Next meeting, Feb. 16 - A business meeting, and since Pres. JODI was felled by the flu last week, she should have a bunch of things saved up for this one.

First and foremost, though, has to be our Flower Sale, chaired again this year by JERRY HODDINOTT. This has been our biggest fund-raiser for years, and April 19th is not that far away. We'll have more details - we already know our cost of product will be up this year (even tho Washington assures us there is no inflation, and therefore no need for an increase in Social Security.) We are holding the line on our prices, so we will need to try to increase sales to maintain the profits for our service fund. Note - we make more profit on roses than we do on mixed flowers, which was not always the case, so concentrate on selling roses. Order blanks and advertising flyers are available now. Get your orange-colored commitment form to JERRY so he'll know how many to order.

At the last meeting, VP JIM SCHUTZ presided, in the aforementioned absence of the Prez. LINDA BERGREN handled all the preliminaries, leading the song and giving the invocation. JIM remarked on the fact that there were no guests. Best way to develop a new member is to bring them to one of our functions- meeting or service project.

SCOTT GROVER says he needs a couple more volunteers for the Kohl Center concession stand for upcoming games. Check the web site or talk to him. He also noted that March is one of our months for cornea transplant courier missions, so stand by to be ready to help.

JIM SCHUTZ reported that we had finished up our vision screening schedule with Head Start. Apparently our work was shown at least twice on TV, which is a huge plus. If you want to participate, there will be a training session in Mazomanie in March. There are now two techniques, using different types of equipment. Training and recertification is required every two years, so if you want to join the crew, or if you haven't been to training in a while, this is your chance!

The editor was looking over an old UW Alumni magazine and ran across a story on the origin of the "chicken dance" so energetically performed by students at UW athletic events, usually cued musically by the Wisconsin Marching Band, led by the legendary Mike Leckrone. The story said that the dance was brought back from a celebration in Germany by another Badger legend, who took it to Leckrone for orchestration. The guy who brought it is someone many of us know - RANDY "JABO" JABLONIC!

VP JIM introduced our speaker, District Governor RICK DALUGE, and his wife PEGGY. He started by thanking our Club for our activities and for our financial support for the District and Lions International. He noted that our Club has had 36 Melvin Jones Fellowships.

He commented on the upcoming USA-Canada Forum, which will be in Milwaukee the 3rd weekend in September. This is a chance to hear some great presentations, material which will help you in Lions but also in your everyday life. Every MCLC Lion who has gone has returned praising the event. See JOHN JENSON for registration info.

The DG visits every Club in his District at least once, and RICK commented that ours was medium in size. A couple in northern Wisconsin are much larger, which means more travel and Lions are spread thinner.

Wisconsin Lions spend 50% of the funds they raise on local projects, 10% on District projects, 30% on Multiple District (State) projects and 10% to Lions Clubs International Foundation. This means that when you sell a flower bouquet or work a shift at the Kohl, you are helping people here, around the state and nation, and around the world. Annual dues for each Lion member, paid through your Club, are $39.00 to LCI, $10.50 to MD 27, and $5.50 to our District 27D-1. The dues cover the administrative overhead, so that charitable donations to Lions go 100% to service.

There are some membership initiatives in the works. It is planned to deploy Lion recruiters in Madison this year, with hopes of starting a new East Side Club, and also finding recruits from the Isthmus for our Club. This is an enterprise we can and should support. Look around for friends, neighbors and acquaintances who you can invite to serve and network as Lions.