I needed to buy a digital camera, one that was simply good at taking good snaps (快照), maybe occasionally for magazines. Being the cautious type, I fancied a reliable brand. So I went on the net, spent 15 minutes reading product reviews on good websites, wrote down the names of three top recommendations and headed for my nearest big friendly camera store. There in the cupboard was one of the cameras on my list. And it was on special offer. Oh joy. I pointed at it and asked an assistant, “Can I have one of those?”  He looked perturbed (不安). “Do you want to try it first?” he said. It didn’t quite sound like a question. “Do I need to?” I replied ,“There is nothing wrong with it？” This made him look a bit insulted and I started to feel bad. “No, no. But you should try it,” he said encouragingly. “Compare it with the others.”

 I looked across at the others: shelves of similar cameras placed along the wall, offering a wide range of slightly different prices and discounts, with each company selling a range of models based around the same basic box. With so many models to choose from, it seemed that I would have to spend hours weighing X against Y, always trying to take Z and possibly H into account at the same time. But when I had finished, I would still have only the same two certainties that I had entered the store with: first, soon after I carried my new camera out of the shop, it would be worth half what I paid for it; and second, my wonderful camera would very quickly be replaced by a new model.

But something in the human soul whispers that you can beat these traps by making the right choice, the clever choice, the wise choice. In the end, I agreed to try the model I had chosen. The assistant seemed a sincere man. So I let him take out of my chosen camera from cupboard, show how it took excellent pictures of my fellow shoppers… and when he started to introduce the special features, I interrupted to ask whether I needed to buy a carry-case and a memory card as well.

Why do we think that new options(选择) still offer us anything new? Perhaps it is because they offer an opportunity to avoid facing the fact that our real choices in this culture are far more limited than we would like to imagine.

1.The shop assistant insisted that the writer should               

A. try the camera to see if there was anything wrong with it.

B. compare the camera he had chosen with the others.

C. get more information about different companies.

D. trust him and stop asking questions.

2.What does the writer mean by “it would be worth half what I paid for it ”(paragraph 2)

A. He should get a 50% discount.

B. The price of the camera was unreasonably high.

C. The quality of the camera was not good.

D. The camera would soon fall in value.

3.The writer decided to try the model he had chosen because he                  

A. knew very little about it.

B. didn’t trust the shop assistant.

C. wanted to make sure the one he chose would be the best.

D. had a special interest in taking pictures of his fellow shoppers.

4.I t can be inferred from the passage that in the writer’s opinion,            .

A. people waste too much money on cameras

B. cameras have become an important part of our daily life

C. we don’t actually need so many choices when buying a product

D. famous companies care more about profit than quality

Along a long path we came to a deep valley, on the far side of which the path led into some very thick bushes. Rather than push through up again and rejoin the path on the far side of the bushes.

       As I climbed down into the valley a bird flew off h rock on which I had put my hand. On looking at the spot from which the bird had risen, I saw two eggs. They were the kind that I did not have in my collection, so I placed them carefully in my bag, wrapped in a little dry grass.

       As we went further down the valley the sides became steeper and not far from where I had entered. It came to drop of about twelve to fourteen feet. The water that rushed down all these small valleys in the rainy season had worn the rock as glass. As it was too deep to climb down, I handed my gun to one of the men and slid down it. My feet had hardly touched the sandy bottom when the two men jumped down, one on each side of me. They quickly gave me the gun and asked me if I had heard the tiger. In fact, I had heard nothing; possibly because of the noise I made sliding down the rock. The men said they had heard a tiger growling somewhere nearby, but they did not know from which direction the noise had come.

According to the text we know that __________.

       A. the writer decided to push through the thick bushes

       B. the writer decided to walk along the valley

       C. the writer wanted to stop climbing

       D. the writer tried to find two eggs

When the writer found the eggs, he ________.

       A. wrapped them in dry grass and put them aside

       B. wrapped them in dry grass and took them with him

       C. tried to find the bird

       D. made the bird fly off

At the end of the story, the writer knew that ____________.

       A. a tiger had run away                  B. a tiger was close to them

       C. the men had seen a tiger                D. a tiger had seen them

Which of the following orders is RIGHT about what happened in their travel?

       A. hear the sound of tiger→find eggs→push through the bushes→climb down into the valley

       B. climb down into the valley→push through the bushes→hear the sound of tiger→find eggs

       C. push through the bushes→climb down into the valley→find eggs→hear the sound of tiger

       D. find eggs→climb down into the valley→hear the sound of tiger→push through the bushes

  You're rushing to get out of the door for a meeting, but you just can't seem to find your car keys. Or you've got tickets booked for a Caribbean cruise(坐船旅行) , but your passport disappeared. Or maybe you've just come back from a grocery store tour and realized…Hey, did I leave my baby in the checkout line?

     Ok, you've probably never gone to the extremes of our last example (we hope), but most of us experience slip - ups like these on a daily basis. No matter how smart you may be, it doesn't mean your brain won't turn to Swiss cheese every so often, and no amount of e-mail reminders can help you remember where you left your TV remote or lucky penny.

     But now, there is a new pair of eyeglasses that can help to find all those little things you know must be around somewhere :  Let's call it Vision 2.0.

     The new glasses, which are being developed in a Japanese lab under the code name Smart Goggles,are similar to a Google search engine for your eyes. The high - tech glasses come with a camera that records everything you see on a daily basis, and boast built - in object recognition software that allows them to keep track of whatever comes across their field of vision. If you've got a collection of art sculptures that the camera can't recognize immediately, no problem :  Just say the name of each item,  and the glasses will memorize them right away.

     The Smart Goggles' superb tracking abilities mean that whenever you're looking for your keys, your overdue library book, or yes, even your baby, all you have to do is to say the word and the Goggles' camera will show you the last time your desired object appeared on screen, telling exactly where you'll be able to find it.

     Though the glasses are still too big for general use, the research team in Japan believes that they'll be able to make the modem glasses smaller to the size of normal glasses in the near future, making them the perfect new accessory for yourself or any other absent - minded Professor you know.

      With these intelligent designs, you'll never lose anything again. Except maybe your glasses.

1.The best title for the passage should be _______.

A. A Habit of Forgetting Small Things  

B. Usage of New High - Tech Glasses

C. How to Find Little Things Easily

D. Glasses Will Help Find Your Things

2.Which of the following is a slip - up according to the passage?

A. You can't find your watch before going to work.

B. You can't work out a math problem in given time.

C. You don't know how to deal with a naughty boy.

D. You don't know how to get to a hospital.

3.Which of the following statement is true about Smart Goggles?

A. They're a search engine used on the Internet.

B. They're a camera with recognition software.

C. They're software used in computers.

D. They're sunglasses protecting our eyes.

4.Where are the new glasses being developed?

A. In China.          B. In America.      C. In Japan.          D. In France.

Complete the following passage by using the words in the box. Each word can only be used once.  Note that there is one word more than you need.

A. desperation    B. authorities         C. diligently       D. confusion    E. enrolled

F. violently       G. financial          H. conclusion     I. devoted      J. graduation

Seventeen years ago, when I was in military college, I was known as “the worrying wreck from Virginia Tech”. I worried so ____1_____ that I often became ill. In _____2_____, I poured out my troubles to Professor Baird, professor of business administration. The fifteen minutes that I spent with Professor Baird did more for my health and happiness than all the rest of the four years I spent in college. “Jim,” he said, “you ought to sit down and face the facts. If you _____3_____ half as much time and energy to solving your problems as you do to worrying about them, you wouldn’t have any worries. ”

I figured that I had failed physics because I had no interest in the subject. But now I changed my attitude. I said to myself, “If the college _____4_____ demand that I pass my physics examination before I obtain a degree, who am I to question their wisdom?”

So I ______5____   for physics again. This time I passed because instead of wasting my time in worrying about how hard it was, I studied _____6_____.

I solved my ____7_____ worries by taking on some additional jobs, such as selling punch at the college dances, and by borrowing money from my father, which I paid back soon after ____8______.

As I look back at it now, I can see that my problem was one of _____9_____, a lack of willingness to find the causes of my worry and face them realistically.

语法填空(共10小题；每小题1. 5分，满分15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，并将答案填写在答卷标号为16-25的相应位置上。

Six days of spring rain had created a wild river       (run) by Nancy Brown’s farm. As she tried to drive her cows to higher ground, she        (slip) and hit her head on a fallen tree trunk. Nancy was badly hurt and could only walk with great       (difficult). The water       (rise). Nancy’s pace got slower and slower. Finally, all she could do was to throw her arm around Lizzie’s neck and try to hang on. About 20 minutes later, Lizzie managed to       (succeed) pull herself and Nancy out of the water and onto a bit of high land.

    It took rescuers another two hours to discover Nancy.      helicopter lowered a doctor,    attached Nancy to a life-support lift. They raised her into the helicopter and took her to the school gym,      the Red Cross had set up an emergency shelter.

When the flood subsided two days later, Nancy immediately went back to the highland. Lizzie was gone.      was one of the 19 cows that Nancy lost. “I owe my life      her,” said Nancy sobbingly.