticks a pickle in their Christmas tree! He also congratulated Larry Fowler on the season that the Cleveland Browns are having this year! He’s also gave a sad dollar the former Rotarian Dave Cannon’s son Andrew died earlier in the week.
Larry Fowler said he is cautiously optimistic of the Browns going to the playoffs but is not ready to put happy dollars yet as not to jinx them!
Gary Young told a very funny story on how his snow blower would not start after a few years of no use. He asked his nephew to work on it to fix it and also install an electric starter while he’s at it. His nephew reported back that it had an electric starter already! Oh well!
Auction: Kevin Wickless: Kevin had a One Pound bag of coffee and Chocolate Coco from Craftsman Cliff Roasters to put on the auction block! $30.00 value. Susy Hurlbert was the high bidder at $15.00!
Lottery: Mary Richardson said there will be no lottery today as we are virtual, however she threw out an idea that we could do some sort of 50/50 online and some more thought has to go into it. She asked the club to think about it and come to her with some ideas on how we might make it work.
Program: There was no scheduled program, however Susy Hurlbert showed a very entertaining video of a real estate agent who told a story of her falling down while going to show a property and her dress ended up over her head and her shoes flying off in a matter of seconds! It was 5 minutes of laughter!
The club ended with the 4-Way Test.
President Mary adjourned the meeting at 1:10pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Bob Reed – RONE Reporter