【推荐3】They’re tough breeds and they have complicated names to match. But free-spirited Aussie dogs Tank the Rottweiler-cross and Muck the Staffie-cross instinctively (本能地) knew when a small child was in danger, and their protective _______ prevented a tragedy.

One December afternoon, Georgie Hillier thought her two-year-old son Max was playing in the back garden of their home. But when she went to check, there was no _______ of Max or their dog Tank. When she couldn’t find them, she jumped in her car and started to _______ the neighboring property. She was frightened that her son could have fallen into one of the dams.

Then she found Tank with the neighbor’s dog Muck. They were both running around the dams, barking furiously and _______ in mud.

“I just panicked. I was running around, checking the sides of the dams,“ Georgie told Sara Hicks. _______ she kept searching, a neighbor called the police. Eventually, a woman who had found Max heard Georgie’s calls and brought the _______ kid out to her.

There was no one there to _______ what exactly happened, but Michael Beattie from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals took up the story. “When the police arrived on the _______, they saw quite distinct drag marks. It was _______ that young Max had actually been pulled out of the dam by one of the dogs - most likely Tank. Max was making moves to go back into the dam and Muck was virtually heading him off at the pass. It was the police’s opinion that the only way that Max was ____________ from drowning was by the two dogs. ”

For saving the toddler’s life, the daring two dogs received the RSPCA’s Purple Cross award for bravery- plus two very large bones.

【推荐1】In late 2021, I began to have a little bit of a midlife crisis. When my father was 48 years old, he had a heart attack that nearly ended his life. As I _________ my mid-forties, I knew that I needed to make a change in my life. I wanted to do something _________ to prove to myself and everyone else around me that I wasn’t going to have the same fate.

As I was trying to determine what kind of _________ that I wanted to set, I found a _________ called The Rut. The Rut is a series of races that are _________ in Big Sky, Montana every September. There’s multiple distances, but the 28 Kilometer _________ is the most popular, as well as the most _________ of the entire series. This race is regularly listed in the top ten most difficult races in the world. It involves almost 8,000 feet of elevation (海拔)_________ . This was the type of race I was _________ .

I also did a detailed training __________ . Even if I was traveling for business, I would stick to it and never __________ a workout (训练). And then came race day.

That day, Big Sky Montana, was unseasonably __________ , almost 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The race is going almost entirely above tree line, which means that you just are __________ to the elements (恶劣天气) nearly the entire time. Many people __________ out of the race halfway. But I finished it. When I reached the finish line, I was greeted by my wife and children, also friends that had traveled with us to Big Sky that day. This was the biggest challenge I had made for myself, but I __________ it.

【推荐2】I was talking to some friends while standing in line in the cafeteria at my middle school. As I started to share a funny story, my friend Elizabeth _______ me. “Coco! Coco!” she called out. Everyone laughed. This is so _______, I thought. I felt a little bit uncomfortable.

However, I never wanted to ask what “Coco” meant. I _______ it was a code word for a cute boy. Elizabeth was one of the girls that everyone wanted to be friends with. I felt _______ to be friends with her. Later, I noticed that Elizabeth often said bad things about other kids. I would have never said those things about someone, but to fit in, I _______ when Elizabeth said them.

One day, a classmate stopped by my locker and said to me, “‘Coco’ means Elizabeth thinks you’re being _______. It’s really mean.” My eyes filled with tears. I couldn’t _______ it.

The next day, at lunchtime, I sat beside Macy, who was sitting with another two girls and who had always seemed nice, _______ that she didn’t know about Coco. “You know Elizabeth is mean, right?” My heart _______. She knew. Before I could respond, Macy said, “You didn’t ________ to be treated that way, and nobody else does either.” I smiled and then talked to my new friends with ________. We laughed a lot, and no one interrupted with a mean code word.

Most adolescents are attempting to ________ who they are and who they want to be. The word Coco will always serve as a(n) ________ that I need to stay ________ to myself and never compromise my values to be friends with someone. Because with ________ friends, I won’t have to.

【推荐3】Teaching is one of those jobs where people expect you to constantly be “on”. It’s a job that you can never _________ at work: there’s always planning, marking, or thinking about your _________ 一like when it’s 9：00 pm and you’re _________ if the feedback you gave on a class _________ was a little too constructive (有建设性的), and make a mental note to check in with them the next day.

Sometimes, I felt that teaching becomes my _________ life.

In the beginning of my first year teaching in China, I did not have a life outside of work. I was constantly thinking about the next day’s _________ my students are going to take part in, or planning for the _________ lesson. For the entire two months of the first term, I was a living _________: I would wake up, go to work, stay late after school to mark or plan, come home to _________ and then get back to planning until bedtime. I did not ____________ take one day off for the first 5 months.

I knew that I should not let work ____________ my life, but despite how much effort I was putting in, I would sometimes still feel unprepared. The thought of not putting in that effort made me ____________ about going into the classroom the next day.

As the months went on, that gradually ____________ I wouldn’t stay so late after school and I would ____________ more at home. I would take days off for my mental health. Sometimes, I wonder if all that is a( n) ____________ of getting better with experience, or if it’s just laziness . . . I say it’s mostly experience.

【推荐3】I was ten when my mother was diagnosed with cancer. Prior to that, she had been a(n) _______ woman, active to an extent most people found astonishing. As a child, I was amazed by her accomplishments. But at thirty-one, her life _______. And so did mine.

She could do anything, I _______. She won tennis tournaments. She took photographs and held her own exhibition. She _______ as a newspaper columnist, and she cooked Spanish dishes for the family.

Now, she faced her illness with the same _______. Words like “disabled” and “physical therapy” became part of a(n) _______ new world we entered together. _______, I began to help take care of her. And it became routine to _______ her into the kitchen, where she instructed me in the _______ of peeling carrots and potatoes and how to prepare a decent breakfast.

Every accomplishment was a ________ for us both: the electric typewriter, the car with power steering and brakes, her return to ________, where she earned a master’s degree in special education. She eventually founded an activist support group called The Handicappers. One day, without ________ much beforehand, she took me to a Handicappers meeting. I had never seen so many people with so many ________. I returned home, thinking how ________ we really were.

Because my mother accepted her condition with such optimism, I rarely felt sad or resentful about it. Instead, I viewed her drive to look forward to things I ________ as a great mystery and powerful inspiration in my life.