Would you eat a ready meal from the fridge rather than cook from scratch (从头开始 )? Have you been doing internet shopping rather than going to the stores? What can't you be bothered to do?

A study into how lazy British people are has found more than half of adults are so idle they'd catch the lift rather than climb two flights of stairs.

Just over 2000 people were quizzed by independent researchers at Nuffield Health, Britain's largest health charity. The results were surprising.

About one in six people surveyed said if their remote control was broken, they would continue watching the same channel rather than get up.

More than one third of those questioned said they would not run to catch a bus. Worryingly, of the 654 respondents (回答者) with children, 64% said they were often too tired to play with them.

This led the report to conclude that it's no wonder that one in six children in the UK are classified as obese (肥胖) before they start school. 

    Dr Sarah Dauncey, medical director of Nuffield Health, said: "People need to get fitter, not just for their own sake, but for the sake of their families, friends and obviously their pets too.

"If we don't start to take control of this problem, a whole generation will become too unfit to perform even the most basic of tasks."

And Scotland's largest city, Glasgow, was shamed as the laziest city in the UK, with 75% surveyed admitting they do not get enough exercise, followed closely by Birmingham and Southampton, both with 67%.

The results pose (对... 提出) serious challenges for the National Health Service, where obesity-related illnesses such as heart disease and cancer have been on a steady increase for the past 40 years and are costing billions of pounds every year.

1.For the interest of country people should         .    

A. continue watching the same channel rather than get up to get the remote control

B. carry out even the most basic of tasks

C. get enough exercise to get fitter

D. admit they do not get enough exercise

2.Which of the following statements agrees with British people?  

A. They are fond of climbing the stairs.

B. They are willing to accompany their children.

C. They like sports and get enough exercise.

D. They are suffering from obesity-related illnesses.

3.What does the word "idle" in paragraph 2 mostly probably mean?   

A. active               B. lazy              C. optimistic      D. pessimistic

4.Which country is the writer most likely to come from?

A. America              B. China             C. U.K             D. France 

5. What's the main idea of the passage?   

A. UK is taking measures to get over laziness.

B. How lazy British people are.

C. British people are suffering from laziness.

D. Challenges for the National Health Service.

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.

1.The main reason for the busy traffic across Britain next week is that _______.

A．young students will travel home for Christmas.

B．young people will travel in every direction.

C．it is a large movement of human beings

D．the traffic flows will be more contradictory

2.From the second paragraph we can learn that the writer _______.

A．went home every week to wash dirty clothes

B．understood his parents’ desire of seeing him

C．didn’t understand his parents’ feelings

D．went home to see his parents regularly

3.The underlined word “remedies” in paragraph 3 is closest in meaning to _______.

A．reasons           B．excuses           C．habits            D．solutions

4.From the last paragraph we know that _______.

A．in modern society, children should leave home

B．Christmas is likely a time for family reunion

C．the significance of Christmas is celebration

D．Christmas is not a comfort for the non-religious

5.From the passage we can infer that by writing the article the writer is to _______.

A．persuade the young to show concern for their parents

B．ask the young to go home regularly

C．make the young understand their parents’ interest

D．enable the young to be more independent

Are there fastest ways to lose weight? Yes, there are! This is no magic trick or miracle. It just needs sensible actions.

●Drink water

No, you don’t have to fill up like a tub, but ensure that you drink 8 to 10 glasses of water every day. Don’t substitute for juice. With adequate water intake your body will be able to metabolize（新陈代谢）fat more effectively. And if you have a glass of water 10-15 minutes before your meal, you will feel full once you start eating. Another fun fact, did you know that you can lose 62 calories by drinking ice cold water?

●Eat 5 times a day

Start with breakfast. The more you eat for breakfast, the less food you will want to eat at night. Please don’t skip this meal as you’ll end up swallowing everything in sight for the rest of the day. You don’t need to gobble up 5 large meals. Eat sensibly so your body doesn’t crave for food.

●Use weights

Needless to say, exercise is crucial to weight loss. You can’t expect to sit on the sofa all day, sip water and lose weight. Join a good gym that lets you work with weights. It will help you build muscle and your metabolism rate will increase. You’ll soon see the fat come off and in its place muscle will develop.

●Smaller bowls

It’s better to substitute the huge bowls you usually use for small ones – when food starts to fall off, you’ll know it’s enough. Try to get these new bowls in dark colors. Dark blue will be your best choice since it is the number one color that fights off the appetite. Avoid red/orange/yellow colors in your dining area – they are the ones making your appetite go sky high.

●Read between lines

Food and drink products are all out to get you. They scream “Buy me! Buy me!” They could be “fat free” but they could still have a lot of calories. You need to analyze the nutrition label on the cover. Find out what’s good for you and what isn’t. Knowing in advance can help you stay away from products that are calorie-enriched.

●Don’t punish yourself

Go easy on yourself at least one day in a week. If you begin to dislike your diet then there’s something wrong. Find a diet that suits your body type and your lifestyle.

1.According to the passage, which of the following is NOT true?

2.If you are going to run a restaurant, which colors will you choose to paint the dining area?

3. Which of the following belongs to “weights” mentioned in the text?

4.In order to lose weight quickly, you can do the following except_____.

I haven’t seen you for a couple of days . What have you been up          ?

A．in           B．to            C．with               D．for

Twenty-first century humanity has mapped oceans and mountains, visited the moon, and surveyed the planets. But for all the progress, people still don’t know one another very well.

That brings about Theodore Zeldin’s “feast of conversation”－events where individuals pair with persons they don’t know for three hours of guided talk designed to get the past “Where are you from?”

Mr. Zeldin, an Oxford University professor, heads Oxford Muse, a 10-year-old foundation based on the idea that what people need is not more information, but more inspiration and encouragement.

The “feast” in London looks not at politics or events, but at how people have felt about work, relations among the sexes, hopes and fears, enemies and authority, the shape of their lives. The “menu of conversation” includes topics like “How have your priorities(优先考虑的事) changed over the years?” Or, “What have you rebelled against the past?”

As participants gathered, Zeldin opened with a speech: that despite instant communications in a globalized age, issues of human heart remain. Many people are lonely, or in routines that discourage knowing the depth of one another. “We are trapped in shallow conversations and the whole point now is to think, which is sometimes painful,” he says. “But thinking interaction is what separates us from other species, except maybe dogs…who do have generations of human interactions.”

The main rules of the “feast”: Don’t pair with someone you know or ask questions you would not answer. The only awkward moment came when the multi-racial crowd of young adults to seniors, in sun hats, ties and dresses, looked to see whom they would be ‘intimate’ with for hours. But 15 minutes later, everyone was seated and talking, continuing full force until organizers interrupted them 180 minutes later.

“It’s encouraging to see the world is not just a place of oppression and distance from each other,” Zeldin summed up. “What we did is not ordinary, but it can’t be madder than the world already is.”

Some said they felt “liberated” to talk on sensitive topics. Thirty-something Peter, from East London, said that “it might take weeks or months to get to the level of interaction we suddenly opened up.”

1.What can the “conversations” be best described as?

A．Deep and one-on-one.                   B．Sensitive and mad.

C．Instant and inspiring.                     D．Ordinary and encouraging.

2.In a “feast of conversations”, participants ______.

A．pair freely with anyone they like

B．have a guided talk for a set of period of time

C．ask questions they themselves would not answer

D．wear clothes reflecting multi-racial features.

3.In paragraph 6, “they would be ‘intimate’” is closest in meaning to “______”.

A．they would have physical contact           B．they would have in-depth talk

C．they would be close friends               D．they would exchange basic information

4.From the passage, we can conclude that what Zeldin does is ______.

A．an attempt to promote thinking interaction

B．one of the maddest activities ever conducted

C．a try to liberate people from old-fashioned ideas

D．an effort to give people a chance of talking freely