Van Hoosen News 2003

December 25, 2003
Merry Christmas! We had a nice Christmas morning at home, opening presents and stockings. In the afternoon, we headed to Mom and Dad's house with the whole Van Hoosen clan.

December 24, 2003
Christmas Eve party at Jon and Glenda's house, with Laura and John, Gary, Shara, Jared, Larissa, and a few others.

December 14 - December 20, 2003
Scott went to Austin, Texas for a week of training for MCSE certification. It was a pretty intense week, with classes going from 8:30 am to 7:00 pm each day.

November 23, 2003
We disembarked from the ship, sad to be leaving, said quick good-byes to Allen, Jane, Brittany and Timmy, and headed off in a taxi to a hotel in Fort Lauderdale. The swimming pool at this hotel had a waterfall to jump through and swim under. Everyone but Becky enjoyed the cold water of the pool. But she did like the warm water of the hot tub.

November 22, 2003
This was another whole day at sea. Again we did a lot of swimming and sunning, lots of cribbage, and ate like pigs.

We had some family portraits taken on the cruise, just before going to the fancy formal dinner.

November 21, 2003
Our final stop was Cozumel, a small island off the coast of Mexico near Cancun. The island was very beautiful. Corey and I were planning on doing a couple of dives here, but the wind was high and the seas fairly rough, so our diving trip was delayed with the possibility of being cancelled. We decided to instead stay with our group. We taxied to Playa Sol by a crazy driver, but it seemed most of the drivers were insane. The lack of functional seat belts intensified our anxiety.

We survived though, and had a wonderful day on the beach. Our package included an open bar, so we all enjoyed lots of pina coladas and strawberry daiquiris. The water was warm and clear. In the water there were some stone ruins, which attracted a few small groups of fish. We saw lots of damsels and small angels, and lots of other silver and yellow fish. Blake and I found a larger sized grouper, around 2 feet long, and followed it for a while.

The trip back to town again felt like a game of Grand Theft Auto. Again no functioning seat belts, a broken door handle on the van's side door, and the driver tended to tail-gate everyone in front. We again survived, and did a bit more shopping.

November 20, 2003
Our next stop was Costa Maya. We went on a guided tour of some Mayan ruins called Chacchoben. The ruins were very interesting, but the tour was very slow paced, and much more information was given than most people wanted, and got pretty boring at times. We did some shopping, but were not comfortable with the pushy style the shopkeepers used.

In the evening, we watched a magic show by magician Drew Thomas and his beautiful assistant Rebecca. His magic was very impressive. Timmy was chosen from the audience as a volunteer, which made the evening even more fun.

November 19, 2003
Our next stop was at Grand Cayman. What a beautiful island! Corey and I separated from the group and headed out on a dive boat, while everyone else set up for some snorkelling and play at Stingray City.

Corey and I did two dives. The first dive was at a site called Great House Wall. We were led by a gal from Germany named Elke, a divemaster. We settled just above the top of the wall, around 60', and explored the reef. The visibility was amazing compared to the northwest diving that I'm accustomed to, probably better than 100', and a comfy warm 84 degrees. The only large creature that we saw was a large lobster, but the smaller, beautifully-colored fish were abundant, including lots of angels, damsels and wrasse. Elke showed us a tiny cleaner shrimp she found, which was so tiny it was hardly discernible even when she put it in my hand. There were also fields of garden eels, pencil-thin black eels that hide in the sand with just their heads and a few inches of their necks exposed. As we would approach, they would back into their holes and disappear until we left their area.

The second dive was at Paradise Reef and the wreck of the Oro Verde. One of the divemasters pointed out a small moray eel near the wreck. We also spotted a couple of baracude, and lots of colorful parrotfish.

Everyone else enjoyed their snorkelling. Even Becky enjoyed the stingrays, and even held one.

Back on the ship, we watched another play, called Cirque Pan, by the same group as before. This story was much more interesting, and combined with the talented singing and dancing of the group, it was very enjoyable.

November 18, 2003
Around breakfast time, the ship docked in Montego Bay in Jamaica. We all hopped on a bus, driven by Basil, who told us about what we were seeing on the way. He pointed out the big, beautiful houses on the hillsides, and said they were in the farm business, "farm" as in "pharmaceutical," AKA drug lords. The ride was hair-raising, with drivers crowding around one another, honking and dodging. We made it in one piece to our destination, a tubing ride down the Great River.

Our tubing guide, Kino, kept us entertained as he paddled our whole group of eight people down river. We enjoyed listening to his Jamaican banter, as he'd tell us to "Watch yer butts" and some of his phrases like "yeah mon," "you-bet," "oh god" when we'd near some small rapids. We stopped by a rope swing and played in the comfortable water for 20 minutes or so.

After the tubing, we were handed rum punch, then piled into the back of a big diesel truck with side-facing seats for a VERY bumpy ride back to the road. This ride was actually more exciting than the rafting, and had everyone laughing. I think the rum punch helped.

Back on the ship in the evening we enjoyed the stand-up comedy of David Naster. This guy was really funny, and kept us laughing the whole time. Allen bought a "Pooter," a small pocket-sized device similar to a whoopie cushion, which he used to cause all sorts of laughs, and some embarassment.

November 17, 2003
We spent the whole day at sea, travelling around the coast of Cuba toward Jamaica. We swam in the pool, and talked with our friends, and Allen and I played a lot of cribbage. We also saw a broadway show called "Mr. Producer." The acting and singing was good, but the story, well, wasn't there, and made it pretty boring.

November 16, 2003
We boarded the Norwegian Sun cruise ship with the Baseys in the morning, and headed out to sea.

November 15, 2003
We rode a shuttle to airport in the morning, and hopped on the plane. After a layover in Dallas, TX, we continued on to Fort Lauderdale, FL, where we took a taxi to Miami. There we met up with Allen, Jane, Brittany and Tim. After a nice dinner, we stayed overnight in a hotel.

September 27 - September 28, 2003
We spent most of the weekend at the annual Portland Juggling Festival at Reed College. We had a good time juggling, meeting other jugglers, watching other jugglers do their stuff, and learning new tricks. Blake learned to balance on a globe, a large ball that you stand on. He caught on very quickly, and was soon walking around the gym on it. Corey and I did a lot of passing clubs, and learned some new stuff.

Corey and I were excited to meet a couple of amazing jugglers that recently moved to the US from Russia. They are Vova, 16, and Olga, 13, brother and sister. They hold three world records so far in passing clubs (9, 10 and 11 clubs). I talked to Vova for a while, then he asked if we wanted to pass clubs with him! He taught us both how to pass 7 clubs, which was really hard for us since it was the first time we'd tried more than 6.

Saturday evening we attended the Extravaganza, a show put on every year at Benson High School. The performances were really amazing and fun to watch. Everybody's favorite was of Vova and Olga, who received a standing ovation. We also really enjoyed Pat Maguire's routine. Pat, a Portland resident, performed for a few years with Cirque du Soleil, and is extremely talented at juggling and performance in general. We also really enjoyed a trio of jugglers who looked like band members from ZZ-Top, called Mud Bay Jugglers. Also Rhys Thomas, another local, did a really entertaining bit where he spun five balls on sticks held by five small children.

September 12 - September 14, 2003
Becky went to belly dance camp in Myrtle Point Oregon. Three days of shimmies and shakes with her dance class. They did their first performance in front of an audience. Although they were nervous, they made it through with success.

September 7, 2003
Corey had the chance to learn a musical instrument in school, so we just rented him a clarinet. He started learning it this weekend. Hopefully he'll enjoy it and stick with it so we'll finally have some musical talent in our family. We'll see!

September 1, 2003
After the day at Enchanted Village, we spent the night in Federal Way, and the next morning headed to Titlow Beach in Tacoma, where Corey and I went on a very nice scuba dive. We found a large octopus near the beginning of the dive. The rest of the dive was very pleasant, with lots of creatures to see, and the tide was gently and working with us. While we dove, Becky relaxed on the deck, and Blake rode his unicycle and explored the area.

August 30, 2003
We took a weekend trip to Washington as a last outing before school starts. We spent the whole day at Enchanted Village (owned by Six Flags) in Federal Way. The first half of the day, while it was really hot out, we hung out in the water park area, going down water slides and swimming in the wave pool. After it cooled down, we put on dry clothes and shoes, and rode on some cool rides. Are favorite was the new wooden roller coaster called Timberhawk. Unfortunately we didn't take many pictures, as we didn't want to get the camera wet.

August 9 - August 16, 2003
We went camping at Cultus Lake for a wonderful, relaxing week, with the Edwards clan, Gary and his kids, and Stuart and Amy's family. We did lots of fun stuff, like swimming, sunning, boating, tubing, scuba diving, crawdad eating, reading, napping, hiking, and playing games.

August 5, 2003
I installed a dropped ceiling in our computer room this week. It's nice to have it done, after so many years of this room being unfinished. It was badly needed, as our whole family spends a lot of time in this room.

July 27, 2003
I bought some spiffy new silicone juggling balls, and Corey and I have been getting better at bounce-juggling all five. Blake has also learned to bounce juggle this weekend. We have some pictures and video of this on our juggling page.

July 26, 2003
Becky's belly dance class participated in West Linn's annual parade. She has been taking lessons since April, and she really enjoys it.

July 13, 2003
We had a nice picnic with Jerry, Mona, Faith and Ben at the Carver Boat Ramp. Corey, Jerry, Faith and I did a dive under the Carver Bridge. Again we played a lot of cribbage and did some juggling.

July 6, 2003
After leaving camp, we visited Port Townsend, a beautiful little city in northern Washington. We walked around town for a while, then took a carriage ride, which was a lot of fun. On the way back, we stopped by Fort Warden.

July 4, 2003
Happy Independence Day! To celebrate, we headed up to Brinnon, WA to go camping at Dosewallups Campground and camped out with the group from Steve's Scuba. While there, we met some new friends, Jerry, Faith and Ben. We played cribbage, juggled, ate, and Corey and I did a dive at Point Whitney with Jerry and Faith.

June 5, 2003
Corey is famous, as he was in a story in a scuba magazine called Northwest Dive News. It was an article about his first scuba diving experience and certification.

May 10, 2003
We took a trip to Tacoma for Corey's scuba certification. The weather was beautiful, the water was clear at Titlow Beach. Corey passed his tests and became Scuba Certified! Afterward, I took him for his first pleasure dive, a nice trip around the anemone-covered pilings at Titlow Beach.

April 14, 2003
Becky started taking belly dancing lessons!

March 18, 2003
Happy 14th Anniversary to Becky and Scott!

February 20, 2003
Corey started taking scuba lessons at Steve's Scuba! It will be very nice to have a family member as a dive buddy.

February 6, 2003
My boss, David, invited my family out to ride around on his Segway. We all took turns, and everyone really enjoyed it. I wonder if these will be the next step in the evolution of transportation.

January 25, 2003
We all went to the beach and stayed at the Salishan resort with the people from my work. It was our holiday party. Before the party, Corey and Blake swam in the pool. Becky and I had a fancy dinner with my co-workers, while the boys had room service and watched movies in the hotel room.

The following morning, we went geocaching with Clyde and Gretchen. We had a really fun time, and found two geocaches; one a mile from Salishan, and another in a little park in Lincoln City. Becky like it so much that she insisted that we get our own GPS (she didn't have to twist my arm much, as I had a fun time too), so she ordered one after we got home. Thus begins another set of adventures in the Van Hoosen family! :)

January 20, 2003
I was promoted at work, to the position of Network Administrator. I'm very excited about this opportunity, and am enjoying it very much.

January 2, 2003
I am now a Red Hat Certified Engineer! Woohoo! I took the RHCE test a couple of weeks ago, but the results were delayed due ot the holidays.