No one knows how much money Dr. Lyle Tullis gave away to students. I was his colleague for nearly a decade and I never stopped being amazed at his generosity. Our college has a program of providing cross-cultural experiences for students. Lots of students take advantage of summer experience oversea. I discovered that no group left for overseas with some of its members receiving financial help from Dr. Tullis.

    It wasn't that he made a lot of money. For one thing, he taught in a church-run school. There, his salary was half of what those people earned in a tax-supported school.

    Other colleagues occasionally complained about the low pay. Not Lyle Tullis. Occasionally some professors would leave our campus for a better-paid position. They told me they did so because, with better pay, they could provide for their families.

    The size of Lyle Tullis' paycheck never seemed to be the most important thing to him. I realized that one day when I was thanking him for helping a student, his eyes shone as he said to me, “I've got so much money that I don't know what to do with it. So, I just give it away.”

    Most people wouldn't have thought that way. Dr. Tullis drove one of the oldest cars on campus. It was even older than almost any of the students' cars. His home, while comfortable, was not fancy at all. But Lyle Tullis lived with the feeling that he had so much money that he needed to give it away.

    He was one of the favorite on campus. Cynics(愤世嫉俗者) might say he bought fame. But they would misunderstand. Lyle wanted to devote his life, all of it, to helping others.

    Exciting screams of joy from two happy little girls rang across the beach. But I walked along, ignoring them. I'd come to this faraway beach on my sailboat, a place to escape. My marriage was in trouble. I worried about the harm to my two boys. But I didn't know how to make things better.

    “Help! Help!” The girls screamed. I saw one girl was at the edge of the surf, yelling. I charged into the waves, swam to her and seized her. “But where is the other girl?” I looked across the water and saw a small head after a big wave. I shifted the girl Td rescued to my back. She told me the other girl was her sister. For a moment I thought of my boys. How much they loved each other. How much I loved them.

    I quickened my swimming and held the second little girl. We were at least 50 yards from land. I couldn't swim that far with two girls hanging on to me. But there was no time to wait. I swam as hard as I could, but the weight of the girls grew heavier with every minute. My lungs burned. I opened my mouth to take a breath, but instead swallowed water. I couldn't breathe. From behind me I felt an unbelievable force, lifting.

    “Mommy!” The cry drew my attention. I looked up. An elderly man was trying to drag me out of the water. Two women were swimming toward shore. “Thank you,” one of the woman cried. “You saved my daughters.” My efforts and my struggles had paid off. I thought of that big wave, lifting me and pushing me. When my body had failed me, and when all hope was disappearing, I was given the strength I needed.

    I stoop up. My family were waiting for me. There were things I could do. I just needed to make an effort. The strength would be given to me.

    Will it matter if you don't take your breakfast? Recently a test was given in the United States. Those tested included people of different ages, from 12 to 83. During the experi­ment, these people were given all kinds of breakfasts, and sometimes they got no breakfast at all. Special tests were set up to see how well their bodies worked when they had eaten a certain kind of breakfast. The results show that if a person eats a proper breakfast, he or she will work with better effect than if he or she has no breakfast. This fact appears to be especially true if a person works with his brains. If a student eats fruit, eggs, bread and milk before going to school, he will learn more quickly and listen with more attention to class.

    Opposite to what many people believe, if you don't eat breakfast, you will not lose weight. This is because people become so hungry at noon that they eat too much for lunch, and end up gaining weight instead of losing. You will probably lose more weight if you reduce your other meals.

    Wrist watches are regarded as a tool to tell the time. At first, watches were created as women's decorative bracelets (手镯). At the same time, men used pocket watches. The first men's wrist watch was available in 1904. A pilot called Alberto Santos-Dumont personally asked a watchmaker to create a wrist watch to use on flights. Soon after that, men's wrist watches were available on the market. Since then, watches have been considered fashionable accessories for men, and watchmakers have started to make men's fashion watches.

    At present, watches are not indispensable to tell the time for most people have cell phones which have watch functions. But a new market has been created for wrist watches, which are not only used to tell the time, but also as important fashion statement pieces.

    Generally speaking, watches for formal occasions are beautifully made and more like pieces of jewelry than watches. Men's watches for informal and semi-formal events include simple, slim designs and large-and-thick-sized styles. Nowadays, men usually don't follow any specific style of dress for watches, and the luxury brands of the expensive and strongly made sports watches have made them believe that they look more stylish because of their high prices. Some of the fashion watches have a diamond and some others are completely decorated with precious stones such as diamonds.

    Men's watches also have many advanced functions. For example, the dual-time watches for travelers make them know the time in most other countries as well as the time in their home if they are abroad.

In a word, a men's watch is one of the few accessories for men's cupboard. Men can choose their most suitable watches to go with their personal taste.

    When the company was small, Google cared a lot about getting kids from Harvard, Stanford, and MIT. But Laszlo Bock, Google's former Senior Vice President of People Operations, said it was the "wrong" hiring strategy. Experience has taught him that there are exceptional kids at many other places, from state schools in California to those in New York. "What we find is that the best people from places like these are just as good if not better as anybody you can get from any Ivy League school," said Bock, who authored a book titled "Work Rules!"

    So what else does Google not care about:

    Grades: Google's data shows that grades predict performance for the first two years of a career, but do not matter after that.

    Brain-teasers: Gone are interview questions such as: Why are manhole covers (井盖) round? How many golf balls can fit in a school bus? "Our research tells us those questions are a waste of time," Bock said. "They're a really coachable skill. The more you practice, the better you get at it."

    Here's what Google does care about:

    Problem solvers: Your cognitive (认知的) ability, or how well you solve problems.

    Leaders: The idea is not whether you were president of the student body or vice president of a bank, but rather "When you see a problem, do you step in and help solve it?" and then critically, "Are you willing to let somebody else take over, and make room for somebody else? Are you willing to give up power?"

    Googleyness: That's what Google calls its cultural fit. It's not "Are you like us?" Bock said. "We actually look for people who are different, because diversity gives us great ideas."

    "What's most important is that people are intellectually humble, willing to admit when they're wrong, and care about the environment around them ...because we want people who think like owners not employees," Bock said.