Emma's dream was to be a boxer. All her life, everyone said she couldn't be a boxer because she was a girl. They said that she should just get a normal job. Her parents told her that she would be killed one day if she kept boxing. It was hard to hear "you can't" all the time. Emma still decided to prove everyone was wrong.

    Emma's life was hard. Girls didn't like her, because they thought she was too manly (有男子气概的). Boys didn't like her, because they thought she wasn't as good at boxing as they were. Because of all these, Emma didn't have any friends at school. She always sat alone in the cafeteria (自助餐厅), and it was hard for her to find partners for group projects.

    However, Emma did have friends from her boxing class. They were all female (女人) boxers. They understood what Emma was going through because they were in the same situation. All they had was each other. They were a family. Because of this, Emma was always excited for boxing class. One day, she was going to be a famous boxer.

    Beakley gets a letter from his grandma. It says, "Please come and visit me soon."

    Beakley puts his green toothbrush and socks into his bag. He takes his favourite toy Bunny too. His friend Weber goes with him.

    They take a yellow taxi to the airport. "This airport is very big," says Beakley, "I am scared(惊恐的) of flying. Maybe we should drive a car there." "No," says Weber, "it's too far. The pilot can fly over buildings and trees just like a bird."

    Flying is fantastic and soon they land(着陆). And then Beakley takes a big purple boat with Weber. It crosses the sea to a big island(岛). On the island, Beakley and Weber take a train. After getting off the train, they rent(租) a bike. "This goes very fast and this is fun." says Beakley.

    Finally they get to a pink house and Grandma waits for them.

    Miss Grey lived in a small house. She was old and did not like noise at all, so she was very pleased when her noisy neighbor moved out. A young man moved in and Miss Grey thought the man seemed to be quiet.

    But at three o'clock the next morning, the noise of a dog woke her up. She thought she had never heard a dog there before. It must be the young man's dog. So she telephoned the young man, said something bad about the dog and then hung up the telephone before he could answer. Nothing more happened until three o'clock the next morning. Then Miss Grey's telephone rang, and when she answered, a voice said, "You telephoned me twenty-four hours ago, now I ring you up to say that I don't have a dog."

Many of us spent our childhoods dreaming of becoming astronauts. However, only a few would make it. But does that mean you'll never get the chance to work in space? Not necessarily.

In fact, some of the space jobs are not only for astronauts and they all sound just cool. One of the most interesting space jobs is "chief sniffer(嗅探员)". NASA has already had a sniffer named George Aldrich.

Using your nose at work might sound a little strange, but the job is actually important. A spaceship is of small size and high temperature, which makes smells inside stronger. And once a spaceship is sent, astronauts have no ways to run away from unpleasant smells. More importantly, smelling objects can help find things that could be harmful to astronauts' health.

Another job, the "space tour guide", may seem a little ahead of its time — after all, there aren't any tourists there. But now, many companies are starting to provide space trips and some rich space lovers have ordered the tours. It may not be long before space becomes one of the top travel destinations(目的地).

Being a space tour guide needs rich knowledge to help passengers get the most out of their journey. Space tour guides also need to be excellent storytellers so that passengers can experience the true beauty of the space travel.

Astronauts often spend long time in space with the same group of people, so a "space psychologist (心理学家)" is also needed to help astronauts overcome bad feelings. "We're crossing the boundaries(界限) between science fiction and reality,"s aid Rohit Talwar, director of the US company Fast Future Research, "Things we've seen in movies are now becoming reality!"

One day, I happened to meet an Englishman in a store and soon we began to talk. As I was talking about how I was studying English, the foreigner seemed to be very surprised, gently shaking his head and saying, "You don't say! You don't say!"

I was puzzled（困惑的）, and I thought, "Perhaps this is not a right thing to talk about."So I said to him,"Well, shall we talk about the Great Wall? Have you ever been there?" "Certainly. When I'm back home, everyone will laugh at me if I leave here without seeing it. The Great Wall is wonderful!" he answered. "Yes, it is one of the wonders in the world. And people from all over the world have come to visit it," I added. As I was telling him more about it, he said again, "You don't say!" I couldn't help asking, "Why do you ask me not to talk about it?" "Well, I didn't ask you to do so,"he answered, greatly surprised. "Didn't you say ‘You don't say!'?" I asked again. Hearing this, the foreigner laughed loudly. He began to explain. " ‘You don't say!' means‘Really?'. Perhaps you know little about English idioms（习惯用语）."

Wow! How foolish I was! Since then I have been careful with English idioms.