完型填空

　　When I was a child, my mom liked to prepare food for dinner every now and then．And I remember one night in 　　1　　 when she made dinner after a long, hard day at work．

　　That Monday evening so long ago, my mom 　　2　　 a plate of eggs, sausage(香肠), and extremely burnt toast in front of my dad．I remember 　　3　　 to see if dad noticed! 　　4　　 all my dad did was reach for his toast, smile at my mom, and ask me how my day was 　　5　　．I don’t remember what I told him that night, but I do remember watching him 　　6　　 butter and jelly(果冻) on that toast and eat every 　　7　　!

　　When I got up from the 　　8　　 that evening, I remember hearing my mom 　　9　　 to my dad for burning the toast．And I’ll never forget what he said：“Baby, I love 　　10　　 toast．”

　　Later that night, I went to kiss Daddy goodnight and I asked him if he 　　11　　 liked his burnt toast．He 　　12　　 me in his arms and said, “Son, your mum put in a 　　13　　 day at work today and she’s very 　　14　　．Besides, a little burnt toast never 　　15　　 anyone!”

　　Actually, life is full of imperfect things and imperfect people．We can’t be 　　16　　 at everything we do．What I’ve learned over the years is that learning to accept 　　17　　 faults and choosing to celebrate each other’s 　　18　　 is one of the most important keys to creating a healthy, growing, and lasting 　　19　　．

　　If you learn to take the good, the bad, and the ugly parts of your life as they are, you can 　　20　　 your life to the fullest．

阅读理解

　　The amount of carbon taken in by growing plants increased from 1982 through 1999 as temperatures rose and the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere increased．But a new study in Friday's edition of the journal Science found a drought-related decline in such plant growth from 2000 to 2009, even though temperatures continued to climb．

　　As drought caused by warming reduces the land's ability to take in carbon, the result could be more carbon dioxide left in the atmosphere, and thus more warming, Zhao Maosheng from the University of Montana explained in a telephone interview．

　　“This is a pretty serious warning that warmer temperatures are not going to endlessly improve plant growth”co-author Steven Running, also from the University of Montana' said in a statement．“We see this as a bit of a surprise, and potentially significant on a policy level because previous interpretations suggested global warming might actually help plant growth around the world,”he said．

　　Instead, he and Zhao found a small but measurable decline of about 1％, compared to a 6％ increase in the past decade．

　　Their study, based on the data collected by NASA satellites, found that north areas continued to increase plant growth, thanks to warmer temperatures and a longer growing season．

　　Someone commented,“This past decade's net decline in earthly productivity suggests that a complex relationship between temperature, rainfall, cloudiness, and carbon dioxide, probably in combination with other factors such as nutrients(营养)and land management, will determine future patterns and trends in productivity．”

阅读理解

　　In the atmosphere, carbon dioxide acts rather like a one-way mirror or the glass in the roof of a greenhouse which allows the sun's rays to enter but prevents the heat from escaping．

　　According to a weather expert' s prediction, the atmosphere will be 3℃warmer in the year 2050 than it is today, if man continues to burn fuels at the present rate．If this warming up took place, the ice caps in the poles would begin to melt, thus raising sea level several metres and severely flooding coastal cities．Also, the increase in atmospheric temperature would lead to great changes in the climate of the northern hemisphere(北半球), possibly resulting in an alteration of the earth's chief food growing zones．

　　In the past, concern about a man-made warming of the earth has concentrated on the Arctic because the Antarctic is much colder and has a much thicker ice sheet．But the weather experts are now paying more attention to West Antarctic, which may be affected by only a few degrees of warming, in other words, by a warming on the scale that will possibly take place in the next fifty years from the burning of fuels．

　　Satellite pictures show that large areas of Antarctic ice are already disappearing．The evidence available suggests that a warming has taken place．This fits the theory that carbon dioxide warms the earth．

　　However, most of the fuel is burnt in the northern hemisphere, where temperatures seem to be falling．Scientists conclude , therefore, that up to now natural influences on the weather have gone beyond those caused by man．The question is：Which natural cause has most effect on the weather?

　　One possibility is the variable behavior of the sun．Astronomers at one research station have studied the hot spots and "cold" spots(that is, the relatively less hot spots)on the sun．As the sun rotates(使旋转), every 27.5 days, it presents hotter or "colder" faces to the earth, and different aspects to different parts of the earth．This seems to have a considerable effect on the distribution of the earth's atmospheric pressure, and consequently on wind circulation．The sun is also changeable over a long term：its heat output goes up and down in cycles, the latest trend being downward．

　　Scientists are now finding shared relations between models of solar weather interactions and the actual climate over many thousands of years, including the last Ice Age．The problem is that the models are predicting that the world should be entering a new Ice Age and it is not．One way of solving this theoretical difficulty is to assume a delay of thousands of years while the solar effects overcome the inertia(惯性)of the earth's climate．If this is right, the warming effect of carbon dioxide might thus be serving as a useful opposed balance to the sun's fading heat．