1 . Imagine your home on its messages today. Legos spread over the floor. Dirty socks are jammed between couch cushions. Receipts and pieces of mail litter on the table. Though many of us feel shame when your homes end up in this state, a messy house is not a moral failing. The only thing that actually matters is whether your house is functional and livable.     1    .

Collect trash. First get a trash bag or a trash can. Then move around the room, collecting the garbage. But don’t take out the trash yet.     2    .

Pile up dirty dishes.     3    . Or you can pile them up. Maybe do the dishes. With unwashed plates in the kitchen and dining table, we are sure to be distracted and upset.

Pick up clothing and laundry. Collect the laundry that’s lying around. You can use a laundry basket or a bag. Bring the laundry to the machine and start it, if you want.

Put back things that have a place. This one is pretty straightforward.     4    . But if some items be long in another part of the house, put them in a basket or pile them up by the door for now.

    5    . Sometimes our belongings become disordered because we’ve never chosen a place to store them. We may decide to gather all the stuff that doesn’t have a place, put it in a basket and set it aside. At this point, you may also decide to create a home for these random odds and ends. Some people call this a “junk drawer.”

2 . We’ve all heard the age-old advice to drink eight cups of water a day. But if you fall short, don’t worry: That advice is probably wrong anyway. That’s according to new research. which found that for most healthy adults, there is no real benefit to drinking eight cups of water a day.

The advice to drink eight cups of water a day comes from a 1945 recommendation from the Food and Nutrition Board of the National Research Council, which encouraged adults to consume about 64 ounces of water daily. The recommendation referred to a person’s total daily intake of water, including from all their foods and drinks, but it was widely misinterpreted to mean that people should drink 8-ounce glasses of water every day.

To see how much water people really need, Herman Pontzer, a professor at Duke University and his co-authors analyzed data on 5,600 people. The participants were tracked with a gold-standard technique called “doubly labeled water”, which uses water laced with tracers that can be used to track the body’s production of carbon dioxide, allowing the researchers to get precise measurements of the participants’ daily energy consumption.

The researchers determined how much water the participants lost and replaced each day. a measurement known as water turnover (水周转率). They found that a person’s daily water turnover was largely determined by their size and their level of body fat, which contains less water than muscle and other organs. The more “fat-free” mass a person has, the more water they need.

The research showed that how much water you need changes over your lifetime. In general, our water needs peak between the ages of 20 and 50 and then decline in parallel with the slowing down of our metabolisms (新陈代谢).

So how much water should you drink? The answer is simple: Drink when you’re thirsty. Prioritize water, and try to avoid sugary drinks, which can cause metabolic problems. “If you’re paying attention to your body and drinking when you feel like you need to, then you should be fine,” Pontzer said.

4 . By the age of 27, Vincent had made the most important decision of his life, to become an artist. He spent the years between 1880 and 1885 developing his _______. He had little money and lived in _______ rooms all over the Netherlands, including the flat agricultural landscape of the Drenthe. There he _______ country people. He was often ill and miserable, but determined to _______ this new career.

After the failure of his studies for the priesthood, Vincent didn’t want to _______ art formally at an academy. But he knew nothing of anatomy (解剖学), the study of the human figure, or of perspective, by which artists show a sense of _______ in work done on flat paper or canvas. Theo, his brother, knew a rich young _______, Anthon van Rappard, who taught Vincent perspective, and _______ him prints to copy. Vincent made hundreds of drawings of people, _______ charcoal, crayon, ink, and watercolor. Theo provided ________ for oil paint, and he began to paint in oils. Vincent often traveled to the ________ or the coast to draw working people. He was beginning to believe in himself as an ________.“Diggers, sowers, planters, male and female, they are what I draw ________. I have to ________ and draw everything that belongs to country life.” The compassion that Vincent ________ for poor people as a preacher was now channeled into his art.

Animated movie Chang’an breathes new life into Tang Dynasty’s most iconic poets, Xu Fan reports. Named after the ancient name for Xi’an in Shaanxi province, which served     1     the capital of the Tang Dynasty for over 280 years, the movie brings to life some of the most iconic     2    （figure） in Chinese literary history. With a runtime of 168 minutes —the     3    （long） of any Chinese animated movie—it is suitably epic (史诗) in scale.

In order to     4    （accurate） convey the Tang poetry and better translate the cultural context fixed in the dialogue, the production team invited Linda Jaivin, an Australian Sinologist,     5    （assist） with the translation process. Xie Junwei,     6     co-directed the movie alongside Zou Jing, explains the distinctive design approach     7    （inspire） by the dynasty’s sculptures, figurines and mural paintings showcased in museums.

The movie     8    （feature） a total of 48 poems, with Li Bai’s masterpiece, Qiang Jin Jiu （Invitation to Wine）, at the heart of the most visually stunning scene. The poem was composed in the year 744. At that time, Li Bai was forced to leave Chang’an and wandered in the mountains with     9     few close friends as a means to ease his sadness at being unappreciated despite     10    （he） great talent.

10 . Nearly everything we do contributes to our carbon footprint.     1     Sales of electric bikes, or e-bikes, are on the rise. In 2021, 880, 000 e-bikes were sold in the U. S., compared with 608,000 electric cars and trucks. That’s up from 450,000 c-bike sales in 2020.

E-bikes have the same components as traditional bicycles: frames, seats, handlebars, and wheels.     2     The speed of a non-electric bike relies on the rider’s physical strength and endurance. Casual cyclists can pedal at 10 to 14 miles per hour, depending on the terrain and weight of the bike and rider.

    3     Some models have a pedal (脚踏板)assist system with a motor to amplify pedaling power, while others have a throttle and don’t require pedaling. The max speed an e-bike can reach is 28 miles per hour, which is comparable to moped speeds, thus requiring more safety precautions than traditional bikes.

The pedal assist on e-bikes can encourage riders to bike farther and more often than they would on a traditional bike, leading to more exercise long-term. This also makes e-bikes a multifunctional option for older riders and individuals with disabilities that would otherwise prevent them from biking.     4    

    5     When it replaces trips made by a car, an individual e-bike can reduce CO₂ emissions by 225 kilograms each year. That’s equivalent to the emissions produced by one passenger flying economy from Philadelphia to Chicago.