Nick and his friends were talking about things that can bring them luck. “I have a lucky red pen,” said Andy. “I have a lucky coin,” said Peter. “Every time I take a test, I carry my lucky coin.” Nick thought for a moment, and said, “My blue socks.” “Blue socks?” the boys were surprised and asked together. Nick said that every time he wore his blue socks to school before a test, he got a good mark.

The next day Nick had a Chinese test. He was sad because he couldn’t find his blue socks. “Mom!” shouted Nick. “Where are my blue socks? I have a Chinese test today, and I need to wear them.”

“Don’t be silly,” Nick’s mom said. “They need to be washed.” “When I wear them, I get a good grade. ” Nick said.

“Did you prepare for your test?” asked Mom.

“Yes.”

“Then don’t worry aboutit. Just do your best.” Mom encouraged.

A few days later, Nick’s teacher told him that he got 95 in his test. Nick was so excited that he couldn’t wait to tell Mom he did well in his test. Mom said, “It wasn’t the blue socks that made you success. In fact, it was made by yourself.”

【推荐2】I recently gave a talk about zero waste living to university students. During the Q&A afterward, the unavoidable question of cost came up. One student pointed out that he “can’t afford to buy $30 toothpaste.” While the $30 price may be a bit generous, the student did raise a good point that buying zero-waste products is often more expensive than the overly-packaged traditional ones.

I tried to handle the question as best I could in the moment, but I kept thinking about it afterward. I’m writing about it because I’m sure many others have similar doubts about their own abilities to reduce waste without breaking the bank.

First, once you begin to explore the zero waste world, you quickly realize how pointless many products in your life are. You start using fewer, buying less, and using them interchangeably. Soon you’ll find yourself spending less money overall, which balances the higher cost of the zero waste ones. The total number of products in my bathroom decreased by 50% when I became more focused on waste reduction.

Second, if you stop to examine those zero-waste products, you’ll see that they are usually of better quality. Companies usually redesign their packaging to be reusable, upgrading them to be healthier, safer, and greener. So you’re paying extra money not just for non-disposable (非一次性的) packaging, but also for a better product that does less harm.

In my experience, higher-quality skincare products last longer than cheap ones. My personal habits have developed gradually, too. Knowing an item costs more leads me to use it in small quantities and use it to the very end. Moreover, I sometimes even make my own. The price-per-unit is cheap.

To quote Lindsey Miles, a zero waste blogger, “Zero waste is not about what we can afford to buy. It is about what we choose not to buy.” To that student who got me thinking about this, I’d recommend starting with what matters to you. Over time you will figure out where you get the most value for your money. In return, you’ll gain a sense of liberation from the consumer culture, and a rewarding sense of accomplishment.

【推荐3】    1     One day, when I was perhaps six years old, I was walking with my father on a crowded street. All of a sudden, the normal flow of pedestrian traffic backed up as people tried to avoid a large object on the sidewalk. To my astonishment, the object turned out to be a human being, a man lying unconscious against a building.     2     Certainly no one made eye contact. As we walked by ,my father — the model of a loving, caring gentleman — pointed to a bottle in a paper bag and told me that the poor soul on the sidewalk just needed to sleep it off. Then the drunken man began to murmur senselessly. My father warned me not to go near, saying "You never know how he’ll react."

    3     I had spent the previous 12 months traveling in poor Asian cities, but even by those standards this was a scene of misery. In addition to being desperately poor, the locals had to live in the extremely hot climate, ridiculously huge crowds and a fairly strong wind blowing dust everywhere. Suddenly a man carrying a huge bag of peanuts called out in pain and fell to the ground.     4     A half dozen sellers ran from their stands to help, leaving unattended what might have been the totality of their possessions. One put a blanket under the man's head; another opened his shirt; a third questioned him carefully about the pain; a fourth fetched water; a fifth kept onlookers from crowding around too closely; a sixth ran for help.    5       The performance could have passed for a final exam at a paramedic (护理人员)school.

【推荐1】Wearing a red nose for a day may seem like a strange way to raise money for charity. However, it seems to work in Britain.

Red Nose Day (RND) is a well-known event in the UK. The aim of the day is to raise money for Comic Relief organization. This is a charity that helps people in need in Africa and in the UK. Comic Relief was started in 1985 by Richard Curtis. He wrote the famous films “Four Weddings and a Funeral” and “Notting Hill”. Richard started Comic Relief in answer to the serious starvation in Ethiopia. It’s called Red Nose Day as on this day many people buy a plastic red nose to wear! The money made from selling red noses goes to the charity.

Red Nose Day takes place every two years in the spring. It is now so well established that many people consider it to be an unofficial national holiday. For example, many schools have non-uniform days.

The slogan (标语) for the last RND was “Do Something Funny for Money.” The money that was collected was used to help fund projects in such areas as education and mental health. Money-raising events take place on this day all over the country and many schools take part. People also donate money by post, in banks, by phone using a credit card and online.

In the evening of Red Nose Day, a very long TV program takes place on the BBC TV channels. It shows some of the events of the day and reports how the money raised will be spent. People also upload videos of local charity events onto the Internet.

So, if you are ever in the UK on Red Nose Day, you will know why you find normal people wearing red noses and doing silly things! It’s all for a good cause!

【推荐2】The Best UK Festivals of 2020

We’ve picked this year’s best UK festivals——find your favourite and get out there this summer.

All Points East

Returning for a third year after its successful 2018 launch,All Points East is a general 10-day festival that takes over Victoria Park in late May.The opening and closing three-day weekends are given over to music.

Place: Victoria Park

Time: May 22,2020-May 31,2020

Ticket: Adult￡35; Age19-24 with ID￡28;Under18 years old, free

Isle of Wight

Huge headliners is one of the UK’s biggest rock festivals.Now in its 52nd year,the modern-day Isle of Wight festival is a far cry from the hippy(嬉皮士) love-in that landed back in 1968.Nowadays,big-name headliners and commercial rock and pop favorites are the order of the day.

Place: Seaclose Park, Newport

Time: Jun 13-14. 12:00 a.m.-15:00 p.m.

Tickets:￡25 Adult;￡15   Age19-24 with ID; ￡10 under 12 years old, under7, free

Love box

Consistently one of the finest festivals in London,catering for cool kids and party monsters alike,Love box has expanded again to become a three-day event in 2020.This year will be its second in west London’s Gunnersbury Park.

Place:London’s Gunnersbury Park

Time:July12-14. 1:30 p.m.-2:30 p.m.

Tickets:￡185(adult three-day weekend);￡70(adult day ticket)

Junction 2

Calling all technology heads:in 2020,this big festival is spreading out over two days again following last year’s successful expansion.Junction 2 is a meeting of some pretty serious music minds.

Place:Boston Manor Park

Time:July 15-16

Tickets:￡45 for all ages

【推荐3】Workplaces all over the UK are preparing for Christmas and all the traditions and customs that come with it. But will Christmas be a cause for happiness and celebration or embarrassment and disappointment?

One way that colleagues in Britain show their appreciation of each other at this time of year is by doing “Secret Santa” present giving. At that time, people who work together buy each other gifts without saying whom they are from.

Co-workers all write their names on a piece of paper and then organize a lottery in which each workmate takes another colleague’s name at random (任意地). Each person then has to buy a present for the colleague whose name they have picked, usually with an agreed price set at a small amount of money such as five or ten pounds.

As the gifts are given without knowing the names of the gift givers, the quality of the presents can be very different; gifts that people received are from tickets to the opera to an air-freshener for a car.

Another common seasonal workplace tradition is the office Christmas party, when workmates put on their most attractive clothes and enjoy lots of free wine.

Although most parties are held without a hitch, sometimes the effects of alcohol (酒精) cause party goers to regret their drunken antics (古怪行为).

The BBC invited people to share their most embarrassing (令人尴尬的) Christmas office party stories, and received hundreds of funny stories, such as the man who split his trousers back to front with his strange dance moves or the drunken lady who spent the entire night with back of her dress tucked into her pants and saw the photos that proved it later at work.

But the worst story must surely come from Stuart Vaines, who got so drunk that he put his boss's head into the toilet. Unsurprisingly, he lost his job the very next day.

【推荐1】A new device works like a solar panel, except that it doesn't harvest energy from the sun. It absorbs energy from the cold night sky.

A prototype(原型)of the device produced enough electricity at night to power a small light bulb. A bigger version might one day light rooms or charge phones. It also could power electronics in remote or low-resource areas that lack electricity.

The device makes use of the temperature difference between Earth and outer space.It then uses that difference to create electricity. As long as one side of it is cooler than the other, the generator can produce electricity.The cooler side faces the sky and is attached to an aluminum plate. That plate is sealed beneath a transparent(透明的)cover and surrounded with insulation(隔热材料)to keep out heat.The bottom of the generator is attached to an exposed aluminum plate. That plate is warmed by the local air. At night, the top plate can get a couple of degrees Celsius cooler than the bottom of the generator.

Researchers tested a 20-centimeter prototype one clear December night in Stanford,California. The generator produced up to about 25 milliwatts of power per square meter of device. That was enough power to light a small light-emitting diode, or LED bulb. Further improvements might increase its production to at least 500 milliwatts per square meter. To do that, the system might need more insulation around the cool top plate.

The device also could help power remote weather stations or other environmental devices,says Aaswath Raman. He is a materials scientist who worked on the device at the University of California, Los Angeles. This may be useful in polar regions that don't see sunlight for months at a time,Raman says. “If you have some low-power load and you need to power it through three months of darkness, this might be a way.”