D

    Huw Thomas fell in love with Megan. But then an accident changed his life, and he had to move to Canada. Megan promised to write to him. But Huw never heard from her … until one day a letter arrived.

    He saw the letter came from where he and his father had lived in their early years. Who was writing to him? He turned the envelope over in his hands several times. Then he took out the letter and read:

Dear Huw,

    I don't know if this letter will reach you, and I don't really know why I'm writing to you after all these years, but …

    Huw turned to the end of the letter and saw:

Best wishes

Megan

    He couldn't believe it. He turned back to the first words of the letter and read:

    …after all these years, but I've just found your letters to me from Canada. Believe me, this was the first time I'd read them and they made me cry, even after 50 years. I found them in a box of my father's papers. They were never opened.

    Huw, I never knew that you'd written to me. I thought your new life in Canada had made you forget me. Now I realize that my father kept your letters. I can still remember asking him if there was any letter for me, and he always said   ▲  , my girl. I told you he was no good. Finally, after about a year, I believed him.

    But why did he keep the letters? Do you think he wanted me to find them when it was too late? Anyway, he's dead now, so I can't ask him. All I can say is I'm sorry. Sorry for what my father did, sorry that you never heard from me and sorry for… everything.

    I hope that at least this letter reaches you. Of course, I'll understand if you don't want to write back to me, but if you do, I am still Megan Jenkins, and I still live at the same address.

Best wishes,

Megan

    Huw read the letter again. Everything with Megan came back to him. He had never forgotten her. He couldn't. Every day he looked at her face on the wall. He had a drawing of her. It had traveled everywhere with him. But to hear from her again …

    “Are you all right, Dad?” asked Mike, coming into the room.

    There once was a man and a woman who had been married for more than 60 years. They talked about everything. They kept no secrets from each other…except that the old woman had a shoe box in the top of her closet and she told her husband never to open it or ask her about it.

    For an these years the husband had never thought about the box, but one day the little old woman got very sick and the doctor said she would never recover.

    In trying to sort out things they had, the little old man took down the shoe box from the top of the closet and took it to his wife's bedside. She agreed it was time that he should know what was in the box.

    When he opened it, he found two beautifully crocheted (钩针编织的) doilies (装饰垫) and some money. He counted the money. It was $25,000 in total. He asked his wife about the unusual contents.

    "When we were married," she said, "my grandmother told me the secret of a happy marriage was to never argue. She told me that if I ever got angry with you, I should just keep quiet and crochet a doily."

    The little old man was so moved, and he had to fight back tears. Only two precious doilies were in the box. She had only been angry with him two times in all those years of living and loving. He was filled with joy and happiness.

    "Sweetheart," he said, "that explains the doilies, but what about all this money? Where did it all come from?"

    "Oh," she said, "that's the money I made from selling the doilies."

    Mason has seen the future—and it's fun. Mason likes thinking about how machines can make our life easier by doing the work we hate, such as cleaning. He shows a floor cleaning machine that's built into the wall. It can clean up the floor.

    When it comes to the kitchen, Bruce, an expert at Whirlpool, is sure that in a few years, robots will be doing most of the boring work, freeing us to relax. "More than just fun, future kitchens will be environmentally friendly," he says. A new system will be built in the house which can recycle energy lost from your kitchen to make the whole home warm.

    "The fridge will be the centre of the home," says Daniel, a market expert. The fridge will have a touch screen (触摸屏幕) where you can watch TV, surf the Internet, check your emails, keep a shopping list and order vegetables. "Your fridge is the first place you go to in the morning and the last place at night," says Daniel.

    "I wonder why a 1.9-metre man and 1.6-metre woman have to cook meals on counters (柜台) of the same height," Jane Langmuir, an expert of cooking machines, says. "But times have changed. We have made a new counter where you can press a button and it moves to whatever height you want."

    Ted Selker has made the dish maker which lets you make dishes and bowls out of plastics at home. After each meal, the dishes are changed straight back into plastics.

{#blank#}1{#/blank#}(几个月前), I read a book. It made me feel it's a {#blank#}2{#/blank#}to always buy more things than I need. I started cleaning my house and got lots of unnecessary things. It's a w{#blank#}3{#/blank#}and trouble for me. And then I{#blank#}4{#/blank#}(考虑)what to do with them.

This question made me think of Garage Sale for Orphans. It helps people clean out their houses and t{#blank#}5{#/blank#} things into money that can help homeless kids{#blank#}6{#/blank#}(全世界). It r{#blank#}7{#/blank#}me. So I ask my boys for help, and they loved the idea of helping others.

They walked from door{#blank#}8{#/blank#}door to ask the{#blank#}9{#/blank#}/'neɪbəz/ for the things they don't need. At first, I wondered if we{#blank#}10{#/blank#}able to fill a box or two. Finally, however, we had ten boxes full of different things. Then it was time{#blank#}11{#/blank#}the yard sale.{#blank#}12{#/blank#} (即使；尽管)we had ads in the newspaper and online, I was still not sure whether whether anyone would come. {#blank#}13{#/blank#}(令我们惊奇的是), so many people came to our yard sale. I p{#blank#}14{#/blank#}to get 400 to 500 that day. At last, we got $743.23! We sent the money to the poor children in Haiti. Thanks for all the people who{#blank#}15{#/blank#}helped us.

Have you ever read the cartoon books The Adventures of Tintin? There are many stories in the books. Each is about an exciting trip of a young reporter named Tintin. When Tintin is on the road, his best friend, a dog named Snowy, is always by his side. Sometimes the two travel around the world. Sometimes they go with their friends.

Tintin, Snowy and their friends aren't real. But thanks to the writer, Georges Prosper Remi, they look quite real.

 Born on 22 May 1907, Georges Prosper Remi was a famous cartoon writer and an artist from Belgium.From an early age, he liked to draw pictures very much. Later he created a new name for himself. It was Herge. From then on, he always signed his works not with his real name—Georges Prosper Remi, but with this new name—Herge.

The series first came out in French on 10 January 1929. Herge thanked French illustrator(插图画家) Alain Gree so much. Once Herge travelled to Paris to meet Alain Gree and asked for some advice. Then the two became good friends.

In 1979, Herge got a serious illness. Later his illness became more and more serious. Herge died on 3 March —1983. His death received front— page coverage in many newspapers. Although Herge passed away, his works are still loved by people from all over the world.

Welcome to Sanxingdui Museum

It is in Chengdu. It is a modern thematic site (专题性遗址) museum in China. There are two halls with a display (展示) area of nearly 12, 000 square meters in it. Welcome!