I was a contestant recently in my public speaking clubs extemporaneous speaking contest. I learned a few trick in speaking with basically no time to gather your thoughts.

My public speaking club - Capital City Toastmasters - held its annual Spring Speech Contest. The contest is part of Toastmasters Internationals Speech contest series. I entered the 'Table Topics' portion of the contest. This has contestants speaking 'off-the-cuff' about a topic they don't know until called upon.

Our club's contest question - Describe the last 24 hours - was basically slow-pitch softball. I took a chance and basically went into an act. The good 'ole 'It was hell' routine. It went over fine and I moved to the next round.

The Area Contest

I had been to several area events before, just not as a contestant. This one was held at a library in North Raleigh. The question caught all of us three combatants off guard. 'You were on a ship 20 years ago. Tell us what has changed and what has stayed the same'.

Had no idea on how to respond. I came up with some very, very lame story about how was still a man, a patriot and a friend. I just tried to keep talking. Nothing really made sense. Somehow, I won the chance to proceed to the division level.

The Division Contest

This turned out to be quite an event. I arrived at exactly 6:59 pm. Had I arrived anytime after 7:00 pm, I would have been disqualified. Thank goodness I decided to ask to directions from the very place the contest was being held at.

There were approximately 60-70 people there and I went against 6 others.. The question was 'Pick any moment in history to go back to and state the reason why'.

I came up with playing pool with the kings in medieval Europe. In hindsite, it was somewhat lame, although I thought I did a good job with it. I thought I performed well.

The judges obviously thought differently. Although I failed to win, place or show, I got a little trophy for my efforts.