Science can't explain the power of pets, but many studies have shown that the company of pets can help lower blood pressure and raise chances of recovering from a heart attack, reduce loneliness and spread all-round good cheer.

Any owner will tell you how much joy a pet brings. For some, an animal provides more comfort than a husband/wife. A 2002 study by Karen Allen of the State University of New York measured stress (紧张) levels and blood pressure in people ---half of them pet owners ---while they performed 5 minutes of mental arithmetic (算术) or held a hand in ice water. Subjects completed the tasks alone, with a husband/wife, a close friend or with a pet. People with pets did it best. Those tested with their animal friends had smaller change in blood pressure and returned most quickly to baseline heart rates. With pets in the room, people also made fewer math mistakes than when doing in front of other companions. It seems people feel more relaxed (放松)around pets, says Allen, who thinks it may be because pets don't judge.

A study reported last fall suggests that having a pet dog not only raises your spirits but may also have an effect on your eating habits. Researchers at Northwestern Memorial Hospital spent a year studying 36 fat people and their equally fat dogs on diet-and-exercise programs; a separate group of 56 people without pets were put on a diet program. On average, people lost about I1 pounds, or 5% of their body weight. Their dogs did even better, losing an average of 12 pounds, more than 15% of their body weight. Dog owners didn't lose any more weight than those without dogs but, say researchers, got more exercise overall---mostly with their dogs --- and found it worth doing.

1.What does the text mainly discuss?

A. What pets bring to their owners.                

B. How pets help people calm down.

C. People's opinions of keeping pets.               

D. Pet's value in medical research.

2.We learn from the text that a person with heart disease has a better chance of getting well if _____.

A. he has a pet companion                                 

B. he has less stress of work

C. he often does mental arithmetic                           

D. he is taken care of by his family

3.According to Allen, why did the people do better with pets around when facing stressful tasks?

A. They have lower blood pressure.                 

B. They become more patient.

C. They are less nervous.                                    

D. They are in higher spirits.

Passage Twelve (We Should All Grow Fat and Be Happy)
Here’s a familiar version of the boy-meets-girl situation. A young man has at last plucked up courage to invite a dazzling young lady out to dinner. She has accepted his invitation and he is overjoyed. He is determined to take her to the best restaurant in town, even if it means that he will have to live on memories and hopes during the month to come. When they get to the restaurant, he discovers that this ethereal creature is on a diet. She mustn’t eat this and she mustn’t that. Oh, but of course, she doesn’t want to spoil his enjoyment. Let him by all means eat as much fattening food as he wants: it’s the surest way to an early grave. They spend a truly memorable evening together and never see each other again.
What a miserable lot dieters are! You can always recognize them from the sour expression on their faces. They spend most of their time turning their noses up at food. They are forever consulting calorie charts; gazing at themselves in mirrors; and leaping on to weighing-machines in the bathroom. They spend a lifetime fighting a losing battle against spreading hips, protruding tummies and double chins. Some wage all-out war on FAT. Mere dieting is not enough. They exhaust themselves doing exercises, sweating in sauna baths, being pummeled and massaged by weird machines. The really wealthy diet-mongers pay vast sums for ‘health cures’. For two weeks they can enter a nature clinic and be starved to death for a hundred guineas a week. Don’t think it’s only the middle-aged who go in for these fads either. Many of these bright young things you see are suffering from chronic malnutrition: they are living on nothing but air, water and the goodwill of God.
Dieters undertake to starve themselves of their own free will; so why are they so miserable? Well, for one thing, they’re always hungry. You can’t be hungry and happy at the same time. All the horrible concoctions they eat instead of food leave them permanently dissatisfied. Wonderfood is a complete food, the advertisement says. ‘Just dissolve a teaspoonful in water…’. A complete food it may be, but not quite as complete as a juicy steak. And, of course, they’re always miserable because they feel so guilty. Hunger just proves too much for them and in the end they lash out and devour five huge guilt-inducing cream cakes at a sitting. And who can blame them? At least three times a day they are exposed to temptation. What utter torture it is always watching others tucking into piles of mouth-watering food while you munch a water biscuit and sip unsweetened lemon juice!
What’s all this self-inflicted torture for? Saintly people deprive themselves of food to attain a state of grace. Unsaintly people do so to attain a state of misery. It will be a great day when all the dieters in the world abandon their slimming courses; when they hold out their plates and demand second helpings!
1.The best title for this passage is
A.On Fat.
B.We Should All Grow Fat and Be Happy.
C.Many Diseases Are Connected with Fat.
D.Diet Deprives People of Normal Life.
2.Why do they never see each other again?
A.Because it is a memorable evening.
B.Because she lets him eat as much fattening food as he wants.
C.Because she does not eat this and drink that.
D.Because eating fattening food is the surest way to an early grave.
3.Which of the following ways is NOT mentioned for diet?
A.Doing exercises.
B.Not eating sugar.
C.Not eating fat.
D.Taking sauna baths.
4.What is the author’s attitude toward diet?
A.Persuasive.
B.Critical.
C.Indifferent.
D.Adversative.

My best friend, Tom, and I live in a senior-citizen apartment in a lovely small town. Tom is a ten-year-old dog and I am a sixty-nine-year-old lady .

Years ago, I __36__  when I retired I would get a dog to __37__  my golden years. From the very beginning, Tom has always been __38_ and I never have to tell him anything more than once. He is extremely __39___ and always puts back the toys where they were after __40__.He is a wonderful companion. We sometimes play a ___41___together. He does many amusing things that make me laugh. As a result, I enjoy his__42___.

One afternoon, Tom started acting ___43__. I was sitting on the floor playing with him, __44___he started sniffing at the right side of my chest. He had never done anything like this before, suddenly he threw his entire__45__at the right side of my chest, and I cried in___46___.

Soon after this, I felt a lump(肿块). After X-rays and tests, doctors told me I __47__cancer. When cancer started, for an unknown __48___, a wall of calcium(钙化壁) built. Then the lump or cancer _49__ itself to the wall. When Tom __50__on me, the force broke the lump away from the calcium wall, which made me ___ 51__the lump. Before that, I couldn’t see or feel it, so there was no way for me to know it was there.

I had a complete __ 52___ and the cancer did not spread. The doctors told me if the cancer had gone unfound even six more months, it would have been too late.

Was Tom ___53__ of just what he was doing? I’ll never really know. What I do

know is that I’ m glad I made a promise to_ 54 __my golden years with this wonderful creature---- for Tom not only shares his life with me; he has made sure that I will be ___55___to share my life with him.

1.A. suggested       B. insisted       C. told        D. promised

2.A. take            B. bring         C. share       D. carry

3.A. well-behaved     B. well-built     C. well-dressed D. well-known

4.A. dirty            B. neat         C. lazy        D. sad

5.A. working         B. sleeping      C. eating      D. playing

6.A. joke            B. fun          C. game       D. face

7.A. company        B. kindness      C. care       D. comfort

8.A. happily         B. luckily        C. strangely   D. sadly

9.A. while           B. when         C. as         D. before

10.A. power           B. energy       C. devotion    D. weight

11.A. joy             B. surprise      C. pain        D. relief

12.A. enjoyed         B. had          C. lived       D. treated

13.A. cause           B. excuse       C. reason      D. idea

14.A. attached         B. devoted      C. fell        D. dropped

15.A. jumped          B. sat          C. stood      D. put

16.A. watch           B. witness      C. observe     D. notice

17.A. task             B. work        C. operation   D. job

18.A. fond            B. aware        C. ashamed   D. afraid

19.A. waste           B. spend        C. cost       D. make

20.A. in              B. around       C. out        D. outside

语法填空(共10小题；每小题l 5分．满分l5分)

    阅读下面短文，按照句子结构的语法性和上下文连贯的要求，在空格处填入一个适当的词或使用括号中词语的正确形式填空，并将答案填写在答题卡标号为16—25的相应位置上。

The Dragon Boat Festival is celebrated on the fifth day of the fifth month according to the Chinese calendar. For thousands of years, the festival _1.________ (mark) by eating zong zi and racing dragon boats in honour of Qu Yuan, who is said to have committed suicide(自杀) by drowning himself.

Qu was a minister of the State of Chu ____2.___ (situate) in the present-day Hunan and Hubei provinces, during the Warring States Period（战国时期）. He was upright, loyal and highly respected. ____3.__, he was dismissed from office. __4.____ (realize) that the country was in the hands of evil officials, Qu leapt into River Miluo on the fifth day of the fifth month. Nearby fishermen rushed over to save him but were ___5.____ (able) to recover his body.

The people of Chu __6.___ mourned Qu’s death threw rice into the river to feed his ghost ___7.___ year on the day of his death. But one year, the spirit of Qu appeared and told the mourners that a huge reptile（爬行动物）in the river had stolen the rice. The spirit then advised __8._____ to wrap the rice and bind it _9.____ throwing it into the river.

During the Duanwu Festival, zong zi is eaten to symbolize（象征，表示） the rice offerings to Qu. And the dragon-boat races symbolize __10._____ many attempts to rescue and recover Qu's body.