无敌英语

无敌英语

My Grandfather

My Grandfather, who is 70, has a habit of collecting beautiful stone and telling stories about them.

My Grandfather has all kinds of wonderful stones with different colors, shapes and sizes in his room. He regards these stones as precious treasure. Whenever there is someone calling him on, he always like showing them to the gusts and talking about them ,no matter whether they like them or not.

I am his faithful listener. Some of the stories are told many times but I am never tired of them. I could ever tell them for him. So my grandfather like me very much.

1. Unless we spend money to spot(认出，发现) and prevent asteroids(小行星) now, one might crash into Earth and destroy life as we know it, say some scientists.

Asteroids are bigger versions of the meteoroids(流星体) that race across the night sky. Most orbit the sun far from Earth and don’t threaten us. But there are also thousands of asteroids whose orbits put them on a collision course with Earth.

But $500 million worth of new telescopes right now, then spend $10 million a year for the next 25 years to locate most of the space rocks. By the time we spot a

fatal one, the scientists say, we’ll have a way to change its course.

Is it worth it? Two things experts consider when judging any risk are (i) How likely the event is; (2) How bad the consequences if the event occurs. Experts think an asteroid big enough to destroy lots of life might strike Earth once every 500,000 years. Sounds pretty rare but if one did fall. It would be the end of the world. “If we don’t take care of these bid asteroids, they’ll take care of us,” says one scientist. “it’s that simple.”

The cure, though, might be worse than the disease. Do we really want fleets(舰队，车队) of nuclear weapons sitting around on Earth? “the world has less fear from doomsday(毁灭性) rocks than from a great nuclear fleet set against them.” Said a New York Times article.

2. The law says that women should have the chance of doing the same jobs as men and earn the same as them.

The reality is very different. Women lose because, 25 years after the Equal Pay Act, many of them still get paid less than men.

They lose because they do lower-paid jobs which men just won’t consider. And they lose they are the ones who interrupt a career to have children.

All this is reported in an independent study ordered by the Government’s women’s unite.

The biggest problem isn’t equal pay in work places such as factories. It is a sort of work women do.

Make a list of low-paid of jobs_ then consider who does them.

Try nurses, secretaries, cleaner, clerks, teachers in primary schools, dinner ladies, and child care helpers. Not a lot of men among that group, are there?

Yet some of those jobs are really important. Surely no one would deny that about nurses and teachers, for a start.

So why do we reward the people who do them so poorly? There can be only one answer--- because they are women.

This is not going to be put right overnight. But the Government, which employs a lot of them,, and other bosses have to make a start.

It is disgraceful(可耻的) that we have gone into the 21st Century still treating women like second-class citizens.

3. There have never been many adventurers. You van read stories about men called adventures. But they were really businessmen. There was something they wanted----- a lady, or money, or a country, or honor. And so they got it. But a true adventure is different. He starts without any special purpose. He is ready for anything he may meet.

There have been many half-adventurers. And they were great men. History is rich with their stories. But each of them had a special purpose. They were not followers of true adventure.

In the big city of New York, Romance and Adventure are always waiting.

As we walk along the street, they are watching us. We look up suddenly and see a face in a window. The face seems to interest us strangely. Or in a quiet street, we hear a cry of fear and pain coming from a house where no one lives. A car takes us to a strange door, instead of to our own. The door opens and we are asked to enter. At every corner, eyes look toward us, or hands are raised, or fingers point. Adventure is offered.

But few of us are ready to accept. We are ready to do only the things we do every day. We wish to do only the things that everyone else does. We move on; and some day we come to the end of a long quiet life. Then we begin to think. Then, when it is too late, we are sorry that we have never known true Romance and Adventure.

4. Around the world more and more people are taking part in dangerous sports and activities. Of course, there have always been people who have looked for adventures ----those who have climbed the highest mountains, traveled into unknown parts of the world or sailed in small boats across the greatest oceans. Now, however, there are people who look for an immediate excitement from a risky activity which may only last a few minutes or even seconds.

I would consider bungee jumping to be a good example of such an activity. You jump from a high place (perhaps a bridge or a hot-air balloon) 200 metres above the ground with an elastic (有弹性的) rope tied to your ankles. You fall at up to 150 kilometres an hour until the rope stops you from hitting the ground. It is said that about 2 million people around the world have now tried bungee jumping. Other activities which most people would say are as risky as bungee jumping include jumping from tall building and diving into the sea from the top of high cliff.（悬崖）

Why do people take part in such activities as these? Some psychologists suggest that it is because life in modern societies has become safe and boring. Not very long ago, diseases could not easily be cured, and life was a continuous battle for survival.(生存).

Nowadays, according to many people, life offers little excitement. They live and work in comparatively safe conditions; they buy food in shops; and there are doctors and hospitals to look after them if they become ill. The answer for some of these people is to look for danger in activities such as bungee jumping.

5. The report came to the British on May 21,1949. The German battleship Bismarck, the most powerful warship(战舰) in the world, was moving out into the Atlantic Ocean. Her task: to destroy the ships supplies from the United States to war-torn England.

The British had feared such a task. No warship they had could match the

Bismarck in speed or in firepower. The Bismarck had eight 15-inch guns and 81 small guns. She could move at 30 nautical(海上的) miles an hour. She was believed to be unsinkable.

However, the British had to sink her. They sent out a task force headed by their best battleship Hood to hunt down the Bismarck. On May 24, the Hood found the Bismarck.

It was a meeting that the German commander Luetjens did not want to see. His orders were to destroy the British ships that were carrying supplies, but to stay away from a fight with British warships.

The battle didn’t last long. The Bismarck’s first torpedo(鱼雷) hit the Hood, which went down taking all but three of her 4,419 men with her.

But in the fight, the Bismarck was slightly damaged. Her commander decided to run for repairs to France, which had at that time been taken by the speed and the heavy fog, they lost sight of her.

For two days, every British ship in the Atlantic tried to find the Bismarck, but with no success. Finally, she was sighted by a plane from the air. The Bismarck was hit.

On the morning of May 27, the last battle was fought. Four British ships fired on the Bismarck, and she was finally sunk.

6. “I would almost rather see you dead.” Bobert S. Cassatt, a leading banker of Philadelphia, shouted when his twenty-year-old eldest daughter announced that she wanted to become an artist. In the 19th century, playing at drawing or painting on dishes was all right for a young lady, but serious work in art was not. And when the young lady’s family racked among(挤身于) the best of Philadelphia’s social(社会各界的) families, such an idea could not even be considered.

That was how Mary Cassatt, born 1844, began her struggle as an artist. She did not tremble before her father’s anger, she opposed(反对) him with courage and at last made him change his mind. Many Cassatt gave up her social position and all thoughts of a thousand and a family, which in those times was unthinkable for a young lady. In the end, after long years of hard work and perseverance(坚持), she became America’s most important woman artist and the internationally recognized leading woman painter of the time.

7. I had just gone to bed after a very hard day when the phone rang. It was an eccentric(怪僻的) farmer. I had never met him before although I had often heard people talk about him. He sounded quite nervous and he had been talking for a minute or so before I understood anything. Even then I could make out was that someone called Milly had had a very bad accident. I hadn’t the slightest idea who she was but I obviously had to go.

It had been snowing heavily that I didn’t know the way. I had been driving for at least an hour when I finally found his place. He was standing there, waiting for

me. It seemed Milly had died. “She meant more to me than anyone… even my own wife!” he said. I could see that he had been crying. I thought something terrible had taken place, a possible scandal (丑闻) . I was even more shocked when he told me he had put her in the barn. “I wouldn’t leave her out in the cold!” he said.

Milly had clearly been a secret lover of his. I was about to tell him he could not expect me to cover anything up when he opened the barn door. He lifted his candle and I saw a dark figure on the ground. “She was such a good cow! I wouldn’t let anyone but a doctor touch her !” he said, and burst into tears again.

Learning a new language isn’t easy. For many of us, speaking it is the hardest part! Here are some tips （advice）to help you become more comfortable speaking English.

Tip 1 When you study, make your mouth do what your mind is learning. If you read aloud, you make your mouth and your mind work. This will help you with both speech and pronunciation（发音）

Tip 2 Talk to yourself as much as possible. You need to be comfortable making sounds in English. All over the day, talk to yourself in English! This will help you feel comfortable thinking in English. Then write down what you are saying and read it aloud again.

Tip 3 Have a “study buddy（partner）”. Get together with him or her at least

once a week and study together. Speak as much English as you can whenever you meet. Then you can help each other.

When Mr. David retired(退休), he bought a small house in a village near the sea. He liked it and hoped to live a quiet life in it. But to his surprise, many visitors came to see his house in summer holidays, for it was the most interesting building in the village. From morning to night, there were visitors outside the house. They kept looking into the rooms through the windows and many of them even went into the house. He decided to drive the visitors away. So he put a notice on the window. The notice said，“If you want to satisfy your curiosity(好奇心),come in and look around. Price: twenty dollars.”Mr. David was sure that the visitors would stop coming, but he was wrong. More and more visitors came and Mr. David had to spend every day showing them around his house. “I came here to retire, not to work as a guide(导游)”, he said angrily. In the end, he sold the house and moved away.