Weekly Message From President Ngaire

Pip Smibert gave us an enlightening address this week in his Member Behind the Badge presentation.  Pip has spent a lifetime developing leading edge technology which blew the minds of those less computer savvy people in the room – that was most of us!!  His latest not-for-profit project involves integrated community messaging, a system that, if available and activated on Black Saturday, would have surely saved lives.  A very worthwhile project worthy of Rotary support.  There was enormous interest from various members who engaged Pip in discussion long after the conclusion of the meeting.

20 RCH members met at Sackville Grange on Saturday for our Club Vision session run by the District team.  It was four hours of fun with a focus.  Many good ideas were recorded and follow up action steps were determined and allocated to various club members.  More will be explained next week at our Club Forum.  A big thank you to organisers Ian Stoney and Anne Scott.

Dr John advises that Jack Ings is due for a knee operation this Friday with another scheduled for early next year.  Geoff Dumayne visited Jack on Tuesday and was pleased to find him in good spirits and looking forward to RCH visitors.  Joe Devereux has already been discharged from Cabrini.  Honorary member Bruce Smith is also on the sick list.  Get well soon, all of you.

Ian Stoney is being admitted to Epworth this Friday for another back operation.  He will be in hospital and recuperating for about a month.  Our thoughts and prayers are with you Ian, and we wish you well in your recovery.

Thank you to all those who filled the tennis parking roster for the AAMI Tennis Parking in January.  We’re half way there - I still have 54 open spots so I need a lot more help to fill those.  This is a major fundraiser so please ask family and friends to roster with you.

Noel Halford is waiting to hear from you with your roster advice for our Christmas Lunch on Sunday December 23.  That’s less than 4 weeks away now so please tell Noel you will help.

Our AGM was held at Tuesday’s meeting.  It was uneventful, and all reports were carried. Thank you to PP Geoff for his presidential report, and to John Higgins and Robert Ball for their financial reports.  A special vote of thanks to our auditor Ken Scott for his work.

Christmas hams are high on the ‘to-do’ list of Phil Stewart who encourages you to keep selling to family, friends and work colleagues.  Wine orders close December 8 and ham orders must reach Phil by December 12.

Next week is our last Club Forum for the year and you will hear an overview of the Vision session held on Saturday.  I will be expressing my thoughts on our Vision Facilitation and your ideas and comments will be welcomed after the presentation.

Enjoy your week and thank you again for all your support with our rosters…

Yours in Rotary,

Ngaire

Thought for the week:

"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart."   - Helen Keller

Stop Press:

I attended the Rotary Club of Kew meeting on Thursday and was absolutely thrilled (gob smacked is more accurate) to receive a cheque from President Jill Forsyth for $10,000, as our allocated share of the profit from the Garden Design Fest held two weekends ago.  I expressed grateful appreciation on behalf of Lille Fro, our major beneficiary, the Asia Pacific Girl Guides, and other nominated charities.  It will be a great delight to present cheques to those very worthy organisations, all of which do such phenomenal work in our international communities.

The diamond earrings and other raffle prizes were claimed by people other than RCH, I did however win the weekly wine raffle!!