Last Friday, December 2, was one of those cold crisp winter night that are great for watching the stars, if you can handle the cold. Jeannie and I were prepared to do just that too, except that after we had that wonderful dinner and the lively meeting that followed, we were just too mellow to take the time to set up the scope. I don't know about anyone else, but we had a great time with all of you, and we want to thank all the members for making us feel so at home every time we do anything involving AOAS. Being new to the area, it can sometimes be hard to make friends, but all of you have proved to be the exception to that rule. Thank you.

Happy Holidays to all, Ed & Jeannie

That WAS a great dinner, wasn't it? I can't remember a better time I've had at one of our previous 19 Christmas Dinner/Meetings. Something we've never done before, but should remember to do at every future Christmas Dinner/Meeting, was when we all just said what was on our minds after we introduced ourselves, with many telling how they got interested in astronomy, and others saying how happy they were to be AOAS members. That touched me, personally, and I felt just a little closer to everyone afterwards.

We really are a friendly group. I love that about our members and I'm glad you brought it to our attention with this post Ed. For everyone's information, Ed was gracious enough to accept the Vice Presidency for 2006 at the event, and I'm convinced he'll be an exceptional VP.

He's going to start by helping us jump-start a new program for 2006 where we plan to award Certificates of Appreciation to companies who either HAVE installed, or ARE installing the new "dark-sky-friendly" full cut-off ligting fixtures around our area. The new Advance Auto Parts stores in the Ft Smith/Van Buren area have all been thoughtful enough to have these energy saving, security friendly, glare reducing fixtures around their new stores. Ed will be helping us organize the very first presentation event where we hope to make a "BIG thing" out of a little thing like this. When we see businesses that have installed these "astronomy friendly" fixtures, we'll award them with their own certificates on a regular basis. This excellent idea was the brainchild of our own Dr. Chuck Larson, AOAS Education Director and a major contributor to our Coleman Observatory.

We're making a bigger splash than ever before in our area, and we expect bigger and better things to come in the near future. Watch out........we're on our way UP!

It was a great dinner and meeting! Ed and Dr. Larson had several great ideas. Glad to be a part of this club!