When summer arrives, it's not uncommon to get a strong desire for sand and water. But those who can only make day-long trips may find it hard to achieve. Don't worry! Plenty of opportunities for kicking back in the sand exist here in Ohio, although it's far away from the oceans.

East Harbor State Park Beach

1169 N. Buck Rd., Lakeside-Marblehead

     Those looking for a bit of extra space between their blankets and their neighbors' will like this beach. At 1,500 feet long, the sandy strip has a significant amount of real estate(房产）for sunning or relaxing in the shade. Amenities(设施）include a bathhouse, vending machines, grills and picnic tables.

Nickel Plate Beach

Corner of Tiffin Avenue and Nickel Plate Drive, Huron

     Anyone who spends a day at the beach knows that swimming and doing sports on the beach give you a good appetite. Luckily, Nickel Plate Beach offers a variety of dining options nearby, including beachside pizza delivery. Amenities include a sheltered picnic area, charcoal grills, playground equipment and beach volleyball courts.

Main Street Beach

Main Street, Vermilion

     No beach umbrella or chairs? No problem. This beach offers hourly rents of chairs, umbrellas, tables, shade tents and wheelchairs. And with downtown Vermilion only a block away，shops and restaurants are nicely within reach. Amenities include an observation deck and some benches. No lifeguards are on duty.

Kelleys Island State Park Beach

920 Division St. Kelleys Island

     With its gradual water depth, this beach is perfect for young children. The park's campground also includes a playground and a store with snacks and ice cream. Other amenities include a picnic shelter and hiking trails.

    During the holiday season, many of us feel pressure to find our loved ones the “perfect” gift. Why? Because gift-giving has long been considered a prime way to express love. However, recent research suggests that small acts of kindness, like a kind word, hugging a child or receiving sympathy, make people feel most loved and supported.

    In the study, 495 men and women between the ages of 18 and 93 completed a questionnaire evaluating 60 possible ways that people can feel love. The storyboards included situations like spending time with friends, receiving gifts, and spending time in nature. The survey also included negative interactions, like being controlled and criticized (批评) by others.

    The findings highlight the psychological benefits that close relationships can offer. In fact, study participants ranked human interaction as a more significant expression of love than receiving material items, like presents. Connecting with others was also rated more highly than getting positive feedback on the Internet, indicating that people get the most support from personal human contact.

    “ During the holidays，anxiety rises, making it harder to remain present with ourselves and others. However, the power of spending time with another person is a gift we can give at any moment,” says Dr. Carla Naumburg, a mindfulness coach and social worker in Newton, Mass. He suggests balancing party planning and online shopping with moments of human connection. Activities like reading to a child, meeting a friend for a walk, or taking a moment to call a family member, are ways to express love and care and can keep us emotionally grounded.

    While the idea of offering loved ones the gift of our time may pale in comparison to giving them a generous present, recent research shows shared human experiences can tighten social bonds. Despite personality differences，most people agree on what makes us feel loved—the presence of our loved ones.

Life is difficult.

    What do you think about life? Maybe most people say that life is difficult. But life is no longer difficult once we truly understand and accept it. Most people do not fully see this truth. Instead, they complain about their problems and difficulties as if life should be easy. It seems to them that their difficulties represent a special kind of suffering especially forced upon them or their families, their class, or even their nation.

    What makes life difficult is that the process of facing and solving problems is a painful one. Problems, depending on their nature, cause us sadness or loneliness or regret or anger or fear. These are uncomfortable feelings, often as painful as any kind of physical pain. And since life causes an endless series of problems, life is always difficult and is full of pain as well as joy.

    Yet, it is in this whole process of solving problems that life has its meaning.

    Problems are the serious test that tells success from failure. When we desire to encourage the growth of the human spirit, we encourage the human ability to solve problems, just as in school we set problems for our children to solve. It is through the pain of meeting and working out problems that we learn. As Benjamin Franklin said, “Those things that hurt instruct.” It is for this reason that wise people learn not to fear but to welcome the pain of problems.

    According to a recent survey on money and relationships, 36% of people are keeping a bank account from their partner. While this financial unfaithfulness may appear as distrust in a relationship, in truth it may just be a form of financial protection.

    With almost half of all marriages ending in divorce, men and women are realizing they need to be financially savvy, regardless of whether they are in a relationship.

    The financial hardship on individuals after a divorce can be extremely difficult, even more so when children are involved. The lack of permanency in relationships, jobs and family life may be the cause of a growing trend to keep a secret bank account hidden from a partner, in other words, an "escape fund".

    Margaret's story is far from unique. She is a representative of a growing number of women in long-term relationships who are becoming protective of their own earnings. Every month on pay day, she banks hundreds of dollars into a savings account she keeps from her husband. She has been doing this throughout their six-year marriage and has built a nest egg worth an incredible $100,000. Margaret says if her husband found about her secret savings he'd be hurt and would take this as a sign that she wasn't sure of the marriage. "He'd think it was my escape fund so that financially I could afford to get out of the relationship if it went wrong. I know you should approach marriage as being forever and I hope ours is, but you can never be sure."

    Like many of her fellow secret savers, Margaret was hurt in a former relationship and has since been very guarded about her own money.

    Coming clean to your partner about being a secret saver may not be all that bad. Take Colleen for example, who had been saving secretly for a few years before she confessed (坦白) to her partner. "I decided to open a savings account and start building a nest egg of my own. I wanted to prove to myself that I could put money in the bank and leave it there for a rainy day."

    Did you know that if you attach a weighed stick to the back of a chicken, it walks like a dinosaur?

    No, you did not know(or care to know) such things, but now you do! Thanks to this year's winners of the 12 Noel Prize! Now in is 251h year, the lg Nobel is the goofy younger cousin of the honored Nobel Prize. It applauds achievements in the fields of medicine, biology, physics, economies.literature.etc. Every September at Harvard University, awards are presented in 10 categories that change year to year, depending on - according to the organization - what makes the judges "laugh, then think".

    The ceremony officially begins when audience members launch paper airplanes at an assigned human target on the stage, then speakers only have 60 seconds to present their research. In previous year, the one-minute rule was imposed by a young girl - nicknamed Miss Sweetie Poo -who would go up to the platform and repeat the words: "Please stop, I'm bored." in a sharp tone until the speaker left the stage.

    Fortunately for candidates though, the Ig Informal Lectures are held afterwards on Saturday to give presenters more time to explain the crazy things they're working on.

    The research can seem more like the brainchildren of teenage boys than of respectable adults. Justin Schmidt won the physiology Ig for creating the "Sting(蛰) Pain Index," which rates the pain people fell after getting stung by insects. Smith pressed bees against 25 different parts of his body until they stung him. Five stings a day for 38 days, Smith concluded that the most painful sting locations were the nose and the upper lip. Ouch.

    As silly as they sound, not all of the Ig awards lack scientific applicability, A group of scientists from 12 different counties won in the medicine category for accurately diagnosing patients with appendicitis (阑尾炎) based on an unusual measurement: speed bumps(减速带) . They found that patients are more likely to have appendicitis if they report pain during bumpy car rides.

    All these weird experiments have just one thing in common. They're improbable. It can be tempting to assume that "improbable" implies more than that--implies bad or good, worthless or valuable, trivial or important. Something improbable can be any of those, or none of them, or all of them, in different ways. And what you don't expect can be a powerful force for not only entertaining science, but also for the boundary-pushing science we call innovation.