The bread is rising... and may explode
Since ancient times, when Romans used bread and circuses to placate the plebes, flour shortages have been synonymous with revolt. Now, with rising demand pushing up global grain costs, a growing list of rulers face bread rebellions. Violent protests calling for government action to ease grain prices have broken out from Morocco to Uzbekistan. In Yemen, where bread prices recently jumped almost 100 percent, riots led to 12 deaths. In Egypt, affordable loaves have become so scarce that men have donned veils to sneak into shorter bread queues for women. Such bread-line unrest will likely affect local council elections in April, with the hard-line Muslim Brotherhood poised to benefit, says Steven A. Cook, Egypt expert at the Council on Foreign Relations. He notes that in 1977 rising bread prices sparked urban riots that almost toppled Anwar Sadat. World leaders would do well to remember: inflation hurts, but bread price inflation can kill.

Good news, you can never oversleep
Does oversleeping make one feel more tired than sleeping a normal seven to eight hours? That depends on what is meant by oversleeping, said Dr. Charles P. Pollak, director of the Center for Sleep Medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center. A long period of sleep may be just what the doctor ordered. “People do not necessarily sleep a long time arbitrarily,” Pollak said. “Sometimes it is in response to insufficient sleep. People make up for lost sleep on the weekend, and the sleep may be very long. But that is not the same as oversleeping. It does not contribute to feeling groggy and tired, but helps make up for sleep you should have been getting during the week.” Pollak explains that most people cannot sleep more than the amount they need, which varies a great deal from person to person and from age to age. “Extending sleep beyond what is normally required might sometimes make you feel groggy,” he said, “but it is not easy to do.”

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