2000
At 11:59 pm on December 31, 1999, we were on an airport shuttle to a hotel in Minneapolis. We had just watched the Rams go down in defeat 31 to 17 against Southern Miss in the Freedom Bowl. The weather caused a long delay, and we missed our connection so we had to spend an extra night in Minnesota.
As usual, we attended the January Joint Mathematics Meetings, which was held in Washington DC. Here are Carol and Darel, promoting our recently-released Calcluus materials.
Our grandchildren were starting to grow up.
The year 2000 began a new chapter of our lives. Linda retired from Poudre R1 School District and Darel began a four-year period of transitional retirement: one semester in the classroom and one semester off.
In the fall of 2000 we joined Mary Ann and Boone on a trip to Europe. Here we are in Munich, Germany, celebrating Octoberfest.
And here we are on the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
2001
Spring 2001 was an off semester for Darel, and we had planned a trip to England with Rex and Margaret Richards. Rex was a regular member of the Fort Collins Investment Club, better known as a poker club. During the first week of our planned two-week stay, we got a phone call informing us that Alice Hardy had died on May 27, a month and a half before she would have turned 98 on July 12. We immediately returned to Montrose, Colorado for her funeral.
In October, barely a month after 9/11, we drove to Atlanta for a mathematics meeting and then drove north along the east coast. The highlight was a stop at Kitty Hawk and the Wright Brother Museum. Washington DC was a virtual ghost town. We could see the damage to the Pentagon.
We vacationed in the Mayan Riviera with Janet and her family the week before Christmas.
2002
In September we joined Mary Ann and Boone on a vacation to Ireland. Lots of wonderful castles, and other sights.
From Ireland we took a fast ferry to Wales, where we rented a car. Looking at our driver’s license, the clerk appeared confused. Finally a light bulb seemed to go off in his brain as he exclaimed, “Oh! Now I understand the expression nine-eleven.” Got to admit, day-month-year makes a whole lot more sense than month-day-year.
A highlight of England was our visit to Bletchley Park, where German codes were broken during World War II. Our tour guide had worked there during the war and was happy to welcome mathematicians to view the computer under reconstruction.
In December, Linda and Darel flew to Puerto Vallarta for a week on the beach.
2003
We celebrated our fortieth anniversary with Janet and Brian and their families at the Fort Restaurant near Morrison, Colorado.
Once in a great while, we went our separate ways. While Darel taught classes at Colorado State University, Linda joined with a few friends and took a tour of Mexico in October. They flew to Tucson, where they boarded a bus that took them to Chihuahua and then a train to Los Moches.
In December, Darel was completely surprised with a retirement reception at the University Club on the Colorado State University campus. He had been on transitional retirement for four years, and December 12 was his last day of teachig.
2006
In March we drove to Florida for a meeting where Carol and Darel promoted their interactive calculus book.
One of the highlights of the year was a DeVinny/Morehead family reunion in Ridgeway.
This was the year that we turned a historic rental house into a cabin. Before we could begin to build, we needed to renovate and sell a house that had been built in 1884. One outside brick wall had a noticeable bow, so we added a second wall on the inside to shore everything up. We also added a second bathroom and did many other upgrades. We quickly found a buyer.
Mary Ann kept telling us that we would never get around to building a cabin, so we had no choice. A friend suggested that we build a real log cabin with logs from western Canada. Blaine assured us that we could get a log kit for well under a hundred thousand, and that we could add a full walk-out basement for another 10K. We hired an architect, started building access roads, and poured the foundation.
The cabin was constructed in Canada. The logs were carefully labeled and the whole thing assembled again at the log show in Denver.
We enjoyed great fall weather and the cabin was dried in by early December.
Just before Christmas we vacationed at an all-inclusive resort in the Mayan Rivera.
2007
The real work of building a cabin took place in 2007. The logs were in place and all the openings were covered with windows and doors, but the infrastructure had barely begun. The building permit was good for 18 months. We manage to get our final inspections done after a single 18-month permit renewal.
The exposed styrofoam framing was covered over with concrete blocks made to look like stones. The roof was covered with green steel roofing. Interior walls were framed can covered with drywall. Linda and Darel did all of the drywall and drilled holes for the electrical wiring. We built a shed for our solar system. Subcontractors dug a well, dug ditches for utilities, installed a sewage system, and build a deck around the cabin.
A cabin can be enjoyed even when it is not quite finished.
We classified our retaining wall as a landscape feature in order to avoid additional building permits and engineering expenses.
We managed to get away from the cabin long enough to vacation with Mike, Lisa, and Levi in Puerto. In addition to lots of time on the beach, we zip lined in the area where Predator was filmed.
Linda and Darel also drove to Ohio for Linda’s family reunion.
Loveland is well known for its art, and we took Carol and Elbert for a tour of the sculpture garden.
We continued to enjoy time at our quarter share at Copper Mountain.
2008
We spent a very relaxing week in the Bahamas with Mary Ann and Boone.
Our cabin was starting to look finished. Even our landscape feature boasted blooms that have not bee equaled since.
It was such a beautiful fall that we were able to host Thanksgiving dinner.
Our big trip was to the Asian Technology Conference in Mathematics held in Bangkok, Thailand in December. Linda and Darel decided to spend a week in Hawaii on the way. We started on Oahu.
We then flew to Maui. We rented a car and drove it all over the island. Although it appeared to be overcast, we decided to drive to the top of the Haleakala volcano and then found that the sky was completely clear once we got above the clouds. We drove the long way on a very primitive road to Hana. We also drove around the northwest corner of the island. We stayed at a resort just south of Kapalua on the west coast.
We met Carol and Elber in Bangkok and saw all the usual attractions.
Darel gave a talk at the conference on using animations as an aid in teaching mathematics.
We all met with Yupaporn, a former student of Darel’s, for dinner. She had met her husband when she was a student at Colorado State University, and they both returned home to Thailand.
2009
We attended the Joint Mathematics Meetings n Washington DC and promoted our interactive books.
Perfect weather made it easy to walk around and view the sights. The weather was much colder a couple of weeks later when Barack Obama was sworn in as president.
