Completed in May 2022

Good evening fellow toastmasters and guests, the title of my speech is 

Icebreaker or monologue?

The definition for Icebreaker is 

1. a ship designed for breaking a channel through ice 

2. Something that serves to relieve inhibitions or tension between people.

The definition for Monologue is a long, tedious speech by one person .

For this evening my speech is definitely the second definition of an icebreaker and whether it is a monologue can be decided at the end.

I have taken part in different types of icebreakers at company training days, they are used as a way to get the employees into a good mood ahead of whatever training session is being done.

I have also used icebreaker games myself as a guide leader to help new girls that have joined to help them feel less self-conscious and also to have a bit of fun.  The best one was to say one word to describe yourself using the letter of your name. For example, I would be Gracious Gwen.

A lot of Science fiction conventions I attend have an icebreaker session for new members who have no idea what is going on and might be nervous, shy or just enjoy meeting new people. I have taken part and it usually involves having a sticky note on your forehead with a famous name and playing the game, who am I, where the other players try to describe the person on the sticky note and you guess who it is.

For this particular icebreaker I have decided to tell you a bit about myself and why my accent can cause confusion about what county I’m from. I’m going to use these lovely coloured socks to help me as a visual aid. 

To start off I have blue & navy socks to represent Dublin as I was born in Dublin and I lived there for the majority of my youth. I think the confusion started early as my mother is a dub but my father is a limerick man and we spent a lot of time going to limerick to visit family and i was raised on Limerick Hurling.

The kids in school would be confused about where I spent my summers as I was in Hospital with my grandparents and I didn’t know why they were confused because that’s where they lived in a small town called hospital. We spent a lot of time in the car driving through small towns to get to Hospital . I loved it and enjoyed seeing all the different places especially at xmas time. 

When I was 18 I stayed in Cork with my sister and I met a nice fella , we dated for a while and when we were 21 we moved to Limerick city.  (hold the green & white socks) Living in Limerick city is very different from the small towns of Limerick so we didn’t stay there that long, a year at most. 

Myself and the Cork fella decided to move to Cobh Co Cork. It’s a beautiful town by the sea  made famous by some large ship that docked there once. (hold the red & white socks)

I spent all of my twenties there having a bit of craic and enjoying it immensely. I learnt to drive on the lovely hills and began my own adventures of driving to Dublin & Galway to visit family, something I definitely inherited from my dad. During that time myself and the cork fella went our separate ways, it’s just how it goes sometimes. 

When I was 30 I went to Galway to visit my other Sister and I met a nice Galway fella. After a year of dating I decided to chance it all and I moved to the nice town of Athenry. (maroon & white socks). Myself and the nice Galway fella are married twelve years now. 

I started working in Chanelle in Loughrea, not a bad town to work in and commute to daily.  It was where I learnt about the toastmasters club when it first opened. I came as a guest once and then I got a job in Galway city and lots of stuff stopped me from getting to a second meeting.. Finally a good while later I managed to come back as a guest for my second meeting and then made a great decision to join up.

As for the county socks I’m not planning on picking up anymore. I think I have enough to try and keep paired. Maroon is definitely my favorite colour. 

I will end my speech there and let you decide if it was a monologue or an icebreaker?

Thank you