Club doings are what the members make them, really.
Our club meetings generally consist of the following:
Short BS session from 6:45 'til 7PM
'Business meeting' from 7PM til... it's done.
We have an E-Board which meets separately to discuss and plan any and all club events, so we usually try to keep the business to a minimum at the general membership meetings. More often than not these days, it's no more than half an hour.
If any member wants to know the ins and outs of what it takes to run an organized and successful club and its associated events throughout the year, there's an open invitation to attend the E-Board meetings. But, otherwise, we see no need to bore those at the general membership meetings who couldn't shive a git about the necessary business aspects of the club.
When we have an event coming up, like our annual show or our mall show or whatever, we sometimes extend the business meeting a bit and hammer out all the last minute details. But this usually doesn't add to awful much time on to the meetings; we have a great buncha guys in this club and on the E-board and the planning and task assignments are taken care of as early as is possible and/or practical.
After the 'Biz', we generally do what most would call 'show and tell' where anyone who brought in a model or any other item(s) of interest talks about it if they wish to do so.
From month to month we rotate one or more of the following:
The 'Round the Room Question' which is usually modeling-related. We go around the room and everyone shares their answer and any additional thoughts. We alternate between topical, humorus and informative queries. Although we try to keep it to a 'yes or no' kind of answer. With 45-60+ folks this type of thing can take awhile!
Our 'Round Tables' are basically discussion groups. To put it simply, the aircraft guys get together and talk aircraft, armor guys armor, cars cars etc...
We often times have demos where someone who has a unique or just plain useful technique shares their 'wisdom'. This is one of the most prevalant activities at our meetings.
Every now and again, we also designate certain meetings as having a special theme. Sometimes it's a 'Reference' meeting where folks bring in new books or stuff that they've recently acquired etc. Even though there's usually several fellas who hawk their wares every month, we have designated 'Flea Market' meetings. We also have 'Build-n-Bulls' where everyone brings something to work on.
Another thing we do fairly often is the 'Show Your Latest' deal. This is where the fellas bring in their latest acquisitions, whether it be kits, accessories etc. We also have meetings where the guys bring in their most unusual modeling tool, worst kit they ever bought etc. We've come up with alotta different things.
A couple months ago we had what we call a 'Blind Build'. There's teams of two: one blinfolded and one not. The blindfolded bloke has to build a model with the non-blindfolded bloke acting as the 'coach'. Then, half-way through, they switch positions. BTW, the building is done with superglue. heheh...
More often than not though, the second half of our meetings are a free-for-all. If someone wants to watch a demo, they watch it. If they wanna choot the chit with some fellas over in the corner, they do that. Our meetings usually turn onto a big BS session, no matter what the 'planned' activities are.
We also have other club doings throughout the year; our faves being the day-long 'Build-n-Bull' and our road trips. The road trips come in many varieties. Sometimes we hit a museum or two. Sometimes we hit all the hobby shops in our area or within decent driving distance.
One of our staples is the trip to Toronto where we have 5 possible stops: Keiths Hobby Shop, Northstar Hobbies, Zet-Burger for lunch (This one is NOT optional! Cheeseburger, cheeseburger! chip, no fries...), Aviation World (right across the street from Toronto IAP) and, on our return trip, we usually hit Niagara Central Hobbies in St. Catherines. Our sixth stop of the day is Ace Hobby in the Falls, after we come back to our side of the border.
By far our most popular road trips are those to shows. We sometimes travel in groups of 20 or more, but it's usually more like 6-10 caravaners. The trip and the antics which go on are often times more fun than the shows themselves...
There's a helluvalot more we do as a club and as niches within the club, but I'm kinda sick of typing. So, in conclusion, I shall finish by ending...
Fade to Black...