From the LocSec
By
May 2009
If you’re a life member or your mailing label has 2010 or later on it, by all means skip this paragraph. If your mailing label has the year 2009 on it, this may very well be the last Mencinnatian you’ll get; the 2009 date indicates that as of March 31, you had not renewed your membership—I show there are 83 CAM members who haven’t renewed as of March 31. There’s a bit of a delay in starting newsletter subscriptions, so there’s a similar delay in ending them; that’s why you get one issue after your membership has lapsed. If you’ve renewed since March 31, go ahead and skip this paragraph, too; so long as you have renewed by the end of April, you won’t miss a Mencinnatian. For those of you still reading, I hope your departure is temporary and brief; we welcome you back at any time, and re-testing is never necessary. (And if you’ve read this far, you obviously like reading the Mencinnatian [and I doubt that you consider my column to be the highlight]! Please renew. Pretty, pretty, pretty please—with honey and sugar on it. I’m not too proud to beg.) If you have questions about renewing, the National Office is glad to help you with the process; the toll-free number is 888-294-8035, and you can call anytime (you’ll get a call back if calling outside business hours in Texas).
I’m writing this as we’re in the final stages of preparing for American Mensa Mind Games ®, which will have been held at the Drawbridge Inn in northern Kentucky by the time you read this. 240 people are registered, including 19 from Cincinnati Area Mensa. Other than a meeting of the American Mensa Committee (“AMC,” our national board of directors) in 2000, this will be the first national event we’ve hosted since the 1998 Annual Gathering that Mary Lee Kemper chaired (and she’s co-chairing this year’s AG in Pittsburgh, so we expect it to be great). I owe great thanks to all the local people who are contributing, but I want to put out very special thanks to one of our “power couples,” Phil & Virginia Plottel. Phil is our onsite registrar, and Virginia is our hospitality chair; they are putting in an enormous amount of work, and not participating in the game playing/judging; this event could not happen without them.
Phil and Virginia represent a special phenomenon—the M & M couple. They met through Mensa, fell in love, and are living happily ever after. We have a few such couples in the Cincinnati Area—about half a dozen that I can identify. If I’ve counted right, 8 of the 21 members of AMC are part of an M & M couple. So you never know what might happen if you start attending Mensa activities! We have a full calendar of local activities in May, and Southeast Michigan Mensa has a regional gathering May 1-3 nearby in suburban Detroit—even if you’re not looking for love, you may find friends, fun and intelligent discussion.
It’s national and international election time; we’ll be voting for AMC members, for some proposed amendments to the American Mensa bylaws, and for members of the International Board of Directors. CAM members who renewed by March 31 will have received ballots in late April for both elections (the international ballot should have come inside the Mensa Bulletin). I won’t use my column to urge specific votes (it’s not fair to use space others don’t get), but I do have opinions, and would be glad to share them upon request. (Many other active CAM members also have been active outside the local group, and will also share their thoughts if asked.) I urge each CAM member to not just vote, but to cast an intelligent ballot.
--Rick Magnus
CAM LocSec