1 . During my first three years of college, I put on about 30 pounds of weight. Between classwork and a part time job, I had zero time for _________. On top of that, I ate a lot of fast food. Not surprisingly, I _________ a fat stomach.

After leaving college, I _________ to take exercise. Invited by a friend, I _________ working out with exercise machines three times a week. I was the kind of person who did not try something _________. I ate the same foods; I did the same things. Clearly, I _________ my routines (习惯). My friend, however, became _________. One day, he said, “We’re not getting enough exercise. We should play tennis instead.”

Me? Play tennis? No way. I was strongly against his _________. I was not good at sports. Besides, I was _________ the exercise machines. __________, weeks later, I found myself standing on a tennis court (球场). As I held my racket (球拍), I felt __________. I gave my friend some looks that could kill. I ran after every ball he served to me, completely __________ about 90% of them, and hitting the rest into the other court. The first few months were quite __________. But one day, as the ball came flying to ward me, my racket and the ball finally met in the place where it is most effective to hit a ball. I watched __________ as my return landed where I had aimed (瞄准) it. I had finally __________ how to play tennis properly!

Tennis would finally become my __________. I played it for several years, only __________ because of a knee injury. I learned a __________ during my journey toward learning to play tennis: I can do whatever I set my mind to. I just __________ to put in the work, and the __________ will follow.

6 . Passion, like life, is about the journey, not the destination. Kimberly and I have been planning a trip to Europe for a year. This was a/an ______ of ours. We took our friends Frantoise and Stein Eriksen with us.

The most   ______ part of the journey started with a train ride that had some curveballs (不顺利). When we were trying to get on a   ______ from Zurich to Croatia, we had gotten the departure time wrong and had to ______ around the station to make it in time. We had a tough time finding a taxi to ______ it to the ship. We finally found a taxi and arrived an hour late. ______ , they waited for us.

Once we got onto the ship we ______ it was not like a large hotel with great service. It was tight quarters. The bathroom was very ______ . The shower was a spout (喷头) connected to the bathroom sink. You ______ it on and sprayed yourself, along with the rest of the room.

The week-long ship ride was full of ______ . There were people from different nationalities speaking different languages. We stopped on islands of all sizes. We bicycled 30-40 kilometers. Then there were high winds-so high that the buses couldn’t ______ because they might blow over. So we took an expensive taxi, and ______ back to make our flight home.

While we loved the more predictable parts of the trip, our real passion was in the ______ —the missed rides, the ______ ship, the mixture of cultures, and even the ______ .

Sometimes people are so ______ it scares them to do something different. ______ when they do get out of their comfort zone, the different experiences they once thought were ______ are what stand out. Mixing things up, trying new things, seeing something through another person’s eyes, being ______ to adventure—this is how you create ______ .

It is now easier than ever to accessing the Internet, whether you are using a computer or a smartphone. There is no doubt that many young people are spending more and more time on online, with both positive and negative consequence. They can do research for their schoolwork and homework. This often help teenagers to wide their knowledge and improve their grades. However, some become addicting to online gaming and this can mean that they waste too many time playing these games. Personal, I think the Internet is such useful tool that the benefits of Internet access outweigh the dangers. In short, we should make use of the Internet in a better way to improve itself.

8 . Alpha, Beta, Delta…these Greek letters used to only appear in our math classes but are now popping up in news headlines.

Now, it’s Lambda. As the Delta variant spreads throughout communities in Asia, Europe and the United States, another variant, Lambda, is spreading rapidly throughout South America, Forbes reported on Aug 10.

On May 31, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced a naming system for variants of the coronavirus that uses letters of the Greek alphabet. Before that, the public had to call a variant its scientific name or refer to it based on where it was identified.

For example, a strain (菌株) of COVID-19 identified in South Africa in late 2020 was called variant 501Y. V2 or B. 1.351. Media also called the same virus. “the South African variant”. Now, everyone calls it “Beta”.

Compared to complicated scientific names, the Greek letters are much easier to remember. “It is a lot easier for a radio newsreader to say ‘Delta’ than bee-one-six-one-seven-two,” Jeffrey Barrett, a UK statistical geneticist told Nature.

WHO hopes this change will help combat the stigma (污名) associated with geography-based names. “I can understand why people just call it the South African variant-they don’t mean anything by it,” Salim Abdool Karim, an epidemiologist in South Africa, told Nature. “The problem is, if we allow it to continue, there are people who have an a goal and will use it.”

“No country should be stigmatized for detecting and reporting variants,” Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s COVID-19 technical lead, wrote on Twitter.

As the virus is still evolving, 11 mutations (变种) have been named as recently as Sept 1. What if the 24 Greek letters are not enough? “We will possibly run out of the Greek alphabet, but we’re already looking at the next series of names,” Van Kerkhove told The Telegraph. “We’re actually considering star constellations (星座).”

Currently, the Virus Evolution Working Group and WHO’s legal team are double checking proposals to “make sure we don’t upset anyone with these names”, Van Kerkhove told The Telegraph.

In the future, will there be a “Virgo variant” or an “Orion variant”? Let’s hope not, but only time will tell.

Marie Kondo is     1     internationally known expert on cleaning. Her first book, called the “The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up,”     2     (publish) in Japanese in 2011.     3     has sold more than 10 million copies in more than 40 countries.

Yet fans want more help and     4     (inform). So Kondo is launching a television show ‘a team of workers who will visit clients’ homes, and a set of special paper boxes     5     (keep) things organized. A set of three costs $89.

Kondo says the boxes were not part of her     6     (origin) idea. In her book about tidying up, she gave two main pieces of advice. First, keep only things that give you joy. Second, store those things in places they can be     7     (easy) reached and put away.

Kondo did not tell readers to get special containers     8     their things. Instead, she suggested people use containers they already had, such as shoe boxes.

But fans still ask Kondo     9     kinds of containers they need to achieve her special way of organizing. So Kondo recently appeared in New York City to launch her new boxes. They are about the shape and size of shoe boxes. They are colored light pink, gray, brown and purple. The insides are painted with designs such as a tree branch dotted with small white flowers.

Kondo says the idea behind the boxes is not to hide things.     10    , it is to make the things inside feel happy.