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study that emotional tears–those formed in distress or grief–contained more toxic byproducts than tears of irritation (think onion peeling). Are tears toxic then? No! They actually remove toxins from our body that build up courtesy of stress. They are like a natural therapy or massage session, but they cost a lot less!

4. Crying can elevate mood. Do you know what your manganese level is? No, neither do I. But chances are that you will feel better if it’s lower because overexposure to manganese can cause bad stuff: anxiety, nervousness, irritability, fatigue, aggression, emotional disturbance and the rest of the feelings that live inside my happy head rent-free. The act of crying can lower a person’s manganese level. And just like with the toxins I mentioned in my last point, emotional tears contain 24 percent higher albumin protein concentration–responsible for transporting many small molecules (which has to be a good thing, right?)–than irritation tears.

5. Crying lowers stress. Tears really are like perspiration in that exercising and crying both relieve stress. For real. In his article, Bergman explains that tears remove some of the chemicals built up in the body from stress, like the endorphin leucine-enkaphalin and prolactin, the hormone I overproduce because of my pituitary tumor that affects my mood and stress tolerance. The opposite is true too. Bergman writes, “Suppressing tears increases stress levels, and contributes to diseases aggravated by stress, such as high blood pressure, heart problems, and peptic ulcers.

6. Tears build community. In her “Science Digest” article, writer Ashley Montagu argued that crying not only contributes to good health, but it also builds community. I know what you’re thinking: “Well, yeah, but not the right kind of community. I mean, I might ask the woman bawling her eyes out behind me in church what’s wrong or if I can help her, but I’m certainly not going to invite her to dinner.” I beg to differ. As a prolific crier, especially on video, I always come away astounded by the comments … the resounding support of people I know all that well, and the level of intimacy exchanged among them. Read for yourselves some of the comments on both my self-esteem video and my recent death and dying video and you’ll appreciate my point. Tears help communication and foster community.

7. Tears release feelings. Even if you haven’t just been through something traumatic or are severely depressed, the average Jo goes through his day accumulating conflicts and resentments. Sometimes they gather inside the limbic system of the brain and in certain corners of the heart. Crying is cathartic. It lets the devils out. Before they wreak all kind of havoc with the nervous and cardiovascular systems. Writes John Bradshaw in his bestseller “Home Coming”: “All these feelings need to be felt. We need to stomp and storm; to sob and cry; to perspire and tremble.” Amen, Brother Bradford!

Why are there 24 hours in a day? No one really knows. However, the tradition goes back a long way. Take, for example, this quote from Encyclopedia Britannica:

Why are there 60 minutes in an hour and 60 seconds in a minute? Again, it is unclear. It is known, however, that Egyptians once used a calendar that had 12 30-day months, giving them 360 days. This is believed to be the reason why we now divide circles into 360 degrees. Dividing 360 by 6 gives you 60, and 60 is also a base number in the Babylonian math system.

What do a.m. and p.m. mean? These abbreviations stand for ante meridiem, before midday, and post meridiem, after midday, and they are a Roman invention. According to Daniel Boorstin in his book The Discoverers, this simple division of the day into two parts was the Romans' first increment of time within a day:

They found that the dinosaur group directly related to birds shrank rapidly from about 200 million years ago.

Theropods shrunk 12 times from 163kg (25st 9lb) to 0.8kg (1.8lb), before becoming modern birds.

The researchers found theropods were the only dinosaurs to get continuously smaller.

From this analysis they produced a detailed family tree mapping out the transformation of theropods to their bird descendants.

It traces evolving adaptations and changing body size over time and across dinosaur branches.

The researchers concluded that the evolution of the branch of dinosaurs leading to birds was more innovative than other dinosaur lineages.

this sustained shrinking and accelerated evolution of smaller and smaller body size allowed the ancestors of birds to develop traits which helped them to cope much better than their less evolved dinosaur relatives.

The researchers believe that miniaturisation and the development of bird-like traits had a joint influence on the evolution of the dinosaurs into today's birds. Professor Michael Benton, from the University of Bristol's school of earth sciences, said: "This study means we can't see the origin of birds as a sudden or dramatic event, with a dinosaur becoming a powered flyer overnight. "The functions of each special feature of birds changed over time - feathers first for insulation, and later co-opted for flight; early reductions in body size perhaps for other reasons, and later they were small enough for powered flight; improvements in sense of sight and enlargement of brain - even a small improvement in these is advantageous. "So perhaps it's a long-term trend associated with deputation to a new set of habitats, in the trees, to avoid predation, and to exploit new food resources."

"Birds evolved through a unique phase of sustained miniaturisation in dinosaurs," Mr Lee said.

What is known for certain is that Leif and the boy eventually found each other and the young man was recognized as his son.

Nevertheless, Leif left the island and got to Norway by the fall. King Olaf welcomed him to his court and asked if Leif had plans for a voyage to Greenland. The king had recently been converted to Christianity and wanted Leif to proclaim Christianity to the Norse settlers living in Greenland, including his parents. He returned to Greenland, and as the king wished, spread the message of Christianity. Leif’s mother, Thjodhild, quickly adopted the new religion, but his father, Eric, was reluctant to give up his pagan beliefs. Only when Thjodhild refused to live with

him as man and wife, did Eric the Red finally convert to Christianity.

Leif Eiriksson’s exploration and discovery of America was inspired by the accidental voyage of Bjarni Herjulfson.

As a skilled sailor and trader, Herjulfson had devoted himself to going on trading voyages from Iceland every other year

In 1002 BCE, Leif Eiriksson decided to explore the unknown lands discovered by Herjulfson while on the quest for his father.

Leif bought a ship from Bjarni and gathered a crew of thirty-five men.

Eric, his father, was approached about being the expedition leader. A fall from a horse prior to embarking convinced Eric that he would be unlucky on the voyage and that he was too old to set off on another adventure. Leif himself took command and the ship and crew departed.

The first country Leif encountered was the last one Herjulfson had seen. It was barren, with glacier-topped mountains and vast stretches of rock-covered ground

Initiating the practice of naming the lands he found after their geological and physical traits, he called this area Helluland, or “land of flat rocks.” (Labrador)

The second country Leif sailed to was level and wooded, with deep white beaches and a sloping shoreline. He called this place Markland (Newfoundland) or “forest land.” Leaving there, he sailed northeast. He found an island north of the mainland. He and his crew sailed the channel between the island and mainland and steered west. When they found land they went ashore, discovering a small river that flowed to the sea. They returned, took the ship up the river to a lake where they decided to build houses, and stayed through the winter.

The area had salmon in the river and lake; the winter was mild and almost frost-free, and the grass did not wither during the cold season.

The hours of daylight and nighttime were more equally divided than in either Iceland or Greenland

Leif divided his crew in half, determined to explore the area. Half would stay in camp while the other half went as a group to investigate the surroundings. The exploration crew was to go no further than the distance they could travel in order to return to camp by nightfall.

to explore the area. Half would stay in camp while the other half went as a group to investigate the surroundings. The exploration crew was to go no further than the distance they could travel in order to return to camp by nightfall.

The subdivision of hours and minutes into 60 comes from the ancient Babylonians who had a predilection for using numbers to the base 60. For example, III II (using slightly different strokes) meant three times 60 plus two or 182.

"We have retained from the Babylonians not only hours and minutes divided into 60, but also their division of a circle into 360 parts or degrees," says Lomb.

While each country has (in broad terms) historically had distinct measurements for distance, weights etc the method of splitting the day into 24 hours, one hour into 60 mins and one minute into 60 seconds seems to be the only one in use, and indeed to me the only one I know of. This non-metric measurement of time is far from ideal, but what other comparably accurate methods have been used historically?

A habitats is a place where living things live and how they survive in that area.

A habitats is a place where living things live and how they survive in that area.

A habitats is a place where living things live and how they survive in that area.

Plants, animals, and even humans choose habitats for many different reasons, depending on their needs.

People constantly regenerate new taste buds every 3-10 days to replace the ones worn out by scalding soup, frozen yogurt, and the like. Unfortunately, aspeople grow older, their taste buds lose their fine tuning because they are replaced at a slower rate.

(The number of taste buds varies in different animal species. For example, cows have 25,000 taste buds, rabbits 17,000, and adult people approximately 10,000.)

Each rain droplet reflects all colors at a given point and time, but only one color comes back to your eye, requiring million of rain droplets to create a rainbow.  As the rain droplets fall through the sky, the colors of the spectrum being reflected and refracted are constantly changing.

The perfect time and place to look for a rainbow you need bright sunlight to your back and rain clouds off in the distance in the direction of your shadow. If it is later than 4:30 in the afternoon or earlier than 8:30 in the morning at these condition there is a very good chance you will be able to see a rainbow in the sky.  Other places you may see rainbows formed are fountains, in the ocean as the waves crash against the rock which create a mist in the air, waterfalls, sprinklers and mist from a garden hose. Always remember to have the sun at your back to see a rainbow, happy rainbow hunting!!!!!!

Rainbows form a complete circle, however only half is visible.  The horizon only  Picture from the web site of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, Arizona State University                                                             allows us to see half of the rainbow circle, so we see just an arc.  What causes the rainbow to have a circular formation is the way that rain droplets fall.  The rain droplets do not fall is flat sheet, however they tend to fall at various distances and speeds.  On some occasions you can see a full circle around a garden hose.

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SoaringSoaring flight is a special kind of glide in which the bird flies in a rising air current (called a thermal). Because the air is rising, the bird can maintain its height relative to the ground. The albatross uses this type of soaring to support its multi-year voyages at sea.

Main group or Galilean moons: Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. They are some of the largest objects in the Solar System outside the Sun and the eight planets in terms of mass and larger than any known dwarf planet, and Ganymede exceeds the planet Mercury in diameter.