Rotary Meeting, February 12, 2013

President Justin Sallaway called the meeting to order. Paul Stone lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance, Chris Chu led us in song with "God Bless America". Justin gave the invocation.

GIFT OF LIFE UPDATE:

Marc Epstein introduced Zomaya and her mother and grandmother! Zomaya is doing well after a few bumps in her road to recovery! Jim Means translated the story of getting little Zomaya here for this operation to save her life in spite of being a special needs child. A Rotarian in Santo Domingo pushed to help get this child accepted into the Gift of Life Program.  The family was extremely appreciative of all that Rotary has done, and while language has been a barrier, the Epsteins have been super stars! We are all so impressed with Marc and Annette for their work with Gift of Life!

Sargent At Arms Mark Nicholas introduced our guests: Ron Peghiny, who is the husband of our newest Rotarian, Sue Peghiny, Kevin O'Connell, superstar musician and brains behind Newton Has Talent, on loan from the West Suburban YMCA, and Susanne McInerney's Intern.

Mark came prepared with a joke, which offended most of us Yankee's fans...but don't worry...we are classy as most Yankees fans, and we kept our cool, and will wait until next October to start up with our Red Sox jokes...

ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Tom Keery gave us an update on Newton Has Talent. Tom introduced Kevin O'Connell who gave us an overview of the progress of Newton Has Talent.  Please forward any potential acts to Kevin (Chris will send around the link). A table will be set up at Newton North to try to recruit acts for Newton Has Talent. We are at 187 facebook likes, and there are lots of emails and inquiries about this event. We still need more celebrity Judges...

SPEAKER:

Our newest Rotarian, Sue Peghiny gave us a classification speech. We are very happy to have Sue join us!