The U. S. Postal Service (USPS) is losing billions of dollars a year. The government company that delivers "small mail" is losing out to email and other types of electronic communication. First-class mail amount fell from a high point of 104 million pieces in 2000 to just 64 million pieces by 2014.

    Congress permits the 600.000-empIoyee USPS to hold a monopoly (垄断) over first-class and standard mail. The company pays no federal, state or local taxes; pays no vehicle fees; and is free from many regulations on other businesses. Despite these advantages, the USPS has lost $52 billion since 2007, and will continue losing money without major reforms.

    The problem is that Congress is preventing the USPS from reducing costs as its sales decline, and is blocking efforts to end Saturday service and close unneeded post office locations. USPS also has a costly union-dominated workforce that slows the introduction of new ideas or methods down. USPS workers earn significantly higher payment than comparable private-sector workers. The answer is to privatize the USPS and open postal markets to competition. With the rise of the Internet, the argument that mail is a natural monopoly that needs government protection is weaker than ever.

    Other countries facing declining letter amounts have made reforms Germany and the Netherlands privatized their national postal companies over a decade ago, and other European countries have followed suit. Britain floated shares of the Royal Mail on its stock exchange in 2013. Some countries, such us Sweden and New Zealand, have not privatized their national postal companies, but they have opened them up to competition.

    These reforms have driven efficiency improvements in all of these countries. Additional number of workers have been reduced, productivity has risen and consumers have benefited. Also, note that cost-cutting measures—such as closing tone post offices—are good for both the economy and the environment.

    Privatization and competition also encourage new changes. When the USPS monopoly over "extremely urgent" mail was stopped in 1979, we saw an explosion in efficient overnight private delivery by firms such as FedEx.

    The government needs to wake up to changing technology, study postal reforms abroad and let businessmen reinvent our out-of-date postal system.

    He wishes the holiday season would end already. His back aches, his red suit feels like a spacesuit, his cheeks have gone tight from smiling for 12 hours—and still the kids keep coming and coming, like ants at a picnic. As Christmas becomes more commercialized (商业化) across the U. S. and Canada, so must Santa Claus. As the holiday begins earlier each year, so must its spokesmen.

    The questions from children these days are harder than ever. Now, with thousands of children expecting a father or mother serving in Iraq or Afghanistan, the questions are as heart­breaking as they are unanswerable. For example, “Can you please bring Daddy home from the war in time for Christmas morning？”

    Santa Claus; also have a pretty good chance of getting sued (指控). A professional Santa Claus in Canada told a story: A Santa had a girl on his knee, and he commented, “You have nice eyes and nice hair.” The girl later said it was sexual harassment (骚扰). When a Santa feels anxious, he often shows it in the same ways ordinary people do. The Santa Claus were always seen to hang around at the dinner table when the show ended. Many of them just sleep in bed for several days and don't see other children again.

    Why can some people sleep through noises like a honking car or flushing toilet, while others are awakened by the lightest sound?

    To find the answer, sleep researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital conducted an unusual study of 12 self-described deep sleepers. After tests confirmed that the healthy volunteers were solid sleepers, they took part in a three-night study in the university's sleep laboratory. The participants spent the night in a big and comfortable room. But the room also included four speakers positioned near the top of the bed.

    During the night, the deep sleepers were subjected to 14 different recorded sounds, like street traffic, toilets flushing, and an airplane flying overhead. Next door, the researchers monitored their sleep patterns and brain waves.

    As expected, all of the participants slept relatively well, but there were differences in how they responded to the noisy interruptions. Some of the sleepers didn't wake up even when a sound was blasted at 70 decibels（分贝）; others were awakened by sounds at 40 or 50 decibels.

    The researchers discovered that the difference in a sleeper's reaction to noise could be predicted by the level of brain activity called "sleep spindles（纺锤体）". A sleep spindle is a burst of high-frequency brain activity coming from deep inside the brain during sleep. The source of the spindles is the thalamus（丘脑）, a part of the brain that sends sensory information to the rest of the cortex（皮层）.

    Before the study, the Massachusetts researchers theorized that the spindles are the brain's way of preventing sensory information from passing through the thalamus and waking the rest of the brain during sleep. They found that sleepers who experienced the most sleep spindles during the night were also the soundest sleepers and were least likely to be awakened by noise.

    Scientists already know that most people become lighter sleepers with age, most likely because older people experience less "slow wave sleep", which is the deepest stage of sleep. People also produce fewer sleep spindles as they age. But even when controlling for the stage of sleep a person was in, the number of sleep spindles still predicted their risk for awakening because of noise.

    More research is needed, but the findings suggest that a better understanding of sleep spindles could lead to new behavioral or drug therapies for people with sleep disorders. For example, future studies may try to determine whether diet, exercise or other behaviors may influence the number of sleep spindles a person produces during the night.

    Dyeing eggs has long been an Easter tradition, but it's the dyeing of baby chicks that is upsetting in some states.

    The dye, which is often ordinary food coloring, is either injected into eggs being hatched or sprayed onto newly hatched chicks. Although hatchery owners say the practice is harmless, critics argue that spraying the birds with color is stressful and that dyeing the animals transforms them into something attractive that can be thrown away when their colorful feathers disappear.

    “These are living creature and dyeing them sends out a message saying that they are more of a new and unusual object than a living animal,” said Dr. Marc Copper, senior scientific manager for the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

Dyed chicks — and sometimes rabbits — have been a traditional part of the Easter holiday in some parts of the world, but the practice has gone largely underground in the U.S. because many people view it as cruel.

    Today, about half of U.S. states ban the dyeing of animals, but last month the Florida Legislature passed a bill to remove the state's 45-year-old ban. The drive to end the law wasn't related to Easter chicks; it was done at the request of a dog groomer(美容师) who wanted to enter pet beauty contests.

    Florida governor Rick Scott must agree to remove the ban, which would be lifted July 1, but the Animal Rights Foundation of Florida(ARFF) has asked him not to remove the ban. In addition to allowing animals dyeing, the law would also lift a ban on selling baby animals as pets, and the organization fears that next year the state could see hundreds of dyed baby chicks on the market.

As long as the dye is not poisonous, experts say the birds' health isn't affected, and there are scientific reasons to dye animals. Wildlife researchers often inject eggs with dye to track birds in the wild, and teachers have dyed chicks for educational purposes. However, animal advocates are quick to point out that dyeing baby chicks for Easter isn't educational — it's done simply to earn profits.

Narayana Peesapaty was sitting on a flight when he noticed a passenger trying to reach food with a biscuit after breaking his spoon. At that moment, the researcher's mind gave birth to a simple yet revolutionary concept — edible spoons.

How do you like your spoon?

Peesapaty's company, Bakeys, makes edible spoons mainly out of sorghum(高粱）though rice, wheat and water are also ingredients. They combine to form a dry eating tool that remains hard even when used in moist or hot foods. Bakeys also makes ginger and garlic flavored(风味) spoons to meet specific requests. All spoons are completely natural and acceptable for nearly all diets.

A rice replacement

An environmentally-minded water researcher, Peesapaty, designed his spoons to be eco-friendly in several ways. Sorghum was chosen as the main ingredient of the spoons instead of rice, which requires 60 times as much water. Sorghum was also chosen for the strength it would lend eating tool, and the grain requires little water, low energy and no chemicals to grow.

In place of plastic

The goal that Peesapaty hopes to attain through Bakeys is to prevent plastic from any contact with food. Plastic products can contain cancer-causing substances that come into food, and average plastic bottles take 450 years to break down. In contrast, a Bakeys' spoon is nutritious and break down in 10 days or less if thrown away. Peesapaty admits that using plastic is cheaper, but he also says that his spoons will be equally inexpensive when mass-produced.

When it comes to having fun in the sun, it's easy to lose track of time. If you're not careful, this can be quite dangerous.{#blank#}1{#/blank#}But it can easily be prevented—all you need is a little sunscreen.

{#blank#}2{#/blank#}People have been using chemical pastes to protect themselves from the sun for centuries. But the first modern sunscreen sold on the market was offered by French company: L'oreal in 1935.

Several other companies were quick to release their own sunscreens. Perhaps the biggest advancement in the world of sunscreen came in the 1970s, when scientists started looking at the sun protection factor, or SPF.{#blank#}3{#/blank#}

The advantages of using sunscreen are obvious. It limits the painful effects of sunburn.{#blank#}4{#/blank#}Millions of people have died from skin cancer caused by ultraviolet rays from the SUITL. Remember to apply sunscreen 30 minutes before going outside.

Unfortunately, there are many mistaken ideas about sunscreen.{#blank#}5{#/blank#}Some also think you only need to put it on once for a whole day's protection or that you don't need it on cloudy days. None of these things are true. Experts say you should apply sunscreen every two hours when outside in the daytime, no matter how dark your skin is or what the weather is like.

A. And it can even save your life.

B. Sunscreen is not exactly a recent invention.

C. Choosing a sunscreen isn't as simple as it used to be.

D. In direct sunlight, sunburn can occur in less than 15 minutes.

E. This rating is a number that shows how effective a sunscreen is.

F. It's believed that you don't need much sunscreen if you have dark skin.

G. Some think a good method is to cover as much as possible with protective clothing.