Welcome to the pumpkin weigh-off at Half Moon Bay (半月湾), California. The event has always been very popular among most pumpkin growers. Thousands of people line up along the city's High Street and watch the proud pumpkin owners from across the country. Each pumpkin is carefully picked up by forklifts (叉式升降机) and placed on a digital weighing scale.
Organizers are offering $30,000 in total prize money for a new record pumpkin entering Half Moon Bay. But in order to receive the "New Record Prize"， the grower will have to bring a pumpkin heavier than the 2,624-pound one grown by Mathias Willemijns in 2017. If the heaviest pumpkin in the contest is unable to surpass (超过) the record, its owner will receive $6 for every pound it weighs.
When: Monday, October 9, 2018. Weighing will begin at 7 am and will end at 11 am Growers will start lining the street as daylight breaks by 7 am
Where: I. D. E. S. Grounds, 735 Main Street, Half Moon Bay, California.
Prize Money: New Record Pumpkin: $30,000 (in total)
1st Place：$6 per pound
2nd Place：$2,000
3rd Place：$1,500
4th Place：$1,000
5th～10th Place: $500 each
11th～20th Place: $100 each
Special Prizes：$500 for the most beautiful pumpkin, judged by the audience (color, shape and size).
The top five pumpkins will be on display for the thousands of visitors to Half Moon Bay's famous Art and Pumpkin Festival that will take place on October 14－15, 2018.
Nov. 21 is World Hello Day. It began back in the 1970s as part of an effort to make the world more peaceful. It was created by the United Nations just after the war between Israel and Egypt in 1973. The philosophy (理念) behind it is saying "Hello and stop war. "
It sounds like a fine idea, but most of us know that simply saying "Hello" won't bring about world peace. Still, on a smaller range, the simple act of saying hello to someone can make a lot of difference.
This might not be obvious. After all, it's such a casual thing and requires so little effort. You raise your head to someone as you pass by them in the school corridor (走廊), say "Hello"， then it's over.
Although we might not realize it, a small thing like a greeting can mean a lot to a person. Many people are lonely because they're shy. They find it difficult to communicate with people, even though they want to. It leads to them feeling cut off.
On this basis, maybe it's a good idea, not just on Nov. 21, but every day, to remember to say "Hello" to as many people as we can. The stranger who hears your greeting may secretly smile in their heart. You might even make their day.
Greeting other people is the easiest way to be polite. Politeness is the way we individual humans link up with the rest of the human world outside of our circles of family and friends. Politeness is one of the aspects of culture that make us a society rather than just many individuals living in the same space.
No one said it better than the French author Joseph Joubert, "Politeness is the flower of humanity. " A "Hello" to a stranger is a small thing, and often neglected (忽视), but through it we can make the world better for another person.
In 1926, US automaker Henry Ford shortened its employees' workweek from six eight-hour days to five, with no pay cuts. It's something workers and labor unions had been calling for. Ford wasn't responding to workers' demands; he was being a businessman. He expected increased productivity and knew workers with more time and money would buy and use the products they were making. It was a way of encouraging consumerism and productivity to increase profits, and it succeeded.
Since standardization of the 40-hour workweek in the mid-20th century, everything has changed but the hours. If anything, many people are working even longer hours, especially in North America. This has a severe influence on human health and well-being, as well as the environment. Until the Second World War, it was common for one person in a family, usually the oldest male, to work full-time. Now, women make up 42 percent of the world's full-time workforce. Technology has made a lot of work unnecessary, with computers and robots doing many tasks previously performed by humans.
Well into the 21st century, we continue to work the same long hours as 20th century laborers, using up even more of Earth's supply to produce more goods that we must keep working to buy, use and replace in a seemingly endless cycle of hard work and consumption. It's time to pause and consider better ways to live like shifting from fossil-fueled lifestyles with which our consumer-based workweeks are connected.
The UK think tank, New Economics Foundation, argues that a standard 21-hour workweek would address a number of interconnected(互相联系的) problems: "overwork, unemployment, over-consumption, high carbon emissions, low well-being, and the lack of time to live sustainably, to care for each other, and simply to enjoy life".
Economic systems that require constant growth on a finite (有限的) planet don't make sense. It's time for a change in our economic thinking.
One day, I went to my favourite café for lunch. I 1 a hamburger and went to the outdoor seats. While waiting for my meal, a homeless man on a bicycle stopped to ask if there was a grocery store nearby. After I gave him 2, seeing me wearing a SCU T-shirt, he asked if I had graduated from Santa Clara University. I told him, yes. Little did I know that this 3 response would lead to a 90-minute conversation. The man, Michael, told me he was very intelligent. However, drug use had ruined both his formal education and his pursuit of 4 in his work. He switched from one topic to another, 5 the fact that I was ready for my lunch.
He clearly had more of a 6 to talk than I did. I made every 7 to give him my full attention, never expecting our talk would go on and on. Eventually, I did eat my meal, bite by bite between 8 in our conversation. Michael was a bit strange. 9 his interests and viewpoints, we had little in 10, but he was fascinated with talking with, as he 11 it, "intelligent people. " I have to admit, I wish our conversation had been limited to ten or fifteen minutes, but when Michael finally 12 off, he thanked me for listening so 13 to him as well as for my 14 to talk with him for so long. It was then that I 15 that, just maybe, that was my purpose in life for today… to be there, in that place, at that time, to participate in that conversation.
Lantern Festival falls the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. This is the first full moon of the new year, representing unity and perfection. This festival also marks the (officially) end of the long holiday.
There are many legends (传说) related to the origins of Lantern Festival. According to one legend, once in ancient times, a celestial (天堂的)swan came into the human world where it (shoot)down by a hunter. The Jade Emperor, the (high)god in Heaven, was angry about this. He planned an attack on Earth on the (fifteen) day of the first lunar month, with orders to destroy all people and animals. But the other celestial (begin) to disagree with him and risked his life (warn) the people on Earth. As result, before and after the fifteenth day of the first month, every family hung red lanterns outside their doors and set off firecrackers and fireworks(烟花爆竹), giving the impression their homes were already burning. By successfully tricking the Jade Emperor in this way, human beings were saved from(destruct).
