We took a rare family road trip to the Adirondacks in late August，and it was as refreshing and exhausting as family vacations tend to be．Toward the end of our long drive home, even the kids were leaning forward in their seats urging my lead foot on．At that point in a road trip，even sixty-five miles per hour feels slow. We have become numb to our speed and numb to the road signs flashing by.

    My family lives on the edge of Lancaster County. Only thirty miles from home，I hit the brakes，and we began to roll，slowly，behind a horse-drawn carriage. We began to open our eyes again．We saw familiar green hills and the farm with the best watermelons. I rolled down the windows, and we breathed again．Just-cut hay and a barn full of dairy cattle．

    At five miles per hour，you remember what you forget at sixty-five．You are thinking about a place，even when you are moving from place to place．

    I am a placemaker. A homemaker, too. I am a mother of a young kid at home，and also a writer and a gardener．But，for me，those roles are wrapped up with the one big thing I want to do with the rest of my life：I want to cultivate a place and share it with others．

    The place I make with my family is a red-brick farmhouse built in l880. It has quite a few nineteenth-century bedrooms and a few acres of land，and we love nothing more than to fill them with neighbors and friends. We grow vegetables and flowers，keep a baker's dozen of egg—laying chickens，and，since we moved in three years ago，we have planted  many，many trees．

    Living with my life's purpose does not allow for much travel. I need to be here，feeding the chickens and watering the tomatoes. Any extra in the budget，and we spend it on trees．

    But I learned something at the end of our family road trip．Travel can help me in the task of caring for my own place．When I slow down and pay attention to the road between here and there，travel tells me the connections between my place and all the other places．

    Ever get that feeling you're being watched? Well, if you're a dog-owner, you may have a point. Dogs are able to watch people's interactions with one another to determine who holds yummier treats, according to a new study. This study joins others that show dogs are good observers of human behaviors and feelings. It offers evidence that dogs use information not only from people's direct interactions with them, but also their interactions with one another.

    In the study, dogs watched a man ask two women for some of their corns. Both women gave the man corns when he asked, but in response to one woman, the man showed his enthusiasm and said the corns were so delicious. In response to the other woman, he gave the corns back and called them gross（in Spanish；the study was conducted in Argentina）. After these interactions, the man left and an assistant holding the dog let the dog go. While many dogs didn't approach either woman, the dogs that did have a preference tended to prefer the woman with the yummier(美味的) food.

    Other studies of dogs' people-watching ability have found dogs are able to tell the difference between happy and sad faces in their owners. They prefer people who give others food when asked over people who don't give others food. And in one study, dogs turned toward crying people more often than toward talking people.

    So how much do dogs really understand about the humans around them? That's not totally settled yet. In a strange twist to the Argentine study above, when the researchers tried an experiment in which they put two plates of corns on a table and had a man react to each plate, dogs didn't preferentially approach the tastier plate afterward. You could say dogs watch for the interaction between two persons, not just how a person reacts. Yet a previous study found dogs will choose boxes that people reacted to happily, but not boxes people reacted to with a disgusted face.

    Well, either way, you can be sure Fluffs is keeping an eye on you, to the best of her ability. The study was published in the journal PLOS One.

    I stepped on the red carpet and smiled as the cameras rushed up to take pictures. I slowly walked into the large hall of my first Hollywood premiere(首映). I had designed the special effects for the hottest movie on the market. Later, a friend of mine came with a big smile on her face. “I'm sure you have never thought that you would be here,” she said excitedly. I calmly smiled back in return.

    Having never had great opportunities, I've worked long and hard to create a bright future. Though I grew up in a poor family, I never doubted that my future goals would be connected with computers. In middle school I became the producer of a daily news television show.

    My future goal became even more possible when a new high school in my area held a technology program created for students interested in technology related jobs. Through the program I was able to learn about computer design and gain experience through a part-time job with a local computer company. Whenever a new movie came out, I would find out the company which created the special effects for the movie. At the same time, I researched job positions on the Internet. The companies on the Internet suggested universities and degrees on their websites. I planned on studying Computer Science.

    Though I didn't give up my dreams, I continued to pay my attention to daily events. I took part in a large number of activities to broaden my view on life. I worked hard in school to develop my mind. I communicated with people who could give me advice about any problem I might meet along the way. And now, after years of preparation, my hard work is paying off. I know I have succeeded because I put my goals into action.

    Artificial Intelligence (AI) is making it possible for companies to monitor workers' behavior in great detail and in real time. Start to slack off (懈怠), and AI could talk to your boss.

    One company offering such services is London-based start-up Status Today. Its AI platform relies on a regular supply of employee data, including everything from the files you access to when you use a key card. From this, it builds a picture of how employees normally function and signals any unusual performance. The idea is to spot when someone might become a security risk by doing something different from their usual behavioral patterns. “All of this gives us fingerprint of a user, so if we think the fingerprint doesn't match, we raise a warning”, says Mircea Dumitrescu, the company's chief technology officer.

    The system also aims to catch employee actions that could accidentally cause a security breach (漏洞), like opening malware (恶意软件).“We're not monitoring if your computer has a virus.” says Dumitrescu. “We're monitoring human behaviors.”

    But catching the security breach means monitoring everyone, and the AI can also be used to track employee productivity. “It seems like they are just using the reputation of AI to give an air of lawfulness to old-fashioned workplace surveillance (监视),” says Javier Ruiz Diaz of digital campaigning organization the Open Rights Group. “You have a right to privacy and you shouldn't be expected to give that up at work.”

    Exactly how companies use the system will be up to them, but it's hard to shake the picture of an AI constantly looking over employees' shoulders. “It will bother people, and that could be counterproductive if it affects their behavior,” says Paul Bemal at the University of East Anglia.

    Phil Legg at the University of the West of England says it will never catch every security risk. “If people know they're being monitored, they can change their behavior,” he says.

    A famous doctor once received a little child who was badly ill. Thanks to his skill and care, his young patient got well and was soon able to get up and run about again.

    The child's mother was very much obliged to the doctor, and she called on him to thank him for what he had done for her child. "Doctor," she said, "you have saved my little son. I don't know how to thank you enough. I feel that money alone cannot repay you, so I have made this little purse with my own hands, as a sign of my gratitude. I hope you will accept it." The doctor stood up and said coldly, "Madam, a little present like that is very nice between friends, but a doctor needs to be paid properly for what he has done." The lady was so surprised and hurt so much that she could not reply for a moment. Then she said quietly, "Perhaps you will tell me how much your fee is?"

    "Fifty pounds", he answered.

    The lady opened the little purse and took out four fifty-pound bank notes. She handed one of them to the doctor, and put the other three back into the purse. She put the purse into her handbag and, saying good bye to the doctor, went out of the room.

    It is every kid's worst nightmare(噩梦) and six-year-old Jaden Hayes has lived it twice. First he lost his dad when he was only at the age of four and then last month his mom died unexpectedly in her deep sleep.

    "I tried and I tried and I tried to get her awake, but... I just couldn't," said Jaden.

    No one could imagine how heartbroken Jaden was.

    But there's another side to his sadness. A side he first made public a few weeks ago when he told his aunt, Barbara DiCola, and now his guardian(监护人)after both his parents died, that he was sick and tired of seeing everyone sad all the time. And he had a plan to fix it.

    "And that was the beginning of it," said Barbara. "That's where the adventure began."

    Jaden asked his aunt Barbara to buy a bunch of little toys and bring him to downtown Savannah, Georgia near where he lives, so he could give them away to anyone who will smile to him. "I'm trying to make people smile," said Jaden.

    Jaden targets people who aren't already smiling and then turns their day around. He's gone out on four different occasions now and he is always successful. Even if sometimes he doesn't get exactly the reaction he was hoping for.

    It is just so overwhelming to some people that a six-year-old orphan would give away a toy -- expecting nothing in return -- except a smile.

    "I'm depending on it to be 33, 000," said Jaden. When asked if he thinks he can make that goal, he answered: "I think I can."