2 . The Choking Dog

Joanne beat impatiently on the steering wheel of her Mercedes sports car. Now she was stuck in a traffic jam in central Birmingham at 5:30 p.m., and at 6:30 she was expected to hold a meeting of the tennis club.

At last, the traffic was moving, and she switched quickly to the fast lane to get home.After she parked her car, she leapt out of the car and ran for the house. As she opened the door, she almost knocked down Sheba, her dog, who was standing behind it.

She bent down to stroke the large Alsatian dog’s head, “I have to go now.” Sheba was coughing or choking as if she was trying to vomit something. She was obviously in real discomfort, and her sad eyes gazed at Joanne helplessly. Joanne examined the dog closely, and Sheba did look very sick. Joanne realized that it is necessary to take her to the vet immediately. Fortunately, the vet’s surgery is not far. Joanne quickly loaded the coughing and choking dog and took her to the vet.

As soon as she arrived at Dr. Sterne’s place, he brought her immediately into his office.

“Something is stuck in her throat,” said Dr. Sterne.

“Doctor, I have to go back to get changed for an emergent meeting. I’ll be back in ten minutes to pick her up, OK?”

“Sure,” said the doctor.

Joanne hurriedly went back to her home. As she entered the door, the phone rang.

“This is Dr. Sterne. I'm coming with the police. Wait outside for us.” said the doctor with fear in his voice. Joanne was confused and also a little frightened.

When she ran into the street, two policemen were getting out of their car. After briefly checking that she was the owner of the house, they ran into the house, without explaining anything. Joanne was completely confused and very frightened. Then the doctor arrived.

“Where’s Sheba? Is she OK?’’ shouted Joanne.

“She’s fine, Joanne. I extracted the thing which was choking her.”

“Why are the police in my house?”

Just then, the two policemen reappeared from the house, half-carrying a white-faced man who could hardly walk and with blood all over him.

“How did he get in there?”

“I think he must be a burglar,” said the doctor. “I knew he was there because when I finally removed what was stuck in Sheba’s throat, it turned out to be three human fingers. I don’t think he’s a very happy burglar.”

3 . Drums

When we think of a drum we usually think of a musical instrument. The drum has also been used for years as an important tool for communication. The human voice is very good for communication, but it cannot be heard very far. As early humans began to live in groups, runners were sent from village to village with important messages, but that took a lot of time. It was discovered that beating on hollow logs could be heard for greater distances, and so a new form of communication called “talking drums” was born.

In many early communities, a large drum was set in the middle of the village to help send messages to nearby tribes. The drums could be hit with hands and sticks. Some of the larger drums could be heard up to sixteen miles away!

A group in West Africa made an amazing talking drum system. Their drums were made of round pieces of wood that were four to five feet long. A skin (often an elephant ear) was stretched over one end of the wood and was held in place by a rope. The skin was tightened or loosened to make higher and lower sounds. They had learned to use the drums so well that they could actually copy the language that they spoke! The drums sounded like a person speaking in a voice loud enough to be heard far away.

Most systems of drum communication used a series of beats that meant something. The messages usually told of danger, death, war, or other news of great importance. The message could be sent very far by a relay system. That is, one village would send a message and a nearby village would hear it. They would then repeat the message on their drums, sending it to their neighbors. Some relay systems worked so well that they could send a message about 200 miles very quickly.

Although “talking drums” became a good system of communicating over distances, it had one very big problem. Their enemies could understand the drum messages, so they would know what was being said or planned. Communication by drums certainly wasn’t perfect!

4 . Fiery Visitors from Outer Space

1. On the next clear summer night, look up into the sky. If you are lucky, you may see a “shooting star”. They look just like stars falling down from the sky.

2. But shooting stars are not stars at all. The real name for a shooting star is “meteor”. There are millions of meteors out in space. They are pieces of rock and metal. When they are in space, meteors do not glow. In fact, we can’t see them at all. But when a meteor comes close to the earth, it starts to fall toward the earth. As it passes through the air, it gets very hot. It starts to glow, and finally it begins to burn. We see the burning meteor as a shooting star.

3. Sometimes meteors travel by themselves in space. But many meteors travel in groups called swarms. The swarms have orbits like planets have. They pass close to the earth every year. A famous swarm is the Perseid swarm. It passes close to the earth in summer, usually in August. Each year a few meteors from the Perseid swarm fall to the earth, so August is a good month to watch for shooting stars.

4. Most meteors are small, so they burn up before they crash into the earth and are buried in the ground. Once a meteor reaches the earth, we call it a meteorite. The biggest meteorite, which weighs seventy tons, landed in Africa.