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Dates and times have been finalized for these training sessions. All sessions are at Post 53 headquarters.

• Tuesday, May 24, 7:00 PM — CPR Certification training. $60 fee.
• Thursday, May 26, 7:00 PM — CPR Heartsavers training (non-certified). No fee.
• Thursday, June 2, 7:00 PM — Trauma/Falls training. No fee.

There will be sign-up sheets available at upcoming meetings. You can also reach out to Frank DeLeo via email to reserve a spot (frankdeleo@hotmail.com). Checks made out to Post 53 are requested when you sign up. There is limited space for the sessions so it will be first come, first served. If demand exceeds availability, we will offer more sessions in the fall.

We plan to clean up the roadside and shore along Pear Tree Road and the Goodwives Meadows Land Trust property on Saturday, April 23, 2022 from 1-3.  Meet at Pear Tree Beach near the boat ramp.  Wear boots – it could be muddy.  Bring gloves.

Contact Gary Banks

DMA (Bill Cavers and Gary Banks), the Darien Coastal Commission and our First Selectman cleaned up the Goodwives River inlet on 4/23.  The area included Pear Tree Point road and coastline as well as Goodwives Meadows, a Darien Land Trust property.  The results were a haul of 350 pounds of trash!

Selleck and Dunlap Woods trail prep in advance of its May 15 Adventure Day. We are looking for volunteers to help Chris Filmer walk the trails, clip branches, pick up trash, etc. on May 13 from 11 am – 1 pm.  Please contact Frank DeLeo (frankdeleo@hotmail.com) if you’d like to help.

Guided by DMA member Chris Filmer, who has been an active member of the nonprofit group dedicated to preserving Selleck’s Woods in Darien, Frank DeLeo, Charles Salmans and others helped rake leaves and prepare a children’s play area within this large nature preserve. Within the woods is an area dedicated to the fantasy play of young children, including an “I Spy” area to spot wildlife and a make-believe challenge of bridges, “spider webs” and other obstacles.

The second catered musical event of the spring season will feature a string quartet from the Norwalk Symphony Orchestra who will perform for the DMA at St. Luke’s on Wednesday evening, April 27. The musical ensemble consists of four highly skilled and experienced chamber musicians, including Emanouil Manolov (violin), Suzanne Corey-Sahlin (viola), Gunnar Sahlin (cello) and Nina Crothers (violin). All perform regularly with the Norwalk Symphony Orchestra and each of them has an impressive resumé featuring performances all over the United States and the world.

As we emerge from COVID, the DMA Social Committee, led by Jan Selkowitz, Gehr Brown and Bob McGroarty, has been seeking to schedule a variety of events and activities for this spring. Plans are in preliminary stages, with many options being considered, including musical performances, sporting events, trips to museums, sorties on Long Island Sound and the June DMA picnic. The first event is a catered musical performance on March 31, at St. Luke’s, by The Melissa Newman Quartet. The Quartet, which has been together since 2012, will be performing standards from The Great American Songbook.

The musical ensemble includes the following talented performers:

Melissa Newman, Vocals: In addition to her vocal talents, Melissa has appeared in many television series (“Bonanza”, “Entertainment Tonight” and “The New Perry Mason” to name a few) and movies (“Mr. and Mrs. Bridge”, “See How She Runs”, etc.). You will also have heard her singing on many commercial jingles. In addition, Melissa is a sculptor and works with ceramics and has volunteered her time to teach art, singing and drawing at correctional facilities for women. She is currently working with the publisher on a previously unreleased memoir by her father, Paul Newman.

Phil Bowler, Bass: Phil graduated with a music degree from The University of Hartford in 1972 and has since played with a long list of jazz greats such as Roland Kirk, Hugh Masekela, Wynton Marsalis, Slide Hampton, John Faddis, Max Roach, Horace Silver and the Count Basie Orchestra. He also hosted Jazz Adventures on WHKN in Bridgeport from 1999-2009.

Tony Lombardozzi, Guitar: Tony has been a jazz guitar instructor and ensemble director on the Wesleyan University music faculty since 1986. He has performed at many famous jazz venues such as the Blue Note and Lincoln Center Jazz in New York City and at many jazz festivals. Since the ‘70s he has performed with a long list of jazz greats such as Clark Terry, Les Paul, Kenny Barron, Rufus Reed and others too numerous to mention.

Matt Moadel, Drums: Matt is a working drummer as well as a teacher. Armed with a degree in percussion from Western Connecticut State University, he has studied many different drumming styles from traditional drum set styles and rudimentary snare drumming to Middle Eastern and African drumming. Matt has performed in many settings—from Jazz and Reggae to Flamenco and Funk to marching bands and pit orchestras.

Time and Location: St. Luke’s Youth and Community Center, at St. Luke’s Parish, 1864 Post Road, Darien Wine and Hors d’oeuvres, 6:30 p.m.—7:30 p.m./Music 7:30 p.m.—8:45 p.m. Catering by Carolyn Eddie’s Absolutely Fabulous Events

Cost: $20 per attendee for DMA members and spouses/significant others. Sign-up sheets will be available during the DMA’s general meetings at the DCA in the month of March. Make checks payable to the Darien Men’s Association and either deliver them when you sign up or mail them to the DMA, c/o the Darien Community Association, attention of Marilyn DeMaio, 274 Middlesex Road, Darien, CT 06820.

Plan to join us for a wonderful evening of food, drink and an outstanding musical performance!

Your hosts: Joe Spain and David Mace

March Madness Entry Form 2022

March Madness Contest
The 2022 March Madness contest will officially start with the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Selection Committee’s naming of the 68 teams who will participate in the annual post season tournament that leads up to the national championship game in early April. They will be named on Selection Sunday, March 13, and will be publicized all over in the media and on the Internet.

At the DMA, at our regular March 16 weekly meeting, members who wish to participate in the contest will hand in their entry sheets naming eight teams of their choosing from the 68 ranked teams that the NCAA has placed in its four regional brackets. We will have distributed entry sheet forms at the prior week’s meeting, and the form also will be available on the DMA website. The entry fee for each sheet shall be $5.00, the same as in prior years, and members can submit entries for themselves and for family members, but each entry should include the name of the DMA member who is submitting it.

The contest objective is to name teams that will win in the successive rounds of games in their respective regions. The entry sheet will be awarded points every time one of its eight named teams wins a game in this single elimination tournament. The number of points awarded for each win will equal the NCAA assigned ranking of that winning team in their tournament region. If a member’s sheet names a team that ranks five in one of the regions, then five points will be tallied on his sheet each time that team wins a game. If another team named on that sheet is a 12th ranked team, then the sheet receives 12 points each time that team wins a game. Teams that lose get no points and are out of the tournament. Only the winning teams continue to play into the succeeding rounds of games over the approximate two weeks when the tournament games will be played at the more than a dozen game venues all over the country.

Each entry sheet should have a circle drawn around the name of one of its teams, indicating that the entrant has chosen that team to be the tournament winner and National Champion. Circling the correct choice of the tournament winner means the sheet could be awarded an additional 25 bonus points in the contest tally. That circled team will have won all of its tournament games, right up to the championship game on Monday, April 4, and each win will have earned points for the entry sheet equal to its NCAA tournament ranking in its assigned division. But if it is the champ, it probably was placed high in the rankings, and every win will have yielded only a few points – save for the handsome bonus of 25 points for becoming Champion.

And, yes – there will be prizes. The winning sheet, the one with the most total points, gets the first prize of $100. And the runners-up get $50 each, until we have handed out all the funds that came in as entry fees. We hope we have a strong showing on the entry line on March 16 when we shall be receiving the entries.

We will hand out entry form sheets at the Wednesday, March 9 DMA meeting, and will have them again at the March 16 meeting, plus members can print their own sheet from the file that will be on our website. There may be some members who want to enter but are not yet ready to come to our Wednesday in-person meetings at the DCA. To accommodate them, the Wanderers plan to stay late after the meeting on March 16 for about half an hour, so members can drop by when most of the crowd has dissipated and make their entry in the vestibule, or outside, if the weather is dry.

Astute DMA members will, by now, have figured out that the entry sheet that has a high chance of winning our contest is one that names teams that received somewhat low rankings in their assigned region by the NCAA Selection Committee, but in reality, turn out to be much better than the rank the Committee gave them. They may be a nine or a thirteen ranked team, but they can defeat the higher ranked teams that they will be facing in each tournament round. And each win will yield bountiful points for their entry sheets. These are often called the Cinderella teams, and an entrant would do well to choose such teams for seven of the teams listed on his sheet. As for the eighth slot on your sheet, that is reserved for the team who will win the tournament, so make sure its name is circled. It doesn’t matter that it may receive only one or two points every time it wins, for the pay-off there is when your circled team keeps on winning and brings home the 25 bonus points. It may turn out that several entrants’ sheets have named and circled the same winning team to become the champ. If so, all such sheets will receive the 25 bonus points.