It's as though the sky fell on my head today.

The airplane should have landed early this morning. I heard on the radio it had crashed. I don't understand. It's as though the sky fell on my head today.

It's certainly more difficult to build an institution from the ground up today. It was very common in the '60s and '70s, when public institutions were expanding.

The first round today is critically, critically important not just for Indonesia, but for the entire region. This is an effort to stop polio virus here but also to stop it breaking out causing a regional infection.

Today's children have very short attention spans because they are being reared on dreadful television programmes which are flickering away in the corner.

Pessimistic" is a word for "realistic" that optimists use to make themselves feel better (about their unrealisticness).