AARP’s top 10 Shows

Just received my August/September 2023 AARP magazine.  While flipping through it I found the article "10 Shows That Changed Our Lives."

Of Course! Star Trek the original series was #4, after The French Chef, The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau, and All in the Family. Good company for our favorite and first series!

Captain’s Log: August 2023

Greetings, Crew!

I hope you've been having a wonderful summer. Tomorrow is the Most Important day in a long time - the State Fair starts!! I'll be out there every morning volunteering at the Red Cross bloodmobile, so if you're there in the early morning, come on by!

We've had some fun times this summer, with the anniversary picnic, comedy outing, CONvergence blood drive, Star Trek: The Next Improvisation, and Garden Party. You can hear all about them at the September meeting in St. Paul. Don't forget we're bowling after the meeting, and it'll fun. More on that elsewhere in this newsletter.

Take care, don't eat too many Sweet Martha's Cookies, and see you around the Galaxy!

Mary

 

2023 Chuckwagon Social

Our event this year is on October 15th and we hope everyone can come and/or support it. We'll be having our usual yummy chili dinner with all the fixins, plus dessert and light beverages (cash bar is available).

The most important things you can do to support our yearly fundraiser are:

  • Sell tickets!
    • The admission price this year is still $13. You can collect the money and bring it to the event, or you can submit it electronically via PayPal or Venmo. You don't need to have a paper ticket to the event - just let us know that you and your friends are coming and how many you are bringing. We'll have a list at the door of those who have paid. Note that we need to know in advance to plan the food (no surprises at the door, please). We need to let the venue know our count by October 7th, so please make sure to let us know who is coming!
    • Our 50-50 raffle is happening again. You can buy/sell single tickets for $5 or three for $10. Again, you don't need a paper ticket as long as you send us the names to go in the drawing, and you can turn in your money online or at the event. We will also be selling them at the event, so bring your money!!!
    • For both of the ticket types, you can print or email copies if you like. Just copy the graphic below!
  • Donate items for sale!
    • A big portion of our proceeds each year come from our action and we need items. A wide variety of items are accepted, as long as they are new. Star Trek memorabilia should be donated only if unique. Handmade items like quilts, services (like cake baking) and interesting trinkets are great. Baskets are always fun, for movie nights or pampering or cooking or the sky's the limit. When you know what you're donating, please contact Roxanne with the following: 1) item name, 2) short description, 3) donor name, 4) value of item, 5) minimum bid, 6) value for quick sale. If you have questions about these details, Roxanne can help you to decide.
  • Donate Cash and Grab items! If you have smaller items that don't fit well in the auction, Cash and Grab is another option. Label the items with their name. We'll mark the price at the event.

Please do take the time to support this event in these ways. We hope to be back to more events this coming year, and our treasury can use a boost! Most importantly, we look forward to seeing you.

 

Captain’s Log, July 2023

Greetings, Crew!

Here's our first back-to-normal monthly newsletter! We have fewer events during the summer, so not a lot to tell, but it's still great to catch up.

Roxanne and I had a great day at the CONvergence Blood Drive on Friday. We had exactly 50 donors on the schedule (the goal!) for the 22nd annual drive. Many people stopped by to greet us and ask about our room (which we didn't have). It's fun to be appreciated!

Our next event is the Garden Party on August 12th. This four-course dinner event showcases our young chefs' talents and has been great fun over many years. The cost is still $35 per person. You can sign up on the signup sheet until July 31st.

We don't have membership meetings in July or August, so the next one is September 9th. At this time we're planning to have our annual bowling party after the meeting, then go to dinner together afterward. If you haven't attended this one, you should. It's fun!

Speaking of September, that's the time when we go over our upcoming year's calendar. This is a big one, since it's our 40th. We will decide on our special anniversary events at that meeting, so if you have ideas please let a board member know.

Take care, stay safe, and see you around the Galaxy!

Mary

 

Back to Normal Nokomis News

BC (Before COVID) we had a curated, monthly newsletter sent by email, and updates to current events were posted to the website but were not necessarily mailed out.  To keep up with the rapidly changing world we set up the website to mail any new articles out in a blast each Wednesday.  Rapid change has settled, and the weekly blast seems to be more noise than usable given the very low click rate we've seen lately.

Starting after the June 14th automatically generated Update email the Nokomis News will return.  You'll get a more complete email once a month,  without the rapid-fire narration.  If we do the job right, everything will be timely and detailed.

What changes?  Well, Scott and I have a monthly task to create a newsletter.  If you're recruiting, running a project or wrapping up a task, we'd very much like you to write the newsletter article and submit them to the newsletter.  We're aiming to mail the newsletter 7 days ahead of the scheduled meeting, so the deadline for contributions will be 10 days prior to each monthly meeting.

Look for the return of Nokomis News, and please let us know what works and how we can make it better for you.

 

-Phill

 

A Way to Reach Out and Help Ukrainian people.

Mark Uecker brought us a touching request.  Mark and his friends, while traveling the Ukraine singing with their choir, were cared for by a wonderful, gentle man.  In the years hence, as the war has taken over their world, this gentle man has taken on care of kids in a local orphanage.  He's been making sure the children get the care they need in the face of the destruction they've seen.   Mark has been helping these folks out regularly, and asked if we'd be interested as well.

When the Nokomis verifies that a charity is legitimate and the money will go where it's needed, it can take work.  In rare cases though, we have a good and trusted friend describing the charity and vouching for the destination.  Mark Uecker is all the good word we need.

The Nokomis will donate $100 without conditions, and match 1:1 donations to the cause up to a total of $500.  This means your donations go twice as far.  Thank you to the membership for approving the amount, for the members present that pledged support.   And in late breaking news, there is another $500 available from a personal source, meaning that up to the first $1000 donated will be matched.  Please consider giving to help.

To donate, get the money to the Nokomis treasury and we'll gather it to one convenient donation.  There are a couple of fee-free ways to get the funds to the Nokomis, the ways are detailed on this web page.  We'll collect funds through at least the Independence Day Weekend, the collect and forward the funds to where they will do the most good.

 

 

 

 

 

  • Ukrainians of all ages and walks of life have come together to create "trench candles" for soldiers on the front line. The process is fairly simple: cardboard sheets are cut up into lines, then twisted and fitted inside tin cans, the cans are then filled with mixture of wax and paraffin.

Thank you for your generosity, one and all!

Strange New Worlds, Familiar Old Place (but NEW!!)

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds starts its second seasons this week, on Thursday June 15th and there's a change in some plans.  Scott Hill described the Nokomis as an eating club with a Star Trek fetish, and all things being equal we'd be meeting at some local watering and eating establishment, and the place we had arranged couldn't stand us up.  But to quote Spock, " All things being equal, Mr. Scott, I would agree. However, things are not equal. This one *can*"

The venue we'd orginally contacted came under new management and that group, while reacting to the changes in dining and all that other post-pandemic stuff, changed the conditions of booking so we can't use them, at least right now.  I'm not using their name here since the entire world is shifting and they are along with it.

So what's a Trekker to do? Phill Goldman and Lynne Tauer have a nice big screen, a nice medium room, and a nice small kitchen perfect for warming up a couple of pizzas.  You're invited to their home on Thursday to view the episode with friends. We'll be ready to have folks arrive just after 6PM, and we'll roll the episode sometime between 7:15 and 7:30p (that's PM for all of them).

Phill's gonna grab a bunch of frozen pizzas, and though he's not asking for funds he'll happily accept a couple of bucks when you get to the house.    We're looking forward to seeing you on Thursday!   Here's the location: link.    If you have other questions, hit Phill at .  See you then!

Captain’s Log: June 2023

Greetings Crew!

I hope everyone is doing well. Here's something to think about before Saturday's meeting. We lost our meeting/viewing room for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds on the 15th. The restaurant has imposed a new minimum spend that exceeds our group's size, so we can't use the space. Now we need a new plan. If you have a thought about this, let me or another board member know ASAP. Our board meeting is tomorrow (June 8th) and we'll discuss it there, making a final decision on Saturday. Thanks for your input on this.

I was contacted by the director of a Star Trek improv show in Minneapolis called Star Trek: The Next Improvisation. It's a show that began more than a decade ago at HUGE Theatre and has recently been revived. They are performing a special run this month at HUGE Theater as a tribute to the closing of the theater before they reopen in a new space. She's invited the members of USS Nokomis to come check out a show on the 10th or 17th (some of us may go on the 17th). Go to this LINK for information and tickets.

We are going to have a great meeting on Saturday, full of lots of plans and topics. See you there, and see you around the Galaxy!

Mary

Special Invitation to YOU!!

Yes, you. We are excited to be getting together at the West Bush Lake Park this Saturday for our 39th anniversary picnic, and we'd love to see you there! Some of our members haven't been able to meet in person for a few years, and here's our chance to see your faces in 3D! We'll have some food, enjoy some friends, and maybe even toss some Peeps (we'll see how many people are up for that). Join us!