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    How often do you check your phone? According to a study led by Nottingham Trent University in Britain, the average person looks at their phones 86 times a day. Updating their status on social media platforms also made people reach for their electronic companion frequently.

    Even the participants thought that was a lot: this figure is twice as often as they thought they did. Our phones might be shaping our behavior more than we realize. Do you actually look at your surroundings more than at your phone? Is it rude to check your phone when someone is talking to you?

    Sherry Turkle interviewed hundreds of college students about this. She's a professor of social studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. They talked about something they called "the rule of three".

    The rule has to do with being considerate to others despite the allure (诱惑力) of the little flat box. Turkle explains: "If you go to dinner with friends, you don't want to look down at your phone until you see that three people are looking up in the conversation. So there's a new rule where you don't look down unless three people are looking up in order to keep a little conversation alive."

    Actually, if you are clever enough you might use your phone as a tool to connect with people next to you. Sharing a bit of your life with them can bring you closer together. And you can also invite everyone to take a selfie (自拍照) with you.

    But the best thing to deal with mobile phone addiction is to go cold turkey and leave the machine behind occasionally or just switch it off and keep it firmly in your pocket for a while.

    In many countries, schools have long summer holidays, with shorter holidays in between. However, a new report suggests shortening school holidays to stop children forgetting what they have learnt during the long summer break. Instead of three school terms, it says, there should be five eight-week terms. And there should be just four weeks off in the summer, with a two-week break between the other terms.

    Sonia Montero has two children at primary school and works full-time. She supports the idea. “The kids,” she says, “have much longer holidays than me and I can't afford to take several weeks off work, so I need someone to take care of them. But nobody wants the work in the summer months — they all have holidays of their own.”

    Not surprisingly, some young people disagree. Student Jason Panos says “It's a stupid idea. I would hate staying at school in the summer. It's unfair, too. The people who suggest this had long school holidays when they were young, but now they want to stop us enjoying the summer. The kids in Spain and America have much longer holidays than here, but they don't forget everything they've learnt in a few months.”

    Nadia Salib agrees. “Sure,” she says, “the first week at school after the summer is never easy, but you soon get back into it. The real problem round here is that kids get bored after so many weeks out of school, and then some of them start causing trouble. But the answer is to give them something to do, not make everyone stay in school longer.”

    Cold weather has a great effect on how our minds and our bodies work. Maybe that is why there are so many expressions that use the word cold. For centuries, the body's blood has been linked closely with the emotions. People who show no human emotions or feelings, for example, are said to be cold –blooded. Cold –blooded people act in merciless ways. They may do cruel things to others, and not by accident. For example, a newspaper says the police are searching for a cold-blooded killer. The killer murdered someone, not in self-defense. He seemed to kill with no emotion.

    Cold can affect other parts of the body, the feet, for example. Heavy socks can warm your feet, if your feet are really cold. But there is an expression—to get cold feet –that has nothing to do with cold or your feet. The expression means being afraid to do something you had decided to do. For example, you agree to be president of an organization. But then you learn that all the other officers have given up the position. All the work of the organization will be your responsibility. You are likely to get cold feet about being president when you understand the situation.

    Cold can also affect your shoulder. You give someone the cold shoulder when you refuse to speak to them. You treat them in a distant, cold way. The expression probably comes from the physical act of turning your back toward someone, instead of speaking to him face-to-face. You may give a cold shoulder to a friend who has not kept a promise he made to you. Or, to someone who has lied about you to others.

    A cold fish is not a fish. It is a person. But it is a person who is unfriendly, unemotional and shows no love or warmth. A cold fish does not offer much of himself to anyone.

    Out in the cold is an expression often heard. It means not getting something that everybody else got. A person might say that everybody but him got a pay raise. He was left out in the cold. And it is not a pleasant place to be.

    Last summer, two nineteenth-century cottages were rescued from remote farm fields in Montana, to be moved to an Art Deco building in San Francisco. The houses were made of wood. These cottages once housed early settlers as they worked the dry Montana soil; now they hold Twitter engineers.

    The cottages could be an example of the industry' s odd love affair with “low technology,” a concept associated with the natural world, and with old-school craftsmanship (手艺) that exists long before the Internet era. Low technology is not virtual (虚拟的) —so, to take advantage of it, Internet companies have had to get creative. The rescued wood cottages, fitted by hand in the late eighteen-hundreds, are an obvious example, but Twitter's designs lie on the extreme end. Other companies are using a broader interpretation (阐释) of low technology that focuses on nature.

    Amazon is building three glass spheres filled with trees, so that employees can “work and socialize in a more natural, park-like setting.” At Google's office, an entire floor is carpeted in glass. Facebook's second Menlo Park campus will have a rooftop park with a walking trail.

    Olle Lundberg, the founder of Lundberg Design, has worked with many tech companies over the years. “We have lost the connection to the maker in our lives, and our tech engineers are the ones who feel impoverished (贫乏的) , because they're surrounded by the digital world,” he says. “They're looking for a way to regain their individual identity, and we've found that introducing real crafts is one way to do that.”

    This craft based theory is rooted in history, William Morris, the English artist and writer, turned back to pre-industrial arts in the eighteen-sixties, just after the Industrial Revolution. The Arts and Crafts movement defined itself against machines. “Without creative human occupation, people became disconnected from life,” Morris said.

    Research has shown that natural environments can restore(恢复) our mental capacities. In Japan, patients are encouraged to “forest-bathe,” taking walks through woods to lower their blood pressure.

    These health benefits apply to the workplace as well. Rachel Kaplvin, a professor of environmental psychology, has spent years researching the restorative effects of natural environment. Her research found that workers with access to nature at the office—even simple views of trees and flowers—felt their jobs were less stressful and more satisfying. If low-tech offices can potentially nourish the brains and improve the mental health of employees then, fine, bring on the cottages.

    It was only -28℃ when we landed in Siberia. That was cold enough to make breathing difficult. Five minutes later, I asked for a second pair of gloves and pulled my scarf tight over my nose and mouth. Clearly, I was a complete beginner to this. At the bus station, Mikhail laughed when we asked him why he wasn't freezing. He had spent the whole day outside only with his fur hat and a sheepskin coat for warmth. It was mid-afternoon and icicles（冰柱）were hanging from his beard.

    In Siberia, there's a belief that enough vodka（伏特加酒）will save you from the cold. However, it's wrong. The local hospital is crowded. Even here, icicles are hanging down on the inside of the windows, though the heating is at full power. The doctors are too busy to talk to us.

    The winter here is cruel —and this one is especially so. After her work as a teacher, Natasha Fillipova comes home. It is a freezing house. She shows us the bedroom — where ice has built up on the inside walls. One night, Natasha washed her hair before going to bed. When she woke up, it was frozen hard to the wall. Now the children are doing their homework in the bathroom — the only room warm enough to sit in. Natasha doesn't want to complain. But she is angry with the government and the architects for building terrible houses.

    The houses here are supposed to stand up to -40℃, but they don't. And her children are ill with coughs and colds. Of course, Natasha's anger is brief, and she seems embarrassed about it. According to her, Siberians are used to the cold weather. People here prefer to depend on themselves and the knowledge that spring will come in the end.

    The idea that you can use humor, laughter, and play to make you healthier probably seems too simple to be true. However, it is really true and simple. The sense of humor, laughter and play plays an important part in keeping you healthy.

    Treat the blues with a sense of humor, which is closely tied to laughter. Laughter is infectious. Have you ever heard a big laugh of a young child and been able to keep yourself from smiling? When laughter is shared between people, it makes them closer to each other and increases their happiness. Smiling is the beginning of laughter and a smile is also just as infectious as laughter is. You can experience something by smiling at everyone around you, and you will feel happier just by sharing a smile, even with a stranger.

    Play is an important part of making sure that we stay healthy. We are often encouraged to make sure our children play, and are told of the benefits of being out playing. However, what we often forget is that it is just as important for old people to make play be part of their life as it's for children. Physical play is important for the old and it certainly helps prevent illness. While the studies are still in the early stages, the studies that have been done have shown that physical play certainly plays a part in preventing cognitive (认知的) falling.