Good afternoon, fellow Toastmasters and most welcome guests.

That is how every one of our meetings opens, and it seemed like the right way to open this page too. I'm Russ Pankratz, the club's Vice President Education, which mostly means I keep the schedule of who is speaking when and I chase people down in the cafeteria line when they forget. By day I am a bridge engineer with the Department of Transportation.

I joined in the spring of 1996. My section chief had volunteered me to walk a legislative committee through our bridge inspection backlog, and I was so nervous my hands shook the overhead projector and twelve people watched a chart of deck ratings wobble on the wall for twenty minutes. A woman from the Revenue building told me about this club the next week. Three years and something like thirty speeches later, I still get nervous. I just don't shake the projector anymore.

We are one of the thousands of clubs of Toastmasters International, which started at a YMCA in Santa Ana, California, back in 1924. There is nothing fancy about us. We are twenty-two state workers, two lawyers, a pastor, a lobbyist and a retired meteorologist, and we meet on our lunch hour so nobody has to give up an evening. Bring your sandwich.

Fifty minutes goes fast when you are the one talking. We run a tight clock because half of us have a 1:00 meeting back upstairs.

About the Ah-Counter. Every "um," "ah," "so," and "you know" gets counted. Our club custom is a dime in the coffee can for each one, and the can pays for the December luncheon. Last year it took in $31.40. Our Treasurer would like it noted that he is also the club's most frequent speaker, and I would like it noted that he said "so" eleven times while asking me to note it.

If you visit, you'll notice a little box at the back of the room with three colored bulbs. That's the Timer's station. For a five-to-seven-minute speech it works like this:

Table Topics run one to two minutes and evaluations two to three, with the lights adjusted to match. In a real contest, going more than thirty seconds past the red disqualifies you. At a club meeting nobody gets disqualified, but by long tradition the Timer is allowed to cough.

• Arlene Mathisen finished the tenth and last project in the basic manual on September 15, and her Competent Toastmaster (CTM) paperwork is in the mail. Arlene joined the same month I did and could barely say her name at the lectern. Her last speech had the room completely silent, and then applauding. Congratulations, Arlene.
  
  
• Tom Reinholt gave his Ice Breaker on September 8. Five minutes and forty seconds on growing up above his parents' hardware store in Baraboo, and not one "um" until the very last sentence. Welcome aboard, Tom.
  
  
• Fall contests. This year our district is holding the Humorous Speech and Evaluation contests in the fall. Our club round is Wednesday, October 20, at the regular meeting. Winners go on to the area contest in November. If you have a funny five minutes in you, tell me by October 6.
  
  
• New members since June: Tom Reinholt, Janelle Okoro, and Ahmad Qureshi. That puts us at twenty-eight. Our VP Membership, Carmen, has promised that if we reach thirty by Thanksgiving she will give a speech in the voice of Elmer Fudd. We are holding her to it.

Please do. Sign the guest book by the door, sit anywhere, and eat your lunch. Guests never have to speak. The Topicsmaster may ask if you'd like to try a Table Topic, and "No, thank you" is a perfectly good answer. Most of us said it on our first visit. Most of us said yes on our second.

If you decide to join, there are International dues every six months and a one-time new member fee, plus a few dollars a year to the club for ribbons and the coffee. You get the basic manual and a mentor, and your Ice Breaker gets scheduled whenever you feel ready. Nobody will rush you. I'll give you the exact figures if you drop me a note.