第三节：阅读理解（共20小题，每题2.5分，满分50分）

阅读下列短文，从每题所给的四个选项中，选出最佳答案

   A couple of years ago, I received a $ 600 insurance dividend (保险股息).Sitting at the kitchen table, my wife and I discussed what we might do with the money. I realized now that the refrigerator overheard our talk. The very next day it went wrong. The repairman told us we needed a new unit. Cost:$600. Not long after that, we got a refund（赔偿金）from the shop, enough to pay for a trip to Mexico. “I’ve something to tell you,” I said to my wife in a low voice. “How about the living-room?” she suggested. I remembered the color TV set was there. “No, not there. Let’s go out.” I showed her the check as we stood on the driveway. We held each other excitedly and hardly noticed the rain. My car was parked within5 meters. I didn’t think anything about it at the time. As I started for the airport the next day, the car began making strange sounds. Changing the engine cost about $ 1, 000.

Then I looked through our financial records. I discovered that during the last ten years we spent all our “found money” repairing a hot water heater, a television and a stove.

I never mention money in front of our mechanical equipment. But if this article is published and I am paid for, the word processor（文字信息处理机）is going to go for sure. It’ll know.

1. What went wrong first as the writer’s?

   A. The refrigerator          B. The stove

   C. The TV set              D. The engine of the car

2. What has been repaired and still remains all right?

   A. The car                 B. The color TV set

   C. The stove               D. The hot water heater

3. Which statement is wrong according to the passage?

A.There are many pieces of modern equipment in the writer’s home

B.The writer often discusses with his wife on how to spend their money.

C.The writer has gone into a lot of trouble to repair his things

D.The writer’s refrigerator can overhear him

 

A recent study of ancient and modern elephants has  come up with the unexpected conclusion that the African elephant is divided into two distinct (不同的) species

The discovery was made by researchers at York and Harvard universities when they were examining the genetic relationship between the ancient woolly mammoth and mastodon to modern elephants—the Asian elephant, African forest elephant and African savanna elephant

Once they obtained DNA sequences (序列) from two fossils (化石)，mammoths and mastodons the team compared them with DNA from modern elephants. They found to their amazement that modern forest and savanna elephants are as distinct from each other as Asian elephants and mammoths.

The scientists used detailed genetic analysis to prove that the African savanna elephants and the African forest elephants have been distinct species for several million years. The divergence of the two species took place around the time of the divergence of Asian elephants and woolly mammoths. This result amazed all the scientists.

There has long been debate in the scientific community that the two might be separate species but this is the most convincing scientific evidence so far that they are indeed different species.

Previously, many naturalists believed that African savanna elephants and African forest elephants were two populations of the same species despite the elephants’ significant size differences. The savanna elephant has an average shoulder height of 3.5metres while the forest elephant has an average shoulder height of 2.5metres. The savanna elephant weighs between six and seven tons, roughly double the weight of the forest elephant. But the fact that they look so different does not necessarily mean they are different species. However, the proof lay in the analysis of the DNA.

Alfred Roca, assistant professor in the department of Animal Sciences at the University of Minois, said, “We now have to treat the forest and savanna elephants as two different units for conservation purpose. Since 1950 all African elephants have been conserved as one species. Now that we know the forest and savanna elephants are two very distinct animals, the forest elephant should become a bigger priority (优先)for conservation purpose .”

1.

 One of the fossils studied by the researchers is that of ________.

A. the Asian elephant                  B. the forest elephant

C. the savanna elephant                D. the mastodon elephant

2.

The underlined word “divergence” in paragraph 4means “________”

A. evolution        B. exhibition       C. separation         D. examination

3.

 The researcher’s conclusion was based on a study of the African elephant’s ____________

A. DNA           B. height          C. weight            D. population

4.

 What were Alfred Roca’s words mainly about?

   A. The conversation of African elephants.      

B. The purpose of studying African elephants

   C. The way to divide African elephants into two units

   D. The reason for the distinction of African elephants

5.

 Which of the following can be the best title for the passage?

   A. Naturalist’s Belief about Elephants.        B. Amazing Experiment about Elephants

   C. An Unexpected Finding about Elephants    D. A Long scientific Debate about Elephants

 

 

1.He grew up in a w     ____    _ family, so he knows nothing about the life of the poor.

2.We’re c      ____    _ about the result of your operation. We have been waiting for 10 hours.

3. In China, young children are usually taught to r     __  __ _ the old. 

4. Now that medical technology has a          ____ _ to its present state, more people are aware of how long one can be kept alive.

5. He stood up and a        ___  _ _ that he was ready to go.

6. Beijing is making          ____ _ (准备)for the 2008 Olympics. 

7.The shop      __   __     _(对面的)the post office is a bank.

8.With the development of technology, new digital products are ____    _  (取代)old machines.

9. China has been stressing the         ____    _(重要性) of its ties with the third world countries.

10. The         ___  _ _  (委员会) sit together to discuss the water pollution.

 

 

The sun shone in through the dining room window, lighting up the hardwood floor. We had been talking there for nearly two hours. The phone of the “Nightline” rang yet again and Morrie asked his helper, Connie, to get it. She had been taking down the callers’ names in Morrie’s small black appointment book. It was clear I was not the only one interested in visiting my old professor—the “Nightline” appearance had made him something of a big figure—but I was impressed with, perhaps even a bit envious of, all the friends that Morrie seemed to have.

       “You know, Mitch, now that I'm dying, I’ve become much more interesting to people. I’m on the last great journey here—and people want me to tell them what to pack.”

    The phone rang again. “Morrie, can you talk?” Connie asked.

    “I’m visiting with my old friend now,” he announced, “Let them call back.”

    I cannot tell you why he received me so warmly. I was hardly the promising student who had left him sixteen years earlier. Had it not been for “Nightline”, Morrie might have died without ever seeing me again.

       What happened to me? The eighties happened. The nineties happened. Death and sickness and getting fat and going bald happened. I traded lots of dreams for a bigger paycheck, and I never even realized I was doing it. Yet here was Morrie talking with the wonder of our college years, as if I’d simply been on a long vacation.

       “Have you found someone to share your heart with?” he asked. “Are you at peace with yourself?” “Are you trying to be as human as you can be?”

       I felt ashamed, wanting to show I had been trying hard to work out such questions. What happened to me? I once promised myself I would never work for money, that I would join the Peace Corps, and that 1 would live in beautiful, inspirational places.

       Instead, I had been in Detroit for ten years, at the same workplace, using the same bank, visiting the same barber. I was thirty-seven, more mature than in college, tied to computers and modems and cell phones. I was no longer young, nor did I walk around in gray sweatshirts with unlit cigarettes in my mouth. I did not have long discussions over egg salad sandwiches about the meaning of life.

       My days were full, yet I remained, much of the time, unsatisfied. What happened to me?

1. When did the author graduate from Morrie’s college?

       A. In the eighties.    B. In the nineties.    C. When he was 16.         D. When he was 21.

2. What do we know about the “Nightline”?

    A. Morrie started it by himself.                      B. It helped Morrie earn a fame.

C. The author helped Morrie start it.              D. It was only operated at night.

3. What can we infer from the passage?

         A. Both the author and Morrie liked travelling.

         B. Morrie liked helping people pack things for their journeys.

         C. The author envied Morrie’s friends the help they got from him.

         D. The author earned a lot of money at the cost of his dreams.

4. What’s the author’s feeling when he writes this passage?

         A. Regretful.        B. Enthusiastic.            C. Sympathetic.         D. Humorous.

 

 ---- Hey, Mum. _________________?

---- I can’t find my wallet. Can you do me a favour and look for it?

   A. What’s on            B. So what        C. Now that            D. What’s up