Speech Contest

Unfortunately, I was not able to go to meetings for the past two weeks, but today I got back into the swing of things and the Ranch Raconteurs held a club speech contest.  It was divided into Table Topics and Prepared Speeches, and the winner of each got the chance to move on to a district level competition.  I didn't sign up for the competition because I am so new to the club, but it was fun to watch.  I was involved in a minor way because during the Table Topics portion I had the role of guiding the contestants out of the room and sending them in one by one so they could not hear each others' answers and get an unfair advantage.

When I first got to the meeting, I was asked if I wanted to participate in the Table Topics as a contestant because two of the people that had signed up were unable to attend.  I declined, because I would have been really nervous and I doubted my ability to compete with people who have been in the club for years when I had only ever done a table topic twice.  I partly regret the fact that I didn't try for it, but what's done is done.  In the future I will try to participate as much as I can to keep improving my skills little by little.  One tip that was given to me by a member when I was there was that I can request to go towards the end of the table topics and then opt to answer someone else's question for the next couple of table topics that I do.  This would help me get more comfortable with standing up there before I have to answer an unknown question. 

Next week's meeting should be a good experience for me.  It is back to a normal agenda and I have signed up for the "Ah Counter" role where I will keep track of the number of "umms and ahs" and give a report at the end.  The only other roles I have done are timer and vote counter, so it will be a good experience to be in a more involved role.