What Does Your Sleeping Position Say About You?

7:00 PM Fashion/Lifestyle, Health, News No Comments

How do you sleep at night? Do you sleep on your tummy with limbs out-stretched? Do you lay curled up in a fetal position? Or do you sleep like a log? It is probably safe to say that most of you do not think much about the way you get your Zzzs at night. But would you if you knew that the way you sleep could tell a lot about the type of personality you have?

According to body language expert Robert Phipps, the way people sleep at night actually determines a lot about the type of personality they have. In a new study on the topic, Phipps has identified four sleeping positions that affect personality.

“Our sleeping position can determine how we feel when we wake,” said Phipps.

The study was carried out as part of a survey for Premier Inn, one of the largest hotel chains in the UK. Hotel spokeswoman Claire Haigh said: “We were shocked the research revealed just how stressed we are. It is important we try to wind down after a long day and get a good night’s rest so we wake up refreshed.”

Phipps found that worriers, those who stress the most, tend to sleep in the fetal position. He found that this is by far the most common bedtime position, with nearly 58 percent of snoozers sleeping on their side with knees up and head down. The more we curl up, the more comfort we are seeking, according to Phipps.

The second most common position is the log. People who sleep with a straight body, with arms at the side, as if they are standing guard at Buckingham Palace, indicates stubbornness, and these people (the 28 percent who sleep this way) often wake up stiffer than when they went to sleep.

“The longer you sleep like this, the more rigid your thinking and you can become inflexible, which means you make things harder for yourself,” according to Phipps.

Yearner sleepers are next on the list. About 25 percent of people sleep in this style–on their backs with arms stretched out in front, looking as if they are either chasing a dream or perhaps being chased themselves. Yearners are typically their own worst critics, always expecting great results, explained Phipps. These people often wake up refreshed and eager to face the challenges of the day ahead.

However, he warned to “make sure what you yearn for is what you really want or you’ll spend a lot of wasted time and energy.”

Perhaps the most peculiar of sleep styles is the freefaller position. This sleep style makes up 17 percent of the population. They sleep face down with arms stretched out. These people, according to Phipps, feel like they have little control over their life. Not only is this the oddest of sleep styles, it also the least comfortable, and people may wake up feeling tired and have no energy.

In conclusion, Phipps has only one more thing to add: “A good night’s sleep sets you up for the following day and our sleeping positions can determine how we feel when we wake.”



 






Source: redorbit.com

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“Only 25% of Nigeria’s medicinal plants being utilised”

4:15 PM Health No Comments

Abuja – Only 25 per cent of Nigeria’s 8,000 medicinal plants are being utilised, says Mrs Zainab Shariff, the Managing Director, Nigeria Medicinal Plants Development Company (NMPDC).

Shariff made this known in an interview Abuja on Sunday.

She said that the company had identified six plants which had more value than what they were currently being used for.

They are `moringa oleifera’ popularly called `zogale’, `Hibiscus Sabdariffa’ known as `zobo’ and `Zingiber officinale or ginger, `Telfairia occidentalis or fluted pumpkin, `azadirate indica’ or bitter leaf and `Ocimum Grattissimum, popularly known as scent leaf.

“These plants are viable and available in the country. They are sustainable and available all year round. This means you can always get them.”

“Pumpkin for instance, if more people will cultivate it beyond being just vegetable, it will generate revenue through export.

“It cures anemia, helps sickle cell patients as it boosts blood count and also an immune support plant because of its high content of anti-oxidant properties.

“So also the anti-oxidant properties in bitter leaf, which researchers say has anti-cancer properties.”

Shariff said the company had taken the challenge to increase the production of the plants for processing into different products.

She said the company had a 10-hectare farmland in Kano State, where it carried out dry season farming and another 18-hectare farmland in Katsina, where it embarked on wet season farming.

She said some plants, which were not indigenous, had been imported and cultivated to further add to those identified.

“We domesticated a plant from China called `Artemisia’, which had been cultivated on our soil and it grows with special nurture.”

“To get the content of artemisinin, artemisia gives you artemisinin and for it to give you artemisinin, you need to process it through an extraction technology.”

According to her, Artemisinin Combination Therapy (ACTs) is derived from artemisia plants, which is a drug composite that possesses the most rapid action of all current drugs against malaria. (NAN)

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10 ways you can make best use of your iPad3

10:00 AM Technology No Comments

It’s possible you may have used your new iPad, popularly known as the iPad3 for almost one year now. But the truth is that there are still many possibilities you can turn on using some of the great features available.

Most of these features are so prominent that you glance over them on daily basis but the irony is that most of the tasks you desperately needed to carry out but could not, are dependent on them without your knowing it.

Now, take the advantage:

Conserve your battery

The priority desire of almost every iPad user is to conserve the battery. This is mostly because the device is mainly used on the go. Although the new iPad has pretty impressive battery life: 10 hours between charges, if you are on a very long-haul flight, however, or you need to conserve battery for some other reason, there are a few things you can do.

Turning down the brightness (found in the Settings menu) will help, as will switching off 3G, or even going to Airplane mode completely when you don’t need any connectivity. You can also conserve battery energy by closing opened applications

Get reminded of appointments with Siri

Another very innovative application on the New iPad is the Siri app. This is Apple’s intelligent voice assistant, which comes to the iPad with the latest software update, iOS 6. Siri can do all kinds of things, including opening apps, retrieving sports results and taking dictation.

iPad

To use it, simply turn it on in the Settings, General menu and then hold down the Home button for two seconds to activate. Then, talk to Siri about your appointment and ask it to remind you. At the exact time, Siri will turn itself on to remind you of the appointment It needs an internet connection to work, though.

How to make use of Find My iPad app

Apple’s Find My iPad works for all iCloud users. Access the Settings, go to the iCloud, enter your Apple ID and then turn Find My iPad on near the bottom of the screen. Now if you lose your iPad, you can go to icloud.com or use Find My iPhone on another device to locate the iPad.

How to get your data wiped if device is stolen

If you’ have sensitive data on your iPad and is afraid that when it gets lost some of those date may get into wrong hands, there is just about one sure way to put your mind at rest- enable a feature that will erase all the data on the device if someone inputs the incorrect passcode 10 times. To do that, navigate to Settings, click on General, locate Passcode Lock and turn Erase Data on.

Screen shots

Taking a screenshot is quick and easy. Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button on the top corner of the iPad and then push the Home button. A screenshot will be added to your camera roll, ready to be emailed, tweeted or just saved for posterity.

Multi-tasking

Ordinarily, the iPad is designed in such a way that most of the gestures are easily picked up within a few minutes of using the gadget. Swiping, tapping and pinching are all easily discovered after a little trial and error. There are a few controls that most people miss, however, but which can be useful. Turn on Multi-Tasking Gestures in Settings, General and then try the following:

•Swipe upwards with four fingers to reveal the multi-tasking bar; swipe down again to close.

- Swipe left or right with four fingers to switch to the previous or next app.

- Pinch four fingers together to close the current app.

Easy typing shortcuts

Typing on the iPad’s glass screen can be frustrating for long periods but you can use shortcuts to make it easier. Try the following:

•Tap and hold the exclamation mark for a shortcut to the apostrophe; do the same with the question mark to quickly enter speech marks.

•Place two fingers near the centre of the keyboard and drag them apart to split the keyboard into two. This can make typing easier on the larger screen of an iPad.

- Turn on Caps Lock in Settings, General, Keyboard and from then on a double-tap on the Shift key will apply Caps Lock.

Copy and Paste

To copy and paste text, first highlight it by tapping and holding your finger on the word you want to copy. If you want to copy more than one word, then wait for the word to highlight and drag the bars at each end so that everything you want to copy is highlighted. Then tap copy. Go to the place you want to paste to then tap and hold and choose paste.

Find text

On a computer CTRL+F is a handy way to find a word or phrase in a document. You can do the same thing on an iPad. Type the word or phrase you are looking for into the search box in the top and if it appears on the page then you will see an ‘On This Page’ section in the search results. Tap that to see the word highlighted on the page.

Parental Controls

If your iPad is going to be used by the younger members of your family then you should enable Parental Controls. It’s useful not only for preventing unexpected bills when the little ones figure out how to purchase apps but also for restricting access to unsuitable content. Go to Settings, General, Restrictions to turn Restrictions on and choose which of the iPad’s features to limit. From then on, Restrictions will be accessible only to those who know the PIN.








By Prince Osuagwu

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How to Know If You’re Eating Horse Meat

10:00 AM Health No Comments

Staid eaters, the kosher, and equestrians should heed the following guidelines during their continental tours: Limit your intake of frozen lasagna, resist Ikea’s Köttbullar, and maybe go for a butty instead of a burger when you hit the U.K. Actually, any euro tourists who feel a little squeamish over cheval might want to stick to fish, at least until testing labs inundated with samples get through their backlogs.

Meat-testing labs, contracted by food-processing companies that can’t wait around for someone to choke on a shard of hoof, check for horse meat contamination by looking for either horse proteins or horse DNA. In the protein-based method, the labs add suspect meat to a solution containing horse-specific antibodies; if there’s at least 1 percent to 2 percent horse protein in there, it will stick to the antibodies, and the test will come up positive.

The second, more sensitive method involves using the “DNA photocopier”: Add short lengths of horse DNA to your sample; heat the mixture to unzip the DNA; let any horse DNA in your sample stick to the DNA you added; add enzymes to get the new horsey codes to replicate themselves; and, if you end up with a bunch more horse DNA than when you started: time to fire your supplier.

Short a thermocycler? Your palate isn’t so discerning, as many unwitting European carnivores have discovered. There’s a consensus that horse meat is softer, sweeter, leaner, and even milder than beef. “If you told me I was eating a leaner cut of steak, I’d have believed you,” says Bloomberg food critic Ryan Sutton, who described barbecued Russian horse meat as “reasonably tough, with no particularly gamey flavors.” So maybe live a little and do as the Romans do. Literally: The cavallo-gorging Italians accounted for half of the 200,000 horses slaughtered in the European Union in 2007, the most recent year for which data are available.

If you’re really that spooked, just eat close to home. Horse slaughter has been effectively outlawed in the U.S. since nobody will fund the mandatory slaughterhouse inspections, and we don’t import anything from the meat processors involved in this scandal. So America is safe from any unintentional horse burgers, and has been for a while. Well, there was that one time more than 30 years ago when Australia may have shipped us a bunch of kangaroo and horse meat, but that’s all blood under the bridge. Bon appétit!





 



Source: Bloomberg Businessweek

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