written by:  Mary Stephenson

We Had a Blast!

With much apprehension we proceeded to the Red Lion for the 58^th Annual Convention, Friday afternoon.  Was this another case of the newbies once again being thrown to the wolves (aka the Redding Newcomers Group).

Figured it would be somewhere between boring or feeling out of place.  But we had made arrangements with Ernie to meet him there and so could not change our plans.

We signed up and were given a program, badge and a First Timer’s Trivia Challenge.  While waiting for the official opening we sat down in the lobby and looked over the challenge.  Could we look in the program and find the info?

It was apparent that this could not be done it would actually require us to talk to people.  Ugh!  Another function out of my comfort zone, in fact it made me feel as if I knew much about nothing!  Google could not bail me out of this one…as it had crossed my mind to go home and look up the answers.

Some of the challenges required initials.  Finally met someone that said these people that needed to answer the questions were anticipating us to talk to them.  Phew…now I finally could eagerly interrupt them and found everyone was willing to help us meet the challenge.

Actually it was a fascinating experience once I pursued it with enthusiasm.  I met Brinkley and was given some history about him.  I learned about Mister Fur Face.  Also found out who portrayed Abraham Lincoln and recited the Gettysburg Address last year at the convention.

In amongst strangers

It reminded me of attending my class reunion years ago, with nervous anticipation, wanting to go but wondering if I should.  Had to though, as I had travelled for 2 days and over a thousand miles, plus had RSVP on the invite.

Well it wasn’t long before people were coming up and saying they just had to meet me.  Reputation had preceded me, being the first female for the Redding Breakfast Lions Club.

Apparently, Redding Breakfast Lions Club also has a reputation for as a few quoted as being “the fun loving rowdy bunch”.  I suppose that is pretty awesome, even a few that have been there before and after I joined the club, said they haven’t changed.  I am grateful that my presence hasn’t changed the character of the club.

International Director Lewis Quinn from Anchorage, Alaska shared with us some awesome ways of how he has promoted the Lions to bring in new members.  The changing of times and how we might incorporate these ideas into building more involvement.  He talked about TV commercials and how they might be available to us in the near future.  He explained “episodic volunteers” and how the program worked.  Want to check out his website:  http://alaskalions.org/

Activities

Friday evening had yummy food at the Candidates Hospitality affair and then we attended the Food Fair.  Over ate!

We had the Parade of Banners on Saturday morning .

Learned some interesting facts about the training of guide dogs.

Listened to the 79^th Annual Speakers Contest.  Three young ladies provided some great speeches and all of them referred to their grandmothers immigrating to America.

Saturday evening they had another yummy spread honoring us “First Timers”.

Sunday they gave awards and made announcements:

Jamie Hart   District Governor  Elect

Marianne Keesee 1^st District Governor  Elect

Susan Kerr 2^nd District Governor  Elect

There were plenty of others but I didn’t make a record of them.

To sum it up Gary and I can honestly say we had a “Blast”.  We met some awesome folks and got many invites.  It was a long weekend but a very rewarding one.