Dear Odd Fellows and Pledges,
Busy times coming up for the Davis Odd Fellows!
1. Only Two Lodge Meetings Remain in 2015. Please mark your calendars. We have only two Lodge meetings remaining this year. The regular meetings of November 25, December 12, and December 23 are all canceled due to the Thanksgiving Holiday, Breakfast with Santa, and the Christmas holiday, respectively. The only remaining meetings this year are the following:
Saturday, November 14. This Saturday will be our last regular meeting of the year. We will be discussing a number of upcoming events including Breakfast with Santa, our New Year’s Party with Mumbo Gumbo, and the Installation and Awards Dinner coming up in January. We will also be holding our election of officers. The only election remaining will be for Noble Grand to serve in 2016. Nominations were closed at the last meeting, and the candidates are Jean-Paul Montreuil and Arun Sen. At our last meeting, the Lodge elected the following members to office: Vice Grand Stewart Savage, Recording Secretary Jim Smith, Treasurer Janis Rosenberg, Financial Secretary Duff Devine, and Dave Rosenberg as Trustee.
Wednesday, November 18. This is a special meeting called for one purpose only: Conferring the Initiatory Degree on eight new members of the Lodge. This will be a fun, and relatively brief meeting, where we initiate and welcome new members. Let’s have a nice turnout for the last meeting of 2015.
2. Do You Have an Ugly Sweater or Shirt? At last – you can wear it and win a cool prize. This Thursday (tomorrow), November 12, at Club Night at the Lodge (from 5 to 8 p.m.) we will have an “Ugly Sweater/Ugly Shirt Contest.” Dinner will also be available for those who wish to partake. We will also have wine tasting for $5 per person – sample an assortment of wines. Club Night at the Lodge is open to members, pledges and their guests.
3. Odd Hike to the Lake Berryessa Area. Our Lodge’s Take a Hike Committee is planning a 5.2 mile hike in the Lake Berryessa area, this coming Sunday, November 15. This is open to members, pledges, friends and family. For more information, contact Dave Reed at dreedng@gmail.com.
4. Odd Fellows Wine Club Meets on November 20. The next Odd Fellows Wine Club gathering will be coming up soon – on Friday, November 20, starting at 7 p.m. It will be hosted by Colleen and Phil Pacca in their lovely South Davis home. More information and details coming up in the next few days.
5. Adopt-a-Highway Committee Clean Up. Our Adopt-a-Highway Committee has a clean up day scheduled for Saturday, November 21. If you want to join this committee and help clean up the environment for a couple of hours, please contact the Committee Chair Sheryl Cambron at sacreed@sbcglobal.net or Committee Co-Chair John Steele at jcsteele53@gmail.com.
6. Tellabration Coming to the Lodge on November 22. Mark your calendars for a fun event at the Lodge on Sunday, November 22. It’s an afternoon of storytelling for teens and adults at the Lodge, from 2:30 to 5:30 p.m. The event is sponsored by the Odd Theater Committee of the Davis Lodge and the National Storytelling Network and held in over 40 states and 9 countries! Also, live music by Driving South.
7. Run/Walk on Thanksgiving Day. “Running With the Turkeys” is a 5K run or walk on Thanksgiving Day (November 26). We only have three people signed up so far for our Odd Fellows team. We would like to have a few more. Good fun and good exercise! The event benefits the Yolo County Food Bank. For information or to join the team, contact Janis Rosenberg at janisrosenberg@outlook.com.
8. Odd Fellows Bingo a Great Success. Our last Bingo – held on November 8 – was another success. Some 66 members of the public attended, and we are providing $811 to our November beneficiary: the Family Resource Center. So far this year, our Bingo Committee has provided close to $7,000 to our beneficiaries – and we have one more to go: the Yolo County SPCA on December 13. This is the NINTH year that we have provided Bingo to the community and it is one of our major contributors to community and charitable groups. Thank you again, to our dedicated Bingo Committee, chaired by Jean-Paul Montreuil and Jeff Oblinger. Thanks also to Dave Rosenberg, who suggested that the Lodge run Bingo and launched it as a Lodge Committee. Our first Bingo game was played on September 9, 2007.
9. Bowling, Anyone? The Odd Fellows Bowling Committee will be organizing bowling excursions in the near future. Contact Committee Chair Bob Dovi at bdovi02@yahoo.com if you are interested in bowling!
10. Bridge, Anyone? Some interest has been expressed by one of our Pledges to form a group of members and pledge who enjoy the game of Bridge. (Could this be our 46th Committee?) If you are interested in Bridge at the Lodge, please write to me and I will compile the list of names. If we have sufficient interest, we will launch it. So, please let me know in the next week by responding to this e-mail.
11. Books, Anyone? We are forming a Book Club group in the Lodge. If anyone is interested in reading and discussing books, please contact Heather Barnes at hjbarnes76@gmail.com.
12. How About Some Caroling. In the spirit of F-L-T, Dave Reed is, once again, organizing a Christmas Caroling group to visit a local convalescent hospital. The date and time is still to be determined. If YOU are interested in joining the Caroling Group, please contact Dave Reed at dreedng@gmail.com. You don’t have to be a good singer – you just need enthusiasm and holiday spirit.
13. A Special Movie Showing on December 20. Hold open the evening of Sunday, December 20. That’s the evening our Lodge’s Classic Movie Committee will offer you a special showing of the holiday comedy classic: “A Christmas Story” [you’ll shoot your eye out] in the Lower Hall of the Lodge. This special showing is only open to members, Pledges, family and their guests. The movie is fun for all ages. This is a family-friendly event and we encourage you to bring the kids! No chairs will be set up so you are asked to bring sleeping bags, pillows, blankets, bean bag chairs or lawn chairs. It’s going to be a big, fun sleep in. We will have popcorn and hot apple cider. Doors will open at 5:30 p.m. and the movie will start at 6:00 p.m. For more information or questions contact Dave Rosenberg at daverose@jps.net.
14. The Davis Rebekah Lodge. The Davis Rebekah Lodge was instituted in 1901 and is currently a small, but active Lodge. Members have fun and do a lot of good works in the community. The Rebekah Lodge is looking for a few new members to initiate. Any member or Pledge of the Davis Odd Fellows Lodge can submit an application to join the Davis Rebekah Lodge, and most of the members of the Rebekah Lodge are also Odd Fellows. If you are interested, please contact Nicole Chaffee, Secretary of the Davis Rebekah Lodge, at nchaffee@ucdavis.edu and she will get you a Rebekah Lodge membership application form.
15. The Davis Encampment. The Davis Encampment was instituted in 1955, and is currently an active group. The mission of the Davis Encampment is to help kids have a summer camp experience. It is one of the two most active Encampments in California (San Francisco is the other one). Any member of the Davis Lodge who holds all three degrees is eligible to submit an application to join the Davis Encampment. In the Encampment, you will receive three more degrees. There are only 220 Odd Fellows in California who possess all three Encampment Degrees. If you are interested in applying to join the Encampment, please contact the current Chief Patriarch Arun Sen at arun.sen@sbcglobal.net.
16. Canton Davis. Yes, Davis has it’s own Canton of Patriarchs Militant. It is one of the two most active Cantons in California (San Francisco is the other one). The Branch confers the “Universal Justice Degree” – the highest degree of Odd Fellowship. Only 86 Odd Fellows in California who possess this final degree. Any member of the Davis Encampment who holds all three degrees in the Encampment is eligible to submit an application to join the Canton. For more information or an application, please contact the head of the Canton, Captain Dennis Corcoran at dcorcoran@aol.com.
17. Breakfast with Santa. This is our 10th year providing Breakfast with Santa (BWS) to the community. The event this year is Saturday, December 12. Tickets go on sale on Monday, November 16, at Avid Reader Active in Downtown Davis and at Common Grounds in South Davis. We have all volunteer positions filled for the breakfast. And thank you to the best Santa ever, Doug Hatton. But we still have two ways that YOU can help:
Sponsor. You can be a financial sponsor of the event for a donation of $100 or more. The funds are used to help foster children in the community, and also to help young adults who recently left the foster care system and need some assistance. The following have already contributed as sponsors: Beth and Bob Dovi, Joyce Trujillo, Lea and Dave Rosenberg, an Anonymous contribution, Law Offices of Roberta Savage, Tim Ainsworth, Sherry and Tony Pruitt, Tandem Properties, Inc., Brooks Painting, Inc., Arun Sen, Allison Zuvella, Davis Ace, Campus Child Care, and Raquel Silva – Attorney at Law. If you would like to be a sponsor, please contact me in the next week. And thank you.
We need help. When BWS is over, Debbie Friend (who is organizing the stage decor) and I need some help clearing the decorations in the room and on the tables, boxing them and putting them away for next year. We don’t want to do this alone. If you can come to the Lodge around 12:30 p.m. on December 12 to help us, it will be very much appreciated. Please RSVP to me in the next week and let me know if you can help.
18. New Year’s Eve Party with Mumbo Gumbo. This was such a great success in 2014, we are doing it again! Our Lodge’s 2nd Annual New Year’s Party with Mumbo Gumbo is open to the public and is our way of helping the community welcome 2016 in style. The party starts on December 31 and ends on January 1. Doors open at 8:00 p.m. and the music starts at 9:30 p.m. Lots of fun music suitable for dancing; light fare of gumbo and corn bread will be available, no host bars will be open. Tickets are $50 each – tickets are now on sale at Avid Reader Active, or you may purchase them on line at www.showclix.com/event/MumboGumbo1231. Juelie Roggli is the overall coordinator of the event and you can contact her at juelrog@gmail.com. Coordinating Lodge volunteers to help at the event is Mary Superak who can be reached at mericanary@mac.com. Only 225 tickets are available for this popular event.
Lea Rosenberg
Noble Grand