Here’s an idyllic(田园风光的) scene: a small village where the sun always shines, crops always grow and your friends drop by to sweep your yard to the sound of guitar music. Animals do what they are told, there is no disease, and lending folks a helping hand makes you richer and wiser. Welcome to FarmVille — current population 69m and rising fast.
“It reminds me of my childhood,” says one player, Lia Curran, 37, a chemist from London. “Right now I’m growing wheat and poinsettia, I’ve got a small orchard, and I’m keeping some chickens and some cows. I like having the animals. It’s comfortable.”
Curran’s young animals, however, are nothing more than a collection of computer-controlled cartoons. FarmVille is an online computer game built into the social networking site Facebook and is described by its players as “addictive”. Launched last June by Zynga Game Network, FarmVille now has more players than Twiter’s entire user base — or more than the population of the UK. The players are largely women over the age of 35.
Jenny Glyn, 33, a London housewife, started playing in September. “I had a look at a friend’s farm and was hooked,” she says. “My first motivation was to overtake her, but I did that pretty quickly. Now there’s something satisfying about growing crops.”
FarmVille intellectually unites the worlds of social networking and gaming. Players are given a patch of ground with six fields, “cash”, a few seeds and a plough and have to build up wealth, skills and neighbors to create bigger, better, richer farms.
Inviting your online friends to play means you earn more and get free gifts; you rise rapidly through the first levels but, once hooked, have to work harder and harder with no final level or goal in sight.
“It’s very moreish,” says Curran. She hasn’t yet paid real-world money to advance in the game, but her friends do. One buys extra virtual currency at the exchange rate of $240 (£145) in FarmVille for $40 (£24) in the real world.
“I’d expanded on FarmVille as much as I could, but I just wanted a pond and some bushes and trees around it,” says the woman, who is too embarrassed to be named. “I didn’t tell my husband I’d paid real money because he’d think I’m mad. But then he did keep me waiting in the car outside our house while he harvested his raspberries.”
Brian Dudley, chief executive at Broadway Lodge, an addiction treatment centre, warns that this sort of obsessive(令人着魔的) play can lead to an addiction as severe as gambling.
59. What does Curran do in the passage?
A. She is a player.                                                      B. She is a farmer who grows wheat and poinsettia.
C. She is a chemist.                                                  D. She is a housewife who raises chickens and cows.
60. By FarmVille, the writer means ______.
A. an addictive farm on which live 69 million farmers
B. a London housewife’s farm
C. an online computer game built into the social networking site
D. a farm on which people grow real crops and play as well
61. In the last but one paragraph, the husband kept the woman waiting outside ______.
A. because he was angry at his wife’s being mad about the farm
B. because he himself was busy with his farm
C. in order to punish his wife for her having paid real money
D. so that his wife would wake up from her addiction to the farm
62. According to the passage, which of the following is NOT true?
A. The population of the UK is less than 69 million.
B. This sort of obsessive play can cause very severe addiction.
C. Once hooked, one has to make greater efforts to reach a higher level.
D. Up till now, nobody has yet paid real-world money to advance in the play.

阅读下列短文，从短文后所给各题的四个选项（A、B、C和D）中，选出可以填入空白处的最佳选项，并在答题卡上将该项涂黑。

       My husband hasn’t stopped laughing about the thing that happened to me. It’s ___56___ now but it wasn’t at that time.

   Last Friday, after doing all the family shopping in the town, I___ 57___a rest before catching the train, so I bought a___ 58___and some chocolate and went to the station coffee shop, that cheap, self-service place with long___59___ to sit at. I put my heavy bag down on the floor, put the newspaper and chocolate on the table to___60___ a place, and went to get a cup of coffee.

    When I came back with the coffee, there was someone in the___61___ seat. It was one of those wild-looking young men, with dark glasses and torn clothes, and hair colored bright___62___ at the front, not so unusual these days. What did___63___me most was he’d started to___64___ my chocolate!

    Naturally, I was annoyed. However, to avoid trouble, then really I was rather uneasy about him—I just__65___down at the front page of the newspaper, tasted my coffee, and took a bit of chocolate. The boy looked at me___66___. Then he took another piece of my chocolate. I could hardly___ 67___it. Still I didn’t want to start an argument. When he took a___68___ piece, I felt angrier than annoyed. I thought, “Well, I shall have the last piece.” And I ___69___ it.

The boy gave a___70___look, and then stood up. As he left he shouted out, “This woman’s mad!” Everyone___71___. That really made me feel silly, but it was even___ 72___when I finished my coffee and ready to___ 73___. My face went red—as red as his hair when I___74___ I’d made a mistake. It wasn’t my chocolate he’d been taking. There was mine, ___75___, just under my newspaper.

A. serious        B. wonderful             C. funny                  D. exciting

A. enjoyed         B. took    C. had            D. wanted

A. cake       B. newspaper        C. magazine                 D. bag

A. chairs     B. tables        C. benches            D. windows

A. order      B. create  C. keep          D. take

A. very        B. same   C. free           D. next

A. red   B. black         C. brown              D. white

A. interest   B. surprise      C. frighten     D. hurt

A. touch     B. drink  C. get      D. eat

A. looked        B. lay      C. read    D. went

A. eagerly  B. really  C. surprisingly      D. excitedly

A. believe         B. bear    C. notice        D. stop

A. last      B. big     C. single        D. third

A. dropped      B. threw  C. got     D. wrapped

A. strange  B. friendly      C. disappointed      D. curious

A. agreed   B. promised    C. stared        D. followed

A. better    B. worse  C. later   D. easier

A. leave     B. pay     C. check  D. regret

A. wondered      B. realized      C. decided     D. recognized

A. tasted    B. tore    C. tied    D. unopened

Eight-year-old Jesse Arbogast was playing in the sea late one evening in July when a 7-foot bull shark attacked him and tore off his arm. Jesse’s uncle jumped into the sea and dragged the boy to shore. The boy was not breathing. His aunt gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation(人工呼吸) while his uncle rang the emergency services. Pretty soon, a helicopter arrived and flew the boy to hospital. It was a much quicker journey than the journey by road.

Jesse’s uncle, Vance Folsenzier, ran back into the sea and found the shark that had attacked his nephew. He picked the shark up and threw it onto the beach. A coastguard shot the fish four times and although this did not kill it, the shark’s jaws relaxed so that they could open them, and reach down into its stomach, and pull out the boys’ arm.

At the Baptist Hospital in Pensacola, Dr Ian Rogers spent eleven hours reattaching Jesse’s arm. “It was a complicated operation,” he said, “but we were lucky. If the arm hadn’t been recovered in time, we wouldn’t have been able to do the operation at all. What I mean is that if they hadn’t found the shark, we wouldn’t have had a chance.”

According to the local park ranger Jack Tomosvic, shark attacks are not that common. “Jesse was just unlucky,” he says, “evening is the shark’s feeding time. And Jesse was in an area without lifeguards. This would never have happened if he had been in an area where swimming is allowed.”

When reporters asked Jesse’s uncle how he had had the courage to fight against a shark, he replied, “I was mad and you do some strange things when you’re mad.”

1.What was the boy doing when the accident happened?

2. In which way did the boy’s uncle help with the operation?

3.How was his uncle in time of danger?

4.According to Jack Tomosvic, _______.

The Worst Part
Mom is usually home on Sunday but this week she was going to a big golf game and I was all alone in the house. I was mad at Mom for divorcing Dad.
I kept looking at the telephone until I couldn’t stand it any longer. I picked up the receiver and dialed Dad’s number over in Bakersfield. I even remembered to dial 1 first because it was long distance. “You promised to phone me this week but you didn’t,” I said, feeling I had to talk to him.
“Take it easy, kid,” he said. “I just didn’t get around to it. I was going to call this evening. The week isn’t over yet.”
I thought about that.
“Something on your mind?” he asked.
“I hoped you would call, so I waited and waited.” Then I was sorry I said it.
“There was heavy snow in the morning,” he said, “I had to chain up on highway 80 and lost time.”
I know putting chains on eight big wheels in the snow is no fun. I felt a little better, as long as we were talking. “How is Bandit?” I asked.
There was a funny silence. For a minute I thought the line was dead. Then I knew something must have happened to my dog.
“Well, kid—”, he began. “My name is Leigh!” I almost yelled. “I’m not just some kid you met on the street!”
“Keep your shirt on, Leigh,” he said. “When I had to stop along with some other truck drivers to put on chains, I left Bandit out of the cab, I thought he would get back … I have sent out a call to CB radio, but I didn’t get an answer yet.” I was about to say I understood when there came the bad part, the really bad part. I heard a boy’s voice say, “Hey, Bill, Mom wants to know when we’re going out to get the pizza?”
【小题1】We can conclude from the passage that              .

Dear editor,

Mary is my friend and she is a very good-hearted girl. She’s always the first to help out others. But her habits make me mad sometimes and she just won’t change her ways. For most situations, that’s just fine with me, as I know it’s what make her who she is. However, sometimes it’s just so hard for me to bear her behavior. She has recently got a cellphone, but she often borrows mine to make calls. My phone has a chain with it. She always tries to open it like her own phone. I usually open it for her, but not always, as sometimes I’m driving my car, so she needs to get it out of my purse and open it herself.

This weekend we were at a party in a faraway village. She borrowed my cellphone. As it was cold outside, I let her take it outside without opening it. Now it’s broken because she didn’t open it properly. I wouldn’t be so mad, but over the weekend she also borrowed my car and never offered to pay for the gas, which made me very angry. She should have offered to pay for the gas. As I have mentioned, she’s the type to help out others when and where she can. Perhaps because of that, she thinks others should also do the same for her. Sometimes I just think she is very childish. I don’t want to hurt her, but I do want to let her know that not everyone can accept that. What should I do to let her know that?

Yours,

Lily

1.What is Lily’s purpose in writing this letter?

A．to advise us to be careful when making friends.

B．To tell others what kind of person Mary is.

C．To tell Mary what she thinks of her.

D．To ask for advice from an editor.

2.We can learn from Paragraph 1 that _____.

A．Mary doesn’t have a cellphone

B．Mary doesn’t have any good habits

C．Lily is sometimes not pleased with Mary’s behavior

D．Lily has asked Mary to change her ways.

3.What happened at the weekend party?

A．Mary lost Lily’s chain.

B．Mary left before the party was over.

C．Lily’s cellphone was broken.

D．Lily had a quarrel with Mary.

4.What kind of person is Mary?

A．Friendly and beautiful.

B．Kind and careful.

C．Careful and childish.

D．Warm-hearted but childish