1 . Directions: Complete the following passage by using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. referring             B. refresh             C. pin                    D. occurred             E. acknowledging F. identify             G. drain                    H. discouraged       I. specific             J. negative K. specifically

Make a Wish List

Most of us know of New Year’s Resolutions, where one sets intentions for the year ahead. But too often, people make their resolutions     1     — “I will no longer eat biscuits left at my desk”— and then feel unhappy. In the cold month of January, the last thing you need is to     2     your energy further by setting up a series of battles with yourself. And if you break a resolution, you feel     3    , which is a rubbish way to start the year. What you need instead are things to look forward to.

So instead, try a wish list. This involves writing down 100 things you would like to do in the year ahead. The items can be enormous or tiny, ranging from “Climb Everest” to “buy a new pencil sharper”. The main thing is that at some point it has     4     to you as something that you would like to do.

The key here is — write it down.

Do you feel any resistance to the ideas? If so, ask yourself why. What is wrong with     5     what you would like to do? Try not to say to yourself: “I can’t I don’t have the money/time/energy/skills.” Just write it down.

It helps to be     6    , so rather than “Get outdoors”,     7     a place you would like to visit. And take your time when creating it — a wish list is not built in a day. Think about it, polish it and     8     it.

Finally, you have your list. And what a work of beauty it is. Here are all the things that you would like to do. Remember to     9     them up where you can see them; let yourself consider how they can be accomplished. You’ll be amazed that so many of your dreams can be realized though the simple trick of writing them down and     10     to them.

2 . Directions: Fill in each blank with a proper word chosen from the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. including            B. urgent             C. features             D. targets          E. lengths          F. chasing      G. accused        H. commands            I. fed             J. restock             K. collecting

Pokemon Stickers Are Back for Koreans Nostalgic (怀旧的) for Childhood

Small pastries include a surprise sticker, and the goal is to find all 159 varieties — just like a trend more than 20 years ago.

Jeong Bo-ram’s new fascination has him     1     mass-produced pastries(糕点), delivery trucks and his childhood memories. His     2     are $1.20 bakery items sold with random Pokemon stickers that fly off store shelves in South Korea.

Just a few short of a full 159-sticker collection, 29-year-old Mr. Jeong has gone to more than 10 convenience stores and supermarkets a day, often leaving empty-handed. He has paid hundreds of dollars. He has learned the evening     3     times throughout his neighborhood to know when fresh drop-offs occur.

More than two decades ago, the Pokemon sticker-treat duo caught on with a generation of South Korean children, before the craze passed after a few years and the products were discontinued. Now the goodies are back just in time for the country’s broader retro boom,     4     by adults nostaglic for simpler times.

South Koreans are going to great     5     to live out the Pokemon tagline of “Gotta catch ’em all,” with some     6     the stickers in display booklets. Pokemon, originally a Japanese game for the Nintendo Game Boy that     7     hundreds of monster characters, has expanded into globally popular animated series, toys and video-games,     8     the recent hit Pokemon Go for smartphones.

Retailers have posted signs on their entrances that read, “We have no Pokemon bread,” while some store owners are     9     of bundling the in-demand pastries with unpopular items. Hunters camp outside supermarkets early in the morning. The rarest of stickers, such as that of the legendary characters Mew (梦幻) and Mewtwo (超梦), fetch $40 online. A full collection     10     more than $700, the listings show. Actual children also try to find the stickers, but adults are using their greater resources for the hunt.

Ko Hyo-jin shrieked when she ripped open a package of “Diglett Strawberry Custard Bread” recently and discovered inside a sticker of Mewtwo - a two-legged monster shown extending its paw. She immediately dialed up her husband. “It felt like winning the lottery,” said the 39-year-old homemaker in the Seoul Suburbs.

The nostalgic chase has been embraced by young adults facing Korea’s stagnant economy, soaring real-estate prices and a tight labor market.

3 . Directions: Complete the following passages by using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A．award             B．house             C．hit                    D．namely             E．specifically             F．grabbed G．traded             H．gang                    I．bar                    J．principled             K．transmission

American authorities arrested Masphal Kry, an official in Cambodia’s forestry administration, last November when he was heading to an international meeting about trade regulations for endangered species in Panama. Prosecutors accused him of conspiring with a smuggling ring. The contraband (违禁品): monkeys,     1     long-tailed macaques. His     2     allegedly grabbed wild macaques in Cambodia’s national parks and bribed officials to label them as captive-bred. Fake papers allowed Vanny Bio Research, a Cambodian pharma company, to ship these unfortunate primates (灵长类动物) to America for use in research. Mr Kry is facing trial in Florida’s Southern District Court. The federal government funds seven National Primate Research Centres (NPRCs), which     3     in total around 20,000 primates, not only macaques but also baboons and marmosets. These centres then     4     primates to labs across America. NPRCs have fulfilled only a third of requests for untested-on macaques in 2021 and prices have soared. Before the covid-19 pandemic a rhesus macaque cost $8,000; by 2022 they had     5     $24,000. Another species, long-tail macaques, is probably per pound currently the most expensive     6     wildlife, says Lisa Jones-Engel, a science adviser at PETA, an animal-rights group.

Getting lab monkeys from abroad became harder during the pandemic. Chinese authorities banned the export of all primates in early 2020. The Chinese government wanted to     7     the country’s wildlife trade, which is thought to encourage the     8     of pathogens—like sars-cov-2—from animals to humans.

That forced American companies to rely on less     9     South-East Asian suppliers. Many scientists believe poaching is prevalent across Cambodia. In February, the Department of Justice subpoenaed Charles River over 1,000 juvenile macaques the pharmaceutical company had bought from Cambodia; the DoJ suspected they were     10     in the wild then exported. These primates are now in Texas and Maryland but also in dilemma: they cannot be tested on, nor can they be flown back to Cambodia.

5 . Directions: Complete the following passage by using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. present        B. features        C. concerned        D. reportedly        E. commercial             F. stretches       G. overwhelming H. exceptionally        I. routinely        J. spared             K. broadcasts

Modern media is awash in advertising clutter(杂乱), and who’s to blame? Modern audiences that hate conventional full-length and full-size ads.

Today’s consumers don’t like to pay for content, which ought to create a rich environment for advertisers. Yet these same consumers are prone to click or turn away when a conventional ad appears. The result is ad clutter.

YouTube     1    a combination of full-length ads, skippable ads, lower-screen banners and display ads on the page alongside each video. Newspapers that once considered the front page important now     2    run ads there.

Advertisers integrate plugs(推销) into content to frustrate digital video recorders, which allow viewers to watch programs on a delay and skip regular commercials. If you watch regional telecasts of baseball games, the commercial clutter is so     3    . Ads are visible on the stadium wall behind the home-plate umpire(裁判). On-screen graphics include sponsor logos. And everything is a paid plug--“This call to the coach’s zone is brought to you by Verizon.”

According to the showbiz paper Variety, several streaming services are about to introduce a new twist: commercials that start running whenever a viewer pauses a program. Hulu intends to launch such ads this year. AT&T’s DirecTV and U-verse units will     4    use similar technology to trigger full-motion commercials whenever a viewer tries to take a break.

There’s a lot at stake. According to Variety, National Football League(NFL) TV broadcasts generate an estimated $4.35 billion in ad revenue during the 17-week regular season. NFL     5    are now loaded with mini commercials that pop up when there is a brief pause in the action, often in “double boxes” that show a view of the field in one frame and a(n)    6    in the other.

Interestingly, with no “screen” to work with, radio is one medium that has tried for some time to buck the trend. Many commercial stations trade clutter for clusters--that is, a solid block of commercials running five minutes or more, followed by lengthy commercial-free     7    of time.

But wherever a screen is involved, or a printed page, ad clutter is     8    everywhere. Programmers and advertisers can’t really be expected to limit this; it’s a fact of business. Consumers, on the other hand, can opt for commercial-free content--if they’re willing to pay for it.

But getting limitless content without paying while also being     9    heavy advertising intrusions is impossible. As media environment is permanently cluttered, audiences should be     10    with what they wish for.

6 . Directions: Complete the following passages by using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. account B. contented C. contested D. date E. feature F. previously G. believably H. pointed I. represented J. stretches K. winds

For centuries, two of the most intriguing question about Leonardo da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa” were “Who?” and “When?” A discovery made at Heidelberg University in 2005 pretty much answered both. A note written in a manuscript in the library confirmed the     1     of da Vinci’s first biographer, Giorgio Vasari: that the sitter was a merchant’s wife, Lisa Gherardini. The note also helped     2     the masterpiece to between 1503 and 1506.

A third mystery—“Where?”—is still in dispute, But on June 3rd a French engineer, Pascal Cotte, declared that he and a collaborator had identified the landscape in the background of the painting. Arguments had once been made for     3     of countryside in the Marche region and between Milan and Genoa. During a presentation in Vinci, near Florence, Mr. Cotte argued that the artist was more     4     depicting a part of his native Tuscany-one that much interested him at the time. According to this theory, da Vinci     5     the area not as it was, but as, in an unrealized scheme, he intended it to be.

Mr. Cotte, who was asked by the Louvre (where the “Mona Lisa” hangs) to create a digital image of the painting, is the inventor of the multispectral (多光谱的) camera: a device that can detect not only the drawing below the surface of an oil painting, but also, where they exist, intermediate layers of work. It was among these, under what appears to be a     6     rock, that he found a preparatory sketch showing that da Vinci intended it to represent a castellated(城堡形的) tower.

The landscape of the “Mona Lisa” also includes a huge steep cliff. That is similar to one that da Vinci included in a sketch of a fortress(堡垒)     7     by Pisa and Florence in the war that broke out between them in 1503 (around the time he was painting Gherardini). The fortress with the nearby cliff—and a tower, known as the Caprona tower—all overlook the river Arno as it snakes from Florence to Pisa. All three also     8     in drawings made by da Vinci to illustrate a plan about which, says Mr. Cotte, he became “obsessive”.

Mr. Cotte argues that a channel that     9     through desolate countryside at the right of the “Mona Lisa” is too wide to be a road, as some have speculated, and is instead the dried-up bed of the Armo as da Vinci pictured it once his plan had been adopted.

It never was. But if Mr. Cotte’s theory is right, it might just explain why Gherardini, a Florentine, wears such a     10    , if mysterious, smile.

7 . Directions: Fill in each blank with a proper word chosen from the box. Each word can only be used once. Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. inevitable B. reversed C. complications D. fueled E. dramatically F. access G. devoted H. exports I. yield J. thrives K. organic

Quinoa, of which both the seeds and leaves can be edible, is a crop native to the Andes Mountains. It took off in richer countries in the 1990s after NASA researchers recommended it as part of a potential space-colony diet. Over the past decade, quinoa, one of the leading crops that     1     on Bolivia’s high plains, 13,000 ft. above sea level, has become a premier product for foodies, health nuts and fair-trade enthusiasts. The gluten-free staple — in Bolivia it is produced solely by small-scale farmers and 90% is     2     — often decorates plates from celebrity chefs like Giada De Laurentiis and Bobby Flay and has inspired entire cookbooks     3     to Salads, soups and stuffing boasting its nutritional goodness. It’s an unaccustomed role for such a humble crop, which poorer Bolivians often grew and ate instead of buying rice. “It was always comida para los indios (food for Indians),” says Benjamin Huarachi, a member of the board of Bolivia’s largest quinoa growers’ association, “Today it’s food for the world’s richest.”

It also provides food for thought about the     4     that arise when rich nations try to support farmers in the developing world. The colorful tall tufts (丛生植物), which     5     one of the healthiest foods on the planet, have become Huarachi’s golden goose. As global food prices have risen, the price of quinoa has tripled in the past five years, to $1 per lb., a benefit to growers in the poorest region of South America’s poorest country. “Now we’ve got tractors for our fields and parabolic antennas (抛物面天线) for our homes,” he says.

And trouble with the neighbors. In an economy dependent on unsteady commodity     6    , quinoa has made farmers richer, but it has also become an out-of-reach luxury for many Bolivians and     7     violent conflict. In February hundreds of farmers clashed over prime quinoa-growing territory, and dozens were injured. The high price of quinoa has     8     cut domestic consumption, sparking concerns about malnutrition, with many farmers scrambling to export all their quinoa, even supplementing their diets with foods like pasta.

The series of problems raises concerns about whether the satisfying act of buying fair trade — which aims to help small farmers gain     9     to higher-end consumers abroad — can do more harm than good for the poor in developing countries. “When you transform a food into a commodity, there’s     10     breakdown in social relations and high environmental cost,” says Tanya Kerssen, a food-policy analyst for the food and development institute Food First, based in Oakland, Calif.

8 . Directions: Fill in each blank with a proper word chosen from the box. Each word can be used only once. Note that there is one more word than you need.

A. abandoning	B. captured	C. caution	D. dominant	E. enduring	F. fearful
G. grief	H. isolation	I. locked	J. popularized	K. revolutionary

Welcome to the YOLO Economy

Something strange is happening to the exhausted, type-A millennial workers of America. After a year spent hunched (弯腰驼背) over their MacBooks,     1     back-to-back Zooms, they are deciding to risk it all. Some are     2     stable jobs to start a new business, and others are stepping off the career treadmill altogether.

If this movement has a rallying cry, it’s “YOLO”—“you only live once,” an acronym (首字母缩略词)     3     by the rapper Drake a decade ago and used by cheerful risk-takers ever since. It has come to characterize the attitude that has     4     a certain type of bored office worker in recent months.

To be clear: The pandemic is not over, and millions of Americans are still experiencing     5     for the loss of jobs and loved ones. Not everyone can afford to throw     6     to the wind. But for a growing number of people with financial cushions and in-demand skills, the dread and anxiety of the past year are giving way to a new kind of professional fearlessness.

“It feels like we’ve been so     7     into careers for the past decade, and this is our opportunity to switch it up.” said Nate Moseley, 29, a buyer at a major clothing retailer. “The idea of going right back to the pre-Covid setup sounds so unappealing after this past year,” he said. “If not now, when will I ever do this?” If “languishing (受煎熬)” is 2021’s     8     emotion, YOLOing may be the year’s defining work force trend. A recent Microsoft survey found that more than 40 percent of workers globally were considering leaving their jobs this year.

    9     of employees’ quitting jobs, bosses are trying to boost morale (士气) and prevent burnout. LinkedIn recently gave the majority of its employees a paid week off.

Raises and time off may persuade some employees to stay put. But for others, stasis (停滞) is the problem, and the only solution is     10     change.

9 . 用方框中的单词或短语的适当形式填空。

even though     be opposed to     call off     as though     agree with care for     spare       spot     consist of     shut down

1. I’m always forgetting to________ my computer before I leave my office.
2. Your story doesn’t________ what the police have told us.
3. My grandma stared at me________ I were a complete stranger.
4. The game was________ because of the bad weather.
5. Most bosses ________ employees working overtime. They don’t think it’s a good idea.
6. It can be hard for even a trained doctor to________ the symptoms of lung cancer.
7. Jack went ahead with his experiment________ he knew it was dangerous.
8. The International Olympic Committee________ members from many countries.
9. Could you possibly________ me a few minutes? I want to have a talk with you.
10. He thanked the nurses who had________ him while he was sick.