In seeking for something to break the boredom that Emily has spoken of and to get a little movement going around here, I remembered this workout that one of my friends used to do. It's called "Chicken Fat". In the 1960's President John F. Kennedy announced that the President's council on Physical Fitness was beginning a physical fitness program for schools. Inspired by the idea, Meredith Willson, composer of "The Music Man", immediately wrote "Chicken Fat" as his contribution to the Kennedy Fitness program. Apparently, schools everywhere played this and the kids exercised every morning before school started. Although I never experienced it personally, my friend, and roomie at BYU, Sheila Sorensen (now Andreason) had a record of this song and used it put it on sometimes and exercise to it.



You should all definitely try it out. Here's the link:



http://www.clubcourtyard.com/ChickenFat.html



Those of you who have little kids can even involve them--it's pretty funny. And to further amuse you, here are some funny YouTube videos of people exercising to this song:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJ3GyMUScUA&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZEHbQqthU4M&feature=related

Hey, Jillian Michaels "The Biggest Winner" it's not, but it's good for a little winter entertainment.

Happy Chinese New Year everyone! A few years ago, we started celebrating Chinese New Year as something fun and interesting to break up the monotony of the winter. So we celebrated tonight by eating our favorite Chinese delicacies. If you can't tell by the image above, this is the year of the brown water rat. I feel especially fortunate because the rat brings good things to the snake:

Snake : 1917, 1929, 1941, 1953, 1965, 1977, 1989, 2001This year will find the energetic rat providing a wonderland of opportunities to the awakening snake. Show your true self and be honest with those who care about you. This may be difficult for the snake who is used to keeping tightly coiled, but there will be little need to use your venom to protect yourself this year. Happiness will be abundant in relationships with friends and family as long as you can uncoil. Successful results in business, especially new ventures, lie ahead for you. Your ability to take quick, decisive actions and make the right decisions will be a great benefit to your career. This may lead you to some big opportunities that you will be ready to take advantage of. Curb the impulsive to spend unwisely. Earth influences favor conservative spending for the snake, but with energy flowing so strongly, you may not be able to resist a quick buy that can turn out to be a mistake.

Poor Sarah--her horoscope for this year says "You will find many flirtatious moments but they will not lead to serious commitments." Obviously, the Chinese horoscope writers have never been to Wausau, WI or on a mission, or they'd know how wrong they are! They'd also know that with Joanna and Sarah on missions and Janet going away to BYU in the fall, we have no extra money for that quick, mistaken purchase.

So, Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Since we're all thinking of Pres. Hinckley, I thought I would contribute my memories of him. When I was a missionary, I met Pres. Hinckley. He was one of several general authorities to come to the Hill Cumorah Pageant in the summer of 1974 (I know, I know. I'm officially old.) Pres. Romney, who was a counselor in the First Presidency, also came that year. He was with his wife and several grand-daughters. He wanted to be driven around and since he had granddaughters with him, my companion and I were involved in that. We also got to eat dinner with him, but that's a story for another time. Pres. Hinckley, who I think was one of the senior members of the Twelve at that time, was totally different. He just wanted to have the use of a mission car and to be turned loose. He was very independent and energetic. One morning, my companion and I were driving down Canandaigua Rd. toward the Hill Cumorah. We looked in the lane to our right and there was Pres. Hinckley, driving a Gremlin. Can't believe the Church actually let people drive those. Anyway, it was pretty funny. For those of you who don't know what a Gremlin is, here's a photo:

One other thing I remember from that occasion is Pres. Hinckley's remarkable memory. As he mingled with the missionaries and they introduced themselves, he would say, "Oh yes, I believe I recently met your parents in Honolulu (or wherever.)" His grasp of who many of the missionaries were was truly remarkable.



If you haven't read this article from the Deseret News yet, I highly recommend it. It's very well written and very appropriate: http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,695248628,00.html.

Oh, somebody had a birthday...

Last week was Rene's birthday. Our birthday celebrations are a good example of how our family has blended the two different backgrounds from which we come. The cake was the traditional Scoresby cake--three layers, one white, one chocolate and one pink, frosted with chocolate frosting. The kids haven't always had this kind of cake for their birthdays, but it's almost always the cake I make for Rene's birthday. He didn't think we'd be able to get the massive number of candles on it, but it was no problem. We had room for probably at least thirty more!

Our birthday song is the traditional "Happy Birthday to you" followed by the traditional Allred birthday song. It goes like this: "Oh, somebody has a birthday, our little________(fill in the blank with the person's name--in Rene's case, "Daddy") here. Kind Father-in-Heaven bless him (or her) through all the coming year." I know that this song was song by my Dad's family because I remember being present on occasions where it was sung. In my family, it was then followed by a sycopated version of "Happy Birthday to you," but we haven't done that. I don't know the origin of this song. I tried to find out something about it on the internet, but could find nothing. Maybe someone made it up.

At any rate, it was a fun celebration.

It's been a pretty interesting week here. Last Friday, Janet's basketball team beat Antigo, a team that was ranked #6 in the state. As a result of that game, her team was in first place in the Wisconsin Valley Conference. Tuesday, they lost to Marshfield, resulting in a four-way tie for first. Last night, they won over Wausau West in a very good game. Now there's a three-way tie, but there's still a lot of basketball to play. For some reason, the media loves Janet and she is almost always shown in the clips on the sports on TV. One of the local sports guys likes to make a little word play on her name--SCORESby! But this week, she has also been featured in several articles in the paper. She had an interview on Wednesday with a reporter from the paper. Then last night, after the game, she was interviewed by the two local TV stations and by the Wausau Daily Herald. She really doesn't like being interviewed--she says they ask stupid questions that she has no answer for. Oh well, I guess that's the price of fame. If you'd like to see some photos of the game, you can check out this site: http://www.wausaudailyherald.com/apps/pbcs.dll/gallery?Avis=U0&Dato=20080125&Kategori=WDH020502&Lopenr=801250820&Ref=PH

Janet is #13 in the green uniform.



Also this week, we went to a breakfast at one of the local Rotary clubs, where Janet received a youth merit award. Several of the people there were big honchos from West who were skeptical when Janet said that Everest would beat West. As we were driving home, I was thinking that we probably won't be going to many more of these kinds of things. We will have a few more graduations--Janet from high school; Shannon, Preston, Sarah and Janet from college; Ben and Preston from professional schools; maybe some more daughters or sons-in-law from graduate or professional schools. But for the most part, our days of going to awards events are pretty much over. From here on out, it'll be up to the next generation to attend those kinds of things. However, I will be available to go to fun little grandkid things!



In other news, we have been in the grip of a real cold snap for about a week. One day, the high was -3 degrees. It's warmer now, but the price we have to pay is snow. It snowed a couple of inches overnight and is still snowing. I'm definitely ready for some sun. This is our mailbox. All you can see is the box, no post or anything.

Since it's the dead of winter here in lovely central Wisconsin and we're basically prisoners of -20 degree temperatures and about 25 inches of snow, I thought I write about other places I'd like to go someday. These fall into two rough categories--places I've never been and places I've been but would love to visit again. This list is far from comprehensive. It's just a list of places that are on my mind right now.

*England--London, Yorkshire, Wales--Okay, pretty much anywhere in
England. My only concern is that there is so much I want to visit there that one 1 week trip will simply never suffice. We'll have to go again and again.
*China--I've always wanted to go there. Rene says that after visiting India, he's not sure about visiting China.
*Disneyworld or Disneyland--I know it's crazy, but as far as I know none of our immediate family have ever been to either one with the possible exceptions of Tracy, Shannon or Preston. I'd like to visit, just so I know what it's like.
*Spain--I may actually get there sometime in the foreseeable future. Rene will probably be going there this year for work, and I may be able to go, depending on timing, finances, etc.
*PEI--Rene has been there a couple of times, but of course, I haven't.
*Banff--Once again, somewhere I've always wanted to go, but never been.
*California--several places would suffice, but I definitely want to go to Humboldt county sometime. Northern California is higher on the list than southern, but as of right now, the only place I've ever been is Sacramento.
*Australia would be nice, but it's not at the top of my list right now.
*Las Vegas--just to see the sights.

In the places I've been, but would like to go back to category:

*New York City--My mom and several siblings and their spouses and I had a blast when we went there last year. I'd like to go again with Rene and Janet.
*The Washington, DC, area--We've been there so many times, but I like it there a lot. Good thing we have reason to visit. No offense intended to Memphis, which we also enjoyed, or Provo, which I love to visit because it feels like home.
*West Virginia and southern Ohio--Sarah and Janet may giggle at this choice, but I liked it's there.
*The eastern coast of the US, from the Delmarva peninsula to Florida--We've really enjoyed our visits to the ocean and would love to go more often. I imagine we'd also like beaches in the Florida panhandle or California. We have also been to the beach in Galveston and in Hawaii and liked those, too.

Perhaps I'll have to post a second list as I continue to ponder traveling. Or perhaps a list of places I don't want to go would be good. Right now, I can't think of many, but I haven't really considered it.

By the way, before any of you can comment on what I'm doing up to 1:52 am, I'd like you to know that it's Senior Ball night and I'm waiting up for Janet. I'm sure she'll post something about it and maybe even a picture.

In his April Conference address, Elder Holland said that one of his maxims is "no misfortune is so bad that whining about it won’t make it worse." I fully intended this entry to be a whole lot of whining, and I'll tell you why.
Yesterday, I had to drive to Milwaukee to pick Sarah up at the airport as she returned from her trip to Mount Vernon. It's a long drive--3 hours--and I had just taken her down on Thursday. As I got ready to leave, I called her to see if her plane was on time. She said that the waiting passengers had been told that the plane would be about 50 minutes late, but that there was severe weather in Milwaukee, so they wouldn't take off until the weather cleared. Now, it was about 42 degrees out, which is unusual for winter here, so I looked out the window. Yep, a little foggy, from all the evaporation of the snow in the "warm" weather. So, I didn't know what to do. If I waited until I knew that Sarah's plane had taken off, she'd be waiting for me for two hours and we'd get home very late. At the same time, I didn't want to get down there and have her flight cancelled and be stuck there overnight. I finally left about 2:30.
On the way down to Stevens Point, I pondered which way I should go. Between Stevens Point and Madison, there is pretty much nothing for 100 miles. And the freeway crosses an agricultural area that is very flat, where everything blows across the road. I was afraid that the fog would be worse that way. Going by way of Oshkosh and Fond du Lac is much more interesting, but you drive by a lot of water and that creates fog. I finally decided to go the Oshkosh route. This had one added advantage. I would be able to stop somewhere civilized and call Sarah to see if her plane was on time.
This is where the whining is supposed to come in. Gosh, it was bad! Between Oshkosh and Fond du Lac, there were some points where I couldn't even see 5 feet in front of me. Traffic, for the most part, was zipping along unconcernedly, but I was definitely cussing out myself, the weather, the stupid airline for being cheaper from Milwaukee, etc. It was very scary, but I didn't know what to do besides go on. I thought that there was no way Sarah's plane could land. After driving for 1 1/2 hours, I tried to call Sarah, but she didn't answer. I then called Janet, who looked online and said that the plane had apparently taken off. This is totally crazy, I thought to myself. But I persevered and about 40 miles out of Milwaukee, the fog suddenly evaporated. As I was turning off on the exit ramp to the airport, Sarah called and said that she had just landed.
After picking her up, we decided that we would try the other route home--to Madison, then turning north. Sarah drove and it was distinctly better--hardly any fog until we got to Madison. As we took the ramp north, we saw several police cars with their lights on. We passed one overturned car and could see a car on fire on the other side of the road. As we went north, we noticed that there was a long, long backup on cars and trucks going southbound. Wow, we thought, good thing we're headed north. There was a little fog, but nothing compared to what I'd driven through. We made it home safely, only 10 minutes later than we expected.
Imagine my chagrin this morning when I read this news:

MADISON, Wis. — Dozens of cars were involved Sunday in two separate pileups that killed two people on a foggy stretch of highway just east of the city.
The Wisconsin State Patrol shut down Interstate 90 in both directions, causing a traffic backup for miles.
Flares lining the interstate's lanes cut through the fog as traffic crawled north of the accident sites. Visibility was about 100 yards. Squad cars and tow trucks streamed toward the accidents as law enforcement agents directed drivers off the interstate.
The accidents happened on a stretch of eastbound Interstate 90 running south from the Badger Interchange with Interstate 94, Dane County sheriff's Lt. Dan Bolch said.
Around 2:30 p.m., cars began braking when they hit a wall of fog near Interstate 90's intersection with U.S. Highway 12/18, Wisconsin State Patrol Lt. Laurie Steeber said. A semi-truck came up behind them and began plowing into vehicles, she said. One person was killed.
A similar pileup happened three miles away when another group of vehicles on the interstate also began braking in fog, Steeber said. A second person was killed in that pileup.

Yep, that's right. I left here at 2:30, about when this all started to happen. Had I gone the other way, I would have been in the backup, which didn't really get clear until 11:30 pm. Instead, I just had a tense trip and we both arrived home safely at a good time.
Did I hear any little voice telling me to go the Oshkosh route? Nope. But I still believe that I was guided in which way to go and protected as I went that way. Isn't that the way we are sometimes? We complain about what happens, when it is really a blessing in disguise. So, no whining here today--despite that darn fog!