Kiwanis Club of Historic St. Augustine

Newsletter – 7 June 2007

President’s Message:

It was with great pleasure that we inducted two more members into our club. Doug Evans, a friend of Dave Thompson (but we won’t hold that against him), was sponsored by Dave; and Jim Matheson, a friend of and sponsored by Mark Shelley, and also a co-worker. I don’t know what pins they are handing out for multiple member sponsorship, but these guys have won it. Doug is a graduate of the Naval Academy, retired from the Navy, and presently is flying an international route for UPS. Jim is a high school coach with many years of experience and has chosen to settle down in our fair city and be an assistant coach at SAHS. We welcome both of them to our club, and we will put them to work right away.

                As mentioned last week, we can expect a visit from our newly elected Lt. Governor in about two weeks, 21 June to be exact. Let’s plan to have a large attendance, and get a good belt line. Let’s do one with more twists and turns in it this time. Rande hardly whimpered when he went through the belt line on his first trip here. We definitely want to hear some good sobs this time.

 

Coming Events: [Advise the editor of events of interest at 797-4332]

30 June 2007: Uptown Saturday Night, check out the local galleries uptown on the last Saturday of each month, and taste their food and wine.

6 July 2007: First Friday Art Walk, check out the local galleries downtown and taste their food and wine.

 

Guests: None this week, since we inducted them into the club. You remember the TV show Where in the World is Carmen San Diego? The burning question now is, Where’s Gary? School is out. He needs to appear.in

 

Programs: (Check the website for your speaker assignment date.)

LAST WEEK: John Thompson, stepped to fill the speaking position and introduced the speaker, Troy Silhan, who discussed hurricane preparedness, which is apropos to the season which kicked in the very next day. Troy has a lot of knowledge concerning this, since he and John both work for CaneProof Windows and Doors in Palm Coast. This is a local industry that produces hurricane proof doors and windows. They meet all the specs to be hurricane proof. Bottom line, if you don’t have their window products installed in your home, get shutters or something that will prevent the flying debris kicked up by a storm from flying into your house as opposed to flying outside your house. It is infinitely better to have stuff flying around outside your house and not into your house. Troy also indicated that he might like to join the club, and took an app with him.

 THIS WEEK: This being the first meeting of the month, and we will have our committee meetings and Board of Directors meeting.

NEXT WEEK: Human and Spiritual Aims meeting. Rene Morris, from St. Francis House will be here to discuss her ideas for change now that she is in charge.

 

⅓-⅓-⅓ DRAWING WINNERS: The winning tickets were drawn and the winners were Jim Matheson & Paul Linser. Congrats to both. Remember to mix those tickets well (put mine on top), and to buy your tickets early and often.

 

Late Breaking News:

Please note: Our Human and Spiritual Values speaker for next month will be Rene Morris, the new director at St. Francis House. Skeeter suggested that we bring canned goods and perhaps take up a collection to give to her after the presentation. Start bringing food items at any time, as the Village Inn has room to store it for us.

                We’ve had some good ideas for projects tossed about lately. Now that the Calendar of Events has been depleted, we need to start to work on some new fundraisers. Heck we need to start planning for next year’s projects if we are smart. For instance, we need to start planning the next Pancake Breakfast. We need to start looking into the dictionary project or some other book plan for young kids. Also, if we are going to give a substantial donation to The Boys and Girls Clubs Building Fund, we really need to put our heads together to figure out some ways to make substantial sums of money. Are we going to continue to give the scholarships as we have in the past, or are we going to put that money into something else? Think about it, and get some ideas down on paper so that at the next Committee/Board Meeting we can at least air some ideas. I hope our President-Elect is working on his committee assignments for next year so that the planning can get off the ground.

                I’m leaving these last two paragraphs for a couple of reasons. (1) We need to be reminded of some things that we have coming up and which we need to think about. (B) It takes up room and I don’t have to work real hard to come up with new material to fill the space. They will slowly disappear over the next two weeks. (III) There is not enough football to write about.

                Maybe not enough football, but what about basketball? The NBA Finals finally get underway Thursday night. (Doesn’t the play-off to get here seem to last forever?) The San Antonio Spurs will face the Cleveland Cavaliers.  Interesting match up. Then the Gators are back in the news. Billy Donovan wants out of his contract with the Orlando Magic so he can stay with the Gators. Did they offer you that much to come back Billy? Don’t forget, Billy, this is the Gators. If you do stay and do not present them with another National Championship in January, they will want your head on a platter. Hear me, Billy, this is the Gator Nation and that is how they have always handled not getting what they want.

 

Quote(s) of the Week:

"For those who chose to fight for it, life has a special flavor the protected will never know..." found written on a C ration carton in Vietnam. (Submitted by Bob Corson)

 

 "In the first place we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the man's becoming in very fact an American and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag, and this excludes the red flag, which symbolizes all wars against liberty and civilization, just as much as it excludes any foreign flag of a nation to which we are hostile...We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people." -- Theodore Roosevelt 1907