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July 3, 2014 Editor of the Week: Sheri Siesseger Table of Contents Alerts & Notices Meet New Director and Board Secretary Irene Osterman OLLI Recorder Consort Entertains Senior Citizens Poet's Corner Ms. Ollie Ettakit Arts & Music at George Mason Meetings & Clubs About OLLI E-News Alerts & Notices A second session of F907 Planning for Your Life After Retirement has been added. The course, taught by Hank Taylor, will be offered Wed, July 9 at 2:15 in the Tallwood Annex. Space is limited to 25 participants. Please remember to drop classes that you are unable to attend. Use the OLLI member portal and go to the courses tab or stop by the OLLI office for an add/drop form. At Tallwood, park in the pool parking lot only in the morning during the summer term. The OLLI office will be closed, Fri, July 4. Ted Parker will now serve as University Liaison along with our current Liaison, Pat Carroll.  Martha Powers will join Dave Ryan as co-chair of the Outreach Committee. Back to Top of Page Meet New Director and Board Secretary Irene Osterman By Sheri Siesseger, E-News Editor Perhaps you haven’t noticed, but OLLI-Mason has a significant number of women serving or who have served in key volunteer or board positions who have library science degrees or library work experience. I have known a lot of folks in this profession. They tend to be people-focused, problem solvers, quick learners, logical thinkers and sticklers for accuracy. Irene Osterman, who, yes, has a master’s degree in library and information sciences, possesses all of these attributes, and more. As a new director, Irene brings a wealth of past experience positioning her well to contribute to future growth and development of OLLI-Mason. Her work experience in space planning for the federal government should be very useful as she joins the Strategic Planning Committee and seeks to solve classroom space issues at Tallwood. As chief editor of OLLI E-News, she has gained valuable insight into the broader OLLI community. And her information science background will surely be useful to her position as our OLLI historian, the keeper of our institutional knowledge! Also, she was recently elected secretary of the OLLI-Mason Board. Irene was born in Seattle and also lived in Syracuse, NY, and Connecticut while growing up. Before moving to this area 36 years ago, she and her husband David (also an OLLI member) lived in New Jersey and New York City. Except for the summer weather, Irene and David, and their two crazy cats, enjoy living here. A key attraction of northern Virginia for the Ostermans: their two children also live in the area. For fun they enjoy kayaking on the Occoquan River, Mason Neck and Pohick Bay, and biking the local trails. They also attend performances at the Center for the Arts, Arena Stage and Signature Theater. They are fans of movies at Shirlington and Cinema Arts theaters, and the Washington Nationals. Irene, the sports nut of the family, is hoping the Nats will stop letting the Cardinals own them! They also enjoy traveling, particularly recent trips to New Zealand and Ireland. Back to Top of Page OLLI Recorder Consort Entertains Senior Citizens By Jayne Hart, Recorder Consort Member The Ollie Recorder Consort has been busy the last two Fridays entertaining senior citizens at Braddock Glen in Fairfax and then at the Lincolnia Senior Day Care Center in Alexandria. The Consort offered a wide range of music including renaissance, baroque, patriotic, folk, and popular pieces. The informative narration by Mike McNamara added a unique and often humorous element to the program. A special feature was the appearance of the “Blues Brothers” (Neale Ainsfield and Kevin Sherlock) playing a spirited version of Mack the Knife. Anyone who is interested in joining this distinguished group, please contact Helen Ackerman. Photos by Donna Sieckmann Back to Top of Page Poet's Corner Courtesy of the Poetry Workshop If Dogs Had Wings   If dogs had wings And porcupines could fly, The world might not be A better place.   If orangutans could tap dance Wolves sing like nightingales, And crows call my name, The world would be less quiet.   If bats drank beer Tulips typed at twilight, And daffodils donned white hats, The place would not be worse.   But if men treaded as light as lambs And as deftly as deer, Leaving a smaller footprint, And did not seek an empire of the earth The world, indeed, would be a better place.                                Jack Arthur Underhill Back to Top of Page Ms. Ollie Ettakit Answers to your pressing questions about OLLI etiquette  By Ms. Ollie Ettakit,   OLLI E-News Manners Expert Dear Ms Ettakit.   I am a fairly new member and perhaps am not yet familiar with the customs of OLLI, but I have frequently noted members arriving late to class, parading across the front of the classroom between the instructor and the class. I think it is disrespectful, especially when sometimes the offenders are carrying a cup of coffee from the Social Room, indicating that they dawdled along the way. One member sauntered in 15 minutes after the class started!   Anonymous   My Dear Anonymous,   You may be new, but your complaint is not. Alas, I have often heard it before and am perplexed at how to entice offenders to be more sensitive and resolve the issue. The staff has done an admirable job of posting start times for our classes in all the classrooms, on bulletin boards, on the website and in the catalog. I seriously doubt that anyone in OLLI does not know when classes start, and it is puzzling that one in possession of that knowledge could be unaware of the effect of his or her behavior on the instructor and the class.    The majority of OLLI members are on time for class, but sometimes things happen and one must arrive a tad late. I have been told, however, that a few members are frequently late and appear oblivious to the disruption they cause. Perhaps if the class liaison notices that unfortunate habit, he or she should gently remind the offenders that it would be much appreciated by everyone else in the class if they would be on time.   It is understandable that someone could, on rare occasions, be late due to traffic or parking problems. In that event, I would hope that the thoughtful gentleman or lady would then take a seat near the door. Some classrooms have signs encouraging people to leave seats near the door vacant for someone who might unavoidably be late. Liaisons could also gently remind attendees in the first few classes to leave such seats vacant. Editors note: As a follow-on, people arriving late (as well as others) often fail to sign in. The Program Committee and staff make great use of the totals from the sign-in sheets to evaluate the course and instructor based on changes to the attendance rate. If you must arrive late, please be sure to sign in before leaving at the end of class. Back to Top of Page Arts & Music at George Mason Performances, next two weeks By Shelly Gersten, OLLI E-News Staff Writer For tickets for either CFA or Hylton, call 1-888-945-2468, buy tickets online through the event calendar (see links below), or visit the venue's box office. For more information see the CFA ticket page or the Hylton ticket purchase page. At the Hylton Center Castleton Festival: Music, Theater, Opera! Featuring Denyce Graves, mezzo-soprano, under the baton of conductor Lorin Maazel. Thu, July 10, 8:00 Admission: $60, $45, $30 Merchant Hall Hylton Performing Arts Center First Annual Juried Exhibit Continues through July 18 The Buchanan Partners Art Gallery is open to the public Tue-Sat, 10:00 to 6:00; Thu, 10:00 to 8:00 and two hours before performances. For more information about the current exhibit, visit HyltonCenter.org/gallery Back to Top of Page For further details on any of the above events, please see the CFA event calendar and the Hylton Center event calendar Back to Top of Page Meetings & Clubs The following list covering the next two weeks is extracted for your convenience from the master online calendar maintained by the office, with direct web links added when available. The list is accurate as of mid-week but to check anytime for the latest information, please view the latest forecast of upcoming events on our website (News/OLLI Calendar). Note: All OLLI members are welcome at, and encouraged to attend, meetings of the Board of Directors, committees and resource groups, Kickoff Coffees, etc. (bolded below). Sat Jul 5 10:30am Tai Chi Club–TA-3 Mon Jul 7 10:00am 10:00am 10:00am 12:00pm Mah Jongg Club–TA-2 What’s in the Daily News cont’d–TA-1 Bridge Club–TA-3 Russia Discussion Group–TA-1 Tue Jul 8 10:00am Knitting and Needlework Club–Panera, Herndon Fri Jul 11  9:00am  9:30am 10:00am 10:30am 11:00am Recorder Consort–TA-3 Photography Club-TA-1 Craft and Conversation–Cottage Loudoun Program Planning Group–Rm 236 Homer, etc–Annex Mon Jul 14 10:00am 10:00am 10:00am Bridge Club–TA-3 What’s in the Daily News cont’d–TA-1 Book Club–TA-2 Tue Jul 15 10:00am Knitting and Needlework Club–Panera, Herndon Wed Jul 16  1:45pm AV Committee Training/Meeting–TA-1 Fri Jul 18  9:00am 10:00am 10:00am 11:00am 11:30am Recorder Consort–TA-3 Craft and Conversation–Cottage Board of Directors Meeting–TA-1 Homer, etc–Annex Cooking Club–Cottage Back to Top of Page About OLLI E-News Editorial Staff Chief Editor/Technical Editor: Irene Osterman Associate Editor: Weekly Editorial Team: Paul Van Hemel, Sheri Siesseger, Leslie Vandivere, Proofreaders:  John West, Gordon Canyock, Susan Van Hemel Backup Chief Editor: Sheri Siesseger Submissions. Members are encouraged to submit letters to the editor, letters to Ms. Ollie Ettakit (on etiquette matters), OLLI-related news items, articles and photos. Submit material to: [email protected]. Deadline – 6:00 pm Tuesday for that week's issue (6:00 pm Monday for letters to the editor); early submissions are greatly appreciated. Please limit articles to about 250 words. Note: You can view past issues of OLLI E-News on the DocStore. To search the content of issues, use Search Our Site or put your search term in Google followed by "site:olli.gmu.edu/" without the quotes. Back to Top of Page