Newsletter 306 November 2018

Rotary Club of Stranraer

Monthly Newsletter No 306

November 2018

Service above self

Meetings – unless otherwise advised

1^st and 3^rd Monday of month – 1pm

2^nd & 4^th Monday of month – 6pm

Imminent Activities  

Mon 5^th Nov – 1pm – Fellowship 

8^th, 9^th and 10^th November – Poppy collections at Morrisons – see below.

Mon 12^th Nov – 6pm – Alan McLachlan from Food Train will be speaking.

Mon 19^th Nov – 1pm - Neil Fraser will be speaking

Mon 26^th Nov – 6pm – Karen Anderson will be giving her autobiographical talk

Dates for your Diary

15^th & 16^th December – Christmas collections.

1st June 2019 – Mull of Galloway Trail Marathon and Half Marathon.

7^th to 15^th July 2019 – Skiffe World Championship in Loch Ryan

Recent Events                 

Mon 1^st Oct – Fellowship

Mon 8^th Oct – 6pm – John Adams told us of how he followed in his father’s footsteps by getting involved in beekeeping at the age of 6. He provided an interesting talk about bees and honey.

Mon 15^th Oct 1pm – Gordon Baird’s delivered an excellent talk on the dangers of unnecessary medical interventions. In particular he is convinced, backed up by medical research, that screening such as breast screening can cause more ill effects that it prevents. He is also extremely concerned about the problems caused by unnecessary travel with medical research showing that cancer patients from this area, who are subjected to travel to Edinburgh rather than Glasgow, have a higher death rate than those living closer to major cancer centres.

Mon 22^nd Oct – 6pm – Gordon Davidson told us about a trip to Vegas where they were going to babysit. A wedding and a stag do were involved as well.  He then told us he drove through Death Valley with no spare tyre as he had a puncture and failed to get it fixed They passed a sign on the way in warning motorists not to drive through with no spare! It was a well received talk, delivered well and full of interesting facts. Death Valley sounds a scary place Hot dry and because it’s so far below sea level means it’s a long climb out testing the cooling system on all vehicles. Thanks to President Ian for this report.

Fri 26^th Oct – Beer tasting at Stranraer Golf Club          

Sun 28^th Oct – Rotary golf at Stranraer Golf Club             

Beer tasting and golf at Stranraer golf Club – thanks to Neville Wright for these articles

Beer Tasting

Four Rotarians participated in a beer tasting event held at Stranraer Golf Club on Friday night 26^th October. There were 7 different brews on offer ranging from 4% APV to 5.7% APV.  All the beers supplied for tasting were brewed at the Sullworth Micro Brewery, Castle Douglas.  Amongst the favourites were the Solway Gold and amber beer and the Criffel Ale a dark beer.  All very distinctive individual flavours.  After the tasting session all participants were given a bottle (or two) of their choice to drink or take home (very few bottles left the premises).  A good night was had by all.

Vegas Golf Scramble

Sunday 28^th October saw the re-run of the annual Rotarian Vegas Golf Scramble, eleven golfers took place on what was a wonderful sunny all be it slightly cold day, which made for good scoring.  The eventual winning team comprising Jackie Wright, Greg Drummond (our Olympian school’s speaker), Donald McColm and David Murdoch edging out the favourites (Neville Wright, Gordon Davidson and Hew Chalmers) by 0.1 of a shot. The President’s Team (Ian McIntyre, Val Plant, Alison Chalmers and Dr Simon Reid) came a close third after being hampered by the spinning of the dice, a three being an unlucky number for the team resulting in tee shots having to be taken from the tick rough, the sea and up a tree (ask the President for explanation).  The event ended with players and partners enjoying a two course meal at the Golf Club.

Meal price increase

I regret having to advise the cost of our meals is increasing by 50p from 1^st January. This is the first increase for several years.

Poppy Collections at Morrisons

The local branch of the British Legion requires help with this year’s poppy collection.  We have agreed to help on a ‘one off’ basis by covering Morrisons for 2 weekends Friday to Saturday. Thanks to Jock Smith for taking on the organisation of volunteers for 2 hour shifts. Please help!

Rotary Shirts

19 of the 22 ordered new Rotary shirts personalised with members names have been collected and paid for. It is hoped that members will help the Club profile by wearing these at events where there is public interaction.

Contact President Ian if you would like one.

Mull of Galloway Marathon

Well done to Gordon Baird for finding an organiser for this annual event. We will still be involved as volunteers.

Rugby               

Our group of 12 supporters and friends make good use of their season tickets to watch Glasgow Warriors.

Our season ticket holders are again making their tickets available to Club members for individual matches which they themselves are unable to attend.  It is essential that Tom Mitchell is contacted at an early stage before spares are offered to others.

Press Officer  

Members should get in touch with Tom Mitchell, in his role as Press Officer, if they have anything they wish included in the Newsletter or reported in the press. He particularly wishes photographs for publication and/or Club archives.  

We have articles in the Free Press and in our District Magazine on a regular basis.

Websites 

 Roger Johnson continues to manage our site. 

 http://rotary-ribi.org/clubs/homepage.php?ClubID=1383  Tom Stevenson continues to look after the Mull of Galloway Trail site.

http://www.mullofgallowaytrail.co.uk/  

Tom Stevenson has also ensured that the MGT is listed among Scotland’s Great trails

http://www.scotlandsgreattrails.com/

We are on Facebook with 23 members. It would be appreciated if members who use Facebook would join the group and forward any new content to their friends thus helping our public profile.

And finally: -

·         A shepherd is wondering how many sheep he has in his field so he asks his sheepdog to count them. The dog runs into the field, counts them and runs back to his master. ‘So’ says the farmer[TM1]  ‘how many sheep were there?’ ‘Forty’ replies the dog. ‘How can there be 40?’ exclaims the farmer ‘I only bought 38’. ‘I know’ replies the dog ‘but I rounded them up!’.

·         Old farmer John farmed a small farm in Wigtownshire. The Agricultural wages Board claimed he was not paying proper wages to his workers and sent an investigator to see him.

'I need a list of your employees and how much you pay them,' he demanded

'Well,' replied old John, 'There's Jimmy who has been with me for 3 years. I pay him £250 a week plus free room and board. The young lad has been here for 18 months, and I pay him £200 a week plus free room and board. Then there's the half-wit who works about 18 hours every day and does about 90% of all the work around here. He makes about £10 per week, pays his own room and board and I buy him a bottle of whisky every Saturday night.'

'That's the guy I want to talk to, the half-wit,' says the investigator.

'That would be me,' replied old John.   

President Ian’ a retired farmer, has commented that the 2^nd story is too close to the truth for comfort.

No doubt he would have appreciated one of the rare breed below!