Before the Meeting

The new guy shows up early (I was second) and no one is there.  His name is Len.  Len Bonilla.   He comes off as a polite and caring diminutive sort, with his way of doing things.   New Presidents are always there early on their first day.  They like to “tend to things”.  There were no chair bearers  bringing  him in like some old Pope (he did mention he may like his moniker to be “His Holiness”).  He had no one precede him into the room with flower petals.  Not even a trumpet or French horn.  He was disappointed.  But he is a humble man; a measured man.

He was the new President.   He is a man with a plan.  He’s an engineer type.  He has pocket protectors and an Ipad.  Calculators are close by, and so are calcultions.  There were 3 ring binders, Outlines, Gantt Charts,  Flow Charts, Power Points, and lots of Graphs should they be needed.  There were different colors for different things.   Red is bad, Green is good.   He was set for the New Year, but no one was there.  

Also….something was askew.   Apparently his “ex-good friend Joe”  had the room set up wrong.  Joe wouldn’t do that on purpose would he?

The tables were set up differently, and the Kiwanis Banner was hanging on the flaggard (that’s not a word but you should get what I mean).   He looked and saw the letters “K I W A N I S” and knew something was wrong.  He’s sharp.  He compared it to the pictures of the letters on our flag (Page 371-2.211 in his Rotary Manual) and there it was -- “R O T A R Y”.   Yep, they were different.  Thank God he found that before the meeting started or he would have made Rotary history standing in front of the Kiwanis Flag with everyone giggling.

Inspector Holmes (or is it Clouseau)  figured that one out and made the change; and checked it off his list.  He’s sharp and on his game, but no one came, except me.  Finally Jack came, and then the Chief, and then others, and Len relaxed a bit and looked at his plan and made a check mark on something as people came in.  He had a list.

The Meeting

The pledge was led by Robin, sweet Robin.  Quiet and complex.

The meeting was pretty much fine as he told us of the plans for the club for the New Year.  No phones went off, no one got shushed (but Frank Glen and I should have been Shushed  ( We were giggling; it was Franks fault).   It was also Franks Birthday so he got a pass.  He took Jacks seat who was selling raffle tickets and wouldn’t give it back to him.  Jack was flummoxed.  I giggled.  Jack moved on.

Jack did sell raffle tickets…he had a system.  Actually he started working on his Raffle Ticket Selling System(RTSS)  when he first arrived.  It was fluid and something to make Engineer Len proud.  It worked well and tickets were sold in a timely fashion.  He just lost his seat.  Selling tickets and hanging on to your chair is complicated.  I giggled, and so did Frank.  We are mature you know.

Sophia (Joes daughter) collected money for fines for “Pin’s and Badges”.  That young lady has cost me a bundle over the years.  I bet she grows up to work for the IRS

Shirley had 2 guests.

Gabby Pacheco a counterpart at LAWA and she is also an Inglewood Rotarian. 

Kelsey McFarland (what a nice name) works for “Best Buddies” dealing with intellectual development difficulties.  She may be interested in seeing more of us:)

Alex introduced a visitor from Sony Pictures.  I believe her name was Regaye Fulcher who lives in El Segundo and her daughter just graduated from El Segundo High School.  She was neat.  She was from Alabama and guess who squealed.  Laura squealed when she heard ALABAMA.   We are mature.  I giggled.

Tyrone Dawkins was back for the 3^rd time, he is a Hypnotherapist and we will be seeing more of him.    

Joe did some fining (go figure eh?).  The other Podium Poacher was not there (guess who -- I love not saying her name.  She hates it when she is not in the bulletin). 

Joe first gave Len a box to stand on like Joe did when his Napoleonic regime was conducted -- both regimes.  He did this two years, and we survived.  I like it when diminutive people pick on diminutive people; it saves me the effort to do it tactfully.  I let Joe do it tactfully.   Tactful may be an unfamiliar word to him.   I don’t believe Joe has ever had an unspoken thought

Len accepted the box and I heard Julia say “good things come in a box”.  Hmm.  No kidding.  I just shook my head and then Len had a sip of some Tequila that was gifted to him by the President of the Kiwanis Club.  No kidding.  As the meeting went on he kept sipping and it was not brought up again, but I noticed. No kidding.  I see a 12 step program here in the near future.  No kidding.  Thee will be others.

Joe got a magazine from Shiela.  The spired lovingly about the magazine and she is such fun to watch.  She also got a very sincere thank you from Joe and applause from the rest of us for all the work she does on the 4^th of July.  She does lots of other things and asks for not thanks.  She is a true Rotarian.  She’s great and her magazine is indeed excellent.  Looks familiar, but excellent nevertheless.

Claire got fined for being alive. 

Robin got fined for taking her life in her hands and sitting close to Claire

Colleen got fined for something (A Hotel Thing)

Sandy got fined, but I am not sure why.

Joe was the Joke of the Day.  (I didn’t mean it that way Joe)  He “told” another great joke.  He is very good at this.   It was very very good, and clean.  His daughter was there.  She doesn't know.  Nice going Joe.

Lots and lots of announcements, and then we passed the brag bucket.  There were lots of "brags", way too many to mention.    I Bragged about the Demotion Party and my fellow Past Presidents.  The Demotion Party has received lots of attention.  If you are interested I decided to put together another document or bulletin about it and setting the record straight that the credit belongs to the Actors and Stage Hands (Randy), not me.  See if you can find it on this web site.  I will figure out a way to put it here separately, because this Bulletin is about Len.  Len Bonilla, President of El Segundo Rotary.

The Exit

When I was leaving I went up to Len and told him he ran a very nice meeting and he only had 51 more to go.  He said, “no, only 47” he corrected me “because there were a number of "dark" meetings throughout the year and he had them on a chart, and …. "Would I like to see it?”  The chart that is.  I said well, ah, no, I had to leave because I thought I might have left the oven on and I had clothes in the dryer.  I bid him farewell and saw him check something off his list.   I also saw Jack approach him and say “I heard you talk to Gary about a Chart, I’d like to see that chart.   I had done something similar when I was chairman of …………….”.    I left the room.  

I returned about 15 minutes later and they were sharing Gantt Charts with each other and were giddy.  Power Point would be next….  They still had their clothes on, but giddy never the less.  A Bromance began, and I would be gone.   

A long year has begun.  Good luck Len.

"Where is Everyone"

"Let's see, Item 47 A, it's here somewhere about the Downy Pancake Breakfast"