In 1990 a report was published about what the earth might be like 20 years from then on. The report was a result of a three-year ___36___. according to the report, the picture of the earth in the year 2010 is not a ___37___ one. The world will be more __38___ because the population will continue to grow. The population could be ___39__ 6 300 million, almost 2 150 million more than in 1985. More people would move into cities, especially cities in ___40___ countries. Cities like Cairo and Jakarta probably would ___41___ have 15 million by then.
Food production will ___42___, but not enough to feed all the people. Farmers will grow 90% more food than they did in 1985, __43___ most of the increase would be in countries that ___44___ produce enough food for their people. Little increase is ___45___ in South Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Poor farming ways are ___46___ large areas of crop land, changing farms into deserts. More farmland is ___47___ as cities become larger and more houses are built. ___48___ will get worse as industrial countries burn more coal and oil. Many of the world’s ___49___ could disappear as more and more trees are cut down. Energy will continue to be a serious problem. The experts say their picture of the earth for the year 2010 ___50___. They only carried out the situation that ___51___ today. By changing the situation, by ___52___ the problems, the picture can be changed. There is ___53___ time for the nations of the world to work ___54___ a plan of action. But they warned that ___55___ too long to make decisions would greatly reduce the chances of success.

Mrs Amatuli was my teacher in the fourth grade. One day at lunch time, Mrs Amatuli asked me if she could  36 my sandwiches. She explained that I could use the money to buy a   37 lunch from the cafeteria（自助餐厅）. I was   38. I never bought my lunch at the cafeteria. It was  39  expensive for my family, and I always carried my lunch and brought the bag back home to   40 again the next day.
You can understand my   41  when I had the opportunity to buy a hot lunch. Kids always  42 about the cafeteria food but I was very  43 of them.
When we  44 lunch that day, Mrs Amatuli took me aside and said she wanted to   45 why she had bought my sandwiches. I really didn’t care why,   46 it gave me a few minutes of her precious  47  so I was very quiet as she explained.
You  48 , she was a Catholic(天主教徒) and she told me that Catholics didn’t eat red meat on Fridays—they ate  49 on Fridays.
Oh, I couldn’t   50 to get home and tell my Mom that from then on I wanted fish on Fridays.  51 my Mom understood why, she gladly fixed fish for me on Fridays. From then on, every Friday I could get in  52 with the rest of the kids for a hot lunch. I didn’t care how many of the kids complained about the cafeteria food—it  53 great to me!
I realize now that Mrs Amatuli   54  have fixed herself a fish sandwich on Fridays. She bought my sandwiches because she saw a little girl who was pleased over the simple
   55 of having a hot lunch.

As the railroads and the highways shaped the American West in the past centuries, a new electrical generating(发电)and transmission (输送) system for the 21^st century will leave a lasting mark on the West, for better or worse. Much of the real significance of railroads and highways is not in their direct physical effect on the scenery, but in the ways that they affect the surrounding community. The same is true of big solar plants and the power lines that will be laid down to move electricity around.
The 19 ^th century saw land grants(政府拨地) offered to railroad companies to build the transcontinental railroads, leaving public land in between privately owned land. In much of the West, some of the railroad sections were developed while others remained undeveloped, and in both cases the landownership has presented unique challenges to land management. With the completion of the interstate highway system, many of the small towns, which sprang up as railway stops and developed well, have lost their lifeblood and died.
Big solar plants and their power lines will also have effects far beyond their direct footprint in the West. This is not an argument against building them. We need alternative energy badly, and to really take advantage of it we need to be able to move electricity around far more readily than we can now.
So trade-offs will have to be made. Some scenic spots will be sacrificed. Some species(物种) will be forced to move, or will be carefully moved to special accommodations. Deals will be struck to reduce the immediate effects.
The lasting effects of these trade-offs are another matter. The 21^st century development of the American West as an ideal place for alternative energy is going to throw off a lot of power and money in the region. There are chances for that power and money to do a lot of good. But it is just as likely that they will be spent wastefully and will leave new problems behind, just like the railroads and the highways.
The money set aside in negotiated trade-offs and the institutions that control it will shape the West far beyond the immediate footprint of power plants and transmission lines. So let’s remember the effects of the railroads and the highways as we construct these new power plants in the West.
【小题1】What was the problem caused by the construction of the railways?

We all remember seeing hitchhikers, standing by the side of the road, thumb, sticking out, waiting for a lift. But it is getting rare nowadays. What killed hitchhiking? Safety is often mentioned as a reason. Movies about murderous hitchhikers and real-life crime have put many drivers off picking up hitchhikers. That no single women picked me up on my journey to Manchester no doubt reflects the safety fear: a large, strangely dressed man is seen as dangerous.
But the reason may be more complex: hitchhiking happens where people don’t have cars and transport services are poor. Plenty of people still hitchhike in Poland and Romania. Perhaps the rising level of car ownership in the UK means the few people lift hitchhiking are usually considered strange. Why can’t they afford cars? Why can’t they take the coach or the train?
Three-quarters of the UK population have access to a car; many of the remainder will be quite old. The potential hitchhiking population is therefore small. Yet my trip proves it’s still possible to hitchhike. The people who picked me up were very interesting-lawyer, retired surgeon, tank commander, carpenter, man who live in an isolated farmhouse and a couple living up in the mountains. My conclusion is that only really interesting people are mad enough to pick up fat blokes in red, spotted scarves. Most just wanted to do someone a good turn; a few said they were so surprised to see a hitchhiker that they couldn’t help stopping.
The future of hitchhiking most likely lies with car-sharing organized over the Internet, via sites such as hitchhikers.org. But for now, you can still stick your thumb out (actually, I didn’t do much of that, preferring just to hold up my destination sign) and people-wonderful, caring, sharing, unafraid people-will stop.
In the UK, with its cheap coaches and reasonable rail service, I don’t think I’ll make a habit of it. But having enjoyed it so much, I’m ready now to do a big trip across Europe and beyond. In the 1970s a female friend of my wife’s hitchhiked to India. How wonderful it would be to have another go, though Afghanistan might be a challenge. I wish I’d got that tank commander’s mobile number.
【小题1】The author tried to hitchhike but was rejected by single women drivers because          .

My experience as a first year camp instructor held many things I was expecting, but also a number of things I was not expecting．My  36  came from lower-income neighborhoods and schools for an 8-week summer day camp．Many of the kids seemed to   37  each other before arriving and those who didn't certainly became friends with each other by the second week of camp．
During the third week of camp, a new camper   38  us．He had just gotten out of year-round school,  39  he joined the summer camp a little late．The first week he would  40  every morning because he wanted to go home．He complained （报怨）of not having any  41  and he didn't think he would have any fun．
One day the following week he didn't  42 to camp．Many of the kids had come up to me and asked me  43 he was and if he was OK．When I told them he stayed home then and that he didn't think anyone 44 him, some of the kids had a  45 look on their face because they knew they hadn't made him feel 46 Thankfully this camper   47  the next day．As he walked over to the area where our group of kids were in the morning times, the entire group stood up and clapped and  48 for him．All that day, the kids asked him to   49  with them at lunch, be on their teams for games, and stayed in  50 with him when we moved to new activities．The．rest of that day, he was happy．
I had the pleasure of  51 his mother a few days ago, and she gave me the biggest hug and thanked me for helping him to  52 ．She said, "My son told me that you are the instuctor who's always  53  to make him feel welcome, and he knows that you  54  care for him．And last week for the first time since he's been here, he didn't call me to pick him up   55 from camp．Thank you．"