Sitting at the two-hour look-ahead meeting this morning, I drew doodles.  I also passively watched the meager PowerPoint presentation that attended to the speakers as Klingon servants would less-than-humbly serve their humanoid masters.  Basically, the PowerPoint was not well done and served to make the meeting, dare I say it, less interesting.  There were seventeen different topics and about seven speakers.  Each speaker has their own personality, I realize, but since they all have the same job, standing out is a considerable achievement.

The first speaker lucks out because everyone is fresh; ready to be sponges for whatever he might say, be it informative, interesting, or ill-contrived.  We, the audience, were sitting straight(ish) in our chairs while we felt dazzled by our first lecturer.  The podium seemed to expound with flourish as he swept through his two presentations, mostly ignoring the poor PowerPoint (for the better).  He sauntered off the stage to no applause.  It seems, the audience is capable of learning and has actually achieved this knowledge – if we clap for one, we have to clap for them all – we no longer clap.  Woohoo, us.

Our second speaker is actually a dual set, both ready to speak about their one topic.  My notes are a sketch of an unknown galaxy (which if the explosions and corrupt gaseous air is any indication) involved in some sort of interstellar warfare.  Therefore, they could not have been too terribly interesting.

Our next set of speakers were, at the very least, good enough for me to actually write words down on my notepad.  The words are unimportant but the fact that I was inspired to stop creating a far-away land and focus on work makes me believe they did will.  Bravo!!!

One speaker had seven of our seventeen points, which I would have been dreading, was she not my favorite person to hear lecture.  She is the kind of person who is so excited about the future that I can’t help but smile and get excited, too.  There was also a visible shift in the audience.  The audience, who had turned into a slumping, leaning, audibly-breathing mass, now pulled up their collective intelligence pool and reaffirmed a suitable professional posture.  Our speaker is brilliant in a way that astounds me – she has this incredible ability to make me feel smarter.  How did she do that?  One minute, I’m doodling and the next, I’m smarter than the average twinkie-eating Ferringhi (for those who don’t know, just pretend I said really dumb and annoying alien).  I feel refreshed!

So knowing who the next speaker was to be, I prepared a game for myself.  You see, this next speaker has an unequivocal propensity to say “um” while giving speeches.  I’ve heard her speak a few times, just enough for me to be prepared.  Every time she said “um” in her three minute presentation, I drew a line.  So that, by the end (no kidding), I have a lovely tower-like structure of 63 lines.  That’s a lot of “um”. 

We ended with our newest speaker, and having never heard him speak, I was interested.  He had nothing to say, but that didn’t stop me from evaluating whether or not I’d attend any of his meetings.  Overall, he was funny, but not goofy, and endearing without being pathetic.  Safe to say I will attend his future meetings.