“Father, do you see Mother in your dreams?” the young girl asks. “You know sometimes I do.”
“Mother comes to see me a lot, you know. We sit and talk.” The father smiles. “How is your homework coming along?”
“Why do I have to study so hard?”
“It is what your mother would have wanted!”
She regrets speaking her mind. “I’m sorry, Father, I shouldn’t have said that.” She looks up and sees his eyes well up with tears.
“It’s okay, love,” he gets up and pours himself a drink. “I’ll just sit outside for a while. You finish up your work, okay?”
“I’m sorry, Father; Mother did love you very much. She told me all the time.”
“Homework, first, eh? Then we can chat about your mother.”
He heads off outside and sits in his usual chair, looking around the courtyard. The whole area relaxes the mind and somehow soothes the soul.
“All finished, Father. May I get a drink and sit with you? I have some questions.”
She comes with two drinks one for him and one for herself. He looks surprised. She never really liked him having a drink. Although he had cut back a lot from before he brought her here, it still seemed strange.
“Mother told me all about you. That is before she passed away. We would laugh together at your love stories.”
He listens without uttering a single sound.
“Why didn’t you come and take her away with you? She really wanted that. Did you know that?”
Her father looks at his daughter lovingly. “Circumstances were difficult back then. It was just the way things were. When it came time to…” He sighs. “To visit her it was too late.”
The girl smiles. “I hope I will have the same kind of love you and mother had.”
“Without all the heartache,” her father adds.
“She always knew you loved her. She told me every day,” the child mentions cheerfully. “I saw her crying sometimes when she read your letters.”
“Did she make you promise to look after me?” She inquires.
“She asked me to take care of you.”
“You promised her, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I did.”
“It is nice out here, isn't it? Mother would have been very happy here.”
She talks with some authority. Her father remains silent. A smile comes to his weary brow. He nods his head.
“Mother wanted me to give you something. I think now the time is right.” She runs to her room. Upon returning she hands her father a book. “It’s mother’s diary! She wanted me to give it to you.”
He takes the book and holds it in his trembling hands, “Thank you.”
“Mother said you would understand things better.”
“Wise woman, your mother.”
He places the book on the table as he gets up. The girl gets up and wraps herself around her father.
“I love you.” she looks up at his face.
He picks her up and hugs her. “I love you, too.” His voice trembles.
“It’s okay, Father. We have each other now and mother is in both of us.”
He kisses her head.
“Time you went to bed,” her father softly says.
He puts her down and she scampers off to get washed and ready for bed.
Clearing up everything he checks on his daughter. She is in bed waiting for her good night kiss. He tucks her in and bids her goodnight.
Just as he is to leave she tells him. “Mother told me she adopted me when I was a baby.”
He stands at her bedroom door. Words fail him. Yes, he knew she was adopted.
“I am really lucky for being loved by my parents, even if I am not really theirs.”
“You trying to bring on the water works?” he tells her.
She giggles, “Goodnight, Father. I love you.”
“Love you, too.”
His face lights up as he wipes his dampened eyes.
The door closes and the child falls asleep dreaming of her mother.
Sitting outside he picks up the diary and opens it and reads the first line: “I love you, my dearest, if only things could have been different…”What can we know about the couple’s relationship?
| A．They understood each other very well. |
| B．They quarreled a lot and are separated. |
| C．They used to have misunderstandings. |
| D．They were quite sure of each other’s love. |
What can we learn from the story?
| A．The girl was adopted because the couple couldn’t give birth. |
| B．Father looks after the girl just because the girl is alone. |
| C．The girl feels unfortunate that she was adopted. |
| D．Father was not very close to the girl before she moved in with him. |
Why didn’t father bring mother home when she was ill?
| A．Because he was too busy with his work. |
| B．Because he didn’t know he was wanted. |
| C．Because he was too poor to afford the medical fees. |
| D．Because he didn’t know she was in hospital. |
What does the sentence “You trying to bring on the water works?” mean?
| A．You want another cup of water? |
| B．Are you kidding me? |
| C．Are you trying to make me cry? |
| D．Are you thinking about the water factory? |
Which word best describes father’s feeling at the end of the story?
| A．Regretful | B．Satisfied |
| C．Confused | D．Doubtful |
Personal computers and the Internet give people new choices about how to spend their time.
Some may use this freedom to share less time with certain friends or family members, but new technology will also let them stay in closer touch with those they care most about. I know this from personal experience.
E-mail makes it easy to work at home, which is where I now spend most weekends and evenings. My working hours aren’t necessarily much shorter than they once were but I spend fewer of them at the office. This lets me share more time with my young daughter than I might have if she’d been born before electronic mail became such a practical tool.
The Internet also makes it easy to share thoughts with a group of friends. Say you do something fun - see a great movie perhaps - and there are four or five friends who might want to hear about it. If you call each one, you may be tired of telling the story.
With E-mail, you just write one note about your experience, at your convenience, and address it to all the friends you think might be interested. They can read your message when they have time, and read only as much as they want to. They can reply at their convenience, and you can read what they have to say at your convenience.
E-mail is also an inexpensive way stay in close touch with people who live far away. More than a few parents use E-mail to keep in touch, even daily touch, with their children off at college.
We just have to keep in mind that computers and the Internet offer another way of staying in touch. They don’t take the place of any of the old ways. The purpose of this passage is to ________.
| A．explain how to use the Internet |
| B．describe the writer’s joy of keeping up with the latest technology |
| C．tell the merits(价值) and usefulness of the Internet |
| D．introduce the reader to basic knowledge about personal computers and the Internet |
The use of E-mail has made it possible for the writer to ________.
| A．have more free time with his child | B．spend less time working |
| C．work at home on weekends | D．work at a speed comfortable to him |
According to the writer, E-mail has an obvious advantage over the telephone because the
former helps one ________.
| A．reach a group of people at one time conveniently |
| B．keep one’s communication as personal as possible |
| C．pass on much more information than the later |
| D．get in touch with one’s friends faster than the later |
The best title for this passage is ________.
| A．Computer: New Technological Advances |
| B．Internet: New Tool to Maintain Good Friendship |
| C．Computers Have Made Life Easier |
| D．Internet: a Convenient Tool for Communication |
Everybody may have seen the film “Death on the Nile ( 尼罗河)”, but nobody can imagine that the writer of the story, Agatha Christie, saved a baby in a most unusual way.
In June 1977, a baby girl became seriously ill in Deleville. Doctors there were unable to find out the cause of her illness, so she was sent to a famous hospital in London, where there were many excellent doctors. The baby was so seriously ill that a team of doctors hurried to examine her without delay. The doctors, too, were puzzled by the baby’s illness and they also became discouraged. Just then a nurse asked to speak to them.
“I think the baby is suffering from thallium (铊) poisoning. ” said the nurse. “A few days ago, I read a story ‘A Pale Horse’ written by Agatha Christie. Someone uses thallium poison, and all the symptoms (症状) are written in the book. They are exactly the same as the baby’s.”
“You’re very good at observing things,” said a doctor, “and you may be right. We’ll carry out some tests and find out whether the cause is thallium poisoning or not.”
The tests proved that the baby had indeed been poisoned by thallium. Once they knew the cause, the doctors were able to give her correct treatment. The baby soon got well and was sent back to Deleville. A week later it was reported that the poison might have come from an insecticide (杀虫剂) used in Deleville. The baby was sent to a hospital in London because ______.
| A．her parents were living in London then |
| B．the hospitals in Deleville were full at that time |
| C．doctors in Deleville were not sure about the cause of her illness |
| D．she was the daughter of a famous doctor in London |
When the baby was first sent to the hospital in London, her illness was considered to be ______
A quite easy to treat
B. the result of thallium poisoning
C. a common one
D. extraordinarily serious From this passage it seems that the baby’s illness had something to do with ______.
A a dead writerB. a harmful substance ( 物质) used to kill pests
C. the water in DelevilleD. a dangerous murderer As far as we can tell from the story, Agatha Christie ______.
| A．had never met this baby |
| B．had spent a long time studying the baby’s illness |
| C．visited the baby both in Deleville and London |
| D．gave the nurse some advice on the telephone |
Joseph Goldberger was a doctor for the Unite States Public Health Service. In 1912, he began to study a disease that was killing thousands of people in the South. The disease was pellagra(烟酸缺乏病).
Doctor Goldberger traveled to the state of Mississippi where many people had pellagra. He studied the patients and their families. Most of the people were poor. The doctor came to believe that the disease was not passed from one person to another, but instead had something to do with food.
He received agreement from state officials to test this idea at a prison(监狱). Prisoners were offered pardons if they took part. One group of prisoners received their usual food, mostly corn. A second group ate meat, fresh vegetables and milk. Members of the first group developed pellagra. The second group did not.
But some experts refused to accept that poor food caused pellagra. They thought there were other causes.
So Doctor Goldberger put blood(血液) from a person with pellagra into his own body. He even took pills that had blood from pellagra patients. An assistant also took part in the experiments. So did Doctor Goldberger’s wife. None of them got sick. Later, the doctor discovered that a bit of dried brewer’s yeast(酿酒的酵母) each day could prevent pellagra.
Joseph Goldberger died of cancer in 1929. He was 55 years old. Several years later, researchers discovered the true cause of pellagra: having little of the vitamin B. How old was Doctor Goldberger when he began to study pellagra?
| A．22. | B．30. | C．38. | D．55. |
The underlined part “this idea” (in Paragraph 3) refers to .
| A．the guessing that pellagra had something to do with food |
| B．a kind of yeast that prevented pellagra |
C．pellagra that was easily pas sed from one person to another |
| D．a poor food that caused pellagra |
Which is the right order about what Doctor Goldberger did?
a. He did a test on prisoners at a prison.
b. He did the experiments on himself.
c. He came to Mississippi to study the patients and their families.
d. He found poor food was easy to cause pellagra.
e. He discovered a little dried brewer’s yeast every day could prevent pellagra.
| A．a, d, c, e, b | B．c, a, d, b, e | C．b, e, c, a, d | D．c, b, e, a, d |
This passage mainly tells us .
A．Doctor Goldberger’s lif e |
| B．something about pellagra |
| C．Doctor Goldberger’s work experience |
| D．Doctor Goldberger’s study on pellagra |
Copywriting is the art of sending a message in writing, especially in advertisements, for the purpose(目的) of persuading someone to do something. This is especially true when writing descriptive(描述性的) copy. Why? Because customers’（顾客） senses don’t work on paper. They only work in person. That’s why copywriters have to create a sensory experience for their customers through their words.
When copywriters create descriptions, they often leave a lot to be desired. There is no interaction(互动) or experience. Descriptions should be descriptive. Successful descriptions should fill the gap of what customers would see, hear, smell, taste or feel as if they were standing before the product. Successful descriptions should also draw customers’ attention and create an actual event as if they could be right there.
Do you make cinnamon rolls(肉桂卷)？You wouldn’t want to describe them simply as “delicious” or “smell great”. Instead, you’d want to bring your customers to the experience of enjoying them. Some
thing like this will work better: Completely NOT your grandma’s cinnamon rolls! Freshly bake them right in your own oven. As the strong pleasant smell of these excellent rolls begins to float in the air, your nose will start to feel excited and you’ll immediately know they are worth the wait.
When writing descriptive copy, choose the senses that are most proper and focus on them. If describing food, certainly you’ll think about not only what you’re tasting, but also what you smell and see. If you’re writing travel copy, you’ll focus on sights, s
ounds as well as feelings. Your goal i
s to have your readers close their eyes and imagine they are in the same experience as you are.The purpose of copywriting is to .
| A．create a pleasant experience |
| B．develop customers’ five senses |
| C．persuade people to do things |
| D．give people rich imagination |
The writer develops the third paragraph mainly .
| A．by cause and effect(因果) | B．by order in space |
| C．by order in time | D．by examples |
Which of the following would be the best title for the passage?
| A．People’s five senses |
| B．Copywriting and advertisements |
| C．Descriptive copywriting |
| D．Copywriting and the five senses |
I had been rather proud of myself when my friends and family got the ticket, whether it was for speeding, parking or stop sign violations(违反). It was something that happened to others. But last Friday I joined the club.
I was asked to do a new project last week. On Friday morning on my way to work, I suddenly remembered that I had spent the past six weeks without considering that I had a week’s vacation pla
nned during that time. I was very disappointed with myself for not remembering it.
The truth is that I was not paying enough attention to my driving and I did not come to a complete stop at the stop sign in front of a school. I was so distracted(思想不集中的) that I didn’t even notice I had a policeman on my tail with his lights flashing. Finally I looked in my mirror and caught on.
The policeman was rude and took my papers. Luckily, I had everything up to date and since I had never had a ticket before, there was nothing for him to do but write me a ticket. While I was sitting there in the seat of “shame”, I felt bad. If I had been that distracted and a child had run onto the road, perhaps I would have not reacted as well as I could have. It was a wake-up call.
People at work asked me if I tried to talk my way out of it. Frankly, it never occurred to me. I felt guilty（有罪的）. Now I no longer have a clean driving record. Please be careful out there, as a moment’s distraction can lead to tragedy（悲剧）.What is this passage mainly about?
| A．The writer’s most unforgettable experience. |
| B．How the writer got her first ticket. |
| C．An accident caused by the writer. |
| D．Why the writer is always so careful. |
We can infer that the underlined part “the club” in Paragraph 1 here refers to .
| A．people who are crazy about driving cars |
| B．a club for drivers without much experience |
| C．people who get tickets for breaking traffic rules |
| D．a club for people to talk about their driving stories |
What made the writer unable to focus on(集中思想) her driving?
| A．Planning how to spend the vacation. |
| B．Thinking of the forgotten vacation. |
| C．Thinking about her work. |
| D．Missing her children. |
When the writer received the ticket, she .
| A．felt lucky that she was an experienced driver |
| B．was so nervous that she shook all over |
| C．was ashamed of herself for being distracted |
| D．was worried about being laughed at |