Nowadays more and more people are trapped in too busy work to relax themselves. We have no time to tell a bed-time story to our children, or enjoy a nice dinner with our family, or take a break to think about how we live the precious life, or even meet friends. All we notice is that the distinctions that used to guide and steady us —between Sunday and Monday, public and private, here and there—are gone. We have more ways to communicate, but less and less to say. Partly because we’re so busy communicating.

   Maybe that’s why more and more people I know, even if they have no religious belief, seem to be turning to yoga, or meditation, or tai chi. Some friends of mine try to go on long walks every Sunday, or to “forget” their cell phones at home. A series of tests in recent years has shown that their brains become both calmer and sharper after spending time in quiet rural settings.

  In my own case, I often turn to extreme measures to try to keep my sanity and ensure that I have time to do nothing at all. I’ve not yet used a cell phone and I’ve never Tweeted or entered Face book. I try not to go online till my day’s writing is finished, and I moved from Manhattan to rural Japan.

  None of this is a matter of principle or asceticism (苦行主义): it’s just pure selfishness. Nothing makes me feel better-----calmer, clearer and happier----than being in one place, absorbed in a book, a conversation, a piece of music. It’s actually something deeper than mere happiness: it’s joy, which David Steindl-Rast describes as “that kind of happiness that doesn’t depend on what happens.” That is the highest of the highest we have been longing for—The Joy of Quiet.

1.The writer sometimes doesn’t do anything because ________.

A. he is out of work

B. whatever he does makes no sense

C. he can enjoy himself in his leisure time

D. he is worried about his writing

2.What does the writer mean when using the word “forget” (in the 2^nd paragraph)?

A. Trapped in busy work, they are really forgetful.

B. They think cell phone is not a suitable means of communication.

C. They leave their cell phones at home on purpose.

D. They hate modern techniques such as the cell phone.

3.Which of the following is right?

A. The writer is unwilling to help others since he is selfish.

B. Slowing down to find deep-down joy is necessary.

C. It is better to go back to the ancient times since we are so busy now.

D. We have more to say because we have more ways to communicate.

4.What is the main idea of the article?

A. The importance of spending time in quiet.

B. We can do some sports such as yoga to relax.

C. To feel better, we should do nothing at all.

D. The more we communicate, the better we will feel.

How the iron of tomorrow
(the first Self Clean Iron)
can change your lifestyle today?
General Electric introduces the iron of tomorrow. The iron can clean itself. Inside where irons get dirty. Because it cleans itself each and every time you empty it.
How?  With a push of a magic blue button.
The magic blue button
The first thing you’ll notice that’s different about this iron is the blue button on the side. It’s marked “Self Clean”. Push this blue button, and you can wash out loose mineral deposits that remain and block up inside. Push this button, and you’ve made life a lot easier.
Less chance of brown spots
Sure, Self Cleaning Iron is going to cut down on brown spots. (Those ugly spots that happen on nice, cleanly pressed clothes.) Because a Self Cleaning Iron becomes clean each time you press that magic blue button.
Steams much longer
Common sense tells you that if you’ve an iron that blocks less often it has to stay younger for a long period of time. In other words, it steams much longer. That’s another joy of owning General Electric’s Self Cleaning Iron.
What does it mean to you
Today you are doing so much more than just running a house and running after the kids.
You’re working. You’re going to school. It’s all part of your lifestyle. The iron can change that lifestyle. By giving you less trouble before you iron. If we can make it easier for you to be a better wife, a better mother, a better house maker, we want to. The new Self Cleaning Iron is another one of Home-Makers from General Electric.
Lifestyle.
We’re with yours.
GENERAL ELECTRIC
【小题1】This passage is ______.

Once upon a time there was a precious sword. Now, this sword belonged to a great King, and for as long as anyone could remember, the King spent all his time in his place, enjoying its shows and competitions with other swords. One day a great dispute（争端）arouse between this King and the King of a neighbouring country. It ended with both declaring war.

The sword was greatly excited at the prospect of taking part in its first real battle. It would show everyone how truly brave and special it was, and would become well-known throughout the kingdom. On the way to the front line, the sword imagined itself the winner of many battles. However, when it arrived, the first battle had already broken out, and the sword got to see the results of the war. What it saw had nothing in common with what the sword had imagined. No elegant shining knights, successful, with their weapons shining in the sunlight. Instead, all the sword saw was broken weapons, and a large crowd of hungry and thirsty men. There was hardly any food left. Everything was covered in dirt and disgusting smell. Many were half dead and scattered on the ground, bleeding from multiple wounds.

Seeing this, the sword realized it liked neither wars nor battles. It decided it preferred to live in peace and spend its time taking part in tournaments and competitions. So, on the night before what was going to be the big final battle, the sword tried to find a way to prevent it from taking place. After a while, the sword started to vibrate（颤抖）. First it gave out a low buzz, and then this gradually got louder, until it became an annoying metallic noise. The swords and armour（盔甲）of the soldiers asked the King’s sword what it was doing. It told them, “I don’t want there to be a battle tomorrow. I don’t like war.”

One answered, “No one likes it, but what can we do?”

“Make yourself vibrate, just like what I’m doing,” said the King’s sword. “If we make enough noise, no one will sleep.”

So the weapons started vibrating, and the noise became deafening. It was so loud that it reached the enemy camp, and the weapons there, which were equally sick of war, joined the protest.

The next morning, when the battle should have begun, not a single soldier was ready to fight. No one had managed to get even a wink of sleep, not even the King or the Generals. So they spent the whole day catching up on sleep. During the evening they started to wake up, and decided to put off the battle until the next day.

However, the weapons, led by the King’s sword, spent the night repeating their peace song, and again no soldier could rest. The battle had to be postponed yet again, and this carried on for the next seven days. On the evening of the seventh day, the Kings of the two armies met to see what they could do about the situation. Both were very angry at their previous disputes, but after being together for a while they started to discuss their sleepless nights, the surprise on their soldiers’ faces, the confusion between day and night, and the amusing situations all this had created. It wasn’t long before both were laughing, like friends, at these little stories. Fortunately, they forgot their old disputes and they put an end to the war, each returning to their own land with the double joy.

1. From the first paragraph, we can infer that _________.

A．the great King was fond of his precious sword

B．a disagreement led to a war between Kings

C．the two Kings were once good friends before the war

D．the precious sword was used to entertain the great King

2. What is the best word to describe the mood of the sword when it heard about the war?

A．Worried          B．Fearful            C．Eager             D．peaceful

3. When did the sword change its attitude to war?

A．When it fought at the first battle

B．After it realized that it was not powerful

C．When it was on the way to the front line

D．After it saw the terrible results of the first battle

4. What is the right order of the following events?

a. The noise was loud enough to reach the other side

b. The battle had to be postponed because the soldiers in both armies lacked sleep.

c. It let out continuous low noise

d. It persuaded other swords to join in.

e. All the weapons in both side confused day with night

A．a, b, c, d, e                            B．b, a, c, e, d

C．c, d, a, e, b                             D．d, b, a, e, c

5. According to the passage, how many times was the battle put off?

A．Seven            B．Eight             C．Nine             D．Ten

6.What do the underlined words in the last paragraph refer to?

A．Both King’s sleepless nights

B．The end of war and being friends

C．The surprise on the soldiers’ faces

D．The confusion of day with night

Hunting

The days of the hunter are almost over in India. This is partly because there is practically nothing left to kill, and partly because some steps have been taken, mainly by banning tiger-shooting, to protect those animals which still survive.

Some people say that Man is naturally a hunter. I disagree with this view. Our earliest forefathers, who at first possessed no weapons, spent their time digging for roots, and were no doubt themselves often hunted by meat-eating animals.

I believe the main reason why the modern hunter kills is that he thinks people will admire his courage in overpowering dangerous animals. Of course, there are some who truly believe that the killing is not really the important thing, and that the chief pleasure lies in the joy of the hunt and the beauties of the wild countryside. There are also those for whom hunting in fact offers a chance to prove themselves and risk death by design; these men go out after dangerous animals like tigers, even if they say they only do it to rid the countryside of a threat. I can respect reasons like these, but they are clearly different from the need to strengthen your high opinion of yourself.

The greatest big-game hunters expressed in their writings something of these finer motives(动机).One of them wrote.

“You must properly respect what you are after and shoot it cleanly and on the animal’s own territory(领地)。You must fix forever in your mind all the wonders of that particular day. This is better than letting him grow a few years older to be attacked and wounded by his own son and eventually eaten, half alive, by other animals, Hunting is not a cruel and senseless killing – not if you respect the thing you kill, not if you kill to enrich your memories, not if you kill to feed your people.”

I can understand such beliefs, and can compare these hunters with those who hunted lions with spears(矛) and bravely caught them by the tail. But this is very different from many tiger—shoots I have seen, in which modern weapons were used. The so—called hunters fired from tall trees or from the backs of trained elephants. Such methods made tigers seem no more dangerous than rabbits.

1.There is no more hunting in India now partly because _________.

A. it is dangerous to hunt there                                                        B. hunting is already out of date

C. hunters want to protect animals                                                   D. there are few animals left to hunt

2.The author thinks modern hunters kill mainly _________.

A .to make the countryside safe                                                       B .to earn people’s admiration

C. to gain power and influence                                                D. to improve their health

3.What do we learn about the big-game hunters?

A They hunt old animals

B. They mistreat(虐待) animals

C .They hunt for food

D. They hunt for money

4.What is the author’s view on the tiger-shoots he has seen?

A .Modern hunters lack the courage to hunt face-to-face

B. Modern hunters should use more advanced weapons

C. Modern hunters like to hunt rabbits instead of tigers

D. Modern hunters should put their safety first

Surely the day you are informed of your being admitted to a famous key university will be ________ of joy and celebration for your family, relatives and friends.

A. that B. the one C. one D. those