A few weeks ago, while I was reading the morning paper, I turned the radio up to listen to a Saturday morning talk show and I heard an old sounding gentleman, with a golden voice. He was telling whoever he was talking with something about “a thousand marbles”.
I was intrigued and stopped to listen to what he had to say …
“Let me tell you something, Tom, something that has helped me keep a good perspective on my own priorities (优先考虑的事).”
He continued, “You see, I sat down one day and did a little math. The average person lives for about seventy-five years. Now then, I multiplied 75 by 52 and I came up with 3,900 which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime. Now stick with (继续倾听……的话) me, Tom. I’m getting to the important part.”
“It wasn’t until I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays that I started thinking about all this in any detail,” he went on. “I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy. So I went to a toy store and bought 1,000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside a large, clear plastic container. Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away.
“I found that by watching the marbles diminish (变少), I focused more on the really important things in life. There is nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight.
“It was nice to meet you, Tom. I hope you spend time with your family, and I hope to meet you again.”
You could have heard a pin drop on the radio when the old man signed off. I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had panned to work that morning. Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. “Come on, honey, I’m taking you and the kids to breakfast. And can we stop at a toy store while we’re out? I need to buy some marbles.”The underlines word “intrigued” in Paragraph 2 probably means “ ________”.
| A．encouraged | B．moved | C．worried | D．attracted |
The old man started practicing the theory of “a thousand marbles” ________.
| A．in his twenties | B．in his fifties |
| C．in his seventies | D．in his eighties |
What life lesson does this text teach us?
| A．Spending more time with our family. |
| B．Enriching our life with marble games. |
| C．It’s never too late to love our family. |
| D．Learning to live life to the fullest. |
It is difficult for doctors to help a person with a damaged brain. Without enough blood, the brain lives for only three to five minutes. More often the doctors can't fix the damage. Sometimes they are afraid to try something to help because it is dangerous to work on the brain. The doctors might make the person worse if they operate on the brain.
Dr. Robert White, a famous professor and doctor, thinks he knows a way to help. He thinks doctors should make the brain very cold. If it is very cold, the brain can live without blood for 30 minutes. This gives the doctor a longer time to do something for the brain.
Dr. White tried his idea on 13 monkeys. First he taught them to do different jobs, then he operated on them. He made the monkeys' blood back to the monkeys' brains. When the brain's temperature was 10℃, Dr. White stopped the blood to the brain. After 30 minutes he turned the blood back on. He warmed the blood again. After their operations the monkeys were like they had been before. They were healthy and busy. Each one could still do the jobs the doctor had taught them. The biggest difficulty in operating on the damaged brain is that __________.
| A．the time is too short for doctors |
| B．the patients are often too nervous |
| C．the damage is extremely hard to fix |
| D．the blood-cooling machine might break down |
The brain operation was made possible mainly by __________.
| A．taking the blood out of the brain |
| B．trying the operation on monkeys first |
| C．having the blood go through a machine |
| D．lowering the brain's temperature |
With Dr. White's new idea, the operation on the damaged brain __________.
| A．can last as long as 30 minutes |
| B．can keep the brain's blood warm |
| C．can keep the patient's brain healthy |
| D．can help monkeys do different jobs |
What is the right order of the steps in the operation?
a. make the blood back to the brain
b. stop the blood to the brain
c. have the blood cooled down
d. operate on the brain
| A．a, b, c, d | B．a, c, b, d |
| C．c, b, d, a | D．b, c, d, a |
Which of the following is not true?
| A．If there isn't enough blood, the brain can live for only three to five minutes. |
| B．If the brain is very cold, it can live without blood for half an hour. |
| C．Dr. White tried his idea for thirteen times. |
| D．After their operations, the monkeys were healthy and busy again. |
At the age of ten I could not figure out what this Elvis Presley guy had that the rest of us boys did not have. I mean, he had a head, two arms and two legs, just like the rest of us. About nine o'clock on Saturday morning I decided to ask Eugene Correthers, one of the older boys, what it was that made this Elvis guy so special. He told me that it was Elvis' wavy hair and the way he moved his body.
About half an hour later all the boys in the orphanage (孤儿院) were called to the main dining-room and told we were all going to downtown Jacksonville, Florida to get a new pair of Buster Brown shoes and a hair cut. That is when I got this big idea, which hit me like a ton of bricks. If the Elvis hair cut was the big secret, then that's what I was going to get.
All the way to town I told everybody, including the matron (女管家) from the orphanage who was taking us to town, that I was going to look just like Elvis Presley and that I would learn to move around just like he did and that I would be rich and famous one day, just like him.
When I got my new Buster Brown shoes, I could hardly wait for my new hair cut and now that I had my new Buster Brown shoes I would be very happy to go back to the orphanage and practice being like Elvis.
We finally arrived at the big barber shop, where they cut our hair for free because we were orphans (孤儿). I looked at the barber and said, "I want an Elvis hair cut. Can you make my hair like Elvis?" I asked him, with a big smile on my face. "Let's just see what we can do for you, little man," he said. I was so happy when he started to cut my hair. Just as he started to cut my hair, the matron signed for him to come over to where she was standing. She whispered something into his ear and then he shook his head, like he was telling her "No". Then he told me they were not allowed to give us Elvis hair cuts. Then I saw my hair falling onto the floor. In the author's eyes, Elvis Presley was __________.
| A．disgusting | B．admirable |
| C．ambitious | D．dynamic |
From the passage, we can know that __________.
| A．Buster Brown was more appealing than Elvis Presley |
| B．An Elvis hair cut cost the orphans a lot of money |
| C．The author was fascinated with the stars Buster and Elvis |
| D．The barber was unwilling to give the boy an Elvis hair cut |
We can learn from the underlined sentence that the boy was __________.
| A．excited to have an Elvis hair cut |
| B．worried to think about the secret |
| C．anxious to remove the ton of bricks |
| D．careful to seize the chance |
How would the boy probably feel when he walked out of the barber shop?
| A．Delighted. | B．Guilty. |
| C．Self-satisfied. | D．Depressed. |
On April 16th, don't be surprised if the woman next to you on the subway looks like she forgot to get dressed for work. She won't be alone. People in their pajamas (睡衣裤)will be spotted all across the country—traveling on the subway, in line for their morning coffee, and even walking into office buildings. That's because people will be trading in their business suits for pajamas and celebrating National Wear Your Pajamas to Work Day.
There is nothing more comfortable than sitting at your desk in soft cotton flannel (法兰绒的）pajamas or wearing your favorite slippers while you deeply think about the day's tasks. The Pajama Gram Company, which produces and sells pajama, believes that Americans need a break, especially the day after income taxes are due. That's why they are celebrating National Wear Your Pajamas to Work Day.
Wearing pajamas to work can be relaxing and can actually help employees be more productive. David Alien, author of The Art of Stress-free Productivity, promotes (倡导）relaxation to increase productivity. "Our ability to be productive is directly proportional (成比例的）to our ability to relax," said Allen. "Only when our minds are clear and our thoughts are organized can we achieve stress free productivity."
At the Pajama Gram Company, it's not unusual to find employees wearing their pajamas at important meetings or at their desks. The company even invented the term" life is bananas, send some pajamas，"to describe how they feel about the world we live in.
The Pajama Grma Company offers over 100 styles of pajamas, robes, slippers and spa products. Each pajama gram gift comes along with beautiful pajamas, lavender(熏衣草)bath tea, Do-Not-Disturb sign for the door and a gift card. On April 16th, people in America often ________
| A．forget to change pajamas for work |
| B．do pajama business on the way to work |
| C．go to work in their pajamas |
| D．celebrate their traditional festival |
People celebrate this special day because they are expected to __________
| A．work in a more effective way |
| B．increase their ability to relax |
| C．spend less on their daily clothes |
| D．have more time to rest |
The underlined word "bananas" can be replaced by __________.
| A．easy and free |
| B．happy and interesting |
| C．crazy and busy |
| D．full of fruits |
According to the passage, which gifts will you receive from the Pajama Gram Company?
a. a sleepwear
b. a beautiful box
c. a Do-Not-Disturb sign
d. lavender bath tea
e. a personalized gift card
| A．c, d，e |
| B．a, c，d |
| C．b, c，d, e |
| D．a, c，d, e |
The main purpose of the passage is to __________.
| A．advertise the Pajama Gram Company |
| B．introduce a special day in America |
| C．describe the busy life in America |
| D．advise people to buy more pajamas |
At 227 billion yuan ($33 billion) for 2008, Guangdong's cultural industries accounted for 6.4 percent of its GDP and experienced a growth rate of 13.8 percent. But Lai admits that size does not equal weight. "Our businesses are mostly small, financing difficult and brands few."
One local brand that has made it big is Pleasant Goat and Big, Big Wolf, also translated as Happy Sheep and Gray Wolf, China's most popular cartoon series currently being aired. But Liu Manyi, general manager of Creative Power Entertaining Inc, the firm behind the hit show, is not laughing to the bank. Instead she is bitter: "Pirate discs were all over the streets before our first movie hit the screen. Their images appear on all kinds of products. All this has no proper licensing."
In case you don't know, China produces the largest amount of animated(动画的) programming in the world. But quantity is not quality. Behind every Pleasant Goat there are tens of thousands of flops. The best way for the government to promote the country's creative industries is to crack down on piracy (盗版). Hollywood often raises its voice about being victimized (受害) in China. Truth be told, Hollywood is probably the least affected since there is a quota system for China's importation of Hollywood films.
Many Chinese producers are taking baby steps and the domestic market is all they have. If their rights in the home market are not protected, they will never see the day their products find a foreign audience.
The sudden closure(关闭) of BT websites where copyrighted materials used to flow freely suggests a determination on the part of the government to take intellectual property rights seriously. This kind of websites is bad for us, so we should ban them.
Much of the news coming out of the 2009 International Cultural Industries Forum was encouraging. China's film industry is expected to get 6 billion yuan ($879 million) in box office receipts this year. A decade from now, this number may go up to 30 billion, according to some forecasts.
If the government takes serious action against online and offline pirates, China's creative industries may well have a bright future. What does the underlined sentence in Paragraph 1 mean?
| A．Fast as the development of Guangdong's cultural industries is, Guangdong's cultural industries don't have a big challenge in the world. |
| B．Guangdong's cultural industries can make a big profit although they are just the small companies. |
| C．Guangdong's cultural industries make a big contribution to its GDP because of their strong economic power. |
| D．The development of Guangdong's cultural industries cannot catch up with any other industries. |
What does Liu Manyi think about Pleasant Goat and Big, Big Wolf!
| A．It is a failure since it is a local brand. |
| B．It is a success but cannot get the expected profit. |
| C．Its profit from the images has been shared legally. |
| D．Pirate discs make it more popular among the children. |
Hollywood films are mentioned to tell us that __________.
| A．Hollywood films make our creative industries have less space to survive |
| B．it is piracy that makes it possible for Hollywood films to get less influenced |
| C．our creative industries need enough protection to have a bright future |
| D．foreign films have taken up more market in China than the local ones |
Which of the following statements is TRUE?
| A．Chinese creative industries are more advanced than foreign ones. |
| B．The domestic market is of little significance to the survival of Chinese creative industries. |
| C．BT websites stand in the way of the development of Chinese creative industries. |
| D．The growth of China's film industry is always slow and needs more support. |
In which column of a newspaper will you probably read this passage?
A. Regional.
B. Economic.
C. Sports.
D, Cartoon.
Mark and his brother Jason both were looking at the shining new computer enviously. Jason was determined not to go against their father’s wishes but Mark was more adventurous than his brother. He loved experimenting and his aim was to become a scientist like his father.
“Dad will be really mad if he finds out you’ve been playing with his new computer.” Jason said, “He told us not to touch it.”
“He won’t find out.” Mark said, “I’ll just have a quick look and shut it down.”
Mark had been scolded before for touching his father’s equipment. But his curiosity was difficult to control and this new computer really puzzled him.
“It was a strange-looking machine –one his dad had brought home from the laboratory where he worked. “It’s an experimental model,” his father had explained, “so don’t touch it under any circumstances.” But his warning only served to make Mark more curious. Without any further thought, Mark turned on the power switch. The computer burst into life and seconds later, the screen turned into colors, shifting and changing and then two big white words appeared in the center of the screen: “SPACE TRANSPORTER.”
“Yes!” Mark cried excitedly, “It’s a computer game. I knew it! Dad’s only been pretending to work. He’s really been playing games instead.” A new message appeared on the screen:
“ENTER NAMES
VOYAGER 1: …
VOYAGER 2: …”
Mark’s fingers flew across the keyboard as he typed in both of their names.
“INPUT ACCEPTED. START TRANSPORT PROGRAM. AUTO-RETRIEVE INITIATED（自动回收程序已启动）.”
The screen turned even brighter and a noise suddenly rose in volume.
“I think we’d better shut it off, Mark,” Jason yelled, reaching for the power switch. He was really frightened.
But his hand never reached the switch. A single beam of dazzling white light burst out of the computer screen, wrapping the boys in its glow (光芒), until they themselves seemed to be glowing. Then it died down just as suddenly as it had burst into life. And the boys were no longer there. On the screen, the letters changed.
“TRANSPORT SUCCESSFUL. DESTINATION: MARS. RETRIEVE DATE: 2025.”Why did Mark touch the computer against his father's warning?
| A．He wanted to take a voyage. |
| B．He wanted to practice his skill. |
| C．He was so much attracted by it. |
| D．He was eager to do an experiment. |
Where did the boys' father most likely work?
| A．In an electronic factory. |
| B．In a computer company. |
| C．In a scientific research center. |
| D．In an information processing center. |
Mark thought "SPACE TRANSPORTER" on the screen was the name of __________.
| A．a computer game |
| B．a company website |
| C．a software producer |
| D．an astronomy program |
Why did Jason want to shut off the computer?
| A．He was afraid of being scolded. |
| B．He didn't like the loud noise and light. |
| C．He didn't want to play games any more. |
| D．He was afraid something dangerous might happen. |
What happened to the boys at the end of the story?
| A．They were blown into the air. |
| B．They were sent to another planet. |
| C．They were hidden in the strong light. |
| D．They were carried away to another country. |