The lion says that he is on his death bed. So he asks all the animals to come and listen to his last wishes.

    The cat comes to the lion's cave(洞穴). He stands there and goes in. Then a sheep goes in. Before she comes out, a rabbit goes in to hear the last wishes of the king of animals.

    But soon the lion looks well again, and goes out of his cave. He sees a fox(狐狸) waiting outside. “Why don't you come in?” asks the lion to the fox.

  “I beg your pardon,” says the fox, “I see many animals go into your cave, but nobody comes out.

    Before they come out again, I will wait outside.”

    This is the story of a little fir(冷杉) tree that dreamed of growing up so that he could be a Christmas tree for humans. The other older trees knew more about life and they told him that being a Christmas tree for humans wasn't as good as he thought. But the little fir tree didn't believe them.

    He was so pleased that day when some children came in with their parents to pick a fir tree as their Christmas tree to decorate the living room. The children adored him at first sight. So he was dug up and brought into the living room. After they finished decorating him, the little fir tree shone with a hundred lights. Christmas was getting closer and everyone admired (欣赏) the little Christmas tree.

    He was the prince of the living room, but he started to lose his leaves after January. Nobody looked at him or touched him. The fir tree started to feel sad that he had been chosen by the family. After several days, the little fir tree was replanted in the family's backyard. He was so happy to be back in the good old earth! In the following years, the family dug him up again to put him back into the living room as their Christmas tree and then replanted him. He was very happy with his new family. And yes, in the end the older trees were wrong. Some humans are good after all.

    My parents told me we were going camping during winter vacation. Camping! They are always trying to get me outside more. It seems like my mom is always saying, "Brian, turn off the computer!" or "Brian, put down your phone and talk to us!" They don't understand that I'm in the zone when I'm using a keyboard, so of course I don't want to stop.

    We drove for an hour to Everglades National Park. As soon as we got there, I couldn't get a signal(信号) for my phone. Suddenly, I was facing three days of no contact with the outside world. My mom tried to tell me I'd like it, "You'll be able to look around more when you're not staring at a screen."

    We took a hike with a ranger(护林者) in the afternoon. He explained a lot to us about the Everglades. At first, I couldn't care less, but after a while I started listening. By the end of the hike, I realized there was more action going on in the park than in most video games.

    We did a lot of walking and that night I was really tired. Even so, I woke up in the midnight, and I was scared at first because of some strange sounds. But then I realized it was the barred owl that the ranger had described. It sounded like it was calling out "Who cooks for you? Who cooks for you?" Then I was not afraid anymore and went back to sleep.

    The next two days we did a lot more exploring. I saw that all the land and water and animals were connected in the Everglades. Small fish eat mosquito eggs; large fish eat those smaller fish; and alligators eat the large fish. If you got rid of(除掉) the mosquitoes, you might lose some of the other animals higher up the food chain too.

    After we left, we talked in the car about the Everglades. Right in the middle of our discussion, I heard a familiar sound from my phone. My friend Jeff was sending me a message. I reached for my phone, then put it back down. "Aren't you going to reply?" asked Mom.

    "I will in a little while," I said. My dad and mom looked at each other and just smiled.