diff --git a/lib/rouster.rb b/lib/rouster.rb
index b4e008f..6593a6d 100644
--- a/lib/rouster.rb
+++ b/lib/rouster.rb
@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@
 class Rouster
 
   # sporadically updated version number
-  VERSION = 0.42
+  VERSION = 0.50
 
   # custom exceptions -- what else do we want them to include/do?
   class ArgumentError        < StandardError; end # thrown by methods that take parameters from users