B

I’ve just done my first jump since the accident that nearly killed me just a year ago. As I was lying in hospital, thinking that I would never skydive again, I wasn’t feeling glad to be alive. Instead I was wondering how I could possibly live without it.

It all started one evening after another nine-to-five day. I was sitting at home thinking, “There has to be more to life than this,” when an advertisement came on the television: “Try skydiving!”

The next day, I called the nearest skydiving centre and booked my first jump.

I will never forget my first jump. It was a beautiful, cloudless day and the sun was just going down. As I pushed myself away from the plane at 11,000 feet, my mind went blank.

Words cannot describe the excitement I experienced while I was free-falling. That was the most amazing four minutes of my life.

From the first jump, I was hooked. I started spending every free moment I had skydiving. At work, I sat in front of my computer and imagined ways of making more money so that I could jump more often.

The accident happened on my 1,040th jump. Another skydiver collided (碰撞) with my parachute (降落伞) at 80 feet. I fell and hit the ground at about 30 mph, face down. I broke my legs, my right arm and my nose. I lost 6 litres of blood, 19 teeth and 25 pounds of fat. I was lucky to be alive.

People who have never experienced skydiving will find it hard to understand that my only motivation to get better was that I could do it again. All I can say is that for me, skydiving is life and life is skydiving.

50. What can we learn about the author’s first skydiving from the text?

A. The author planned it for a long time.

B. The author was too excited to enjoy it.

C. It turned out to be fairly successful.

D. It took place a year before the accident.

51. The underlined part “I was hooked” most probably means “__________”.

A. I was attracted by skydiving          B. I was shocked by skydiving

C. I became familiar with skydiving      D. I became curious about skydiving

52. Which of the following shows the author’s strong will for skydiving?

A. The author spent almost every nine-to-five day skydiving.

B. The author worked hard to make more money for skydiving.

C. The author imagined himself skydiving while at the hospital.

D. The author expected to recover only to continue skydiving.

 

完形填空 （共20小题；每小题1.5分，满分30分）

My wife called, "Will you come here and make your darling daughter eat her food?" I rushed to the scene. My only daughter, Sindu,  36   frightened. In front of her was a bowl filled with  rice. She   37   disliked rice.

    “Sindu, why don’t you take a few   38   of this? Just for  Dad’s sake. If you don’t, your mom will shout at me. ” Sindu softened a bit and   39   her tears with the back of her hands.  "OK. Dad. I will eat. But, you should…" Sindu hesitated. " Dad, if I eat the rice, will you give me  40  I ask for?" " Oh, sure. " She  41   eating the whole quantity. After the ordeal was  through, Sindu came to me, " Dad, I want to have my   42  shaved off this Sunday!"

      " Darling, we will be sad   43   you with a clean - shaven  head." "Dad, you saw how difficult it was for me to eat the  rice. " Sindu was in tears. "   44   you promised to give me  whatever I ask for. " It was   45   for me to call the shots . "Our promise must be  46 . "

      With her head clean - shaven, Sindu had a round face. On  Monday morning, I dropped her at her   47    Just then, a boy  shouted, "Sindu, please wait for me!" 48   struck me was the  hairless head of that boy.

      "Sir, your daughter Sindu is great   49 !" a lady said to  me. ."That boy who is walking along with your daughter is my son  Harish. He is   50   from leukemia(白血病)?He lost all his  hair due to the side   51   of the chemotherapy ( 化疗). He refused to  52   to school for fear of being laughed at. Sindu visited him last week'" But, I   53   imagined she would sacrifice  her lovely hair for the sake of  54  "My little angel, you are teaching me 55 selfless real love is!" I wept.

1. A. looked      B. Proved          C. sounded          D. turned

2.A. properly     B. likely           C. formerly          D. particularly

3. A. bowls       B. mouthfuls        C. rices             D. pieces

4.A. cleaned      B. burst            C. wiped           D. crashed

5. A. however     B. whenever        C. wherever        D. whatever

6.A. enjoyed      B. finished         C. practiced        D. liked

7.A. hair         B. face            C. ear             D. hand

8.A. comparing    B. looking         C. seeing          D. watching

9.A. So          B. And            C. If              D. Though

10. A. chance       B. good           C. choice          D. time

11.A. made        B. carried          C. kept            D. broken

12.A. room        B. school          C. house           D. desk

13.A. That         B. This           C. It               D. What

14.A. in fact        B. for example     C. indeed          D. really

15.A. suffering      B. separating      C. judging         D. affecting

16.A. illnesses       B. effects        C. health           D. medicine

17. A. come back     B. turn back      C. pay back         D. date back

18.A. such          B. even          C. ever            D. never

19.A. your daughter   B. my son         C. me           D. you

20.A. how           B. Whether       C. where          D. when

 

I was very disappointed not to be able to go to the jazz concert last Friday. The announcement in the paper said that you could buy tickets at the theater box office in Richland Hills any day between 10:00 and 4:00. Since I work from 9 o’clock to 5:30, the only time I could go to the theater was during my 45-minute lunch break. Unfortunately, the theater is on the other side of the town, and the bus service between my office and Richland Hills is not very good. But if you are lucky, you can make the round trip in 45 minutes. Last Monday, I stood at the bus stop for fifteen minutes waiting for a bus. By the time I saw one come around the corner, there was not enough time left to make the trip—so I gave up and went back to the office. The same thing happened on Tuesday, and again on Wednesday. On Thursday, my luck changed. I got on a bus right away and arrived at the theatre in exactly twenty minutes. When I got there, however, I found a long line of people at the box office. I heard one man say he had been waiting in line for over an hour. Realizing I would not have enough time to wait in line, I caught the next bus and headed back across the town. By Friday I realized my only hope was to make the trip by taxi. It was expensive, but I felt it would be worth hearing the concert. The trip by taxi only took 10 minutes, but it felt like an hour to me. When I got to the theatre, I was relieved to see that nobody was waiting in line. The reason, I quickly discovered, was that they had already sold all the tickets.

1.The writer is probably ______.

    A. a worker                             B. a college teacher   

    C. a boss of a company                  D. a secretary

2.He learned ______ that there would be a concert last Friday.

    A. from his friends                         B. from one of his colleagues

    C. over the radio                              D. from the newspaper

3.He could go and buy the ticket ______.

    A. any day before work hours                B. both before and after work hours

    C. only during lunch time                   D. on Saturday and Sunday

4.The word “relieved” in the last two sentences may best be replaced by “______”.

    A. surprised            B. pleased          C. puzzled          D. sorry

5.  The story is about ______.

    A. a good concert      

    B. someone enjoying a good concert

    C. someone trying to buy concert tickets for his friends

    D. someone failing to buy the concert ticket

 

阅读下面的短文，并根据文章后的题目要求回答76-80小题。

A beautiful, expensively dressed lady complained to her psychiatrist (精神病医师) that she felt that her whole life was empty; it had no meaning.

So the psychiatrist called over the old lady who cleaned the office floors, and then said to the rich lady, “I’m going to ask Mary to tell you how she found happiness. All I want you to do is to listen.”

So the old lady put down her broom, sat on a chair and told her story, “Well, my husband died of malaria and three months later my only son was killed by a car. I had nobody … I had nothing left. I couldn’t sleep; I couldn’t eat; I never smiled at anyone; I even thought of taking my own life. Then one evening, a little kitten followed me home from work. Somehow I felt sorry for that kitten. It was cold outside, so I decided to let the kitten in. I got it some milk, and it licked the plate clean. Then it purred comfortably and rubbed against my legs, and for the first time in months, I smiled. Then I stopped to think; if helping a little kitten could make me smile, maybe doing something for people could __________. So the next day, I baked some biscuits and took them to a neighbor who was sick in bed. Every day I tried to do something nice for someone. It made me so happy to see them happy. Today, I don’t know of anybody who sleeps and eats better than I do. I’ve found happiness, by giving it to others.”

When she heard that, the rich lady cried. She had everything that money could buy, but she had lost the things which money couldn’t buy.        

1.What is the best title of the passage? (Please answer within 5 words.)

_________________________________________________________________________

2.Which sentence in the passage can be replaced by the following one?

I’m sure that nobody eats or sleeps as well as I do.

___________________________________________________________________________

                                                                                 

3.Please fill in the blank in the third paragraph with proper words or phrases to complete the sentence. (Please answer within 10 words.)

                                                                                        

4.Do you agree with the old lady, why? (Please answer within 30 words.)

___________________________________________________________________________

                                                                                

5.Translate the underlined sentence in the first paragraph into Chinese.

                                                                            

 

Thirteen, for me, was a challenging year. My parents divorced and I moved to a new town with my father, far from my old family and friends. I was terribly lonely and would cry myself to sleep each night. To ease my sadness, my father purchased an old horse for me at a local auction. I named him Cowboy.

Cowboy was without a doubt the ugliest horse in the world. But I didn’t care. I loved him beyond all reason. I joined a riding club and suffered rude comments and mean snickers about Cowboy’s looks. I never let on about how I felt, but deep inside, my heart was breaking. The other members rode beautiful, registered horses.

When Cowboy and I entered the events where the horse is judged on appearance, we were quickly shown the gate. No amount of preparation and love would turn Cowboy into a beauty. My only chance to compete would be in the speed events. I chose the jumping race.?

One girl named Becky rode a big brown horse in the race events. She always won the blue ribbons.  Needless to say, she didn’t feel threatened when I competed against her at the next show. She didn’t need to. I came in next to last.

The stinging memory of Becky’s smirks made me determined to beat her. For the whole next month I woke up early every day and rode Cowboy five miles to the arena (赛马场). We practiced running and jumping for hours in the hot sun and then I would walk Cowboy home totally exhausted. All of our hard work didn’t make me feel confident by the time the show came. I sat at the gate and sweated it out while I watched Becky and her horse charge through the course and finish in first place.

My turn finally came. I put on my hat, rubbed Cowboy’s neck and entered the arena. At the signal, we dashed toward the first fence, jumped it without trouble and raced on to the next one. Cowboy then flew over the second, third and fourth fences like a bird and I turned him toward the finish line. As we crossed the line the crowd was shocked into silence. Cowboy and I had beaten Becky and her fancy horse by two seconds!

I gained much more than a blue ribbon that day. At thirteen, I realized that no matter what the odds, I’d always come out a winner if I wanted something badly enough to work for it.

63. 1.The underlined expression "shown the gate" (paragraph 3) most probably means ______.

A. told how to enter the arena

B. shown how to make the horse beautiful

C. removed from the competition early

D. told to enter the timed-speed events

64. 2. When the final race finished, nobody cheered because        .

A. the audience didn’t like Cowboy             B. people envied the writer

C. the win was unexpected?            D. the writer bad run out of time

65. 3.Why was the writer not confident of victory?

A. He was an inexperienced rider.

B. He had not practiced enough.

C. He believed he was unpopular with the crowd.

D. He thought his horse wasn’t so good as the others.

66. 4.What did the writer learn from his experience?

A. Life can sometimes be unfair.

B. Anything is possible if one tries hard enough.

C. A positive attitude will bring success.

D. One should not make judgments based on appearance.