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    As cultural symbols go, the American car is quite young. The Model T Ford was built at the Piquette Plant in Michigan a century ago, with the first rolling off the assembly line（装配线） on September 27, 1908. Only eleven cars were produced the next month. But eventually Henry Ford would build fifteen million of them.

    Modern America was born on the road, behind a wheel. The car shaped some of the most lasting aspects of American culture: the roadside diner, the billboard, the motel, even the hamburger. For most of the last century, the car represented what it meant to be American—going forward at high speed to find new worlds. The road novel, the road movie, these are the most typical American ideas, born of abundant petrol, cheap cars and a never-ending interstate highway system, the largest public works project in history.

    In 1928 Herbert Hoover imagined an America with "a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage." Since then, this society has moved onward, never looking back, as the car transformed America from a farm-based society into an industrial power.

    The cars that drove the American Dream have helped to create a global ecological disaster. In America the demand for oil has grown by 22 percent since 1990.

    The problems of excessive（过度的）energy consumption, climate change and population growth have been described in a book by the American writer Thomas L. Friedman. He fears the worst, but hopes for the best.

    Friedman points out that the green economy（经济）is a chance to keep American strength. "The ability to design, build and export green technologies for producing clean water, clean air and healthy and abundant food is going to be the currency of power in the new century."

    A team of UK researchers recently compared the performances of 120 women and 120 men in a computer test involving switching between tasks of counting and shape recognition.

    Men and women were equally capable when tasks were handled one at a time. But when the tasks were mixed up, there was a clear difference. According to the paper published in the journal BMC Psychology, both women and men slowed down and made more mistakes as the switching became more rapid. But the men were slower, taking 77 percent longer to answer, whereas women took 69 percent longer.

    To make the experiment more relevant to day-to-day life, researchers tried a second test. A group of women and men were given eight minutes to complete a series of everyday tasks, such as finding restaurants on a map, doing simple math problems, answering a phone call, or deciding how they would search for a lost key in afield. Once again, women outperformed men in the test, particularly in the key-searching task.

    “It suggests that in a stressed and complex situation women are more able to stop and think about what's going on in front of them,” researcher Keith Laws of the University of Hertfordshire, UK, told BBC News. “In contrast, men had a slight impulsiveness（冲动）, answering without giving much thought to their responses.”

    So where do women get the ability to keep organized under pressure better than men? Researchers believe that it has its roots in evolution. In early human communities, women had to keep an eye on children while cooking meals. Meanwhile, men only needed to focus on hunting.

    Gardening is popular in many parts of the world. This outdoor activity gives us beautiful plants, pleasant smelling flowers and fresh fruits and vegetables. But it also does a lot of good to our health.

    Gardening connects people. When you are gardening, you are outdoors. So it is a perfect chance to meet and spend time with your neighbors. Most people love to talk about their hobbies, and gardeners are no different. They usually enjoy showing people what they are growing. And most enjoy sharing advice and stories about their gardens almost as much as sharing flowers and vegetables from their gardens.

    Gardening is a great activity for children. It gets them outdoors and off computers, televisions and cell phones. Gardening is also a great teacher. It can teach a child about where food comes from and healthy eating. It also helps them to understand that the natural resources (资源) are not inexhaustible and the importance of using them carefully.

    Then, when you garden, you must move around. All the different movements needed for gardening, like bending and lifting, work small muscles (肌肉) in the body. And you can easily get good exercise when you are digging holes or pulling grasses.

    In a study, researches looked at more than 2,800 people over the age of 60. They studied their lifestyle habits, activities and health over a 16-year period. They found that gardening could lower the risk of future dementia (痴呆) by 36%. Gardening requires people do many repeated actions, such as picking off dying flowers. These actions have a calming influence on the brain. The brain is still active but not in the same way when we use computers.

    You'll feel wonderful when what you grow in a garden looks, smells, feels and tastes good.

    If you have come to Britain, there are some beautiful places you can't miss. Below are four that you can enjoy during your trip to Britain.

    Cotswolds

    The Cotswolds are a range of hills measuring about 2,000 square kilometers, designated as an area of outstanding beauty and shared by countries of Somerset, Wiltshire, Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire, Warwickshire and Worcestershire. Sometimes known as "The Heart of England", the hills are small but perfectly formed and dotted with pleasant towns and well-preserved old villages inhabited mainly by well-preserved old English folk.

    Bath

    Bath is a historic Roman and Georgian spa city. It is a World Heritage (遗产) site, situated in 100 miles west of London and 15miles southeast of the nearest big city, Bristol. A unique city, Bath is famous for its hot springs, Roman period baths, medieval heritage and stately Georgain architecture. The famous English writer Jane Austen spent some time there, and her novel is a satire of the social life of the city at the time. Many of the sites she mentioned are still able to be visited in the city today.

    Much Wenlock

    The Shropshire town of Much Wenlock is a characteristically English town, off the beaten track, but well worth a visit. Not only is Much Wenlock a stunning beautiful medieval town, but it also played a part in the birth of the modern Olympic Games. Much Wenlock is the birthplace of William Penny Brookes, the inspiration for the modern Olympic Movement and founder of the Wenlock Olympian society. In recognition of its sporting heritage, the 2012 London Olympic Games named one of their mascots Wenlock.

    Castle Combe

    Nestled in a wooded Cotswold valley, with the ambling Bybrook River flowing through its heart, Castle Combe is a truly delightful example of the traditional English village. Architecturally, little has changed since the 15^th century. There are no street lights or TV aerials and you enjoy the peaceful atmosphere, and you will understand why it has won the "Prettiest Village in England" award so many times. Castle Combe is also a favored location for Hollywood film and television companies.

    The goings-on in the consulting room have become more transparent (透明的) recently. Thank goodness. We know more than the lines supplied by the movies in which the therapist knows all and gives wisdom to those who, sitting on a couch, consult with them. Therapists are interested in how the individual, the couple or the family experiences and understands their difficulties. That has to be a starting place. We can be of value if our first port of call is to listen, to gradually feel ourselves into the shoes of the other, to absorb the feelings that are being conveyed and to think and then to say some words.

    The thinking and talking that I do inside the consulting room is at odds with many features of ordinary conversation. Not that it is mysterious, but it isn't concerned with traditional ways of sharing or identifying. The therapist makes patterns and theorizes, but they are also reflecting on the words that are spoken, how they are delivered and how the words, once spoken, affect the speaker and the therapist themselves.

    Words can give voice to previously unknown feelings and thoughts. That's why it's called the talking cure. But just as words reveal so, too, can they obscure, and this gets us to the listening and feeling part of the therapy. Whatever and however the words are delivered, they will have an impact on me as a therapist. I might feel hopeless, I might feel energized, I might feel pushed away, I might feel demanded of, I might feel pulled to find solutions.

    The influence of the other is what makes any relationship possible or impossible. A therapist is trained to reflect on how those who consult with them affect them. As I try to step into the shoes of the other and then out again, my effort is to hold both those experiences, plus an awareness of my ease or discomfort with what I encounter in the relationship.

    Feelings are the bread and butter of our work in the consulting room. They inform or modify our ideas and they enable us to find an emotional bridge to what can so hurt for the people we are working with. Along with the more commonly thought-about theories and ideas we have about the psyche, they are an essential part of the therapist's toolkit, certainly for me. The talking cure means talking, yes. It also means the therapist is listening, thinking and feeling.

    If you are planning on travelling, there are few simple rules about how to make life easier both before and after your journey.

    First of all, always check and doublecheck departure(出发) time. It is surprising how few people really do this carefully. Once I arrived at the airport a few minutes after ten. My secretary had got the ticket for me and I thought she had said that the plane left at 10:50. When I arrived at the airport, the person at the departure desk told me that my flight was closed. Therefore, I had to wait three hours for the next one and missed an important meeting.

    The second rule is to remember that even in this age of credit cards(信用卡), it is still important to have some local money in cash(现金). Once I arrived at a place at midnight and the bank at the airport was closed. The only way to get to my hotel was by taxi but because I had no dollars, I offered to pay in pounds instead. "Listen! I only take real money!" the driver said angrily. You can image how terrible I felt at that moment.

    The third and the last rule is to find out as much as you can about the weather at your destination before you leave. I feel sorry for some of my workmates who travel in heavy suits and raincoats in May, when it is still fairly cool in London or Manchester, to places like Athens, Rome or Madrid, where it is already beginning to get quite warm during the day.