The Voice in the Box
When I was quite young, my family had one of the first telephones in our neighborhood. I remember well the polished the wooden case fastened to the wall on the lower stair landing. But my first personal experience with this genie-in-the-receiver came one day while my mother was visiting a neighbor. Amusing myself at the tool bench, I hurt my finger with a hammer. The pain was terrible, but there didn’t seem to be much use crying, because there was no one home to offer sympathy. I walked around the house, and finally arriving at the stairway. The telephone! Quickly I ran for the footstool and dragged it to the landing. Climbing up, I unhooked the receiver and held it to my ear. “Information Please,” I said into the mouthpiece just above my head.
A click or two, and a small, clear voice spoke into my ear, “Information.”
“I hurt my finger…” I cried into the phone. The tears came readily enough, now that I had an audience.
“Isn’t your mother home?” came the question.
“Nobody’s home but me.” I sobbed.
“Are you bleeding?”
“No,” I replied. “I hit my finger with the hammer and it hurts.”
“Can you open your icebox?” she asked. I said I could. “Then break off a little piece of ice and hold it on your finger. That will stop the hurt. Be careful when you use the icepick(冰锥),” she said, “And don’t cry. You’ll be all right.”
After that, I called Information Please for everything. I asked her for help with my geography and she told me where Philadelphia was, and the Orinoco, the romantic river that I was going to explore when I grew up. She helped me with my arithmetic, and she told me that my pet chipmunk----I had caught him in the park just the day before----would eat fruit and nuts.
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Since I was young, I always enjoyed cooking. Every night I would sit in the kitchen and watch my mother make dinner. I had a toy set of pots and pans, and would mimic (模仿) her actions at the table -pretending to pour in ingredients and mix them excitedly just as she did.
On Sundays, my grandmother would make us a huge family dinner. Watching her in the kitchen was like watching an artist at work. She never needed a cookbook, never had to follow a recipe. Everything was second nature. I couldn’t wait to learn to cook myself.
So it was no surprise when as an adult, I decided to be a chef. I had worked in a number of kitchens over the years, but when I got the chance to be the head chef at a new restaurant, I could not have been more excited.
On the first night the restaurant opened, I proudly put my apron on and prepared for success. Soon, orders came in, and the kitchen was at full staff running in every direction. There were many waiters coming in and out, and cooks walking between stations. It was very exciting, but a bit nerve-racking. There was so much to do and a lot of pressure to do it perfectly. It seemed like the crowd was not slowing down.
I was hurrying to gather ingredients from the shelves and fill the orders when there was a scream from the other side of the kitchen. Looking over, I saw one of the other cooks holding her hand in pain. She had burned her fingers on a pan. I ran over to help, and as we placed her hand under cold water, a puff of smoke started to rise out of the oven.
“Oh no!” I screamed. I reached the oven just in time to open the door and see the charred (烧焦的) remains of a roast. Placing my hand on my head, I thought the night couldn’t get much worse.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
One of the waiters came into the kitchen, looking very worried.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________One of the guests asked to speak to the chef.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Missus Sommers one day found herself the unexpected owner of fifteen dollars. It seemed to her a very large amount of money. For a day or two she walked around in a dreamy state as she thought about her choices. Her daughter Janie was wearing worn shoes and needed new ones. She would buy cloth for new shirts for the boys. Her daughter Mag should have another dress. And still there would be enough left for new stockings for her children. The idea about how to spend the dollars made her restless with excitement.
On the day she planned to go shopping with the money, she ate a light meal- no! Between getting the children fed and the house cleaned, and preparing herself to go shopping, she forgot to eat at all!
When she arrived at the large department store, she spotted a pile of silk stockings at the entrance. A sign nearby announced that they had been reduced in price a young girl behind the counter asked her if she wished to examine the silky leg coverings. She smiled as if she had been asked to inspect diamond jewelry, and started to feel the soft, expensive items. Missus Sommers picked up a black pair and looked at them closely. Two red marks suddenly showed on her pale face. She looked up at the shop girl and said proudly, “Well, I will buy this pair.”
Missus Sommers changed her cotton stockings for the new silk ones in the ladies’ rest area. She had let herself be controlled by some machine-like force that directed her actions and freed her of responsibility. How good was the touch of the silk on her skin! Then she put her shoes back on and put her old stockings into her bag. Next, she went to the shoe department, where she tried on a pair of new boots. Her foot and ankle looked lovely. She could not believe that they were a part of herself.
注意：1.所续写短文的词数应为150左右；
2.至少使用5个短文中标有下划线的关键词语；
3.续写部分分为两段，每段的开头语已为你写好；
4.续写完成后，请用下划线标出你所使用的关键词语。
Paragraph 1：
After buying a pair of new boots, she walked into the clothing department.
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Paragraph 2：
She was about to leave the store when a kid running around reminded her of something.
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When I worked as a nurse, I was on day duty and while my friends were on night duty. On one shift, I remember I sensed something just before going off duty at 11am. I had brought the ward sister her morning tea, so I put down the tea tray. The tray rattled and fell through the window. At first I thought I had accidentally knocked it over, but then I felt the whole building shook and patients screamed.
I realized that we were in the grips of a tremendous earthquake. I caught hold of a nearby patient, who was terribly frightened by it. I pushed her under the bed and held the bed in place while I got under it myself. I then pulled a blanket down between us. As soon as it settled, I decided to try and get the patient safely outside, I carried her out and helped her down to the lawn, where several other people now had gathered.
I knew the ward sister was with another patient, so I went back inside the building. When I reached the ward sister, I found her patient couldn’t walk. We made a seat for her by linking our hands and arms, and carried her outside together. We went back through the building to check no one was left behind. Almost all of the patients had been able to get themselves out of our ward, as far as I knew.
Once our ward was cleared, a doctor called for volunteers to go down to the isolation ward with him to help more people. Another nurse and I went down there. The first thing we saw was a bath in the hallway, We came to the ruined ward. The doctor went in ahead of us through the remains of what had been a doorway. He found one of the nurses partially covered with rubble (碎石). She was still alive so we began to clear the rubble away. Suddenly the aftershock struck. The doctor ordered us to leave. This brave man intended to stay with the trapped nurse and risk his own life.
注意：1. 所叙写的短文词数应为150左右；
2. 应使用5个以上短文中标有下划线的关键词语；
3. 叙写部分分为两段，每段的开头语已为你写好；
4. 叙写完成后，用下划线标出你所使用的关键词语。
We were determined to save the nurse with him together.
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Later in the afternoon I had time to look around, and saw the ruined building.
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