--Sichuan earthquake anniversary--

Parents of victims told not to hold memorials
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Parents of the children who died during last year's earthquake in Sichuan have been threatened with imprisonment if they hold memorials for their dead on May 12th, the one year anniversary of the disaster.
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The government has released figures stating that 5,335 school children died when the 7.9
magnitude earthquake hit the south-western province. Most perished when their schools collapsed.
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Anger over the number of children killed and the government's failure to hold an inquiry into the reason why almost 12,000 schools were destroyed or damaged has been rising ahead of the sensitive first anniversary of the earthquake, which left 70,000 dead and another 18,000 missing.
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In an attempt to silence protests, some parents have been detained in so-called 'black jails', or unofficial prisons, for up to 21 days. Now, though, they have been threatened with longer jail terms if they attempt to commemorate their children.
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"The police visited me earlier this week and said that if we stage a memorial, then we won't just be temporarily detained, but we might go to prison for a few years," said Luo Guoming.
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Mr Luo had been planning to hold a memorial on May 12th for his 16-year-old daughter Luo Dan at the site of the Juyuan Middle School near Dujiangyan, along with some of the other parents of the estimated 300 children who died when the school collapsed last May. But the land where the school once stood is now surrounded by barbed wire and parents and journalists have been forbidden from approaching it'.
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~http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/5294397/Sichuan-earthquake-anniversary-Parents-of-victims-told-not-to-hold-memorials.html

--5 Sleep Myths Busted--

It accounts for a third of your life and a big chunk of your health and longevity. So why aren't you sleeping enough?

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What a night. The woman of your dreams appeared. Your pulse raced. Heavy breathing ensued. You do remember it, right? Oh, wait, you were asleep. And that's not all you missed. Under cover of night, sleep floods your veins with age-defying human growth hormone. Sleep raises an army of T cells and sends them into battle against colds and infection. Sleep resets the appetite controls that tell you to not hit the turn signal when you pass a McDonald's. And, of course, sleep helps you above the neck as well as below the belt.

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"It stabilizes your waking brain, makes you more alert, and allows you to process information faster," says David Dinges, Ph.D., who studies shut-eye at the University of Pennsylvania. "It helps you remember things and consolidate those memories." You won't get that from a Red Bull. So then why are we engaged in a society-wide experiment in sleep deprivation? Average nightly sleep time during the workweek in the United States is down nearly 20 minutes in the last decade, to six hours and 40 minutes. And men ages 30 to 44 are the worst offenders: Thirty percent of them say they log less than six hours of sleep at night, according to a survey from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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~http://health.msn.com/health-topics/articlepage.aspx?cp-documentid=100235358&GT1=31036

--Frank Sinatra--Fly Me to the Moon (1964)--

Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra (December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998)

"Fly Me to the Moon" is a pop standard song written by Bart Howard in 1954. When introduced by Felicia Sanders on the cabaret circuit, it was originally titled "In Other Words". The song became popularly called "Fly Me to the Moon" from its first line, but it took a few years for the publishers to change the title officially.
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Frank Sinatra recorded the song on his 1964 album It Might as Well Be Swing accompanied by Count Basie. The arrangement by Quincy Jones has become the rendition by which most people recognise the song. Jones changed the time signature, which was originally 3/4 waltz-time, to 4/4 and gave it a 'swing' feel. Sinatra's recording was a hit and was played to the astronauts of Apollo 10, on their lunar mission. Sinatra also performed the song with Basie on 1966's Sinatra at the Sands, and on 1994's Duets II, his final recording of "Fly Me to the Moon" and his final collaboration with Antonio Carlos Jobim. He also performed this song in 1969 TV-show "Sinatra", there he dedicated it to the Apollo astronauts "who made the impossible possible".
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~http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fly_Me_to_the_Moon

--John Lennon-Imagine (1971)--

"Imagine" is a song written and performed by English rock musician John Lennon. Among Lennon's best known and influential songs, it is considered by critics to be his magnum opus. The track was released as a single in October 1971, and is the opening track of his album Imagine released the same year. "Imagine" reached #3 in the U.S. Billboard charts, and #6 in the United Kingdom. After Lennon's death in 1980, the song rose to #1 on the UK Singles Chart, where it remained for four weeks. When asked about the song in one of his last interviews, Lennon declared "Imagine" to be as good as anything he had written with the Beatles. The song is one of three Lennon solo songs, along with "Instant Karma!" and "Give Peace a Chance", in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Rolling Stone magazine ranked it #3 among greatest song of all time.

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~http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imagine_(song)

--FC Barcelona for Liga BBVA 2008/2009--

MADRID (AP) -- Valencia thumped defending champion Real Madrid 3-0 on Saturday to provide Barcelona the chance to win the Spanish league this weekend.

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Madrid's defeat at Mestalla Stadium kept it seven points behind the leader, allowing Barcelona to be proclaimed champion for the 19th time if it beats Villarreal at Camp Nou on Sunday.

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~http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/soccer/05/09/spanish.rdp.ap/index.html?eref=T1

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~http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_League

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~http://soccernet.espn.go.com/league?id=esp.1&cc=4716

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~http://www.fcbarcelona.com/web/index_idiomes.html

--"Yesterday" (1965)--

"Yesterday" is a pop song originally recorded by The Beatles for their 1965 album Help!. According to the Guinness Book of Records, "Yesterday" has the most cover versions of any song ever written. The song remains popular today with more than 3,000 recorded cover versions, the first hitting the United Kingdom top 10 three months after the release of Help!. Broadcast Music Incorporated (BMI) asserts that it was performed over seven million times in the 20th century alone. The song was not released as a single in the UK at the time of the US release, and thus never gained number 1 single status in that country.
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However, "Yesterday" was voted the best song of the 20th century in a 1999 BBC Radio 2 poll of music experts and listeners.
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"Yesterday" takes the form of a melancholic acoustic ballad about a break-up. It was the first official recording by The Beatles that relied upon a performance by a single member of the band — Paul McCartney was accompanied solely by a string quartet. The final recording differed so greatly from other works by The Beatles that the other three members of the band vetoed the release of the song as a single in the United Kingdom. Although credited to "Lennon/McCartney", the song was written solely by McCartney.
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~http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yesterday_(song)
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--Mother's Day 2009--

The modern Mother's Day holiday was created by Anna Jarvis as a day for each family to honor its mother, and it's now celebrated on various days in many places around the world. It complements Father's Day, the celebration honoring fathers.
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This holiday is relatively modern, being created at the start of the 20th century, and should not be confused with the early pagan and Christian traditions honoring mothers, or with the 16th century celebration of Mothering Sunday, which is also known as Mother's Day in the UK.
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In most countries the Mother's Day celebration is a recent holiday derived from the original US celebration. Exceptions are, for example, the Mothering Sunday holiday in the UK.
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~http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mother