Mr. Brown is an old man. Every morning he goes for a walk in the park. And he comes home at twelve thirty for his lunch in the middle of the day.

But today a car stopped at his house at twelve 0'clock. Two policemen helped him get out. One of them said to Mr. Brown's daughter, "He can't find his way home in the park and ask us to take him home in the car."

    The daughter thanked the policemen and they leave. Then she asked her father, "Dad, you go to the park every day. But today you can't find the way. What's wrong?" The old man smiled like a child and said, "I can find my way home. But I don't want to walk home."

    Baloo the bear, Leo the Lion and Shere Khan the tiger have the most unusual and unlikely friendship between them. They were saved eight years ago, when they were cubs only two months old.

    They were first sent to a rescue（救护）center, where they were raised together. Now they are in an American zoo. Because they came here as a kind of family, the zoo built a large clubhouse so that they could all sleep in it.

    Now they have grown up. You can see them playing around like brothers. The three big animals seem to no sense(意识) of their animal differences.

    Baloo and Shere Khan are very close. That is because they rise early, as Leo being a lion likes to spend most the day sleeping. When Leo wakes up the three of them mess around for most of the day before they settle down to some food. It is wonderful to see a giant American Black Bear put his arm around a Bengal tiger and then to see the tiger touch the bear with his nose lightly like a pet cat. You can often see they lie on top of each other for heat and for love.

    “They are not wild animals any more. But you must remember who you are dealing with when you are with them,” said one of the zoo keepers.

    Once upon a time, a young man wanted to go to a village on business. Halfway there was a mountain. Before he left home, his family warned him to stay calm and climb onto trees if he was in face of beasts. In this way, the beasts couldn't do anything to him.

    The young man remembered these words and began his trip.

    He walked for a long time carefully and found that no beasts were out there. He thought his family's worries were superfluous. And he became relaxed as he walked. Just at that moment, he saw a fierce tiger running to him and he climbed onto a tree nearby at once.

    The tiger roared around the tree and even jumped to reach the man. The young man was too scared to hold the tree and fell right on the back of the tiger. Full of fear, he had to hold the tiger tightly. The tiger thought that must be a giant beast. So it was afraid and started running madly.

    People on the road didn't know what happened and said, "Look at the young man. He is riding a tiger!" "Cool!" "Superman!"

    Hearing these words, the young man was very angry. "Why can't they see I'm suffering a lot? Don't they understand I am in fear and almost scared to death? "he said to himself.

Tommy loved ice cream. It was his favorite dessert. His parents let him have a small dish each night after dinner, if he ate all of his vegetables. Tommy loved eating ice cream at home. He always tried a new kind of ice cream each time. When he turned eight, he had a checkup at the doctor's office. Dr. Katz said, "It's fine to have a little ice cream once in a while, but not every night."

That night at supper, Tommy ate all his vegetables. But there was no ice cream for dessert. Instead, Mom came up with a new rule.

"If we want to eat ice cream, we'll have to earn it by walking to the ice cream stand," she said. Tommy would like to give it a try, so they decided to take their walk on Saturday afternoon. According to the map, the ice cream stand was a mile away.

Saturday was a sunny day. The sun was so bright that he had to almost close his eyes. Tommy asked, "How much farther is it?" Mom checked the map on her phone and then said, "We're not even halfway yet. Do you want to turn around?" Tommy did want to turn around, but he also wanted ice cream. Walking was the only way to get it.

The sun beat down so strongly that even Mom was sweating （流汗）. Tommy's legs felt heavy. He wanted to sit down, but there were no chairs. He wanted to give up. He looked up to tell Mom he was ready to turn around. But when he did, he could see the purple flag at the top of the ice cream stand. They were almost there! Tommy started to walk faster. He could almost taste the cool, creamy ice cream already. It was a long walk, but it was certainly worth the effort.