2 . We’ve all been there before. You’re driving down the road when suddenly a pothole(凹坑) seems to appear out of nowhere and sends the _________ bumping. Most people think potholes are _________, but artist Jim Bachor sees them as canvases (画布) for his artworks.

Bachor uses the _________ art form of mosaic(马赛克) to create eye-catching and colorful images of famous people or simple every day _________ like food. He even makes less-appealing visuals of insects.

Bachor was a graphic designer for 20 years before he began his _________ in mosaic. He regards an incidental trip to Europe as his motivation for changing his career. While _________ in Italy, Bachor fell in love with Pompeii, the preserved ancient Roman city. A tour guide pointed out a mosaic, mainly made of glass and marble, and told Bachor, “Glass and marble don’t _________. So, this looks essentially the same as the artist intended.” Bachor says, “That kind of staying power just _________ me so much.”

A year later Bachor returned to attend a mosaic class in Ravenna, Italy, to learn the proper way to _________ the ancient technique. Years after that, he mastered the technique. He __________ that mosaic could be just as significant today as the art form over 1,000 years ago. “I just saw that there was a(n) __________ to bring it into the new age as a contemporary subject,” he says.

So, Bachor decided to make a series of __________ for those potholes. He has __________ mosaic art around Chicago, Detroit and New York City.

While he may not get __________ from drivers or passengers, Bachor’s art is __________ a pleasant surprise to discover.

3 . Last night I was driving from Harrisburg to Lewisburg, a ________ of about eighty miles. It was late and I was in a hurry. However, if anyone asked me how fast I was ________, I’d say I was not over-speeding. Several times I got________ behind a slow- moving truck on a narrow road, and I was holding my fists tightly with________.

At one point along an open highway, I________ crossroads with a traffic light. I was alone on the road by now, but as I ________ the light, it turned red and I braked to a stop. I looked left, right and behind me. Nothing. No cars, no suggestion of headlights, but there I sat, waiting for the light to ________, the only human being for at least a mile in any________.

I started________ why I refused to run the light. I was not afraid of being________, because there was obviously no police-man around, and there certainly would have been no________ in going through it.

Much later that night, after I________ a group of my friends in Lewisburg and climbed into bed near midnight, the question of why I’d stopped for that light________ me. I think I stopped because it’s part of a contract we all have with each other. It’s not only the________ but it’s an arrangement we have, and we trust each other to ________ it: we don’t go through red lights. Like most of us, I’m more likely to be________ from doing something bad by the social convention that________ it than by any law against it.

It’s amazing that we ever________ each other to do the right thing, isn’t it? And we do, too! Trust is our________ preference.

I was so ________ of myself for stopping for the red light that night.

5 . Most forms of conventional advertising — print, radio and broadcast television — have been losing ground to online ads for years; only billboards, dating back to the 1800s, and TV ads are holding their own. Such out-of-home advertising, as it is known, is anticipated to__________ by 3.4% in 2024, and digital out-of-home (DOOH) advertising, which includes the LCD screens found in airports and shopping malls, by 16%. Such ads draw viewers’ attention from phones and cannot be skipped or __________, unlike ads online.

Billboard owners are also __________ the location data that are pouring off people’s smartphones. Information about their owners’ locations and online browsing gets collected and sold to media owners. They then use these data to work out when different groups — “business travellers”, say — walk by their ads. That__________ is added to insights into traffic, weather and other external data to produce highly relevant ads. DOOH __________ can deliver ads for coffee when it is cold and iced drinks when it is warm.

Such __________ works particularly well when it is combined with “programmatic” advertising methods, a term that describes the use of data to automate and improve ads. In the past year billboard owners such as Clear Channel and jcDecaux have __________ programmatic platforms which allow brands and media buyers to select, purchase and place ads in minutes, rather than days or weeks. It is said that outdoor ads will increasingly be bought like online ones, based on audience and views as well as__________.

That is possible because billboard owners claim to be able to __________ how well their ads are working, even though no “click-through” rates are involved. Data firms can tell advertisers how many people walk past individual advertisements at particular times of the day. Advertisers can estimate how many individuals __________ to an ad for a handbag then go on to visit a nearby shop (or website) and buy the product. Such metrics make outdoor ads more__________, automated and measurable, argues Michael Provenzano, co-founder of Vistar Media, an ad-tech firm in New York.

However, the outdoor-ad revolution is not free of __________ . The collection of mobile-phone data raises privacy concerns. And __________ of the online-ad business for being vague, and occasionally dishonest, may also be targeted at the DOOH business as it becomes bigger and more complex. The industry is ready to__________ such concerns, says Jean-Christophe Conti, chief executive of VIOOH, a media-buying platform. One of the__________ of following the online-ad pioneers, he notes, is learning from their mistakes.

6 . If Confucius (孔子) were still alive today and could celebrate his September 28 birthday with a big cake, there would be a lot of ________. He’d need a fan or a ________ to help him put them out.

While many people in China will remember Confucius on his special day, ________ people in the United States will give him a passing thought. It’s nothing personal. Most Americans don’t even ________ the birthdays of their own ________.

But this doesn’t ________ that Americans don’t care about Confucius. In many ways he has become a ________ that foreigners must cross if they want to ________ a deeper understanding of China.

In the past two decades, the Chinese studies programs have ________ huge popularity in Western universities. ________, the Chinese government has ________ Confucius Institutes in more than 80 ________. These schools teach both Chinese ________ and culture. The main courses of Chinese culture usually ________ Chinese art, history and philosophy (哲学). Some social scientists suggest that Westerners should take advantages of the ancient Chinese wisdom to make up for the ________ of Western philosophy. Students in the United States, at the same time, are racing to ________ Chinese. So they will be ________ for life in a world where China is an equal power with the United States. Businessmen who hope to make money in China are reading books about ________ to understand their Chinese customers. So the old thinker’s ideas are still alive.

Today China ________ the West more than ever, and it will need more teachers to introduce Confucius and Chinese culture to the West.

As for the old thinker, he will not be forgotten by people in the West, even if his ________ is.

8 . I was ready for bed. My eyes fell on the musical _________ on my bedside table. In it was a photo of Dad smiling, and once opened, it would play his _________ song recorded before his death. It was propped (支撑) open just enough so the recording wouldn’t play.

Dad was a _________ man. He was always singing me his little made-up songs to share joy although he was _________ off-key, not hitting every note.

Dad was a man with big heart. When my house burned down a few years ago, Dad _________ my family into his home. When we tried to offer some _________, he said with his characteristic voice, “Don’t be _________!”

With happy _________, I fell asleep.

“Beautiful and marvelous!”

Suddenly, I was awoken hours later by the _________ song. The card! I snapped it shut (啪的一声合上).

How did that card just start playing? I checked the windows, all tightly shut. But why couldn’t I __________ the feeling that something was wrong?

I decided to __________ downstairs. Opening the door to the laundry room, I was hit with a strong smell of __________. The heat lamp had fallen, and the carpet was burning.

The __________ wasn’t too bad. I let out a shaky breath with __________. What could have happened? Perhaps another house fire. But we were safe. All thanks to Dad’s one-of-a-kind __________.