Meeting Flash

Rotary FLASH of 05-27-2008
Meeting held on May 27, 2008
Carl Rossman began our meeting by leading us with the Pledge of Allegiance and God Bless America. Our invocation was given by Bill McGrath, who also happened to be our Sergeant at Arms. Bill reported 44 Rotarians in attendance out of our 96 membership. We had two guests. Dan Carr brought Nick Marshall, and Tom Hower brought a guest. His name was mentioned, but I couldn’t read his handwriting on the sign in sheet. (I would guess he is a doctor.)
Carl Rossman announced that there would be a mini board meeting following the meeting. He also announced that we received a thank you from the family of June E. Barnhart for our condolences.
Bill McGrath announced that there is some availability for people to join the club for the golf outing dinner. Please let Bill know ASAP if you would like to attend and haven’t signed up yet. Bill also reminded us that on June 24, the annual President’s dinner will be held at WCCC at 5:30. Remember that there is no lunch meeting that day.
MEMBERSHIP PROPOSAL:
The Board of Directors has approved the following for publication.
Christine “Chris” Mueseler, Vice President for Institutional Advancement, Seton Hill University. Chris resides in Irwin and works in Greensburg. She has attended the required two meetings. Chuck Anderson has proposed her for membership.
Any objections to her becoming a member must be submitted in writing to the Secretary within seven days.
Ed Meadows introduced Guy Davis, who gave his miniautobiography. Guy was born in Greensburg and has lived in Westmoreland County all his life. He has been married to his wife for 20 years this year, and has two children, one in 10th grade and one in 4th grade. He works in the Stickley Furniture store, but is a man of many talents. He is a corpsman in the Navy reserves, and teaches basic first aid, CPR, etc to people who go abroad then teaching those skills to others. He also performs blood draws, inoculations, EKG’s, checks vitals, and from 2004-2005 he filled out medications for soldiers in the Middle East. Guy wants to personally thank all those who have served our country. He also plays in an old-timers (he said it, not me) baseball league, restores antique cars, and has been to Rotary International twice, but both times were not as a Rotarian.
Guy’s father was a member of the Greensburg Rotary, and Guy wanted to share some information about our club that we might not know. We have had 14 father/son/daughter combinations in the club, as well as a number of uncle/nephew and husband/wife combinations. Thank you Guy for your introduction, especially for the newer members who might not know you too well, and thank you as well for some of the interesting Rotary trivia.
Pete Dochinez, sporting a Penguin jersey (Brooks Orpik’s, by the way) gave us the club birthdays and anniversaries with a little Penguin fever. Those who had birthdays in May got to find out who wore a jersey with the same number as the date of their birthday, as well as their age. Pete didn’t mention who was what age to protect the innocent. Thank you Pete for the unique twist on the birthdays. Go Pens!
Carl ended the meeting a little early with the Four Way Test. Enjoy the weather while it lasts.

Rotary FLASH of 05-20-2008
Weekly meeting of May 20, 2008

This week, like most other weeks, Carl Rossman started our meeting off with the Pledge of Allegiance, God Bless America, and Tom Hedley gave our invocation. Mark Parker reported 50 members out of 96 members in attendance this week, as well as a number of guests. Ed Meadows brought his wife Sue as a guest. Bobbi Stemmler-Guest brought her husband, Ed Guest, and everyone wondered if that makes Ed our guest Guest. Will Brown brought Tom Whetsel as a guest, Dick McNeil brought Janet his wife, Ed Nemanic brought Jim Vaughn, and Cesar Muccari brought Wendy Erway, and last but not least, Chuck Anderson brought Chris Mursler.
Mary Clymer started off our announcements with a recap of the spelling bee. It was an amazing event, and she wanted to thank all of the people who had a hand making the event the success that it was. Hundreds of area kids were affected positively, and the winners were thrilled with the prizes.
Mark Barnhart passed around a signup sheet for the “Bon Voyage” covered dish dinner being held for our guests from Greensburg Kansas at Tom Hower’s place. Anyone interested should contact Mark and let him know how many people you’ll be coming with, and what dish you plan on bringing.
Ben Policastro announced that Saturday June 21 will be the first roadside cleanup of the year. The group will meet at the Greensburg Country Club Tennis Courts, and they are looking for a good turnout as usual. Anyone interested in helping should sign up. Don’t forget, this is a good opportunity to get students service hours who need them.
Bill McGrath is looking for anyone who wants to have dinner with the club at the golf outing – if you’re planning on coming, Bill needs to know as soon as possible. Also, he announced that Tuesday June 24 at 5:30 PM will be the President’s dinner celebrating Carl Rossman’s term as president. The dinner will be at WCCC, and it will be $20 a person. Please sign up if you plan on attending.
Mark Parker announced that the golf outing has hole-in-one prizes of 2 cars, $10,000 in cash, and golf irons. What we need now are four hole monitors to be witnesses to any holes in one. Please let Mark Parker know if you can help with this.
Bob Bloom announced that the Rotary year is fast coming to a close, and the roster needs to be updated. Please check your information and make sure it’s up to date.
Carl gave us our Word of the Week. A panegyric is a formal eulogistic composition intended as a public compliment. It comes from Greek, but I don’t remember what the root words were. I’m not an English major.
Ed Meadows introduced our speaker. Beth Shoup spoke to us from the Wildlife Works Inc, a non-profit organization dedicated to rescuing, rehabilitating, and releasing natural environment species in Western PA. When they started in 1991, they rehabilitated 79 animals, and now they have grown to helping 300 – 500 animals each year. They take care of pets or wild animals that have health problems, or have become “imprinted.” An imprinted animal is one who was dealt with inappropriately by his parents, and as a result believes it is a human being. The animal may be completely healthy, but when it comes time to mate, it will attempt to do so with a human. It cannot relate with its own species.
Beth brought an example of an imprinted animal. She brought Napolean, a male American kestrel. The kestrel is the smallest species of falcon in the US, and as such he is not permitted to be a pet. When the parents brought him in, they could tell that he had been imprinted right away by the interaction between Napolean and the parents. Beth’s group has been not only developing their rehabilitation center, but also a program to educate youth at schools, scouting groups, and other organizations. Our Rotary Club offered a $1500 grant for this purpose, and she expressed her thanks for our aid in their worthy cause. Thank you Beth for speaking with us and for bringing Napolean along.
We ended the meeting in the usual way with the Four Way Test. Next week we will be hearing from Pete Dochinez with our May birthdays and anniversaries, and we’ll also have a mini-autobiography from Guy Davis.

Rotary FLASH of 05-06-2008
The Greensburg Rotary meeting began as members trickled in, discussing various topics from upcoming & past Rotary events, business, sports (especially the Penguins), and a variety of personal topics: fantastic Rotarian fellowship.

The meeting was called to order by President Carl Rossman. President Carl led us in the Pledge of Allegiance and a stirring rendition of God Bless America. A great invocation was delivered by a dedicated Rotarian, whom this writer neglected to note (good job Oh Nameless One).

Announcements for the good of the Club:

- Tom Jachimowicz is currently in the hospital due to an unexpected triple-by-pass surgery. We were told he would probably be in the step-down unit today (Tuesday). A card was passed around to deliver to Tom in hospital.

- Dr. Hower reminded the Club of the Annual ARC of Westmoreland Fishing Trip to his property. A sign-up sheet for volunteers will be passed around within the next few weeks.

- Bill Kern gave a report from district conference:

o Chuck Strobel was elected to the District Finance Committee for a 2 year term
o Jeff Malloy enjoyed distinction for receiving the honor of Best Website in our district
o Katy Doran corralled 11 Youth Exchange members during her conference stay. God Bless you Katy!

- President Carl announced April Birthdays & Anniversaries:
o Birthdays: Guy Davis (4/16), Dave Delisi (4/30), Mick DeNezza (4/6), Tim Henry (4/19), Al Lazar (4/11), Bobbie Stemmler-Guest (4/29)
o President Carl went a bit fast for this writer to note all the anniversaries, so instead, noted is the winner for longest anniversary: Jim Harrold with 35 years.

The Word of the Week - Procrustean - and adjective meaning "marked by cruelly & mercilessly, arbitrarily making everything & everyone the same." (if you can use it in normal conversation correctly, I'll give you a $1)

Our speaker this week was Randy Bish, a political cartoonist from the Trib. Randy passed out a bunch of cartoons, most of which gave hearty chuckles to various members of the audience.

He mentioned during his presentation that some his cartoons have been censored over time as various papers did not want to offend certain political figures.

Randy also mentioned many times when political figures or their families asked for the original, signed drawings for themselves, or their deceased loved-ones.

Great presentation. If you weren't there, you missed some fun.

Ed Meadows is going to kill me, but I've lost the paper he so dutifully delivered to me to assure next week's speaker was recognized.... Is it a veterinarian, Ed?

Ah well, Dan will be back next week to deliver the news more reliably..... ;-)

Respectfully Submitted,
Leia T. Shilobod, Princess of the Technology Universe