A

    Once a very rich man and his son collected valuable paintings by famous artists like Picasso, Van Gogh and Monet.

    Later, the son left to join the army. After a few weeks, the old man received a letter saying his son had died while taking another soldier to a hospital. The old man became very lonely and sad.

    One day, a soldier visited the old man and gave him a painting—it was a portrait（肖像）of his son. The painting of his son became the old man's most valuable item. He told his neighbors it was the greatest gift he had ever received. The following spring, the old man died.

    All of the old man's paintings would be sold at an auction（拍卖会）. The auction began with the painting of the old man's son.

    “Who will open the price at $100?” the auctioneer asked. Moments passed and no one spoke or raised their hands. Someone said, “Who cares about that painting? Let's get on to the good ones.” More voices followed in agreement. “No, we must sell this one first,” replied the auctioneer. “Now, who will take the portrait of the son?”

    Finally, a good friend of the old man spoke, “Ten dollars!” “Will anyone go higher?” called the auctioneer. After more silence he said: “ Going once… going twice…Sold!” The auctioneer then announced that the whole auction was over. “According to the father's will, whoever takes the son's portrait gets the whole collection.” The auctioneer said.

    Because of the father's love, whoever took the son got it all.

    Martin is a fifteen-year-old boy. He used to be a "problem child", but a recent 1 with his mother changed his life. He didn't use to give his mother many problems. 2 , after his father's death a few years ago, Martin's life became 3 more difficult. His mother couldn't afford to pay for her child's education. To do this, she 4 work, and so she was often not at home. His mother looked after him as 5 as she could. Unfortunately, Martin still caused problems. He was not 6 in studying and he often got into trouble. Luckily, his mother was very 7 and didn't give up trying to help him. In the end, she 8 a difficult decision: to send him to a boys' boarding school. Martin hated it and used to cause a lot of trouble. One day, he told his teacher he wanted to leave the school. The teacher said it was necessary for Martin to 9 with his mother. Martin called his mother, but to his 10 , this phone call changed his life. "It was exactly 11 I needed," he said. "My mother helped me to understand how much she had given me. She also told me that even though my father was no longer with us, he was 12 me and would always take pride in everything good I do. That's when I decided to change. I realize that 13 my father died, I have been afraid of being alone, and have tried to make my mother pay more attention to me." Now Martin has 14 changed. He has been working hard and is now one of the best students in his class. How was he able to change? His mother's 15 helped him to feel good about himself.

    Michael Jackson was one of the world's best singers. He was born in the middle west of the city of Gary， Indiana， in 1958. He began singing with his four brothers. They called the group， “The Jackson Five”. The group became very popular after appearing on a television program. In 1970 the group made their  first record with the name of I Want You Back. It was very popular. One of their hit records was Never Say Goodbye.

    Michael was good at dancing as well as singing， for example， his dance moves and moon walking. He was asked to act in a film in 1978 for the first time， and in the same year he made a record on his own， which was sold eight million copies all over the world.

    Michael nearly didn't go out because he was too famous. Once his fans went off in a faint(晕倒）when they saw him at the concert. No one can do it by now. He lived in a large house and kept lots of animals. He never ate meat. He often raised money for charity. This made him win the Guinness world Records（吉尼斯世界纪录）in 2006. He died on June 25th， 2009， but he would live in our hearts forever.

Everybody Should Say Thank You to Ray Tomlinson

    Why should you thank Ray Tomlinson? You might have never heard of his name before, but do you know that the email you use every day was his "child"?

    Ray Tomlinson is known as "the father of email". He was born in New York in 1941. He attended college at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where he took part in a program with IBM and in 1963 he received a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering.

In 1971, Ray created the first email system, which allowed people to send messages electronically from the same computer. But he thought that there might also be a way to send messages from different computers, which led to the birth of the email we know now. He chose the@ sign to separate(区别于)local from global(全球的) emails in the mailing address. "I used the '@' sign to show that the user was 'at' some other hosts (电脑主机)rather than being local," said Ray in an interview Person to person network email was born and user@ host became the standard for email addresses, as it remains today.

    Ray Tomlinson died at the age of 74. Thank Ray Tomlinson for inventing the email and making the@sign well-known. Though he may not be as famous as Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates, Ray Tomlinson surely has his place among the geniuses(天才) that gave us the convenience in our life.

    In Los Angeles, a waiter served a group of teens. The waiter remembered his experience as a young high school student. So he made sure the teens had a pleasant experience at the restaurant. The waiter made sure of it.

    After serving all the teens doing a great job, he was left a tip, only $3.28. That was hardly enough to buy a drink at Starbucks.

    The waiter went home. And he felt hatred for the students who did not know the value of hard work. They looked down on people like him. Or so he thought.

    After several days, the waiter forgot about it. His life went on as usual. But ten days later, he received a letter from the teens.

    "About a week and a half ago, on October 7, my three friends and I came to eat at this restaurant as our own homecoming celebration. It was an exciting experience for us to be here alone, and it was all new to us. And you were the best waiter we could ask for. You were kind, helpful, and didn't treat us like babies! So I want to say thank you for making our 'grown-up' experience so amazing and fun.

    "I would also like to say sorry on behalf of my group. Since we were new to all of this, our 13-year-old minds didn't exactly know how to deal with the bill. The bill was reasonable, but we had completely forgotten (and didn't know, to be honest) what a tip even was, let alone how much to give. So we emptied our pockets, and all our money added up to $3.28.

    "Having no idea of how small this really was, we left. Later, we realized our mistake and felt terrible. We knew we had to make it right.

    "So together with this letter, you will find the correct 18% tip + extra for simply being amazing. Thank you for your help and patience and also thank you for making our night fun. Thank you!"