Drug problems

    If you're worried about your own or someone else's drug taking or misuse, it's good to know the facts.

Why take drugs?

    Drug users don't start using drugs with the intention of becoming addicted. But many drugs contain addictive substances(物质) and even people who use them occasionally can become dependent and need to use them regularly.

    Reasons why people start using drugs can include: to escape problems they may be having in other parts of their life, peer pressure and fitting in with another group of people, being curious about the effects of drugs.

    If you start to use drugs on a regular basis, or if you become dependent on them, it can affect your family and friends as well as having a serious impact on your own physical and mental well-being.

    Drug overdoses can be fatal. You can die instantly from misusing substances and drugs that you can buy over the counters.

Signs of drug abuse and misuse

    There is not a common list of symptoms that you can use to tell if you or someone you know is misusing drugs. That's because drug use affects different people in different ways, depending on the type of drugs they're using.

    Although anxiety, tiredness and a change in sleeping habits can be signs of drug use, they can also be caused by changes in your body, stress or other problems.

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    Drugs are categorised into three classes based on their overall level of harm. Class A drugs are the most dangerous, however, all the drugs in all three classes are harmful and addictive.

    Remember that all drugs are illegal, even Class C drugs like cannabis(大麻烟). If you're caught selling them to other people, or carrying a small amount in your pocket, it's likely that the police will get involved.

    If you're found guilty of any of these offences, you may face a fine or time in custody(拘留), with Class A drugs carrying the most severe sentences.

Worried about a friend?

    If you think that one of your friends or relatives is misusing drugs, you may want to approach them and talk about it. It's not your responsibility to make them stop, but you can tell them about how their behaviour is affecting your relationship.

    If they ask for help with their problem, then it's important to listen and help them find the right information and treatment.

National Drugs Helpline

    If you're worried about drug abuse and addiction you can call the National Drugs Helpline on 0800 776 600 for confidential advice—lines are open seven days a week. Calls are free and they won't show up on your phone bill, but you may be charged if you use a mobile.

More useful links

Information about addictions from need to know

Information about drugs, the law and human rights

    Which boy hasn't dreamed of being a cool secret agent (特工)? The wonderful fighting abilities and the world-saving adventures are much more colorful than most people's everyday lives. Well, Cody Banks is just like any other boy, except that he is not just dreaming. He has a big secret his friends never know about. He was trained to be a spy (间谍）by a special CIA programme, which was made to look like a summer camp. He learned high-speed driving, hand-to-hand fighting and the use of high-tech tools.

    After proving he could become a young hero by saving a baby from a runaway car, Banks gets his first real task. He must make friends with a popular girl at school, Natalie Connors. Then, he must spy on her father, a scientist who has developed a dangerous technology (技术).Banks must stop a group of bad people from forcing Natalie's father into using the technology to endanger the world.

    The CIA may have taught him first-class self-defense moves, but they didn't show him how to talk to girls. Banks has zero ability when it comes to dealing with girls. How can he get around his problem and get an invitation to the girl's upcoming birthday party? Will he finally become Natalie's boyfriend and find out whatever he can about her father's work?

    Agent Cody Banks has everything that young people are interested in: big explosions, breath-taking performances and funny girl-dating experiences. It was listed No.2 in the American box office last week.

    “This story is interesting and fun for the whole family to enjoy, and especially cool for young boys，” said Paul Perkins, a film reviewer in the US.

    It's never easy to explain exactly when a specific language began, and in the case of English we can hardly regard it as a separate language before the Anglo-Saxons came to Britain. Germanic invaders (入侵者) came and settled in Britain from the north-western coastline of continental Europe in the fifth centuries. The invaders all spoke a language that was Germanic (related to Dutch, Frisian, German and the Scandinavian languages), but we'll probably never know how different their speech was from that of their continental neighbors.

    The reason that we know so little about the language in this period is because we do not have much in the way of written records from any of the Germanic languages until several centuries later. When Old English writings began to appear in the seventh and eighth centuries there was a good deal of regional variation (变化), but not more than that found in later periods.

    The Celts already lived in Britain when the Anglo-Saxons arrived, but there are few obvious signs of their language in English today. Some scholars have suggested that the Celtic tongue might have had some influence on the grammatical development of English, particularly in some parts of the country, but this is highly speculative (猜测). The number of borrowed words that have entered Old English from this language is very small. Those that survive in modern English include “comb” (a type of valley), alongside some place names.

    Cropping (修剪) an Image With the Snap Shot Program

    Welcome to the world of photo-editing!

    Cropping an image allows you to zero in on (对准，聚焦) just the portion that is important to your project. For example, you may want to insert an image of a covered train in a report but may not want to include the whole train. Cropping the image allows you to select only the small area you wish to retain (保留) and eliminate all other portions of the original picture.

    Option 1: Cropping by Placing the Image in a Shape

    Screen Shot 1

    Using one of Snap Shot's standard shapes as a photo-editing tool requires no special abilities to crop an image with a standard shape:

    a. Click Cropping & Orientation from the Effects menu.

    b. Click to select one of the six shapes to frame your image.

    c. Use the mouse pointer to draw a frame around the portion of the image you wish to retain. Re-size the frame by dragging the shape's sizing handles. When you are satisfied with the results, click Cut It.

    d. Snap Shot will automatically return to the project that is open. (You may also copy or cut the cropped image and paste it into another application.)

    Option 2: Freehand Cropping of an Image

    Screen Shot 2

    If you want to trace the shape of an object in order to crop out everything else, freehand cropping is the way to go. To crop an image freehand:

    a. Click Freehand Crop from the Cropping & Orientation option on the Effects menu.

    b. Using the mouse pointer, trace around the shape you want to crop. Be sure to completely enclose the image by ending at the same place you began outlining.

    c. Click Cut It. Snap Shot will automatically return to the project that is open.

    When I heard the piano, I walked to Mrs. Windsor's house and waited outside as I always did. That meant she was working with another student, and I was not supposed to bother them by ringing the bell. I stood against the wall and daydreamed what I'd rather be doing. "Almost anything", I sighed dejectedly. I had been tutored enough to read, understand, and even write some musical compositions, but I just didn't have a gift for it. It didn't come to me naturally. I thought back to happier times when I was writing stories and acting them out with my friends, cutting up old clothes to make dresses that performers wear in plays, and building scenery out of old things we found. But Mrs. Windsor had offered to give me the lessons for free, so I felt my duty to try.

    The door opened and Wendy Barton came out. I walked in, sat down on the piano bench and began to sort through my sheet music.

    "Hello," I heard a voice behind me say softly. I turned around to see a little girl standing behind me, eating an apple. But before I could make any response, Mrs. Windsor walked into the room in her usual urgent manner and announced, "Jennifer, this is my niece, Pasha. Pasha, this is Jennifer. Pasha will be giving you your lesson today. I'm up to my ears in something else!" she then exited to the kitchen.

Pasha set her apple down on the side table and slid beside me on the piano bench.

    "What piece do you like best?" she asked.

    "What do you mean?" I asked. "They're all the same to me. I don't know.

    "You mean you don't have a favorite?"

    "No, not really."

    Pasha looked at me, rather puzzled, then opened my sheet music to the beginning page and asked me to play. I arranged my fingers on the keys and studied the notes on the page for a moment. Then I frowned and concentrated to make the notes on the page match the finger movements. I have to admit I was a rather mechanical pianist.

    After about a page or two, Pasha gently put her hand on top of mine as if to calm my fingers. There was a long pause. "What are you hearing in the music?" I looked at her rather strangely and admitted I didn't know what she meant.

    "Like a story. What story is being playing out within the music?"

    "I guess I've never thought about it before. I don't know."

    "Here, let me try and you listen," Pasha advised.

    She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, letting her fingers dance lightly over the keys. Then, she began to play. "See, it begins here beside some kind of river. Hear the water flowing beside you?"

    Her fingers rose and fell gently on the keys. "Now the princess appears and she's picking flowers from the water's edge." A carefree, happy piece of music filled the air in time to Pasha's dancing fingers. "Oh, but she slips!" The music changed. "And our princess is being carried off by the fast-flowing stream. Quickly, the princess's horse sees her plight (困境)," Pasha continued, "and races to the river's edge where he swims out to let her catch hold of him. They make it to the bank and she hugs her faithful horse and swears she will never again wear princess skirts that weigh her down." Pasha finished with a big smile and then looked at me.

"Aren't you the girl who tells the stories?" she asked.

    "I guess. I do tell a lot of stories."

    "Oh, yes! All the kids talk about them. I've heard about you. Well, all you have to do is learn to hear the stories in the music. That's all there is to it."

    "I've never thought it that way."

    "Let's try another one, shall we?" Pasha smiled and together we played that afternoon, finding the stories in the music and learning that sometimes it takes a friend to pull you out of the river onto dry land again.

    People like to post their selfies(自拍照) on social media. To know more about it, scientists at Syracuse University in New York recently did a research and came up with some surprising findings.

    People who post selfies and use editing software to make themselves look better show behavior connected to narcissism(自恋), the researchers said. Makana Chock, a professor from Syracuse University, said because social media is mostly used by people to share unimportant information about their lives, it is a good place for people to "work towards satisfying their own vanity." Those "likes" under their Facebook selfies make them feel good.

    Besides, people who post group selfies show a need for popularity and a need to belong to a group, the research found. Some people feel "peer(同伴) pressure" to post selfies and some follow the popular belief that if there is no picture of an event or experience, it did not really happen. "Anyway, it shouldn't be seen as negative. People get sense of satisfaction especially when they get likes. And it does no harm," Chock said.

    Other findings from the study include: There are no major differences on how often men and women post selfies and how often they use editing software. But men who post selfies showed more of a need to be seen as popular than women who posted selfies.

Chock said posting selfies on social media is not all that different from what people have done for many years. On trips and special events, our parents and grandparents used cameras instead of phones to take photos. They would bring back photos to show friends and family. You had no choice but to look at them. You probably commented about how nice everyone in the photos looked, especially children and the person showing the photos. They were happy to hear your comments. That was the old way of "clicking like". On social media, however, people can decide not to look at photos — even if they click "like".