A famous foreign company that invested in China wanted to employ a reception secretary for its public relation department.

    A beautiful girl with a master degree in electric engineering became a winning candidate(候选人) through the difficult process of employment. At its last stage she faced an oral test together with another girl who was her equal not only in good looks but also in education standard. The girl we talk about was confident in herself and successful in the oral test. It seemed that she would get the chance. The examiner told her on behalf of the company that she could come to office of company next Monday as a new employee. At last he asked her, “Have you anything else to say? Shocked by the unexpected question, the beautiful girl was quite at a loss, saying with hesitation(犹豫不决),”“I have to talk with my parents before I give an answer.”Surprised, the examiner said calmly,“In that case, let’s wait till you are ready.”

    The next day the girl came to tell that her parents agreed to her beginning work next Monday. But the examiner said regretfully,“Sorry, the job position is filled by another suitable candidate. You had better have a try in another place.”The beautiful girl was surprised. She asked for an explanation and was told,“What is needed here is a person who knows her own mind.”

 That was how a good opportunity slipped away right under the nose of a beautiful girl.

What did the examiner value most?

A．One’s beautiful looks.    B．One’s knowledge.

C．One’s young age.          D．One’s independence.

It can be inferred from the passage that ________.

A．the other girl who failed at the last oral test was most likely to get the job

B．another girl chosen in next test held the company

C．the company lost its best employee

D．the examiner was surprised at his first choice

Why did the beautiful girl want to ask her parents for advice?

A．She didn’t know what to do.

B．She couldn’t answer the question.

C．She hadn’t expected the examiner would ask such a question.

D．Her parents would scold her if she agreed without their permission.

The best title of this passage probably is ________.

A．Make your decision quickly    B．Have your own judgment

C．Seize your chance in time      D．Hesitation leads to failure     

A couple of years ago, I received a $ 600 insurance dividend (保险股息).Sitting at the kitchen table, my wife and I discussed what we might do with the money. I realized now that the refrigerator overheard our talk. The very next day it went wrong. The repairman told us we needed a new unit. Cost:$600. Not long after that, we got a refund（赔偿金）from the shop, enough to pay for a trip to Mexico. “I’ve something to tell you,” I said to my wife in a low voice. “How about the living-room?” she suggested. I remembered the color TV set was there. “No, not there. Let’s go out.” I showed her the check as we stood on the driveway. We held each other excitedly and hardly noticed the rain. My car was parked within5 meters. I didn’t think anything about it at the time. As I started for the airport the next day, the car began making strange sounds. Changing the engine cost about $ 1, 000.

Then I looked through our financial records. I discovered that during the last ten years we spent all our “found money” repairing a hot water heater, a television and a stove.

I never mention money in front of our mechanical equipment. But if this article is published and I am paid for, the word processor（文字信息处理机）is going to go for sure. It’ll know.

What went wrong first as the writer’s?

   A. The refrigerator          B. The stove

   C. The TV set              D. The engine of the car

What has been repaired and still remains all right?

   A. The car                 B. The color TV set

   C. The stove               D. The hot water heater

Which statement is wrong according to the passage?

There are many pieces of modern equipment in the writer’s home

The writer often discusses with his wife on how to spend their money.

The writer has gone into a lot of trouble to repair his things

The writer’s refrigerator can overhear him

A programmer and an engineer are sitting next to each other on a long flight from Los Angeles to New York. The programmer leans over to the engineer and asks if he would like to play a fun game. The engineer just wants to take a nap, so he politely declines and rolls over to the window to catch a few winks.
The programmer persists and explains that the game is really easy and has a lot of fun. He explains, “I ask you a question, and if you don’t know the answer, you pay me $5. Then you ask me a question, and if I don’t know the answer, I’ll pay you $5.” Again, the engineer politely refuses and tries to get to sleep.
The programmer, now somewhat agitated, says, “OK, if you don’t know the answer you pay me $5, and if I don’t know the answer, I’ll pay you $50!” This catches the engineer’s attention, and he sees no end to this torment(折磨) unless he plays, so he agrees to the game.
The programmer asks the first question. “What’s the distance from the earth to the moon?” The engineer doesn’t say a word, but reaches into his wallet, pulls out a five dollar bill and hands it to the programmer. Now, it’s the engineer’s turn. He asks the programmer, “What goes up a hill with three legs, and comes down on four?” The programmer looks up at him with a puzzled look. He takes out his laptop computer and searches all of his references. After about an hour, he wakes the engineer and hands him $50. The engineer politely takes the $50 and turns away to try to get back to sleep. The programmer, more than a little miffed, shakes the engineer and asks, “Well, so what’s the answer?” Without a word, the engineer reaches into his wallet, hands the programmer $5, and turns away and goes back to sleep.
【小题1】What’s the best title for the passage?

D
At the railway stations all across Britain next week, groups of students will gather with their backpacks to wait for the trains that will carry them home for Christmas. This is a large movement of human beings as before, but with more contradictory traffic flows, so that trains filled with the young pass each other travelling in every direction.
At first, I went home every weekend with my washing, but then those visits became less regular. How did I let my parents know I was coming? They had no phone. Perhaps I wrote to them (“Expect me with dirty shirts this Friday afternoon”), but more likely I didn’t let them know, and just turned up or didn’t turn up, not understanding that my parents’ hopes of seeing me were a greater disappointment of my carelessness than a spoiled tea.
And in all this I suspect I was typical (有代表性的), at least of young men. As for our fathers and mothers, none of them talked of “empty-nest syndrome (综合症)”, even though its possible effect that the main human duty is to protect and feed the young would have suited their generation better than ours. Then, the feeling of loss went without a name. Today, it’s a condition with remedies, which will make parents feel more enjoyable in their life, The Mayo Clinic, for example, suggests you try to maintain regular contact with your children through “visits, phone calls, emails, texts or video chats”. If you feel unhappy, lean on (depend on … for support) loved ones or your mental health providers. Above all, stay positive: “Thinking about the extra time and energy that you might have to devote to your marriage or personal interests after your last child leaves home, it might help you adapt to this major life change.”
What can’t be denied, however, is that children often leave home. In modern societies, this is what they do. Christmas is the very time they can be depended on to return. For the non-religious, that may be this season’s true comfort and significance.
【小题1】The main reason for the busy traffic across Britain next week is that _______.

D
“Pay has little to do with motivation in the workplace”．That’s the argument put forward by best-selling author Daniel Pink in his new book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us．“Pay for performance is supposed to be a folk tale,” he says．
Daniel argues that, if employees receive a basic level of payment, three other factors matter more than money: a sense of independence, of mastery over one’s labor, and of serving a purpose larger than oneself．For example, in 2008 at the offices of Best Buy’s Richfield, salaried workers there were allowed to organize their own work day, putting in only as many hours as they felt necessary to get their jobs done．Productivity increased by 35% according to The Harvard Business Review．
But the managers at Goldman Sachs aren’t exactly making some efforts to adjust．Like others on Wall Street, the banking giant argues that fat bonuses （extra rewards） are essential to make its numbers．“That’s exactly the attitude that leads to the recent financial crisis in the United States,” responds Daniel, “as managers always focus on short-term rewards that encourage cheating, shortcuts, and dishonest behavior．”
Moreover, the 45-year-old author and former Al Gore speechwriter refers to social-science experiments and experiences at such workplaces as Google and 3M．In one 2005 experiment he describes, economists working for the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston tested the power of incentives （激励） by offering cash rewards to those who did well in games that included reciting a series of numbers and throwing tennis balls at a target．The researchers’ finding: Over and over, higher incentives led to worse performance --- and those given the highest incentives did the poorest job．
From this and other cases, Daniel draws a conclusion that monetary incentives remove the element of play and creativity, transforming “an interesting task into a dull one．” It’s even possible, he adds, for oversized rewards to have dangerous side effects, like those of a drug dependency in which an addicted requires ever larger amounts．He refers to scientific testing that shows the promise of cash rewards increase a chemical in the brain similar to that brought on by cocaine or nicotine．
Daniel, however, is also aware that his company examples --- no GE, no IBM, no Microsoft --- hardly represent the commanding heights of the economy．But he thinks his approach will catch on, even in the biggest companies．“Managers tend to be realistic, and in time they will respond,” he says．
53．In his book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Daniel Pink is promoting the idea that _____．
A．it is a money-driven society    B．all workers are not driven by money
C．money plays a key role in management  D．pay has nothing to do with workplaces
54．In Daniel’s point of view, many Wall Street managers are _______．
A．dishonest      B．considerate   C．short-sighted       D．ridiculous
55．In paragraph 5, the example of drug-taking is given to show _______．
A．money is as addictive as cocaine or nicotine
B．big rewards bring about dangerous side effect
C．nicotine and money bring the same chemical
D．workers do not need the incentives of money at all
56．We can learn from the last paragraph that _______．
A．Daniel’s approach will be popular in a wider field
B．realistic managers will first consider Daniel’s approach
C．Daniel’s approach meets the demand of economic crisis
D．GE, IBM and Microsoft will join in Daniel’s approach next