Maybe it's because it was our first purchase as homeowners. The salesman must have spotted just how green we were, so he began persuading. And soon he led us to a classic leather chair. All these years later, I remember he used words like rich and handsome, the thing every living room needed.
We believed him. So we bought that chair — just less than $100, a great deal in the 1970s for a young couple!
How we loved that chair! It always occupied a place of honor in our various living rooms, moving with us from our first tiny house to our beloved new house.
Somehow, conversations were better on that chair, and life was more fun around it. Three daughters spilled their secrets on it. Old friends seemed to be attracted by it on those wonderful occasions. Crazy as it sounds, that leather chair seemed to have — well, powers. All for good.
At first, we didn't really care that the leather was showing signs of wear or that it had lost its sheen (光泽). But in our most recent move, when the chair was moved in our new living room, it suddenly looked terribly lonely sitting close to newly painted walls and a couple of shiny new tables.
My husband and I tried but still we couldn't ignore the rough spots. Our chair had a skin disease. Even our adult kids raised eyebrows, urging us to at least remove the chair to some dark corner of the room. Neither of us could imagine such a retirement for it.
So we had an inspired idea. We'd call in an upholsterer (修理工) to give our old chair a whole new life. Our friend Joe studied the chair and then took out a simple leather conditioner. He explained that although it wouldn't work miracles, it would definitely get our weary chair looking younger again. It certainly doesn't look new, but its seat and back are shining, and some of its deeper wrinkles have lightened.
Best of all, it's back in the living room, looking like a wise old friend to the furniture around it. And, yes, there it will stay.
Because some things, like some people, just deserve a happy old age.
1. How did the salesman persuade the author into buying the chair?| A．By thinking highly of the author. |
| B．By saying that the author was green. |
| C．By describing how great the chair was. |
| D．By comparing the chair with others. |
| A．Sweet memories with the chair. |
| B．Various functions of the chair. |
| C．People's comments on the chair. |
| D．Family activities and parties of friends. |
| A．Because he was persuaded by Joe. |
| B．Because he didn't have enough money. |
| C．Because it showed signs of hardness. |
| D．Because it couldn't match his new house. |
| A．East or west, home is best. | B．From saving comes having. |
| C．It is never too late to mend. | D．Old friends and wine are best. |
相似题推荐
【推荐1】“Serena, don’t forget your promise to me that you will mow (割) Mrs Matin’s yard this weekend,” said Dad, “Don’t let me down.”
Serena was the oldest child in the family, and one of her chores was to mow their yard. Mrs Martin, their elderly neighbor, was unable to take care of her yard, so Serena’s dad had volunteered Serena for this job. Since Mrs Martin’s yard was not very big, Serena knew the job would go quickly. However, she still resented her dad’s promise.
“Why didn’t you ask me first?” Serena had complained.
“Did you ask me first when you volunteered me to be in the school festival last fall?” asked Serena’s father.
“Well, no. I didn’t ask you first, but you would have done those things anyway. You’re always willing to help.”
“I try when I can,” Dad answered. “Serena, we have known Mrs Martin for a very long time. She has often helped our family. Now we can do something for her. Besides, the feeling you get from helping someone makes you wonder who is really helping whom.”
“I don’t know, Dad,” said Serena. “The only feeling I get from mowing our yard is tired.”
“Just you wait and see,” said Dad.
After breakfast, Serena made her way to Mrs Martin’s yard. She was good at her job and soon had Mrs Martin’s yard looking tidy. Mrs Martin came outside with a big glass of orange juice and offered it to her. Serena stopped her work and gratefully enjoyed the drink, while Mrs Martin talked to her about all of the flowers in her yard. Seeing the joy in Mrs Martin’s eyes, Serena began to understand how much the yard meant to Mrs. Martin.
After finishing her drink, Serena returned to work with a new attitude. A warm feeling began to spread through her body. Her dad was right. It was hard to tell who was helping whom!
1. The underlined word “resented” (Paragraph 2) means __________.| A．understood | B．disliked | C．welcomed | D．broke |
| A．Through Dad’s words. | B．Through Serena’s actions. |
| C．Through Mrs Martin’s behaviour. | D．Through the author’s statement. |
| A．Serena likes the job of mowing her family’s yard. |
| B．Mrs Martin shared her love for the yard with Serena. |
| C．Mrs. Martin and Serena did the work together |
| D．Dad volunteered himself to take part in the school festival. |
【推荐2】If you could have one superpower, what would it be?
Dreaming about whether you would want to read minds, see through walls, or have superhuman strength may sound silly, but it actually gets to the heart of what really matters in your life.
Every day in our work, we are inspired by the people we meet doing extraordinary things to improve the world.
They have a different kind of superpower that all of us possess: the power to make a difference in the lives of others.
We’re not saying that everyone needs to contribute their lives to the poor. Your lives are busy enough doing homework, playing sports, making friends, seeking after your dreams. But we do think that you can live a more powerful life when you devote some of your time and energy to something much larger than yourself. Find an issue you are interested in and learn more. Volunteer or, if you can, contribute a little money to a cause. Whatever you do, don’t be a bystander. Get involved. You may have the opportunity to make your biggest difference when you’re older. But why not start now?
Our own experience working together on health, development, and energy the last twenty years has been one of the most rewarding parts of our lives. It has changed who we are and continues to fuel our optimism about how much the lives of the poorest people will improve in the years ahead.
1. What does the underlined part in Paragraph 2 refer to?| A．Your life style. | B．Your life value. |
| C．Your trouble in life. | D．Your life experience. |
| A．They possess different kinds of superpowers. |
| B．They have got the power to change the world. |
| C．Some people around them are making the world better. |
| D．There are many powerful people in their life and work. |
| A．Learning more and contributing more to a cause. |
| B．Rising above self and acting to help others. |
| C．Working hard to get a bigger opportunity. |
| D．Trying your best to help the poor. |
【推荐3】When I was a kid, my mom set aside some breakfast food for supper every now and then. I remember one night after a long, hard day at work, my mom placed a plate of eggs, sausage, and a plate of extremely burnt biscuits on the table. I waited to see if my dad would get annoyed.
All my dad did was to reach for the biscuits, smile at my mom and ask me how my day at school had been. I don’t remember what I told him that night but I do remember watching him add butter and jelly on that ugly burnt biscuit and ate every bite of that thing. He never made a face nor uttered a word about it!
When I rose from the table that evening, I remember hearing my mom apologize to my dad for overcooking the biscuits and I will never forget what he said, “Honey, I love burnt biscuits every now and then.”
Later that night I went to say goodnight to my daddy, and I wondered if he really liked his biscuits burnt. He wrapped me up in his arms and said gently, “Your mom put in a hard day at work today and she is really tired. Besides, a little burnt biscuit never hurt anyone!
As I have grown older, I’ve thought about that many times. Life is full of imperfect things and imperfect people. Learning to accept each other’s faults and choosing to celebrate each other’s differences contribute to a healthy, growing, and lasting relationship. We could extend this philosophy to any relationship, such as a husband-wife, parent-child, or friendship. Don’t put the key to your happiness in someone else’s pocket. Keep it in your own. So, please pass me a biscuit, and yes, the burnt one will do just fine.
1. How did the author’s dad react to the burnt biscuit?| A．He set it aside for breakfast. | B．He ate butter and jelly instead. |
| C．He uttered his complaints loudly. | D．He ate it up as if nothing happened. |
| A．Show understanding to imperfect things. |
| B．Ask the children to respect their parents. |
| C．Enjoy the over-cooked biscuits willingly. |
| D．Make important decisions on your own. |
| A．History and culture. | B．Family and relationship. |
| C．Cuisine and health. | D．Entertainment and sports. |
【推荐1】I’m now at a special university where 46 speech and hearing impaired (受损) students graduate each year. Every morning, I made it a practice of setting the intention (意图) in my heart of “May I be a tool for them to get what they need right now?”.
Today, one girl came and sat down. I started with how we usually do. She can speak but cannot hear and lip-read. I asked one question, and she went on for 10 minutes straight, and in Tamil (泰米尔语). I understood a couple of words here and there, so I understood that she was not saying anything connected with what I asked. I just kept on listening to her without speaking a word. This went on for an hour and a half! Then, after a long pause, I told her to get back on track with another question. And then she shared for another half an hour straight! The whole time I was just looking in her eyes which would go here and there but come back to me. In the end, I just got up and hugged her and she was smiling wider.
Then I invited her to have juice with me. She said yes. What put me in a state of fear was realizing, just a few minutes later, that treating my new friend to some juice was the first celebration of my very first salary! A month ago, I started my first job, and what a blessing to have this important moment in my life be rooted in generosity.
1. What was the writer’s intention according to Paragraph 1?| A．A doubt. | B．A wish. | C．A struggle. | D．A guess. |
| A．required her to speak in English | B．discovered something strange about her |
| C．asked her questions as usual | D．began to teach her to lip-read |
| A．She asked the writer to speak. |
| B．She listened most of the time herself. |
| C．She stared at the writer’s eyes all the time. |
| D．She went on talking for 1.5 hours before a long pause. |
| A．Glad. | B．Regretful. | C．Bitter. | D．Grateful. |
【推荐2】James ran his first 30 kilometres. It was not easy for him, but he made it. Months earlier, he wasn't in any condition to run five miles, let alone 18.6 miles, the distance of a 30 kilometres.
One day, early in the morning, my wife Lisa discovered that our older son, James, had been playing video games since he got home from school the previous day. What she found angered both of us.
We were sick of the amount of time James spent playing video games. He would often sleep until 2:00 p.m. on Saturdays because he stayed up playing games until 3:00 in the morning.
Driven to break our son's life style, we tried several different approaches, like limiting the amount of time he was allowed to play games each day, but we couldn't find anything that worked consistently. He always seemed to go back to the game, especially when we were not there to monitor him.
It's not that I'm against video games; I am just against playing them every waking moment at the expense of exercise. In an attempt to ensure that our kids did not become addicted to games, I came up with an idea: Game time in our house would have to be earned, just like money. Each mile run equals 30 minutes of video-game play. We put no limit on the number of miles James could run in a day, so the only limit to the amount of time he played was based on how far he decided to run. The first couple of days didn't go very well. James got sick of the idea and refused to run at all. Eventually, James decided he would give running a shot.
It never occurred to him that running was giving him a sense of purpose. James even planned to join a marathon and hoped to become the youngest family member to complete one. It was my hope that running teaches him to invest his time in worthwhile causes, not just video games. I never want him to stop challenging himself.
1. What do we know about James at the beginning?| A．He stayed up learning. | B．He was a video game addict. |
| C．He was academic. | D．He could control the amount of time playing games. |
| A．Indifferent. | B．Favorable. |
| C．Objective. | D．Opposed. |
| A．It was beneficial and meaningful. | B．It was tiring and meaningless. |
| C．It was boring and difficult. | D．It was skillful and exhausting. |
【推荐3】I write this on a spring morning, in the van I have called home for two years now.
From one small window, I have a view of joggers pounding the sunny path by the Oxford Canal, and the other looks onto the busy railway line along which trains travel from Southampton Docks to Birmingham.
The woods where I’ve parked my van have grown up between them. This ancient van, a vehicle designed for freedom and the open road, has proved a stable solution for surviving the current housing crisis.
I became a travel writer after my studies ended, committing to brief “residencies” with museums and art centres—where temporary accommodation is often provided in exchange for producing new work about a community. Over the years that followed, living and working on location in the polar regions or Scandinavia or the Alps, not settling down for very long, meant wherever I landed was always “home”.
It was necessary to adopt a more permanent engagement with locality. Oxford had often drawn me back. It’s a crossroads of reality and the imagination, the perfect city for a writer.
It takes a surprising amount of work to keep a tiny home in order: buying a used van online; ensuring the smooth running of a gas cooker and car batteries; fetching water and emptying the mobile toilet. I began to enjoy taking care of my immediate surroundings. Over the summer, I worked to turn waste-ground into a wild garden, replacing weeds with wild plants.
I made friends with the self-sufficient boaters living nearby, always ready to share knowledge on the low-carbon simplicity of life without electricity. I’ve learnt that comfort can be found away from the bright infrastructure of urban life: in watching the birds that nest in the tree and the foxes playing in the woods at dawn, in making a cup of coffee on a spring morning.
My step away from conventional housing has been a necessary act of personal economy, but the benefits include taking nothing for granted, and unexpected delight.
1. The writer makes the van his home because ______.| A．the feature of the van and that of his occupation are matching |
| B．the van equals to a crossroads of reality and the imagination |
| C．the views of joggers and trains outside of it can relieve his pressure |
| D．living and working on location in the polar regions are appealing to him |
| A．a used van | B．a gas cooker | C．a wild garden | D．a mobile toilet |
| A．Joining joggers to do exercise. | B．Keeping a tiny home in order easily. |
| C．Improving the economy of Oxford. | D．Embracing delightful surprises. |
【推荐1】阅读下面短文，并按照题目要求用英语回答问题。
Luke has always been my closest companion these past five years. As you already know, there have been a lot of forest fires during the summer season. Many forests are badly damaged by fire each year. Not far from our shelter, a forest caught fire during this hot summer. We are on July, a heat wave which has been going on for three days.
Luke rushed towards the forest where flames send out a fierce heat. There’s no longer any hope at the moment to wait for Luke to come back to the shelter. In fact, I was waiting for the fire brigade(消防队) to announce me his death in the forest. Suddenly, a fireman burst into my office and informed me that my dog Luke succeeded to save four kittens who were trapped by the flames. According to the fireman, Luke seized the kittens, one by one moving them to a safe place.
I immediately accompanied the fireman to the forest to pick up the rescued kittens. Once on the scene of the incident, Luke was not there. Then we heard the sound of a dog came from the forest barking. I recognized the sound of my dog Luke. The firemen followed the tracks of the dog until they found him barking loudly by the side of an injured fireman who was lying on the ground and desperately waiting for rescue.
Thanks to Luke, four kittens and a fireman were saved. That day, I was very proud of Luke for his two heroic actions. Luke showed much compassion for both animals like him and for a human being who was trying to put out the fire with his colleagues. Truth to tell, my happiness is great and immeasurable.
I paid a visit to the fireman in his house accompanied with my lovely Luke. What a memorable scene when the fireman hugged Luke tightly to his chest! “One thousand thanks, Luke, for saving my life,” the fireman said.
This true story of love and compassion shows us that pets are loving, caring and compassionate. We should love and protect them. Don’t belittle them. Little animals can make enormous things for humans.
1. What happened near the author’s shelter this summer? (no more than 10 words)
【推荐2】If there's one memory Anna wanted to keep from her experiences during the Second World War, it was her son, Andrzej.Anna,89, lost touch with him when she was forced to leave her native Poland and sent to a labor camp in Austria more than 60 years ago.Now,64，Andrzej hugged his mother at the airport, who had been waiting for him.
Andrzej searched for his mother for more than 50 years, almost giving up. But his mother made the first phone call. Unluckily, he wrote down his mother's phone number wrong and spent another month trying to reach her again. When he did, the two talked regularly on the phone for two months to break down the language barrier. Anna can hardly speak Polish over the years and Andrzej doesn't speak English.
After the war, Anna could not find her son and went to Italy, finally ending up in Great Britain，the US，then Canada 45 years ago. She used the Internet to track her son，making phone calls with no luck. Meanwhile Andrzej contacted( 接 触 ) the Polish Red Cross last year to help in his search. At last, they locate each other at the same time. Andrzej will spend a month with his mother in Britain.
1. The labor camp where Anna was sent was in________.| A．Poland | B．Austria | C．Germany | D．France |
| A．Over 30 years. | B．Over 40 years. |
| C．Over 50 years. | D．Over 60 years. |
| A．He had to learn English first |
| B．He needed some time to prove the news |
| C．He put down a wrong phone number |
| D．He had another special and important task to do. |
| A．Andrzej can speak English. |
| B．Anna went to Italy 40 years ago. |
| C．Anna is too old to use the Internet at present. |
| D．Andrzej turned to the Polish Red Cross for help last year. |
【推荐3】Navy officer Allen Parton suffered a serious head injury while on duty in the Gulf War. It left him in a wheelchair, unable to talk, and he lost half of his life’s memories. He couldn’t remember his children’s first steps, their first days at school, and their being born. Allen didn’t even recognize his children. And he lost the ability to feel any emotion. He had two attempts at killing himself in the process of recovery.
But all changed when coming across a dog named Endal, who failed his training to be an assistance dog and needed a home. Endal saw something on the floor by Allen's wheelchair, ran across the training centre, picked it up and put it in Allen's lap. He wanted a treat, a reward, praise, anything, but he got no reaction. Then he ran over to the mock-up supermarket, took a tin off the shelf, put it in Allen’s lap. Surprisingly, that made Allen’s brain switch on and he smiled for the first time in a long time. And it was the start of their relationship.
Endal became his 24-hour companion, helping with every practical aspect of his life.
Then one night, which showed the dog’s devotion, Allen and Endal were both hit by a car. Although Allen had been knocked unconscious out of the wheelchair and Endal had been hurt by the vehicle as well, he got up, pulled Allen into the recovery position, and he pulled out the blanket from under Allen's wheelchair and covered him with it.
Legs bleeding, he ran to a nearby hotel and sounded the alarm. Before that, he found Allen’s mobile phone in the dark, and he brought it to his face.
And for what he did to his owner he won the Victoria Cross Award.
The dog saved Allen’s life, his marriage, and brought him back to his children.
1. Which of the following statements is true?| A．Allen graduated from a famous navy school. |
| B．The serious injury left Allen in a wheelchair. |
| C．Allen once wanted to kill himself during the war. |
| D．Endal used to be an assistance dog. |
| A．The dog. | B．The supermarket. |
| C．The tin. | D．The dog’s behaviour. |
a. covered Allen with the blanket
b. pulled Allen into the recovery position
c. brought Allen’s mobile phone to his face
d. sounded the alarm
e. came to a nearby hotel
| A．b→a→e→d→c | B．b→a→c→e→d |
| C．a→b→c→e→d | D．a→b→e→d→c |
| A．ability | B．cuteness | C．knowledge | D．devotion |
