My brother Joe and I no longer live in the same state, but I make sure to give Joe a call every Christmas. In fact, I will never forget a Christmas when I was seven and Joe was five. I’ve kept a secret about that Christmas for 20 years. Now hearing Joe’s voice makes me feel guilty (内疚的) about it all over again. I think he probably doesn’t even remember it.
When we were kids, Joe almost drove me “crazy”! If Mom brought home my favorite yogurt, Joe would make sure to eat it before I got a chance. When our parents gave us each our own basketball, Joe insisted on playing with mine instead of his own.
That Christmas when I was seven, I was determined to teach him a lesson. At that time I was old enough that I no longer believed in Santa, but I knew Joe did. I couldn’t stand him thinking Santa had put him on the “nice” list when I knew he’d been naughty (淘气的) all year.
One day before Christmas, I put on my winter jacket and headed over to our neighbor’s backyard. It was filled with rocks. To me they really looked like coal (煤炭). I was sure that they’d look like coal to Joe too. I filled a lot of the rocks into the pockets of my winter jacket, brought them up to my room and hid them under my bed. Then I waited.
That morning, I got up early, went downstairs secretly and put the rocks into the red stocking with Joe’s name on it. I watched Joe take down his heavy stocking, lay it on the living room floor.
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Looking at the gift inside, Joe’s smile disappeared suddenly.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________I said on the phone, “Hey, Joe, do you remember that Christmas morning when you were five …your stocking…”
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________An Unforgettable Thanksgiving Day
“Mom, is it okay if I invite a few of the classmates for Thanksgiving?” asked my son Evan. Evan had been senior high school students for two years. The school he attends is a challenging school and is strict with students but Evan did well and he had changed a lot. We were very grateful that our son had learned not only to tidy up, but to shine everything. Most importantly, he became more outgoing.
But with all the strict rules and hard work, the students there were also forming lifelong friendships. It was a practice that those unable to go home for the holidays would find a welcoming place at the table in the home of any of their friends. We’d hosted Evan’s roommates last year and looked forward to meeting new guests this Thanksgiving.
“Oh, one thing, Mom,” Evan continued. “These guys are exchange students. They would be Tim from Thailand, Kanok and Patrick from Mexico and Costel from Canada. They couldn’t eat their traditional dishes at school. So you’d better cook some special dishes for them. I know you are good at cuisine（烹饪）. ”
Indeed, I did delicious dishes and I was very excited about the international dishes we’d have at our dinner table. What dishes would I cook for these special visitors? They’d probably love a traditional turkey. But ... what are their traditional dishes? I love to cook, so this was an excuse to take out my wide variety of cook books, to do a little research on the favorite foods of these three faraway lands.
I decided to roast a turkey, and found several traditional dishes of Mexico and Canada. The only traditional dish of Thailand I thought I could have a try was something called foufou. I told Evan about it, who checked in with his friend Tim. “Tim is crazy about foufou, Mom! You have to make it! Tim also said he could help you if you needed. ”
So Turkey Day morning found me busy in the kitchen. The last dish I cooked was foufou. I followed the steps to prepare foufou and finally placed it on the stove（火炉）to cook for ten minutes.
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。
At this time, I heard Evan’s excited voice, so I went out of the kitchen.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________Just as I talked with Tim, I smelt something burning in the kitchen!
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