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

    Nowadays people are facing lots of threats（威胁）all over the world.

   A serious threat to farmers in many parts of the world is erosion（侵蚀）.Erosion happens if a large area of land is cleared of trees and is then badly treated by the farmers.The rain and winds may gradually wash away,or blow away much of the topsoil.When this happens,crops of wheat and corn become weaker and weaker until nothing grows well.If erosion continues,it will turn good land into a desert.

    In the past,when erosion appeared,farmers sometimes moved to a new place to farm.Sometimes they could not move,but continued to try to grow food in the unhealthy soil.This caused them to sink into poverty.Soon some people realized that there was little rich,fertile soil in the world.The government began to try to stop erosion.

    One of the first experiments to stop erosion began in the United States in 1933.The experiment was carried out in the area of the Tennessee River.Flood and bad farming in this area had ruined the land that had once been rich.As a result,most of the people living around the Tennessee River were very poor.

The government built big dams across the river and stored the water for use during the dry season,when there was no rain.The government workers also helped the farmers fertilize their soil and to learn new farming methods which could stop erosion.

    In the beginning,the farmers were not interested.But soon,good healthy crops began to appear on the land where new methods were used.Ten years after that the crops were extremely good.The great success of this experiment led to similar projects in other parts of the world.

With the development of science and technology,people are trying to get rid of all the threats they are facing. However,it's not an easy job,because at the same time people are polluting their homeland.

    The vast majority of us spend our entire lives pulled down by gravity. Then there are astronauts.

This small population of space travelers has given researchers a rare look at what happens to the human body when it's able to spend large amounts of time outside the downward pull of the Earth. This week, a study on one of the largest groups of astronauts yet —34 participants—was published in The New England Journal of Medicine.

    In the new study, a team of international radiologists supported by NASA looked at MRIs of the brains of astronauts before and after their trips to space. The scientists found that upon returning to Earth, many of the astronauts' brains had become repositioned inside their skulls, floating higher than before. In addition, the space between certain brain areas appeared to have shrunk. The changes were more common in astronauts who took longer trips into space.

    The team characterized astronaut trips as short (an average of less than 14 days) or long (an average of about 165 days). Radiologists who didn't know each astronaut's duration（持续时间）in space compared MRIs from before and after their trips.

    Of the 34 total astronauts involved in the study, 18 took long trips to space—spending most of that time on the International Space Station —and of those, 17 returned to Earth with smaller areas between the frontal lobe（脑前额叶）and parietal lobe（顶叶）. The same area of the brain also shrank for three of the 16 astronauts who took shorter trips with the US Space Shuttle Program. The researchers also found that 12 of the ISS astronauts and six of the space-shuttle astronauts returned home with their brains sitting slightly higher in their skulls than before.

    It's not clear what, if anything, these brain changes mean for the health of space travelers. In general, it appears the human body tolerates space travel fairly well: the time astronauts have spent in zero-gravity environments so far doesn't seem to have had any strong or long-lasting effects.

    Photography is a very popular art form. Anyone with a camera – or a mobile phone – can practice it. A picture communicates in a way that words often can't. As the photographer Destin Sparks put it, "Photography is the story I fail to put into words." And there's no better opportunity to practice the art of photography than during our vacation time.

    Holiday photos have been a part of the culture of travelers for a long time. For decades, vacationers have made sure they've packed a camera along with bathing suits, Hawaiian shirts and sunglasses. A camera is an important holiday item. But over the last 10 years, photography has become much more popular. It's easy to capture (捕捉) still and moving pictures of places of interest, and it's also easy to show off these pictures on social media. Armed with their smart phones, tourists, this year more than ever, are capturing the beauty of our planet.

    Of course, travel companies have caught on to this. Trekksoft has an example of photo-tourism from the United States, a land with a vast choice of beautiful locations. Antelope Slot Canyon Tours in Arizona specializes in tours of the state's famous canyons（峡谷）, which gives photographers the opportunity to capture them on camera.

    Not that any great technology is needed for this: most of the tourists are able to make beautiful images with just their mobile phones. Still, help is on hand from the tour guide for those who aren't great at using their cameras. These tour guides have taken a course in photography in case the skills they've learned would help their customers.

    An Israeli law banning too skinny models went into effect with the start of 2013. The law, approved last March in Israel, requires models to prove they have maintained a Body Mass Index (BMI) of at least 18.5 for three months before a fashion show. That means a woman who is 68 inches tall can weigh no less than 119 pounds.

    "This law is another step in the war against eating disorders," said physician Adatto. "Underweight models," he explained, "can no longer serve as role models for innocent young people who copy their false image of being skinny."

    But some critics in this country say it is misguided, focusing on weight instead of health. They also say the Israeli ban is bound to fail because of the strong power of the fashion industry. "I think it's an approach that isn't going to work." said eating disorder expert Susan Ice, who worked with an organization which creates a healthy working environment for models.

    But Adatto told the reporter that he began to concern the issue after meeting an ambitious model who looked like she needed to be hospitalized. He said. "I realized that only legislation(立法) can change the situation. There was no time to waste; so many girls were dieting to death."

    However, the efforts to regulate models' weight in Spain and Italy have not resulted in significant changes in part because of difficulties in determining reliable methods of measuring weight and health.

    Still, folks including Ice say there's no denying that images from Hollywood and the fashion industry can be difficult for young women to deal with. "Certainly I don't believe the modeling industry has caused the rise in eating disorders, but it makes it harder," she says. "It's a difficult recovery environment, worshiping thinness as the beauty ideal."

    The World Bank is warning that the West Africa Ebola outbreak could seriously harm the economies (经济)of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone unless action is taken quickly. World Bank President Jim Yong Kim spoke to reporters recently to discuss the effects of the Ebola spread.

    "Our findings show that if the virus(病毒)continues to spread, the economic cost to these countries could grow eight times by 2015. This would be a big catastrophe to their already weak economies," said Kim.

    Mr. Kim says, "saving lives and preventing new spread" is most important. The bank has given $117-million for an "immediate help." The World Bank President says the SARS outbreak between 2002 and 2004 showed how a disease could damage economies. 800 people died from SARS and the economic losses were up to $40-billion.

    Mr. Kim says SARS and the H1N1 outbreak of 2009 taught that fear and avoidance resulted in about 90-percent of the economic losses. That means the disease is causing two levels of economic damage.

    "There are two kinds of contagion(传染). One is connected with the virus itself and the second is connected with the spread of fear about the virus," said Kim.

    The World Bank thinks the losses to the economies of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea will be big .Mr. Kim says losses could be about $97-million at the moment.

    Mr. Kim says fast action is necessary. He says getting the disease under control is still far away. That is because there are not enough health care workers in the affected areas. The World Bank President says the most important measure is to act quickly in order to limit economic losses.