I have two sons. They are as different as night and day. My youngest is sweet, loveable, easy-going, and finds joy in everything. My oldest we've nicknamed the “Evil Genius” is ambitious, self-confident, and suffers no fools. Whenever we mentioned Santa my husband and I were rewarded with major eye rolling and deep sighs from my oldest. At first we both tried to ignore it.

    We both knew that our eldest had figured out the big secret. But I'd be damned(指责) if he was going to ruin it for his six-year-old brother who had plenty of Santa-loving years ahead of him. I looked at my husband in the eye and said, “I'll handle this.” to which he responded “Okay just be careful because I'm not sure he knows - he might just be acting like it.” But I knew. And I had it in my mind that he was about to break his younger brothers spirit and break the news to him. I was afraid he was going to take the Christmas spirit away from my sweet innocent youngest and stamp all over it. I had to protect him. I needed to control this now before it got out of control. I rushed into the play room where my oldest was playing alone. I looked him dead in the eyes and said: “Well you know Santa isn't real, right?” And as I stared at my eight-year-old son for what seemed like a long time of silence, his eyes started to fill with tears. And a tear dropped down his cheek when he screamed out, “He's not?” “Um well it's not that he's not real (shut up you idiot- stop saying he's not real), but he doesn't really make and deliver all the toys. Dad and I get some of them for you. So he's real. He's just got a little help from us.”

    The Evil Genius wasn't buying it. He just sat there looking at me with an expression of doubt. You know when you make a terrible mistake but you can't stop yourself from making it worse? That was me because I just had to know. I had to know why he had seemed to be over Santa. So I asked him why he rolled his eyes and sighed every time his father and I mentioned Santa, to which he replied that kids at school had been saying Santa wasn't real but that he still thought he was.

    Founded in 1764 by French traders, St. Louis today is the fifteenth largest urban area in the United States. There are many attractive destinations for tourists.

American Kennel Club Museum of the Dog

    Dog lovers who visit St. Louis won't want to miss this 14,000-square-foot museum. Inside are over 500 paintings, prints, watercolors, and a variety of other dog art objects.

    The Museum is open year round, Tuesday through Saturday 10 AM to 4 PM, and Sunday 1 PM to 5 PM. Admission is $ 5 for adults, $ 2.50 for seniors, and $1 for children up to 14.

Anheuser Busch Brewery

    The Anheuser Buxch Brewery tour is not just for beer lovers. The tour includes the historic Brew House. Then the tour continues to the modern Bevo Packaging Plant. The best will be the Budweiser Clydesdale stables. The tours are always free.

Gateway Arch

    Designed by Eero Sarinen and Hannskari Bandel, it took over two years and 900 tons of stainless steel to build. It is the tallest of the country's National Monuments. The Arch is part of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial. About one milion people per year come to the top of the Arch, where there is an observation platform providing a great view of the city.

St. Louis Zoo

    First version of the St. Louis Zoo opened in 1904 at the St. Louis World's Fair, but in the century since it has grown into one of the chief zoos in the world. The passenger train takes visitors around the Zoo, which contains over 9,000 animals of over 800 species.

    The Zoo is open every day but Christmas and New Year, with summer hours of 8 AM to 7 PM, and hours the rest of the year of 9 AM to 5 PM. Admission to the Zoo is free.

    Traditionally, across the world, boys and girls attend a mixed school, where they study together. But boys' schools are the perfect place to teach young men to express their emotions (情感) and encourage them to take part in activities such as art, dance and music.

    Boys at single-sex schools were said to be more likely to take part in cultural and artistic activities that helped develop their emotional expressiveness, rather than feeling they had to correspond to(和…相符) the "boy code" of hiding their emotions to be a "real man".

    The findings of the study go against accepted wisdom that boys do better when taught together with girls.

    Tony Little, head master of Eton, warned that boys were being failed by the British education system because it had become too focused on girls. He criticized teachers for failing to recognize that boys are actually more emotional than girls.

    The research argued that boys often perform badly in mixed schools because they become discouraged when girls do better earlier in speaking and reading skills.

    But in single-sex schools teachers can tailor (量身定做) lessons to boys' learning style, letting them move around the classroom and getting them to compete in teams to prevent boredom, wrote the study's author, Abigail James, of the University of Virginia.

    Teachers could encourage boys to enjoy reading and writing with "boy-focused" approaches such as themes and characters that appeal to them. Because boys generally have more acute vision, learn best through touch, and are physically more active, they need to be given "hands-on" lessons where they are allowed to walk around. "Boys in mixed schools view classical music as feminine（女性的） and prefer the modern genre （类型） in which violence and sexism are major themes," James wrote.

    Single-sex education also made it less likely that boys would feel that they had to be "masterful and in charge" in relationships. "In mixed schools, boys feel forced to act like men before they understand themselves well enough to know what that means," the study reported.

    Two men were sitting together in a plane. They were on a long journey. One of the men was a businessman. The other was a farmer. They sat without talking for a while, then the farmer said, “Let's do something to pass the time.”

     “What do you want to do?” the businessman asked. “We can ask each other riddles.” The farmer said, “You start.” “Let's make the rules first,” the businessman said. “That's not fair. You are a businessman with much knowledge. You know more things than I do. I am just a farmer.”

    “That's true.” The businessman said. “What do you want we should do?” “If you don't know the answer to a riddle, you pay me $100. And if I don't know the answer, I'll pay you $50.” The farmer said. The businessman thought about this, then he said, “OK. That's fair. Who will go first?”

    “I will,” The farmer said. “Here is my riddle. What has three legs when it walks, but only two legs when it flies?” The business man repeated the riddle, “What has three legs when it walks, but only two legs when it flies? Mm, that's a good one. I'm afraid I don't know the answer.” He gave the farmer $100, then said, “Tell me the answer. What has three legs when it walks, but only two legs when it flies?” “I don't know.” The farmer said and gave him $50.

    SPORTS EVENTS

    BASKETBALL:

    Central Sports Centre. City Road.

    All Stars vs Rockets, Saturday 8: 30 p.m. $12

    Northerners vs Tigers, Sunday noon $14

    BUSHWALKING (越野走)：

    Meet at Wanda Station, Saturday 9:00 a.m. sharp for 3-hour walk to Canary Mountains. $7, ph 341-5432 Meet at Westley Station, Sunday 9:00 a.m. sharp for a full day walk to Wombak Valley. $5, ph 341-8643. Bring your own lunch.

    FOOTBALL:

    St Martins Sports Centre

    St Martins vs Doonsberg, Saturday 2:00 p.m. $8

    Eastside Central vs Light Hill, Sunday 2:00 p.m. $8

    Neill Park Recreation Centre

    Neill Park vs Robinson, Saturday 2:00 p.m. $11

    Essen vs Springwood, Sunday 2:00 p.m. $11

    LAWN BOWLS(草坪滚木球）：

    Tans Town B.C

    Tans Town vs White Vale, Saturday 9:00 p.m. $10

    Wake Hill B.C.

    Wake Hill vs Colls, Saturday 2: 00 p.m. $9

    If you don't have a college degree, you're at greater risk of developing memory problems or even Alzheimer's (老年痴呆). Education plays a key role in lifelong memory performance and risk for mental disorder, and it's well documented that those with a college degree possess a cognitive（认知的） advantage over their less educated counterparts in middle and old age.

    Now, a large national study from Brandeis University published in the American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry shows that those with less schooling can significantly make up for poorer education by frequently engaging in mental exercises such as word games, puzzles, reading, and lectures.

    “The lifelong benefits of higher education for memory in later life are quite impressive, but we do not clearly understand how and why these effects last so long,” said lead author Margie Lachman, a psychologist. She suggested that higher education may encourage lifelong interest in cognitive efforts, while those with less education may not engage as frequently in mental exercises that help keep the memory agile (敏捷地).

    But education early in adulthood does not appear to be the only route to maintain your memory. The study found that intellectual activities undertaken regularly made a difference. “Among individuals with low education, those who are engaged in reading, writing, attending lectures, doing word games or puzzles once a week or more had memory scores similar to people with more education,” said Lachman.

The study, called Midlife in the United States, assessed 3,343 men and women between the ages of 32 and 84 with a mean age of 56 years. Almost 40 percent of the participants had at least a 4-year college degree. The researchers evaluated how the participants performed in two cognitive areas, verbal memory and executive function — brain processes involved in planning, abstract thinking and cognitive flexibility. Participants were given a battery of tests, including tests of verbal fluency, word recall, and backward counting.

    As expected, those with higher education said they engaged in cognitive activities more often and also did better on the memory tests, but some with lower education also did well, explained Lachman.

    “The findings are promising because they suggest there may be ways to level the playing field for those with lower educational achievement, and protect those at greatest risk for memory declines,” said Lachman. “Although we can not rule out the possibility that those who have better memories are the ones who take on more activities, the evidence is consistent with cognitive plasticity (可塑性), and suggests some degree of personal control over cognitive functioning in adulthood by adopting an intellectually active lifestyle.”