everyone to this edition of Stream, the annual** newsletter of Outdoor Adventure Social Club!  Thank you so much to the many different contributors for volunteering their time to create numerous interesting articles, interlaced with breathtaking scenic photographs!

I can't wait for a winter season filled with numerous exciting adventures, both outdoors for those who enjoy the sublime beauty of frozen waterfalls and quiet trails with endless views (thanks to leafless trees), and indoors for those who seek warmth on frosty days.  Club activities don't wane in the wintertime, they just shift to different types, such as caving / spelunking;  skiing, snowboarding,  snowshoeing, and snow tubing in Virginia and West Virginia; ice skating;  sledding and snow football when it snows; and much more.  Winter is a great time to continue enjoying and building skills in indoor rock climbing and wallyball, and we're looking into indoor pool water volleyball, too!  Our year-round social activities -- including bowling,  plays and musicals,  restaurant dinner socials,  movie nights,  game nights, and more --  tend to be even more popular in the wintertime for those who enjoy staying warm.  Why let the winter months drag you down, when instead, you can join in on the fun?!!

The club is nearing its fourth anniversary.  I feel blessed with so many new friends and great times since day one, and am incredibly grateful to our Leaders for making all of this be possible!  OASC brings laughter and smiles to many faces every day (weekday evenings and weekends).  There always is room for improvement, however; working on your ideas and suggestions, and innovating new exciting things for the club are challenges that I love.  Please keep the feedback coming so we know what to change or enhance to make all y'all enjoy the membership experience even more.

Perception problem investigated, solved, and improving:  some Members have the perception that many adventures have wait lists, and so one can't get into adventures of choice.  As continuous club improvement is my #1 goal, with the always-impressive help of our webmaster Doug Turnbull I ran some statistical analyses and found that for all adventures between January and November 2007 inclusive, there was a 92% chance that if you joined an adventure, you got to attend it -- that's an "A" in most places!  The Leaders and I figured out that the misleading waitlist perceptions stem from a phenomenon in which some folks seem to be joining adventures without being sure that they can or want to attend, and then they withdraw later on -- a seemingly benign course of actions, but upon studying the issue we realized that it has several unfortunate side effects impacting other Members and Leaders.  Details on this issue are in the Friendly Reminders section of this newsletter.  Let's work together to solve this problem:  the Leaders and I will work to raise the 92% chance of getting into an adventure to be even closer to 100%, and we ask our Members to please only sign up for adventures once availability and interest is confirmed, or at the very least if one does sign up for an adventure without first checking schedule, please verify and withdraw within 24 hours so that waitlistees (if any) can get off the waitlist and accordingly plan to attend, with maximum advance notice.  Thanks!

All seasons and all club activity types considered, I have two favorites in the club:  white water rafting combined with hiking and camping; and Winter Sports Extravaganza (skiing, snowboarding, snowshoeing, snow tubing and two nights in historic rental houses!).  Day trips in the club are great fun and exercise; overnighters offer even more opportunity to really get to know people well, and make some great new friendships within your own age group as well as across generations.  Our two Winter Sports Extravaganza adventures to Snowshoe Mountain Resort, WV in 2008 will be January 25-27, and February 22-24.  The first trip already has over 50 people signed up!  With rental houses ranging from "Tranquility," to "Halfway," to "Animal" in nature, there's something for everyone and great times to come for all!  See you on the slopes!

~ Matthew Rosefsky, Manager

12/14/07

** It takes the club Manager more than two solid weeks of time to put Stream together, and numerous others several hours in creating their outstanding contributions (thank you again!).  As such, Stream is likely to continue as a once-per-year endeavor, enabling the club Manager to enjoy facilitating, editing and creating the website for it once per year, while affording him more time for leading adventures and continuous improvement projects throughout the rest of the year.

Please let us know if you find any errors or omissions.  Thanks!  One benefit of a web-newsletter is that we can make corrections right away.