BRAD GARRETT'S COMEDY CLUB

Category: Comedy

Best known for his role on the Emmy award-winning sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond, Brad Garrett returns to his Vegas roots with his comedy club at the MGM Grand. It is a good place to check out when you need a break from work.

Prices from: $56.40 and up

Age restriction: Must be 21 years of age or older

Show Length: 115 minutes

MAC KING COMEDY MAGIC SHOW

Category: Comedy, Magic

Mac King Comedy Magic Show is different every afternoon, with lots of audience participation. He is willing to make fun of himself instead of his guests in order to make everyone feel welcome and entertained. The afternoon is kid-friendly from start to finish. Still, whether you're eight or 80, you won't be able to figure out King's secrets.

Prices from: $40.90 and up

Age restriction: No age restriction

Show Length: 90 minutes

THE MENTALIST, GERRY MCCAMBRIDGE

Category: Comedy, Magic

Using his skills as a “mentalist”, Gerry McCambridge shocks the crowds as he uses his abilities to predict just what audience members will do next. Anyone who has seen the show has walked away in disbelief, amazed by his unusual power.

Prices from: $34.99  and up

Age restriction: Under 13 will not be admitted into the theater

Show Length: 75 minutes

ROCK OF AGES

Category: Plays & Musicals

The cheerful Rock of Ages brings audiences back to the times of big hair and even bigger bands with 28 popular rock songs from the 80s including “Every Rose Has Its Thorn,” “I Wanna Know What Love Is,” “Here I Go Again,” and more.

Rock of Ages has been nominated for five Tony Awards including Best Musical and Best Direction of a Musical. It also received a Drama League nomination for Distinguished Production for a Musical.

Prices from: $74.00 and up

Age restriction: Must be 15 years of age or older

Show Length: 125 minutes

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    {#blank#}1{#/blank#} . One of the best things you can possibly do is to start you own club. It's great fun especially if you are the sort of person who feels there's never anything to do during the school holidays.

    The first thing you need to come up with is an idea for your club. {#blank#}2{#/blank#}. Pets, clothes, pop music or dancing groups, sports, making things? The list is endless.

    Next you need some friends to be in your club with you. {#blank#}3{#/blank#}. All you need is three or four other people who are interested in the same thing as you.

    {#blank#}4{#/blank#} .You should all sit down somewhere together with lots of pieces of paper and write down every name you can think up. That'll keep you busy for ages.

    At your first meeting you should make up a rule book. And the first rule should be no grown-ups or little/big brothers or sisters! The best clubs are always secret!

    Now you have just about everything you need, except membership cards. These are very important and again you can speed a lot of time making them. {#blank#}5{#/blank#} . Why not leave some space for a photo of yourself? That will make the membership card really look like it.

    So there you are, get clubbing! Once you get started you'll think of loads of more interesting things to do!

A. That's easy.

B. Enjoy your own club!

C. Invite a designer to join you.

D .What are you interest in?

E. Some vacation is just around the corner.(即将来临)

F. Then you need to pick a name for your club.

G. Use a bright thick pen to make a special design.

    Google's new artificial intelligence can defeat both humans and other AIs. Fortunately, the only war zone where it fights and wins is the ancient board game Go（围棋）.

    AlphaGo Zero, developed by Google-owned DeepMind, is the latest AI program. The original AlphaGo defeated Go master Lee Sedol last year, and AlphaGo Master, an updated version, went on to win 60 games against top human players. What's different about AlphaGo Zero is that it became potentially the world's best Go player without any help from humans.

    The program AlphaGo Zero started off knowing only the basic rules and then played millions of games against itself in just a few days. After almost five million games played against itself, AlphaGo Zero could outplay humans and the original AlphaGo. After 40 days, it was capable of beating AlphaGo Master.

The program learned the strategies humans accumulated over thousands of years in a matter weeks and also developed nontraditional strategies and moves that beat the techniques of the human masters, leaving them astonished. "At each stage of the game, it seems to gain a bit here and lose a bit there, but somehow it ends up slightly ahead, as if by magic," said Andrew Jackson of the American Go Association

    DeepMind says it has plans for the technology behind AlphaGo Zero beyond just defeating all over an ancient game board. "In the end, we want to apply these breakthroughs to helping solve all sorts of pressing real world problems like designing new materials," said Demis Hassabis, co-founder and CEO of DeepMind, in a statement.

    That sounds great, but just as a precaution, let's take the advice of Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking and keep any super-fast learning AI away from the nuclear launch codes for now.

    A sea turtle named Herman, an octopus called Octavia, and a seal named Lidia all spent this summer at the Smithsonian's National Zoo in Washington, D.C. But unlike the zoo's other residents, they are not real animals. These creatures are actually huge sculptures and they're made entirely out of plastic trash from the ocean.

    These giant artworks, along with 14 others, are part of a traveling exhibit called “Washed Ashore: Art to Save the Sea”. The Washed Ashore project, led by artist Angela Haseltine Pozzi, works to raise awareness about the problem of plastic pollution in Earth's oceans.

    More than 315 billion pounds of plastic litter the world's oceans today. Most of the plastic is garbage from towns and cities, as well as trash that people leave on beaches, rainwater, winds, and high tides bring the trash into the ocean or into rivers that lead to the ocean. Once it is under the waves, the plastic begins to break up into smaller and smaller pieces. It often collects in spots called garbage patches, which spread over large areas of the ocean.

    Thousands of marine animals--including whales, sea turtles, and fish--die each year from eating or getting stuck in plastic bags and other items. Plastic pieces can also injure coral and kill sea grass.

    Washed Ashore and other organizations are working to stop that from happening. Since 2010, Washed Ashore volunteers have collected 38,000 pounds of plastic trash from more than 3000 miles of beaches. They helped Pozzi create more than 60 sculptures of marine creatures that were harmed by plastic pollution.

    The artworks on display at the National Zoo include a 20-foot-long coral reef, a 12-foot-long shark, and a 16-foot-long parrot fish. Each one is made from hundreds of pieces of trash like water bottles and sunglasses.

    “These sculptures are a powerful reminder of our personal role and global responsibility in preserving biodiversity(生物多样性) on land and in the sea,” says Dennis Kelly, director of the National Zoo.

    Steven Stein likes to follow garbage trucks. His strange habit makes sense when you consider that he's an environmental scientist who studies how to reduce litter, including things that fall off garbage trucks as they drive down the road. What is even more interesting is that one of Stein's jobs is defending an industry behind the plastic shopping bags.

    Americans use more than 100 billion thin film plastic bags every year. So many end up in tree branches or along highways that a growing number of cities do not allow them at checkouts(收银台) . The bags are prohibited in some 90 cities in California, including Los Angeles. Eyeing these headwinds, plastic-bag makers are hiring scientists like Stein to make the case that their products are not as bad for the planet as most people assume.

    Among the bag makers' argument: many cities with bans still allow shoppers to purchase paper bags, which are easily recycled but require more energy to produce and transport. And while plastic bags may be ugly to look at, they represent a small percentage of all garbage on the ground today

    The industry has also taken aim at the product that has appeared as its replacement: reusable shopping bags. The stronger a reusable bag is, the longer its life and the more plastic-bag use it cancels out. However, longer-lasting reusable bags often require more energy to make. One study found that a cotton bag must be used at least 131 times to be better for the planet than plastic.

    Environmentalists don't dispute(质疑) these points. They hope paper bags will be banned someday too and want shoppers to use the same reusable bags for years.

Bees (蜜蜂) touch our lives in ways we may not realize. They are responsible for as much as one third of the food that we eat, and even play a role in growing the cotton (棉花) used in much of our clothing. {#blank#}1{#/blank#} Here's how you can help:

1. Plant more flowers

Bees depend on garden flowers to ensure they have different kinds of diet. By planting flowers in your garden you can create a pleasant place for bees. {#blank#}2{#/blank#} Another idea is to add hanging baskets of flowers next to your front door.

2. Find a space for a beehive (蜂窝) in your garden

Many would-be beekeepers find it difficult to find a safe space for their bees. If you have some space, contact your local beekeeping organization. {#blank#}3{#/blank#} You will be surprised what a difference a beehive will make to your garden.

3. Give bees water

{#blank#}4{#/blank#} They use water to produce food for their bee families and control the temperature in their hives. Bees look for a clean source of water. Leave out containers filled with clean water in your outdoor spaces and refresh them often.

4. Be bee friendly

Bees are good neighbors, and only sting (蜇) when they feel threatened. Beekeepers wear protective clothing when they are dealing with bees. If a bee flies in front of you when unprotected, do not flap (拍打) your hands. {#blank#}5{#/blank#} The bee will soon lose interest.