Sunday is more like Monday than it used to be. Places of business that used to keep daytime“business hours” are now open late into the night. And on the Internet, the hour of the day and the day of the week have become irrelevant（不相关的）. A half century ago in the United States, most people experienced strong and precise dividing lines between days of rest and days of work, school time and summer time. Today the boundaries still exist, but they seem not clear.

    The law in almost all states used to require stores to close on Sunday; in most, it no longer does. It used to keep the schools open in all seasons except summer; in most, it still does. And whether the work week should strengthen its legal limits, or whether it should become more “flexible,” is often debated. How should we, as a society, organize our time? Should we go even further in relaxing the boundaries of time until we live in a world in which every minute is much like every other?

    These are not easy questions even to ask. Part of the difficulty is that we rarely recognize the “law of time” even when we meet it face to face. We know as children that we have to attend school a certain number of hours, a certain number of days, a certain number of years — but unless we meet the truant officer (学监), we may well think that we should go to school due to social custom and parents' demand rather than to the law. As adults we are familiar with “extra pay for overtime working,” but less familiar with the fact that what constitutes（构成）“overtime” is a matter of legal definition. When we turn the clock forward to start daylight-saving time, have we ever thought to ourselves: “Here is the law in action”? As we shall see, there is a lot of law that has great influence on how we organize and use time: compulsory education law, overtime law, and daylight-saving law — as well as law about Sunday closing, holidays, being late to work, time zones, and so on. Once we begin to look for it, we will have no trouble finding a law of time to examine and assess.

    Food festivals around the world

    It's the holiday season, the time when we connect with family and friends. Social media sites like Twitter and Facebook are full of festive pictures, featuring parents' catching and sharing those special family moments, their child's wish list, and maybe even a cute video of their child dancing to “Jingle Bell Rock” while wearing a diaper (尿片) and Santa hat. Swelling with pride, parents can't wait to get approval with a “thumbs up” or better yet a personalized message on their treasured post.

    Adults should be able to post what they want online. However, when exposing family moments online, are they sharing too much information? Do parents have the right to share those cute now, but embarrassing later moments about kids? Have children willingly given their agreement to sharing their cute but funny video online?

    A recent study found that 75% of parents turn to social media for parenting-related information and social support. There is even a term used to describe the overuse of sharing too much information about kids on social media: “sharenting”. Research also finds that “sharenting” isn't going anywhere anytime soon. What's troublesome is that a typical parent has about 150 Facebook friends and only a third of them are actual friends. So that brings up good questions – Who are we really sharing our information with and why? Who knows when and where that photo could resurface in the future?

    While there's no reliable information on how young children feel about things posted online, we do have information about how teens feel. According to a report by the Family Online Safety Institute, 76% of teens are concerned about their privacy. Many teens constantly search for new apps that allow anonymity. When names are required, they use screen names that don't reveal real information. If our teens are doing a better job of protecting themselves online, shouldn't parents take the lead and do the same? Plus, with more and more college admission representatives and potential employers surfing the internet for potential candidates, we'd hate for one of our posts to change an important decision. Think about it … online reputations are now becoming inseparable with real life ones.

    Of course, we can secure our privacy settings, only allowing our friends to view pictures, posts and videos, but that doesn't stop others from uploading our pictures. Adults need to be cautious of sharing information online, especially information about children.

    So, this holiday season, enjoy family time and share those special memories with family and friends. Before clicking the app to upload photos or videos, stop and think twice.

    Do you know of anyone who uses the truth to deceive(欺骗)?When someone tells you something that is true, but leaves out important information that should be included, he can give you a false(假的) picture.

    For example, someone might say, ''I just won a hundred dollars on the lottery(彩票). It was great. I took that dollar ticket back to the store and turned it in for one hundred dollars!"

    This guy's a winner, right? Maybe, maybe not. We then discover that he bought $200 worth of tickets, and only one was a winner. He's really a big loser!

    He didn't say anything that was false, but he left out important information on purpose. That's called a half-truth. Half truths are not technically lies, but they are just as dishonest.

    Some politicians often use this trick. Let's say that during Governor Smith's last term, her state lost one million jobs and gained three million jobs. Then she seeks another term. One of her opponents says, “During Governor Smith's term， the state lost one million jobs!” That's true. However, an honest statement would have been, “During Governor Smith's term, the state had a net gain of two million jobs.”

    Advertisers will sometimes use half-truths. It's against the law to make false statements so they try to mislead you with the truth. An advertisement might say, “Nine out of ten doctors advised their patients to take Yucky Pills to cure toothache.”' It fails to mention that they only asked ten doctors and nine of them work for the Yucky Company.

    This kind of deception happens too often. It's a sad fact of life: Lies are lies, and sometimes the truth can lie as well.

    It is a psychological strategy that all parents will be familiar with: instead of scolding an misbehaving child, focus instead in rewarding them for good behaviour.

    Now the idea is well received outside the nursery, with implications for everything from recycling clothes to policing.

    Consumers end up with piles of unwanted clothes. Every year in the UK, 300,000 tonnes ends up in landfill — 235 million individual items.

    Now however, apps such as ReGain, Regive and Stuffstr are making it simpler — and more worthwhile — for people to return their unwanted clobber.

    The ReGain app can be used to find one of 20,000 drop-off points. In return, the diligent consumer earns rewards such as discount coupons for high street retailers. Stuffstr works in partnership with John Lewis to help people get cash in return for unwanted items from the chain.

    “Possibly the one prediction that we economists get right is that if you incentivise (激励) a behaviour, you will get more of it,” says Dr Matthew Levy, a lecturer in economics at the London School of Economics.

    He cites research, including his own, showing that financial incentives encouraging regular exercise, stopping smoking and losing weight effectively promote healthy behaviours and that there is no backlash when the incentives are removed.“If anything, the incentives can be used to jump-start a healthy habit that keeps going,”he says.

    In the four months after its launch, the ReGain scheme received almost 17,000 parcels containing 47 tonnes of used clothes and shoes, of which 95% could potentially be reused, according to its founder Jack Ostrowski.

    “We need to find a way to influence behaviour, and discount coupons help,” he says. The platform is also working with brands and retailers to find ways to divert used clothes from landfills and into the production of new clothes, he adds.

    Other reward schemes have had success in encouraging behavioural change.

    When police in Canada issued “positive tickets”— coupons for free food or movie tickets — to reward good behaviour among young people, they reported an almost 50% drop in youth-related service calls.

    “My officers would say' In the old days we'd drive up in the police car and the kids would run away from us, now they run to us'.”

    In a similar venture, Hull city council have announced plans to launch a digital reward token — the HullCoin — that can be earned by volunteering and spent at local retailers.

    Elsewhere, a study on the recruitment of health workers in Zambia found that highlighting economic incentives during the recruitment process caused future employees to be more motivated and task-focused.

    “Obviously different groups are motivated by different factors,” says Ostrowski. “For some, the feel good factor is enough, and for others, that reward stimulus is required.”

    There are two types of people in the world. Although they have equal degree of health and wealth and other comforts of life, one becomes happy and the other becomes unhappy. This arises from the different ways in which they consider things, persons, events and the resulting effects upon their minds.

    People who are to be happy fix their attention on the convenience of things: the pleasant parts of conversation, the well prepared dishes, the goodness of the wine and the fine weather. They enjoy all the cheerful things. Those who are to be unhappy think and speak only of the opposite things. Therefore, they are continually dissatisfied. By their remarks, they sour the pleasure of society, offend (hurt) many people, and make themselves disagreeable everywhere. If this turn of mind was founded in nature, such unhappy persons would be the more to be pitied. The intention of criticizing (批评) and being disliked is perhaps taken up by imitation (模仿). It grows into a habit, unknown to its possessors. The habit may be strong, but it may be cured when those who have it realize its bad effects on their interests and tastes. I hope this little warning may be of service to them, and help them change this habit.

    Although in fact it is chiefly an act of the imagination, it has serious results in life since it brings on deep sorrow and bad luck. Those people offend many others; nobody loves them, and no one treats them with more than the most common politeness and respect. This frequently puts them in bad temper and draws them into arguments. If they aim at getting some advantages in social position or fortune, nobody wishes them success. Nor will anyone start a step or speak a word to favor their hopes. If they bring on themselves public objections, no one will defend or excuse them, and many will join to criticize their wrongdoings. These should change this bad habit and be pleased with what is pleasing, without worrying needlessly about themselves and others. If they do not, it will be good for others to avoid any contact (接触) with them. Otherwise, it can be disagreeable and sometimes very inconvenient, especially when one becomes mixed up in their quarrels.