In July, my dad, mom and I flew to Whitehorse to care for my sick old grandfather. We planned to spend two months in the town of my youth.
A few days before we arrived, my grandfather called to say he was being flow n to Vancouver for another operation. My dad and mom had already booked the air tickets and their leave from work, so even though my grandfather wouldn’t be there, we made the trip north anyway.
Grandfather kept a puppy. It was the only companion of my grandfather while we were not in Whitehorse. He had adopted it from a local shelter(two years earlier and renamed him “Scruffy” because it looked untidy. Its fur was messy. Its ears were like two wings when it ran. While we were alone in my grandfather’s house with nothing to do, Scruffy saved us. The dog needed to be walked. Those walks were chances to re-visit where I’d grown up. I had left that small town behind as soon as I finished high school and had rarely visited home. Scruffy and I took my family to the school, where my picture still hung. We walked through the forest where I once rode my bike. With no one to talk to when my parents were occupied with their own business. I found myself chatting with Scruffy. He was too excited to see me. I gave him many nicknames: Scruffster, Scruff-man, Scruffmaster. He would happily respond to them all.
By the fall, we were back in Toronto and my grandfather was back in Whitehorse. My mom and her brothers took turns flying up to take care of him.
注意：
1.续写词数应为150个左右;
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
We visited my grandfather again in November.
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After Grandfather’s death, we had to rehome Scruffy.
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As my wife worked late, my three small children looked at me expectantly. “What’s for dinner?” one of them said. The last time I had made dinner was when I was in college. Now, I had three mouths to feed, but I was crucially short on ideas. Suddenly, I searched for a possible answer. “Where's the Twister game?” I asked. “Not Twister,” Abbv, my oldest child, said, “dinner.”
I walked to the closet, pulled out the game and tested the spinner (旋转器). Then I put paper between the plastic arrow and the cardboard base and drew four quadrants (象限). I looked at the children and said, “Who wants chocolate?”
Alex, my youngest child, screamed in delight. I wrote in the upper right quadrant: chocolate. Aiden, my middle child, asked, “Dad, what are you doing?” I answered, “You will see in a second.” I pointed at the second area and asked, “How about ice cream?” Alex started dancing around in a circle. “When we get four options written on the spinner, we will spin to see what we do for dinner tonight.” They debated the final section for a few seconds and then collectively decided on pizza.
“We’re going to spin it once, and whatever we land on, that’s what we will do tonight.” Abby shook her head and said, “I don’t think this is a good idea.” Alex yelled, “I want to spin it.” “Great. Go for it.” Alex's second try sent the little plastic arrow flying around and around until it landed on... chocolate.
Everyone screamed, “Chocolate.” I still had no idea what we were going to do. Abby looked at me and asked, “But what are we going to do?” I answered, “Hop in the car.” We took the normal fifteen minutes to find shoes and jackets and manage the car seats. Then we were off to the. grocery store.
注意：
1.续写词数应为 150左右；
2.请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
We bought chocolate bars, cookies and cakes, and then back into the car full of expectation.
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As they brushed teeth and headed to bed, Abby asked, “Can we do this again tomorrow?”
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When I was a child, my mother told my sister, who had a 10-inch very obvious scar (伤疤) on her arm, “Nancy, if you ignore the scar, other people will ignore it. It does not mean they will not notice it, but it means it will not matter to them if it doesn’t matter to you.”
It never occurred to me that something like this would happen to my son years later. Sending a child off to college can certainly be stressful for concerned parents. It was in 2018 that my son went off to college. He rarely contacted us. I couldn’t help asking about other aspects, which sometimes made him complain that I didn’t treat him as an adult.
To be honest, my son is excellent. Some of my friends always tell me that they admire my son’s characters and they hope their sons could have some of them.
Unexpectedly, it was 4 o’clock in the morning in 2020, when I received the phone call. “This is the emergency room calling and your son was just brought in with severe burns on his face, neck and arms. We have called for an aircraft and are going to fly him to the burn unit in Seattle.” Seattle was 350 miles from his college, so we knew immediately this was serious.
The doctor described the reason, which caused the burns. At 6 am, my son and his friends decided to barbecue hamburgers in the courtyard of their apartment. When they lit the charcoal, it burst into flames because they had sprayed too much gasoline. The flames caught my son’s shirt tail and shot from his waist to well over his head.
Fortunately, one of the boys who was quick-minded grasped my son and rolled him on the grass. While it saved his life, it was not in shape to save him from severe burns and terrible scars.
After he recovered from the treatments, the doctors told him they would not do plastic surgery for 6 months because it takes that long for the skin to stop shrinking and wrinkling.
注意：1. 续写词数应为150左右；
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
The doctors suggested he return to college with scars of severe burns temporarily.
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________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Davey got up early in the morning and couldn’t wait to look out of the window. To his great disappointment, it was snowing heavily outside. Usually he would look forward to watching snow, but today he was not. It was Christmas Eve, and because of the snowstorm, Davey was worried that his cousin Josh would be stuck in the road and couldn’t make it to his home for Christmas from a neighboring city.
“We haven’t seen each other for half a year, and I have got a special present for him!” Davey said to himself. “How I wish he could get here!” Davey turned away from the window with a sigh (叹气).
In the afternoon, Davey and his parents drove to the town to buy a Christmas tree. When they finished shopping and were about to leave the store, Davey saw a crowd of people outside. He ran to get a closer look. It was Santa Claus (圣诞老人)! Children were waiting in line to express their wishes to him. “Can I get in line, please Dad?” asked Davey. “Well, we’re kind of in a hurry,” said his dad. “But since this is Santa Claus, I guess we can spare the time.”
Davey gave his dad a big thank-you hug and ran to the line. When it was finally his turn, Davey climbed up on Santa’s lap. Santa asked, “Well, what would you like for Christmas?”
“I wish my cousin Josh could get home for Christmas,” Davey said. “But the snow is so deep that Mom and Dad don’t think he can make it.” Having known from the weather forecast(预报) that it would clear up with the snow stopping in the late afternoon, Santa Claus said, “I don’t usually deliver people on Christmas Eve, but I’ll tell you what to do. Tonight, before you go to sleep, make your wish on the biggest, brightest star in the sky. That’s the Wishing Star and it might hear your heart.”
注意：
1. 续写词数应为150左右;
2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。
When it finally came to the bedtime, Davey rushed to the window.
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Just then, they heard the doorbell.
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