I hope all enjoyed last week’s meeting – it was great to have the opportunity to explore the workings of Hothouse Theatre followed by a wonderful lunch at La Maison. We’ve been fortunate with the excursions so far this year – Hothouse, and earlier DECA and it makes be think how truly fortunate we are as a community to have such facilities.

The Butter Factory Theatre is the home of Hothouse Theatre, Australia’s leading regional theatre company.  Hothouse formed in 1997 out of the Murray River Performing Group, with a mission to develop excellent contemporary Australian theatre for the local community.  Over the last 17 years Hothouse has developed a coherent and focussed theatre practice and built a reputation as a small to medium theatre company that produces and presents the best theatre in the country, as well as engaging with the local community through a number of outreach and education programs. Jon Halpin and Tahni Froudist took us on a tour of this vibrant and innovative 162 seat venue before joining us for lunch at La Maison Café. Jon has been the Artistic Director of Hothouse since June 2010 and prior to this was the Artistic Associate of the Queensland Theatre Company and Associate Artist at Brisbane’s Metro Arts. Tahni has been the General Manager at Hothouse since April this year. Prior to Hothouse she was an Associate Producer for Sydney’s Belvoir St Theatre, and has a Bachelor of Arts Management.”

Last week was a great evening for the Club with the International Evening. For those who could not make it the nutshell message for me is that Rotary is an extraordinary organization that does so much to assist the disadvantaged. If you are not certain as to what Interplast, ROMAC, Donations in Kind, Shelterbox and Aquabox are about please make sure you spend a few moments to jump on-line and take a look. You will truly be amazed.

Obviously Thursday evening would not have happened without a lot of preparation – a big thank you to Gordon, and in particular Peter for all your hard work. Again on the night people like our amazing treasurer Dennis and secretary Nic work hard to make sure everything runs smoothly.

With October 24 being World Polio Day, I would ask all members to take a moment to jump online and refresh themselves with the great work that Rotary is doing to help eradicate polio. With Ebola sadly dominating headlines more recently, we need to be mindful of how deadly polio has been. There were an estimated 350,000 polio cases each year world-wide in 1988, in 2013 there were 416 reported cases. The fact that Rotary has been at the forefront of polio eradication is amazing, but the job will not be complete until polio is completely eradicated. Please – take the time to read up a little on polio

It was wonderful to see the contingent of Club members at the Albury Golf Club on Friday night. The night seemed to go well, or at least I have not received a phone call from Club staff about any wayward members! Thank you to Dennis H for organising the evening, and hopefully we can continue with these social evenings through the year. During the week I received Wendy Killeen’s resignation. Wendy has been a wonderful member of the Club, and someone whose company is very much enjoyed. As members would appreciate, attendance at Club meetings has been difficult for Wendy since her move to Rutherglen, and her resignation a consequence of this. Hopefully we will continue to see Wendy on occasion as a guest of the Club, and no doubt our members will continue to support the Fortifieds of Stanton & Killeen (I’ll certainly take a hit for the team).  On the plus side in terms of membership it has been lovely to have David Allen at Club lunches recently. David has relocated from Bright and is looking to transfer from the Rotary Club of Bright to our Club – welcome David. Members should be receiving an email from Nic with regards to this shortly.