A Very Toasty Christmas

If you missed our Christmas party, you missed out on a lot of fun. We had a great white elephant gift exchange. Jan brings the best stuff. Or maybe it's the worst stuff. No, it's definitely both! :)

And Kyle gave a very poignant toast to Michael and his fiancee Hannah.

 

Toasters Compete and Win at Area Contests

Three members of Toasters competed in the Area 62 contests. Jackie competed in the Evaluation contest, Eddie competed in the Humorous Speech contest and Kyle competed in both. Kyle won the Area 62 Humorous Speech contest.

Check out all the contest photos.

Congratulations Michael!

Toasters has a tradition that the club buys a name badge for members when they complete their first Competent Communicator award. We followed that tradition today when Michael was given his name badge for completing his CC. And then Michael followed that by giving his first speech from an advanced manual.

Congratulations on completing your CC, Michael! We look forward to many more of your speeches!

(Photo: Keith presents Michael with his name badge.)

The New Year

The new Toastmasters' year has begun. Coming up we have quite a few events:

• TLI (Toastmasters Leadership Institute ... aka Officers' Training) on August 1st


• The Fall contest season with Humorous Speech and Evaluation Contests


• The Fall District 23 Conference in Amarillo

New Members

Congratulations to our newest members, Chase and Tom, for completing their first speeches. The first one is always the hardest.

Projector Setup

As Powerpoint, video, and even Excel become more common tools in presentations, Toasters has number of options for members wanting to utilize a touch of technology during their speeches.

Members are, of course, welcome to bring their own video projection system. There is a pull-down screen built into the bookcase. But for members who don't have a projector, there are other options:

[caption id="attachment_45" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Laptop with S-Video port (click on picture for full size image)"][/caption]

To display video from a computer, the first is to bring a laptop (or computer of your choice) with an S-Video output port. The large television in the bookcase cabinet supports input via an S-Video cable which is in the cabinet beneath the television. If you are uncertain about whether or not you have an S-Video output on your laptop (some do, some do not), please look for a port like the one in the image at the right. The port will usually have a small image of a television with "rabbit ears" next to it or possibly the words "S-Video".

Warning: Please be aware that the S-Video port looks similar to a PS2 Mouse and PS2 Keyboard port. If the ports on your laptop have a picture of a keyboard or mouse next to them, they are probably not S-Video.

[caption id="attachment_46" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Laptop with VGA port (click on picture for full size image)"][/caption]

The other option is to have one of the members bring a projector and use a VGA output port from your laptop. A VGA port has 15 holes in it, arrange in three rows of five holes each. There's a picture of a VGA port to the right.

Please contact Keith or Tracy to arrange for a projector for your presentation. You will need to contact one of them several days in advance to make sure they can provide the computer projector, which comes with all the necessary cables.

In either case, you will need to supply your own computer as the club does not have one.

Please note that if you are a Mac user, these are the only two devices we have for doing video projection. If your Mac does not have an S-Video or VGA port, you will have to:

• make arrangements to provide an adapter to S-Video or VGA,


• bring your own projector,


• or find another computer you can use.