05-08-2006, 06:24 AM
Well, I'm happy to say that, thanks to Forum Member Clay, the pictures are finally available online.
I had wanted to have a clickable link to a full size slide show with titles but even without that I think you will still be able to see that we all had a great time.
When you access the pages with the pictures, please click them to see the full size images if you have the bandwidth,
Here's the link to the pictures:
I'm sorry the pictures of our "Mystery Guest" lost their titles, somewhere in the process, but you can tell he got pretty wild and was chasing the beautiful staff at McKenna's. He got right into the raffle and grabbed a prize for himself and finally passed out on top of a box containing System 7.
Oh well! we all know what kind of guy he is.
My thanks to MikeF, who kindly volunteered to take all but a couple of these pictures (the two with Mike and Teresa) with my Canon 20D while I covered the rest of the bases
Guess what? As I was writing this I received an email from Larry saying that he would be happy to have OWC host the pictures and even to do this for others on the Forum.
This is great news because he said I'd be able to do the slide show that I wanted.
But for now I'm happy to post what we have available and to tell the story of our event.
And now the report:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
When Mavis and I arrived at McKenna's, I saw right away that Ken (Harbourmaster) had steered us to the right place.
As you can see the entrance is simple, warm and inviting.
Inside we received a warm welcome from the reception staff and Luis, the manager.
The tables had been set for fifteen people which is what I originally expected but there were several additions that I knew of, so seating for four more guests was quickly added, along with a table to hold the raffle donations and the birthday cake for the Members whose birthdays fell in the first half of the year. You'll clearly see their names in the pictures of the cake. I'm sorry to say that RgrF, Schmani and Webster J. Duck couldn't be there.
Look at the picture of the beautiful setup. The tables, the room, everything seemed just right to me
Once we had the tables set up, Mavis and I moved to the bar area where we told everyone to meet us. We were happy that MikeF and his wife, Teresa arrived early as promised.
Mike took over the camera duties and as more Members arrived I began to distribute our beautiful name badges. The badges were the work of Dennis R and his wife who generously designed, produced and mailed them at their own expense. Everyone at the Lunch sends their thanks. You can see the design in a number of the pictures including the one that the 'mystery guest is wearing in some of his more embarrassing shots.
As more Members and several more wives and one youngster arrived we moved to our tables and got seated.
It's interesting to me, how quickly everyone became comfortable, even with those Members we had never seen before. Clearly we are a community!
We all got into conversations and then began looking over the wonderful menu. I must admit that I'm very picky about restaurants, so when I saw the wide range of tempting selections on McKenna's menu, I was sure that I would find a dish that I would enjoy.
I want to thank Effin Haole for generously ordering an appetizer plate to share at our end of the table. The breaded shrimp I had were amazing and Mavis couldn't stop nibbling on the grilled artichoke. By the way, Effin explained the derivation of his screen name to us. It seems that when he was living in Hawaii, Haole was a term the Hawaiian locals used to put down outsiders. You can figure what "effin" stands for. Anyway, as he tells it, he often heard that term of "affection" when he was surfing with his friends and cut someone off. At least that's how I heard it :^)
When the food came, there was no question that everyone was happy with their choices. Mavis and I had sand dabs which were lightly breaded and came with asparagus, garlic roasted potatoes and a light lemon butter caper sauce. Delicious! I feel we all would be glad to recommend McKenna's to our friends.
With lunch out of the way, it was time for the raffle!
N-OS-xtasy! spoke right up and said "pick my number" and unbelievably I did! I wouldn't play cards with this guy after that :^)
As you can see from the pictures, everyone got something and both N-OS-xtasy! and Punkindrublik got to double dip. Most prizes were gags, like an original boxed System 7 and lots of outdated peripherals, but a few things were a bit better. There was a Radio Shack USB Scale! and a Sharp VCR. I hope the other Members will mention what they won, since I didn't think to make a list.
Looking back at the pictures, I enjoy seeing the smiles on everyone's face as we picked from the plain wrapped "treasures."
I had printed up a prize certificate for the OWC iTunes Gift Card and I put it in a small box with one of Precious' little plastic foot toys so it would rattle if the box was shaken. Pat's friend, Brenda L headed right for that little box without any hesitation. You can see from the pictures she wasn't sure what she had won at first. I was glad to hear that she could use it and she very happy. I'm forwarding her info to Larry on Monday.
I'd like to rely on the Members who were there to fill in the details that I'm leaving out. There was a lot going on all afternoon.
After the raffle we sang "Happy Birthday!" to Cam, N-OS-xtasy!, Pat, Punkindrublik, RgrF, Schmani and Webster J. Duck.
At this point, our "Mystery Guest," who turned out to be none other than Mini LEADER!, grabbed the very sharp knife and proceeded to cut the cake. Several of us managed to pry the knife out of his hands and for a while he was somewhat subdued. Cake cutting continued and I'm sure everyone had their fill.
The rest of the afternoon was filled with good conversation and a bit of drink.
I suggested that we start planning our event for the second half of the year early and the consensus seemed to be that we would do something in late September to mid October. Our plan is to start a new sticky and for the first two months to consider ideas for the event and for the date. We'd like to give it two months in order to chose something really creative and to allow some of our Members who live outside of the So Cal area to plan ahead to attend. It would be great to have a lot more of our friends at the next event.
The next two months will be devoted to logistics. Putting together the details for our event and arranging for out-of-towners to get here, to get picked up if necessary and perhaps even setting up a place to stay. I'm not sure about any of this. It's just an idea in my head right now, but I do know of someone with a vintage schooner who does charters and Catalina Island did seem interesting to the Members discussing this with me.
We ended up staying past 4 PM which surprised me but as they say "time flies when you're having fun!"
All in all I was very happy with our Lunch. I'm just upset that I found it so difficult to follow through with the pictures. I apologize for the delay and I hope you all enjoy the report of our event.
I want those of you who didn't make it to the Lunch, to make sure you come to our next event. You will enjoy yourself. That is a guarantee.
A last thanks to everyone that helped to make this a success, including the members and their family and friends, to MikeF for taking the pictures and to wms for his excellent pictures as well, to Dennis R and his wife for the buttons, to Clay for helping me by getting the pictures online, to Stuffed Shirt and rgG for helping with the stickies and the posts and for their suggestions, to the staff of Mckenna's and in particular Luis and Megan, and lastly, to Larry for his generosity and for providing us with a new forum, a community where we all feel at home and where we make and maintain friendships that seem to last for years.
We would love to have you to join us at our next event.
That's about it for now. I hope that I haven't left out anything important, so please fill in if I have.
Enjoy!
GeneL
I had wanted to have a clickable link to a full size slide show with titles but even without that I think you will still be able to see that we all had a great time.
When you access the pages with the pictures, please click them to see the full size images if you have the bandwidth,
Here's the link to the pictures:
I'm sorry the pictures of our "Mystery Guest" lost their titles, somewhere in the process, but you can tell he got pretty wild and was chasing the beautiful staff at McKenna's. He got right into the raffle and grabbed a prize for himself and finally passed out on top of a box containing System 7.
Oh well! we all know what kind of guy he is.
My thanks to MikeF, who kindly volunteered to take all but a couple of these pictures (the two with Mike and Teresa) with my Canon 20D while I covered the rest of the bases
Guess what? As I was writing this I received an email from Larry saying that he would be happy to have OWC host the pictures and even to do this for others on the Forum.
This is great news because he said I'd be able to do the slide show that I wanted.
But for now I'm happy to post what we have available and to tell the story of our event.
And now the report:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
When Mavis and I arrived at McKenna's, I saw right away that Ken (Harbourmaster) had steered us to the right place.
As you can see the entrance is simple, warm and inviting.
Inside we received a warm welcome from the reception staff and Luis, the manager.
The tables had been set for fifteen people which is what I originally expected but there were several additions that I knew of, so seating for four more guests was quickly added, along with a table to hold the raffle donations and the birthday cake for the Members whose birthdays fell in the first half of the year. You'll clearly see their names in the pictures of the cake. I'm sorry to say that RgrF, Schmani and Webster J. Duck couldn't be there.
Look at the picture of the beautiful setup. The tables, the room, everything seemed just right to me
Once we had the tables set up, Mavis and I moved to the bar area where we told everyone to meet us. We were happy that MikeF and his wife, Teresa arrived early as promised.
Mike took over the camera duties and as more Members arrived I began to distribute our beautiful name badges. The badges were the work of Dennis R and his wife who generously designed, produced and mailed them at their own expense. Everyone at the Lunch sends their thanks. You can see the design in a number of the pictures including the one that the 'mystery guest is wearing in some of his more embarrassing shots.
As more Members and several more wives and one youngster arrived we moved to our tables and got seated.
It's interesting to me, how quickly everyone became comfortable, even with those Members we had never seen before. Clearly we are a community!
We all got into conversations and then began looking over the wonderful menu. I must admit that I'm very picky about restaurants, so when I saw the wide range of tempting selections on McKenna's menu, I was sure that I would find a dish that I would enjoy.
I want to thank Effin Haole for generously ordering an appetizer plate to share at our end of the table. The breaded shrimp I had were amazing and Mavis couldn't stop nibbling on the grilled artichoke. By the way, Effin explained the derivation of his screen name to us. It seems that when he was living in Hawaii, Haole was a term the Hawaiian locals used to put down outsiders. You can figure what "effin" stands for. Anyway, as he tells it, he often heard that term of "affection" when he was surfing with his friends and cut someone off. At least that's how I heard it :^)
When the food came, there was no question that everyone was happy with their choices. Mavis and I had sand dabs which were lightly breaded and came with asparagus, garlic roasted potatoes and a light lemon butter caper sauce. Delicious! I feel we all would be glad to recommend McKenna's to our friends.
With lunch out of the way, it was time for the raffle!
N-OS-xtasy! spoke right up and said "pick my number" and unbelievably I did! I wouldn't play cards with this guy after that :^)
As you can see from the pictures, everyone got something and both N-OS-xtasy! and Punkindrublik got to double dip. Most prizes were gags, like an original boxed System 7 and lots of outdated peripherals, but a few things were a bit better. There was a Radio Shack USB Scale! and a Sharp VCR. I hope the other Members will mention what they won, since I didn't think to make a list.
Looking back at the pictures, I enjoy seeing the smiles on everyone's face as we picked from the plain wrapped "treasures."
I had printed up a prize certificate for the OWC iTunes Gift Card and I put it in a small box with one of Precious' little plastic foot toys so it would rattle if the box was shaken. Pat's friend, Brenda L headed right for that little box without any hesitation. You can see from the pictures she wasn't sure what she had won at first. I was glad to hear that she could use it and she very happy. I'm forwarding her info to Larry on Monday.
I'd like to rely on the Members who were there to fill in the details that I'm leaving out. There was a lot going on all afternoon.
After the raffle we sang "Happy Birthday!" to Cam, N-OS-xtasy!, Pat, Punkindrublik, RgrF, Schmani and Webster J. Duck.
At this point, our "Mystery Guest," who turned out to be none other than Mini LEADER!, grabbed the very sharp knife and proceeded to cut the cake. Several of us managed to pry the knife out of his hands and for a while he was somewhat subdued. Cake cutting continued and I'm sure everyone had their fill.
The rest of the afternoon was filled with good conversation and a bit of drink.
I suggested that we start planning our event for the second half of the year early and the consensus seemed to be that we would do something in late September to mid October. Our plan is to start a new sticky and for the first two months to consider ideas for the event and for the date. We'd like to give it two months in order to chose something really creative and to allow some of our Members who live outside of the So Cal area to plan ahead to attend. It would be great to have a lot more of our friends at the next event.
The next two months will be devoted to logistics. Putting together the details for our event and arranging for out-of-towners to get here, to get picked up if necessary and perhaps even setting up a place to stay. I'm not sure about any of this. It's just an idea in my head right now, but I do know of someone with a vintage schooner who does charters and Catalina Island did seem interesting to the Members discussing this with me.
We ended up staying past 4 PM which surprised me but as they say "time flies when you're having fun!"
All in all I was very happy with our Lunch. I'm just upset that I found it so difficult to follow through with the pictures. I apologize for the delay and I hope you all enjoy the report of our event.
I want those of you who didn't make it to the Lunch, to make sure you come to our next event. You will enjoy yourself. That is a guarantee.
A last thanks to everyone that helped to make this a success, including the members and their family and friends, to MikeF for taking the pictures and to wms for his excellent pictures as well, to Dennis R and his wife for the buttons, to Clay for helping me by getting the pictures online, to Stuffed Shirt and rgG for helping with the stickies and the posts and for their suggestions, to the staff of Mckenna's and in particular Luis and Megan, and lastly, to Larry for his generosity and for providing us with a new forum, a community where we all feel at home and where we make and maintain friendships that seem to last for years.
We would love to have you to join us at our next event.
That's about it for now. I hope that I haven't left out anything important, so please fill in if I have.
Enjoy!
GeneL
