Quarterly Networking Receptions – 2009

For 2009, all our Quarterly Networking Receptions will be held at the Capitol Hill Club, 300 First Street, S.E., Washington, DC 20003, on the House side of Capitol Hill, directly across the street from the Capitol South Metro Station [There’s a green awning over the entryway]. We gather from 6-8 p.m. [1800 – 2000 for those of us still wearing our military watches] in the 75 Room, just outside of the Grill Room in the basement level. Parking on Capitol Hill is LOUSY, so we urge everyone to take the metro or a cab, unless you are up on Capitol Hill often and have your own “secret parking space”. The website for the Capitol Hill Club is www.CapitolHillClub.org The phone # is 202-484-4590 if you need to call for any reason. Our event is listed as “The Flag & General Officers’ Network”. RSVP’s should be via e-mail to RADMCarey@aol.com Our general M.O. is that the fare is $25 per person, which includes refreshments, plus there is a buffet available to us in the Grill Room. There will be a bar in the room where we “serve ourselves” for beer, wine, and soft drinks. For mixed drinks, you will need to go to the bar in the Grill Room and put it on the “Tab for Admiral Carey” [since he is the Club Member and our sponsor for the evening].

We have learned over time that while we gather regularly 4 times a year in Washington, DC, the mix of our crowd is quite different every time. This is driven by the fact that all our members remain very busy and very involved, all of us travel a lot and/or have conflicting events involved with our day job, so we never end up with our same attendees being able to make all events. Add to this that we regularly add new members each month and these new faces also begin to attend. The bottom line is that we have a unique and different group of flag and general officers for each of us to network with every time we meet. Also, to ensure that everyone that attends DOES get to meet everyone else, at 7 p.m. we gather in a circle and we go “round the room” with each of us introducing ourselves, talking a bit about what we did during our uniformed service, and also indicating where we work and what we do post-military. This makes it easy for everyone to identify others they still need to network with and they can accomplish that during the final hour of the event. Active duty flag and general officers are welcomed as both members and attendees, and we always have several that are in attendance. All members are also always welcome to bring any flag or general officer as their guests in order to introduce them to the group and show them “who we are”.

The schedule for 2009, always on a Friday night, is:

January 23, 2009
April 24, 2009
July 24, 2009
October 23, 2009