Tsunami Table Quiz

As I'm sure everyone is aware at this stage, there will be two events taking place this weekend to raise funds for the Tsunami Disaster Relief Fund. I am thrilled by the repsonse from people and the willingness shown by people to take the simple step of setting up a telescope and accepting money for charity.

On Saturday night there will be a table quiz taking place in Portlaoise. Ann-Marie Kelly, a DJ from Today FM, has agreed to host this event for us free-of-charge. So we have a hotel which is giving us a room for free, and a Dublin-based DJ who is giving up her time for free and travel all the way down to Portlaoise. Isn't that wonderful? Here we have strangers, total strangers to the world of astronomy who are willing to help us out and to help us raise money for the victims of the Tsunami. Surely then it is not too much to ask that people make the effort to travel down to Portlaoise to help out.

Get a team together and come on down. You'll have a fun night. Be the designated driver and let your friends enjoy themselves for a good cause. If you can't get a team together come down yourself and help out with the running of the event. Stay over and enjoy some craic afterwards with the others who come down. Enjoy a sumptious fry the next morning. If you can'y come down at all, then how about sponsoring a spot prize for the raffle? If you can't sponsor a spot prize then throw some change into an envelope and send it down with someone who is going.

Come on, if Ann-Marie Kelly can give up her Saturday night, then so can you.

`Just to remind everyone of the table quiz tonight in the Heritage Hotel, Portlaoise, in aid of the Tsunami Disaster Relief fund and being run in conjunction with GOAL. It seems that we should be able to fill the tables, but I'm still a little short on people to correct answers, collect answer sheets and give out stuff. If you're at a loose end this evening, and with the weather forecast being so bad we can't expect any observing to take place, then please come along and help out. John Flannery and Wally Mee will be making the trek from Dublin, as well as Mick O'Connell coming from Kilcock so people are travelling to help out, and, I'm sure, would be more than happy to share a car.

got a map?

I can find portlaois, its finding the hotel among all the roundabouts thats the problem!

www.theheritagehotel.com/html/location.html

It might help a little!

The IFAS Table Quiz in aid of the Tsunami Disaster Relief fund took place last Saturday night in Portlaoise. We had a reasonably good turnout, although there were a few tables empty. We raised 750 Euro which will be lodged to the GOAL account this week, and hopefully we can have a cheque-presentation ceremony at the COSMOS weekend.

Thanks must go to all the people who came along and took part, those who helped out, the people who donated spot prizes, and those who could not make it, but still contributed. The event wouldn’t have run so smoothly without the help of Mick O’Connell and Denise who acted as score-keepers and helped get the place ready. John Flannery donated a huge amount of spot prizes, including DVDs, CDs, and bottles of wine and spirits. Andromeda Optics gave us a lovely spotter scope which was our first prize, so a big thanks to Wally and Jimmy for their support. Al White brought down a table, and managed to keep neck-and-neck with John and Wally throughout the event. Most of all though I’d like to thank my wife Sharon who, despite not being a member of IFAS, gave up a huge amount of time printing, photocopying, and preparing materials for the night.

Thanks again to everyone who supported this event, including Bart for publicising it on this website. We must specially thank Ann-Marie Kelly from Today FM who publicised this event extensively for us and who gave up here Saturday night to act as quizmaster.