Alzheimer's disease is a major national health problem. Nearly 2 million Americans over the age of 65 have Alzheimer's disease. It is a leading cause of death among the elderly. But Alzheimer's disease is not confined (限于) to the aged. There may be a million or more people under the age of 65 suffering from the disease.
At one time, people suffering from the disease were said to be "getting old". The disease was thought to be a natural part of growing old, but it is now known that Alzheimer's disease strikes young and old alike. It is an organic(器官的) disease that destroys brain cells.
Alzheimer's disease affects the patient's memory, speech, and movement. In the beginning stages of the disease, the patient may seem slightly confused. He may have trouble speaking. Then the patient's memory begins to fail. He may forget dates, telephone numbers, names and plans.
As the disease progresses, the patient may not recognize family and friends. These symptoms(症状) often cause terrible anxiety in the patient. He may feel lost and frightened. Sometimes the patient reacts with wild and bad behavior.
In the last stages of the disease, the patient may not be able to take care of himself. He may have lost the ability to speak and walk.
Some of the scientists think a virus causes Alzheimer's disease. At present, there is no cure for the disease. But there are ways to slow its progress. Exercise and physical treatment can help the patients of this disease.Alzheimer's disease ____________.
| A．a terrible part of the aging process | B．is an organic disease that affects young and old |
| C．can be cured by physical treatment | D．causes high fever |
All of the following are symptoms of Alzheimer's disease EXCEPT ____________.
| A．brain damage | B．difficulty in speaking | C．loss of sight | D．loss of the ability to walk |
According to the passage, which of the following may be a cause of Alzheimer's disease?
| A．Poisons produced by the brain. | B．Getting old. | C．A virus. | D．Lack of exercise. |
I was in a strange city and I didn't know the city at all, and what is more, I could not speak a word of the language. After having spent my first day in the town-centre, I decided to lose my way on my second day, since I believed that this was the simplest way of getting to know the strange city.
I got on the first bus that passed, rode on it for several stops, then got off it and walked on. The first two hours passed pleasantly enough. Then I decided to turn back to my hotel for lunch. After walking about for some time, I decided I had better ask the way. The trouble was that the only word I knew of the language was the name of the street in which I lived and even then I pronounced it badly.
I stopped to ask a friendly-looking newspaper-seller. He smiled and handed me a paper. I shook my head and repeated the name of the street and he put the paper into my hands. I had to give him some money and went on my way. The next person I asked was a policeman. The policeman listened to me carefully, smiled and gently took me by the arm. There was a strange look in his eyes as he pointed left and right and left again. I thanked him politely and began walking in the direction he pointed.
About an hour passed and I noticed that the houses were getting fewer and fewer and green fields were appearing on either side of me. I had come all the way into the countryside.
The only thing left for me to do was to find the nearest railway station.The writer believed that if you wanted to get to know a strange city, ______.
| A．you should go everywhere on foot | B．you should have a map |
| C．you should ask people the way | D．you should get lost |
The newspaper-seller ______.
| A．could understand what he said | B．didn't know what he said |
| C．laughed at him | D．didn't want to take the money |
The writer's real trouble was that _______.
| A．he couldn't speak the language | |
| B．he followed the policeman's direction | |
| C．he took the wrong bus | D．he left the town-centre |
The policeman ______.
| A．didn't help him | B．pointed at him |
| C．didn't understand what he really meant | D．didn't know the way |
Name: Off the Beaten Path
Cover price: $30.00
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The best-selling Reader’s Digest travel book has 40% new content including over 200 new sites, over 200 new full-color photographs, and all-new, up-to-date maps. It spotlights over l, 000 of the United States’ most overlooked must-see destinations.
Name: Container Gardens by Number
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A unique book contains 50 easy-to-follow container designs. Each design provides a simple numbered planting plan that shows exactly how to create each display, with an instruction of the finished planter and in-depth plant information. The plans are easy to follow and for any type of living space or garden.
Name: Best Weekend Projects
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Choose from 80 unique ideas to create an extraordinary living space. The projects are practical, as well as attractive, and will improve your home and yard and can be made in a weekend. These 80 well-designed projects are presented in a clear, easy-to-follow style that addresses readers in an accessible, user-friendly tone.
Name: l80l Home Remedies
Cover price: $40.00
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Plenty of health complaints can be handled at home. Each and every remedy will be tested by a doctor to make sure it is safe and sound.
Dozens of conditions are covered, from headaches, sunburn, bad breath, and blisters(水泡) to allergies(过敏), and hiccups(打嗝). You can most probably read the passage in a ___________.
| A．newspaper | B．travel guide | C．reference book | D．textbook |
How much money could you save if you want to buy a travel book?
| A．$6.46 | B．$l0. 20 | C．$l3.96 | D．$l9.8 |
Which of the following could help you to deal with common diseases without a doctor?
| A．Off the Beaten Path. | B．Container Gardens by Number. |
| C．l80l Home Remedies. | D．Best Weekend Projects. |
What’s the purpose of the passage?
| A．To share his opinion about the books with readers. |
| B．To advise readers to read more in spare time. |
| C．To share the pleasure of reading with readers. |
| D．To advise readers to buy their books. |
Friendship can deeply affect the physical and mental health of both men and women. Studies show that people who have no friends or who are lonely, are more likely to die earlier, get sick more often and suffer greater physical wear and tear（折磨）than those who have a support system of friends.
Sometimes, family members may be more likely to give you advice or tell you what you don’t want to hear. It may not be as good as a friend who will listen to you and guide you, but support your decisions anyway. The most important elements about friendship are those who suffer support and do not judge your decisions based on society.
One reason for the link between social support and good health practice seems to be that people who feel cared for by others are less stress-out and are protected against the symptoms（症状）of depression and loneliness.
Generally, women benefit most because of how they deal with stress. Women are more social in how they deal with stress than men, while men are more likely to have a “fight or flight” reaction. Women also tend to have larger, denser social network, in which more people know each other and help each other, while men typically have smaller groups of friends and will rely on their wives or other important people for more support. While all these affect people psychologically（心理上）, friendship brings comfort that reduces the ill effects of stress, and the sex difference also contributes to the difference in the length of one’s life time.In the author’s opinion, a real friend should _________.
| A．tell you what to do even if you refuse to hear it. |
| B．try to persuade you to change your mind quickly. |
| C．judge your decision according to his/her experience. |
| D．give you advice but respect your own decision. |
Women benefit more from friendship than men because _________.
| A．women are always cared for by more people than men. |
| B．women are usually less stress-out when staying with others. |
| C．women are more likely to solve problems with friends’ help |
| D．women can always keep more long-life friendship than men |
According to the passage we can infer that _______.
| A．it’s good for women to tell men what they should do or not |
| B．friends are always more important than family members |
| C．men don’t want to share their problems with many people |
| D．the trend that women can live longer makes them more relaxed |
This passage mainly talks about _________.
| A．why people should develop friendship |
| B．when friendship affects people’s health |
| C．people’s different attitudes towards friendship |
| D．the friendship which can make people live longer |
Every day we experience one of the wonders of the world around us without even realizing it. It is not the amazing complexity of television, nor the impressive technology of transport. The universal wonder we share and experience is our ability to make noises with our mouths, and so transmit ideas and thoughts to each other’s minds. This ability comes so naturally that we tend to forget what a miracle (奇迹) it is.
Obviously, the ability to talk is something that marks humans off from animals. Of course, some animals have powers just as amazing. Birds can fly thousands of miles by observing pos
itions of the stars in the sky in relation to the time of day and year. In Nature’s talent show, humans are a species of animal that have developed their own special act. If we reduce it to basic terms, it’s an ability for communicating information to others, by varying sounds we make as we breathe out.
Not that we don’t have other powers of communication. Our facial expressions convey our emotions, such as anger, or joy, or disappointment. The way we hold our heads can indicate to others whether we are happy or sad. This is so-called “body language”. Bristling (直立的) fur is an unmistakable warning of attack among many animals. Similarly, the bowed head or drooping tail shows a readiness to take second place in any animal gathering.
Such a means of communication is a basic mechanism that animals, including human beings, instinctively acquire and display. Is the ability to speak just another sort of instinct? If so, how did human beings acquire this amazing skill? Biologists can readily indicate that particular area of our brain where speech mechanisms function, but this doesn’t tell us how that part of our bodies originated in our biological history.According to the passage, the wonder we take for granted is .
| A．our ability to use language | B．the miracle of technology |
| C．our ability to make noises with mouth | D．the amazing power of nature |
What feature of “body language” mentioned in the passage is common to both humans and animals?
| A．Lifting heads when sad. | B．Keeping long faces when angry. |
| C．Bowing heads when willing to obey. | D．Bristling hair when ready to attack. |
What can be inferred from Paragraph 3?
| A．Body language is unique to humans. |
| B．Animals express emotions just as humans do. |
| C．Humans are no different from animals to some degree. |
| D．Humans have other powers of communication. |
This passage is mainly about .
| A．the development of body language |
| B．the special role humans play in nature |
| C．the difference between humans and animals in language use |
| D．the power to convey information to others |
Modern inventions have speeded up people’s lives amazingly. Motor-cars cover a hundred miles in little more than an hour, aircraft cross the world inside a day, while computers operate at lightning speed. Indeed, this love of speed seems never-ending. Every year motor-cars are produced which go even faster and each new computer boasts (吹嘘) of saving precious seconds in handling tasks.
All this saves time, but at a price. When we lose or gain half a day in speeding across the world in an airplane, our bodies tell us so. We get the uncomfortable feeling known as jet-lag; our bodies feel that they have been left behind in another time zone. Again, spending too long at computers results in painful wrists and fingers. Mobile phones also have their dangers, according to some scientists; too much use may transmit harmful radiation into our brains, a consequence we do not like to think about.
However, what do we do with the time we have saved? Certainly not relax, or so it seems. We are so accustomed to constant activity that we find it difficult to sit and do nothing, or even just one thing at a time. Perhaps the days are long gone when we might listen quietly to a story on the radio, letting imagination take us into another world.
There was a time when some people’s lives were devoted simply to the cultivation of the land or the care of cattle. No multi-tasking there; their lives went on at a much gentler pace, and in a familiar pattern. There is much that we might envy about a way of life like this. Yet before we do so, we must think of the hard tasks our ancestors faced: they farmed with bare hands, often lived close to hunger, and had to fashion tools from wood and stone. Modern machinery has freed people from that primitive existence.The new products become more and more time-saving because .
| A．time is limited | B．our love of speed seems never-ending |
| C．the prices are increasingly high | D．the manufacturers boast a lot |
What does “the days” in Paragraph 3 refer to?
| A．Simple life in the past. | B．Imaginary life. |
| C．Times of inventions. | D．Time for constant activity. |
What is the author’s attitude towards the modern technology?
| A．Objective. | B．Critical. | C．Optimistic. | D．Negative. |
What does the passage mainly discuss?
| A．Machinery and human beings. | B．The present and past times. |
| C．Imaginations and inventions. | D．Modern technology and its influence. |