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The Rich Are Often “Insecure and Troubled” “Millionaires feel insecure and troubled,” states the Beijing newspaper China Daily. A survey was conducted among individuals from East China and South China who had an average wealth of 2.2 billion yuan ($275 million). The researchers, who studied rich people’s “attitudes toward faith, marriage, life, career and money,” found that “a majority of the millionaires love and hate money at the same time.” A number of respondents said that besides social status and a sense of accomplishment, “annoyance is the main thing money has brought them.”

The Distracted Worker “Office life can sometimes seem like a constant stream of calls, alerts and interruptions,” says New Scientist magazine. Researchers found that a sample group of information workers averaged only three minutes of activity before being diverted. Since interruptions can eat up two hours of each working day, some busy office workers use computer analysis to distinguish the urgent from the nonurgent. Suggestions that can be used by all include: “Be honest with people, . . . tell them you really don’t have a minute if you don’t,” and have the courage “to turn off your email, phone and instant messenger until the job is done.”

Headaches for 64 Years A Chinese woman finally discovered the cause of the “relentless headaches” that had plagued her for more than 60 years, when doctors removed a three-centimeter-long bullet from her head. During the Japanese invasion of a village in Xinyi County in September 1943, the woman, who was then 13, sustained a head injury. No one imagined the cause of her problem. When the headaches became more frequent, an X-ray revealed the bullet, says the Xinhua News Agency. The woman, now 77, is reported to be “in good condition.”

Mail for God Every year, the Israeli postal authority “delivers hundreds of letters addressed to God,” reports The Economist. “Letters come from every corner of the world, at all times of the year, but God’s pen pals are most zealous before religious holidays such as Christmas or Yom Kippur.” The letters voice praise, complaints, or requests—often for forgiveness or help. What happens to the letters? “Letters with a sender’s address are sent back,” states The Economist. “The rest are delivered to the Western (“Wailing”) Wall in Jerusalem, care of the chief rabbi, to be inserted into the holy wall’s cracks. If a writer appears not to be Jewish, his missive is forwarded to the ministry of religious affairs.” However, “mail to God is delivered only once or twice a year,” says the article. Israel’s telecom firm now “has a dedicated fax line to God and has just opened an e-mail account for those wishing to speed up heavenly connections.”

Pet Funerals—To Tax or Not to Tax? Claiming that the income it receives from pet funerals, cremation, and ash storage should be tax exempt, a Buddhist temple in Japan recently filed suit against tax authorities, explains Japan’s newspaper IHT Asahi Shimbun. The tax office argued that cremation and religious services for pets constitute “contractual business” and that the storage of ashes puts the temple in the “warehousing business.” The temple, on the other hand, claims that “a memorial service is a religious act, which aims to heal the sorrows of bereaved pet owners and to console the soul of animals,” without a view to profits.

Women or Men—Who Work Longer? Except in North America and Australia, women everywhere work longer hours on the job than men, reports Populi, the magazine of UNFPA (United Nations Population Fund). The greatest gap exists in Africa and the Asia-Pacific region, where women in the labor force, on the average, work some 12 hours per week more than men. “In many developing countries,” notes the magazine, “women are now working 60-90 hours a week just to try to maintain their meagre living standards of a decade ago.” Meanwhile, in the industrialized world, men’s share in household work is increasing. “But,” explains Populi, this increase “is not due to a more equal division of routine cooking, cleaning, and laundry. Rather, men are taking longer to do such tasks as shopping.”

Climbing Stairs Improves Health “Taking the stairs regularly is a simple and practical means to improving health,” reports the British medical journal The Lancet. Researchers asked 69 sedentary employees to use only the stairs at their place of work instead of the elevators. After 12 weeks, the workers’ aerobic capacity had increased by 8.6 percent, which gave them “a 15% reduction in all-cause mortality risk.” The workers also saw significant improvement in their “blood pressure, cholesterol, weight, fat mass, and waist circumference.”

Do You Fidget? About 15 percent of the general population have nervous mannerisms, says Canada’s Globe and Mail newspaper. Researchers note that some fidget by “hair-twirling, foot-tapping, leg-jiggling, fingernail-picking and the like.” Why do people fidget? Peggy Richter, a psychiatrist at Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, believes that such ritualistic movements provide a feeling of comfort. On the other hand, clinical psychologist Paul Kelly says that fidgeting is due to tension and is an automatic, unconscious response that kicks in and takes you outside of a stressful situation. According to experts, “you can learn to interrupt and eventually stop the habit by replacement therapy—that is, concentrate on another object when you notice yourself fidgeting,” says the Globe.

“Celebrity Worship” “New psychological research suggests that worship of celebrities by the public has begun to take the place of religion in many people’s lives,” says psychiatrist Dr. Raj Persaud. Writing in The Sunday Times of London, Persaud states that the weaker a person’s religious convictions, the more likely he is to “worship” celebrities. This form of worship is demonstrated by those who are willing to pay high prices to collect items owned or touched by celebrities. Additionally, Persaud says, “celebrity worshipers” will pattern their values and life-style on those of their favorite idol, who is often perceived as incapable of wrongdoing and as “operating under a different set of rules which cannot be understood by ordinary mortals and for which allowances must be made.” The impact that celebrities have on others is also evident in the results of product endorsements and in the mimicking of crucial health-care decisions, notes Dr. Persaud. He adds: “This suggests that our worship of celebrities does indeed turn them into the most powerful people on the planet—the equivalent of gods in our midst.”

Sleep—How Much Is Enough? “Adults who get 7 hours of sleep on weeknights are less likely to die over a 10-year period than those who spend more time in bed,” reports USA Today. Researchers in Japan followed over 104,000 adults for about ten years, considering their sleep patterns, general and mental health, and life-style. The scientists found that “less sleep, even as little as four hours a night, didn’t significantly increase deaths for men and only lowered survival for women if they averaged less than four hours.” These findings are backed by two other major published studies and numerous smaller studies. However, sleep specialists also found that “those sleeping four to 5 1/2 hours did poorly on tests that measure memory, clear thinking and the ability to pay attention.” Psychiatrist and sleep researcher Daniel Kripke says: “People should get as many hours [of] sleep as they need to feel rested.”

The Roar of a Tiger Why does the roar of a tiger seem to paralyze not only other animals but also some humans? Scientists from the Fauna Communications Research Institute in North Carolina, U.S.A., “have established that the tiger emits low-pitched ‘infrasound,’ a growl so deep that it is inaudible to humans,” reports The Sunday Telegraph of London. Humans can only hear sound frequencies above 20 hertz (Hz), but the tiger “mixes infrasound growls at 18 Hz and below with the roar that we can hear, and the result, according to Elizabeth von Muggenthaler, the president of the institute, is that humans can actually feel the tiger roar, a sensation that causes momentary paralysis,” explains the newspaper. Even longtime tiger trainers have experienced this phenomenon.

The Olympics and Poverty “The number of medals won by some countries at the Olympics and the amount of money invested on facilities and corporate sponsorship at the games raise questions about the world’s commitment to ending poverty,” reports the ENI Bulletin, of Switzerland. “This is not to say we shouldn’t celebrate excellence or applaud extraordinary feats of human skill and endurance,” says Greg Foot, from the World Vision agency of Australia. “But,” he adds, “we do have to ask whether we are quite getting the balance right when we spend so much on perfecting the diet of our elite athletes when millions of our neighbours have barely enough food to be able to walk.” It is estimated that during the two weeks the Olympics were held in Atlanta, 490,000 children died of hunger and preventable diseases worldwide.

Tips for Air Travelers Long-distance air travel puts stress on mind and body, and The Times newspaper of London offers some suggestions for relief. These include “avoiding alcohol but taking plenty of soft drinks, eating only light meals and picturing yourself in a pleasant place.” Sitting still for long periods can cause swollen feet and can make clothing feel tighter. Thus, reports The Times, “doctors suggest loosening clothes, removing shoes and requesting an aisle seat so you can keep strolling to the lavatory.” Flexing and stretching your arms and legs during the journey helps to prevent circulation problems. To combat jet lag, “seasoned travellers sometimes adjust their daily routine in advance of their journeys. Those heading east get up earlier for a week and those heading west go to bed late.”

Keep Learning as You Age Learning new workplace technologies, such as computers and communication systems, can be stressful for some older workers, reports the Toronto Star newspaper. Job trends specialist Ann Eby says that the problem is more often a matter of how they are learning rather than what they are learning. “As we age,” explains Julia Kennedy, president of Axiom Training and Development, “our neural processes slow down, but the brain remains healthy.” Kennedy observes that unlike children, who are adept at learning by repetition without paying attention to meaning, “adults need to draw connections between what they already know (life experiences) and what they have just learned.” While it may take longer for senior workers to learn complex tasks, they still have the ability to learn. Kennedy offers the following suggestions for older workers attempting to learn new and difficult tasks: If possible, schedule your training periods in the morning, try to master concepts rather than every detail, and avoid comparing yourself with others.

World’s Oldest Person Dies Jeanne Louise Calment, the world’s oldest person according to the Guinness Book of World Records, died on August 4, 1997, at the age of 122, reports the French newspaper Le Figaro. Jeanne was born on February 21, 1875, in Arles, southeast France—before the invention of the light bulb, the phonograph, and the automobile. Married in 1896, she had one daughter whom she outlived by 63 years, and one grandson, who died in 1963. She recalled meeting the painter Vincent van Gogh in 1888, when she was a teenager, and she was a friend of the poet Frédéric Mistral, who won the Nobel prize in 1904. Jeanne made many quips about the secrets of longevity, mentioning such factors as laughter, activity, and “a stomach like an ostrich’s.”

Increasing numbers of people have been turning to cremation to reduce the cost of burial. According to the National Funeral Directors Association, the average cost of a traditional funeral in the United States was $4,600 in 1996. In contrast, “cremation costs between $500 and $2,000,” says the Chicago Sun-Times, “depending on the type of container chosen for the cremation itself and the urn that will hold the ashes.” Also, cremation does not require a cemetery plot and marker, which can add another 40 percent to the cost of a traditional burial. The paper said that in the United States in 1997, cremation was used in 23.6 percent of all deaths, and the figure is expected to reach 42 percent over the next ten years.

It’s a Dog’s Life “Australia spends more on pets than on foreign aid,” reports The Sydney Morning Herald newspaper. “Doggie lifejackets, diamond jewellery and breath fresheners for pets are among other items that have sent Australians’ spending on their pets soaring to $2.2 billion a year.” Jason Gram, a pet shop owner, noted the change in attitude toward pets in the last decade. “Dogs used to be in the backyard, covered in fleas and chewing on a bone,” he said. “Now they’re indoors, sitting on a fluffy bed and wearing a diamante collar.” He noted, though, that the shift has been good for business, as dogs are now treated as members of the family and lavished with expensive goods. While some pets are “cared for as if they had human needs, desires and aesthetic standards,” said the paper, there is “no evidence that dogs preferred a $50 toy to a $5 toy. But the indulgence appeared to satisfy the owners’ need to demonstrate love.”

“Power Napping” “Napping can improve mood, alertness and job performance,” reports The Wall Street Journal. The rejuvenating effects of a good snooze have prompted some industries to seek ways to incorporate naps into the regular workday. This is especially true where safety concerns are tied to the alertness of employees—such as truckers, airline pilots, and nuclear power plant operators. “We’ve found that you get tremendous recovery of alertness—several hours worth—out of a 15-minute nap,” says sleep researcher Claudio Stampi. Napping on the job has a long way to go, though, before it will be embraced by most employers. The Journal says that in order “to make sleeping on the job more palatable, proponents now refer to it as ‘power napping.’” Have a little nap guys!:)

Bible Proofreading Errors “Errors in Bible printing were fairly commonplace in the 17th and 18th centuries,” notes Bible Review magazine, “but that doesn’t mean they were taken lightly.” For example, what became known as the Fool Bible came out during the reign of Charles I. In Psalm 14, the printers mistakenly changed a word. As a result, the first verse read: “The fool hath said in his heart there is a God.” This brought a fine of 3,000 pounds. Another company, Barker and Lucas, was fined 300 pounds in 1631 for omitting a word in what was called the Adulterous Bible. This put them out of business. Their version read: “Thou shalt commit adultery.” Similar was the Sin On Bible, of 1716. Where Jesus told the man he healed to “sin no more,” it has him saying “sin on more.” Not to be overlooked is the Vinegar Bible, published in 1717. The chapter heading over Luke 20 says, “The parable of the Vinegar,” instead of reading, “The Parable of the Vineyard.”

Cheating Chess Players “Many chess players don’t always take the rules too seriously,” reports the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. One example is an amateur player who won against a grand master. Later, however, it was discovered that hidden under his long hair were a microphone, earphones, and a camera, for communicating with a chess player at a computer in another room. Others have been known to go to the toilet, close the door, and pull out a hand-held computer to calculate their next moves. On-line players can also be devious. Some run a chess program on their computer while participating in an on-line game. In other cases players participated under two names and played against themselves—one name always losing and thereby pushing the other up in the ranking list. “For many it is not so much a question of prize money,” states the newspaper. “In almost every case, the motivating factor is, not greed, but vanity.”