Los Altos Rotary Club Home of the Annual Rotary Fine Art Show October 3 2013

With his disarmingly cheerful smile, Pres JACK opened the meeting by recognizing those who made this club’s meeting tick.  ALISON SALISBURY started us off by leading the pledge. Since this meeting’s program is culturally inclined, SALLY MEADOWS read an autumn poem about summer pirouetting away (hard to pin that one down, as the sound didn’t carry well).

PP DICK HENNING transformed into the crooner himself, becoming Bing Crosby as he hummed “buh buh buh doo”, which of course drew laughter from all around. You had to be there! Bing would rather sing than eat, but DICK would eat than sing, and we all, he surmised, would rather eat than hear him sing! Finally he got us to sing something important: ‘America’.

Our Greeters were also all smiles: JOHN EVANS, MIKE ELLERIN, and DEBORAH PENDER (who “won” the chance to be a greeter today by answering quickly to Greeter Chair CAROL GARSTEN’s call). MIKE ABRAMS proved his power by hauling stuff in and out as Sergeant-At-Arms, and LARRY CHU JR. counted the money as cashier.
 
As always, we had a large group of invited guests of members PP BOB ADAMS, PP SAM PESNER, DWIGHT MATTHEWS, and GARY WALDECK. Ken Smith who participated in our Encore! Event also attended with his wife Sonja so his daughter, a ballet dancer, could hear the guest speaker.
 

Announcements
Pres JACK tantalized us by suggesting that “libations” will be served at next week’s Red Badge Auction.

 
ROY JONES encouraged all shirtless LARC members to come pick up their newly-arrived LARC shirts.

CAROL GARSTEN passed a sign-up list to become a greeter, which is a wonderful way to start new friendships in the club.

HARRY PRICE invited all to the Oct. 18 Wine & Cheese (and Oktoberfest Beer) Social from 6 – 8:30 PM at the home of Cathy and PP STEVE ANDERSON. Halloween costumes optional!

PE KENDRA encourages us to attend Avenues of Service on Thursday, Oct. 17. It’s a great way to learn about Rotary service opportunities and have a little fun, all paid by your Rotary Club. Be sure to get there for the 4:30 happy hour, followed by your choice of four sessions: I’m a new member, Where’s the money? Navigating Rotary in the digital age, and Problem-solving in Rotary. Check out the displays by our club’s World Community Service and ALLART LIGTENBERG’s Water-Health-Hunger-Solar. Carl Guardino, President of Silicon Valley Leadership Group will be the keynote speaker, and dinner is included. Need we say more? It’s a very worthwhile way to spend Thursday eve, especially for new and recent members.

President JACK didn’t even blush when he announced that his green plaid bloomers photo was unveiled at the District 5170 Cabinet meeting.

Be there for LARC’s 65th Charter Anniversary which will be celebrated in March. Details to follow, says Pres JACK.

LAREF Treasurer PP DENNIS YOUNG read a touching message from Past District Governor Arley Marley whose beloved wife MARY MARLEY, a very active member of LARC, passed away Feb. 5, 2013.  She left a Legacy Gift of $14,116 to be distributed 50% to LAREF (unrestricted use), 25% to Partners for New Generations (PNG) and 25% to Los Altos Rotary AIDS Project (LARAP). DENNIS delivered her checks for $3,529 to SALLY MEADOWS and RICH CASEY for their committees. DENNIS encouraged us all to consider making Legacy Gifts in our wills.
 

They just keep joining! Membership Director JEAN MORDO was pleased to announce that nine new members have already joined LARC since July 1, and two more are ready for induction today. The Board has approved an incentive, retroactive to May, of 500 Paul Harris points awarded to sponsors of new members who achieve Blue Badge status and 250 points to new members who earn a Blue Badge within 6 months of induction. These points count like dollars contributed to Rotary International towards the honor of becoming a Paul Harris Fellow.

Today’s new members are BILL MASON, sponsored by GARY WALDECK, a retired professor of sociology at UCLA and co-founder of UCLA’s Center for Population Research. FELIX HU, sponsored by PP SAM PESNER, was born on Taiwan, graduated from UC Davis and earned his MBA at San Francisco State U. He now provides financial services. When this writer asked a friend, “What is his last name?”, the friend replied, ”Who!” Oops, that was the answer, not a question.

In his Ten Minute Talk, RICH CASEY regaled us with old-time photos of other LARC members, as well as himself. Born in San Francisco and raised in San Mateo, his early path crossed those of Mary Prochnow, Bonnie Burdett, Mel Kahn, Jerry Tomanek (fun photos!) and probably other club members.

After graduation from Stanford in Chemistry, he worked as an educational TV producer in Ethiopia with the Peace Corps where he met lifelong friends. At Stanford Business School he met Shelley, his wife of nearly 40 years with whom he has raised two adult children and traveled extensively in Asia and Africa. His busy career path included Eli Lilly, Syntex Corp, CEO of Scios, and his newest CEO position at Neutralis Pharmaceuticals.

In 2008 Rich joined LARC and soon became intensely involved with the Los Altos Rotary AIDS Project (LARAP) which he now leads in TRF grant proposals for Child AIDS Prevention in Africa. Rich has lived a very busy life with successful career(s), and we all enjoyed his photos of LARC friends as kids.
 

Finemaster GARY WALDECK gave us the choice of dinosaur questions (since some of us are reputed to be “dinosaurs”) or “others”. Of course, everybody opted for “others”.  He managed to extract money from JEFFREY BAIER, STEVE BIANCHI, JOE EYRE (stressing the Community Foundation’s brunch honoring PP ROY LAVE as well as the “psychological benefits of giving”. JOE took the opportunity to feel those benefits by giving $100 to join the President’s Club.) Others who got nicked included JULIE ROSE, LARRY CHU JR. MICHAEL ELLERIN, PATRICIA ROHRS, and TIM SHEEHAN ($30 per phone ring)
 

Today’s program was Dennis Nahat, introduced by LINA BROYDO who thanked him for donating four tickets to his upcoming show “Yulan” for the Red Badge Auction. Nahat was trained at the Julliard School, Martha Graham’s school and with other renowned teachers. In addition he won two Emmy awards and the Dance Masters of America’s award for Lifetime Achievement.

Nahat described “Yulan”, his new production slated to run Oct. 3-13 at the California Theater, San Jose. “Yulan” means Magnolia” the flower of Shanghai; it spotlights a combination of Chinese acrobats and ballet dancers from Dalia, sister city to Oakland, California. Following that, Nahat will open his “Terra Cotta Prince”, a Chinese twist on the Nutcracker Suite, in Los Angeles and San Jose.

He also discussed “Blue Suede Shoes”, his ballet set to a composite of 36 Elvis songs. When asked to compare Chinese with American ballet dancers, he said, “Americans are the best, due to their artistic freedom.”