The Smiths’ House

Mr Smith’s house has got four bedrooms, a living-room, a dining-room, a kitchen, a bathroom and a separate toilet. There is a toilet in the bathroom too. The bedrooms and the bathroom are upstairs, and the living-room, the dining-room, the kitchen and the toilet are downstairs.

The first bedroom is Mr and Mrs Smith’s, the second one is John’s, the third one is Mary’s, and the fourth one is Anne’s. Catherine’s baby bed is in Anne’s bedroom too.
When you enter Mr Smith’s house, the room on your left is the living-room, and the room on your right is the dining-room. Where is the kitchen? It is behind the dining-room. And where is the toilet? It is straight on, in front of you.

There is a garden behind the house, but it is not big.
Is there a garden in front of the house too?
Yes, there is, but it is very small. When you go upstairs, Mr and Mrs Smith’s bedroom is on your left.
The bedroom on your right is John’s, and the bathroom is between his bedroom and Mary’s. Anne’s bedroom is behind Mary’s.
There is a big bed and two big wardrobes in Mr and Mrs Smith’s bedroom, and there is a small bed and a wardrobe in John’s room. John and Mary’s beds are big, and Anne’s bed is small. The wardrobe in Mary’s room is very big, and the wardrobe in John’s room is small.

Anne’s room has got blue walls, and there are white ships and green islands on them, because it is a child’s bedroom. John’s bedroom has got white walls, and Mary’s has got grey walls.
John has got pictures of horses on his walls, and Mary has got pictures of beautiful clothes.

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A rare bushy-tailed mongoose found!

Africa’s least known carnivore, the Jackson’s mongoose, has been captured on film in Tanzania, away from its previously known haunts in Kenya.

The Wildlife Conservation Society(WCS), based in New York, captured the rare, bushy-tailed creature during a camera-trap study in the Matundu Forest in Udzungwa Mountains in southern Tanzania. The findings were reported in the latest issue of Oryx journal.

“These mongooses may represent a separate subspecies from the one that exists in Kenya,” said Daniela De Luca of WCS’ Tanzania Program. “Given the fragmentation and small sizes of the forest patches in which they live, full protection of nearby forests would improve conditions for conserving this species.”
Jackson’s mongoose has round, broad ears, yellow fur on the neck and throat and a white bushy tail. WCS said not much is known about the animal, which is a relative of the bushy-tailed mongoose. Previous records for the

Jackson’s mongoose are limited to forests in Kenya.
Besides recommending increased protection for Matundu, the scientists called for initiating studies into the Jackson’s mongoose’s genetics and ecology to learn about the animal’s needs and how to better protect it.

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Cars of the future are here

Sure, cars and trucks are convenient, and most of us couldn’t live without them, but they have become very expensive to run and are harmful to the environment.

Gas prices have been hovering around $2 a gallon (Rs. 206), and carbon-dioxide emissions from cars pollute the environment and contribute to global warming. As a result, hybrid cars and electric cars have emerged as economical and Earth-friendly alternatives to conventional vehicles.

Hybrid Cars
Hybrid vehicles combine two sources of energy such as a battery-powered electric motor and a conventional internal combustion engine.

The driver decides which source of power is appropriate for a given journey. Short jaunts to the grocery store or the post office could use the electric motor, while weekends in the country may require the internal combustion engine. The Honda Insight and the Toyota Prius are popular hybrid cars. In late 2004, Ford introduced the first hybrid SUV, the Escape.

Electric Cars
Electric cars run on rechargeable batteries rather than fuel. They also don’t have a transmission, a radiator or hoses. The best thing about them is they cause about 97% less pollution than regular cars.
But there are some downsides, too. The battery runs out of juice after driving between 100 and 140 miles, and it takes about eight hours to recharge the battery. Electric cars also are expensive.

Their batteries cost $2,000 and wear out in just a few years. And, ironically, electric cars do very little to reduce carbon dioxide emissions because most electricity in the U.S. is generated by burning coal and other fossil fuels.

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A pony-tail from the space

U.S. astronaut Sunita Williams, assigned to the International Space Station, sent a present home with the Discovery space shuttle crew -- a ponytail.

Williams’ tresses (pony tail) were ferried to Earth, where they will become a wig for a child suffering hair loss either from chemotherapy or a medical condition, said CollectSPACE.com, which first reported the event.
Williams earlier this month was shuttled to the ISS, where she’ll live for six months. At the space station, astronaut
Joan Higginbotham snipped the hair that hung down Williams’ back.

“We’re so excited,” Madonna Coffman, president of Locks of Love, which will receive Williams’ hair, told USA Today. She said the donation “will bring in families who may not have known about us.”
Williams grew her hair for months in anticipation of donating it, her mother, Bonnie Pandya.
Long hair can be problematic in the space station, which has no gravity to keep it in place. Cutting hair also can be tricky, the newspaper noted. Higginbotham used clippers attached to a hose connected to the station’s vacuum system.

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Researchers note rise in sea levels

Estimates of how much the world’s sea level would rise because of global warming may have been significantly underestimated, German researchers said.

Their study, using newer models, suggested that a rise in sea level could be twice as much as previously thought, researchers at Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Potsdam, Germany, said.
The semi-empirical modeling researchers used combined computer modeling and actual observations, which can correlate the rise in sea level to a given rise in temperature, NewScientist.com said.

At the high end of possible temperature increases, the increase in sea levels could be as much as 56 inches by the year 2100, said lead researcher Stefan Rahmstorf. At the low end of rising temperatures, the predicted increase in sea level would be about 20 inches, he said.

Even though other factors affect sea levels, Rahmstorf said new calculations showed the uncertainties in sea level predictions are greater than expected.

“We should not take this risk,” Rahmstorf said. “We should start with very effective emission reduction measures. The global temperature increase should be kept to under 2 degree C.”