Jonola14

PRESENTATION SKILLS

“Right, Jon, your turn” the tutor said as she motioned to me to take the floor and present myself in front of my colleagues. I had scribbled a few notes on a scrap of paper just before the course began in preparation for providing a few stories from my early days, including an early childhood memory.

The previous presentations had described such events as missing lessons at school and grazing knees, but I wanted to be different.

“Kiss chase” I blurted. “At my school, the girls used to chase the boys, slobbering at the mouth and generally putting the fear of God in us”, I continued, proceeding to recount an anecdote involving girls, me, a tree and a ladder.

“Nowadays” I added, trying to convince the audience that I hadn’t, in fact, attended some special school for the sexually reversed, “nowadays, if a school girl was chasing me, slobbering at the mouth, then I might find it more difficult to resist and I’d probably have to force myself to abide by her wishes.” I turned my back to the audience, section one complete, but then horror dawned on me. I rapidly turned back around and tried to repair some of the potential damage.

“I don’t mean that in the Matthew Kelly sense of the phrase” I hastily added, “what I mean is that if they were at the more mature end of the schooling stage, then I might have to co-operate”. By this time it was too late, Rogers was in fits of laughter, the tutors were shaking their heads and the video camera had it recorded…..