When the opening came, that day at noon, the Anytime website suddenly had a single field that read, “What do you want?” All you had to do was type the words into that box, and then specify how quickly you wanted your item delivered: within one, ten, or twenty-four hours.

　　Bloggers were the first to test the service. And their reviews were glowing. Within weeks, Anytime had become a part of daily life. Nobody used other delivery sites or the post anymore as Anytime was much cheaper and faster.

　　Chris still wondered what exactly Anytime was. He tried to find out who owned the company, but it was registered in a small country that did not require such information to be made public. He did find some interesting facts, though. Anyone who challenged the company, it seemed, met with serious trouble. A government official critical of Anytime for avoiding tax was forced to leave his position after news stories suddenly appeared claiming he was dishonest. The head of another company taking Anytime to court died in a car accident just days before the case was to begin.

　　Chris began making a list of all the people who had something terrible happen to them after opposing or criticising Anytime. By lunch, he had more than one hundred examples. Something was definitely wrong. Chris worked on his list the rest of the day, emailing people who could provide more information and looking through newspaper records. After working through the night, an exhausted Chris finally fell asleep at his desk at 4 a.m..

　　When he woke a few hours later, there was a message flashing on his computer screen: “Stop making trouble.” Chris smiled. He had no intention of stopping now that he knew he was on the right track.

　　1.What was on the front of the card sent to Chris Lin?

　　A. An invitation to a company opening.

　　B. The website address of a new company.

　　C. The words “Anytime: Starting tomorrow”.

　　D. The words “Anything you want, anytime you need it”.

　　2.Why did the company choose to send the cards to many news reporters?

　　A. Because it didn’t have enough money for traditional advertising.

　　B. Because it wanted to attract the reporters as customers.

　　C. So the reporters would write stories about the new company.

　　D. So people would find the new company interesting.

　　3.What did Chris’ s research suggest about Anytime?

　　A. Itmay be very dangerous.

　　B. Its popularity would soon decrease.

　　C. It was doing business all over the world.

　　D. It was being widely criticised by journalists.

　　4.How did Chris feel at the end of the story?

　　A. Scared that he would get into trouble.

　　B. Confident that he would find the truth.

　　C. Nervous about what the company would do.

　　D. Satisfied that he had discovered the company’s secret.

　　Inside a secured room in a beautiful castle near Paris, a small metal cylinder (圆柱体) rests on a shelf beneath a double set of bell jars. It has lain there for more than a century, its rest only occasionally disturbed when the room’s three key holders perform a coordinated opening ceremony to let technicians enter and clean this precious piece of metal.

　　First, the cylinder is rubbed with a piece of soft, alcohol-soaked cloth. Then it is steamed with pure water. Finally, the 1kg cylinder is returned, carefully, to its resting place.

　　Such attention to a lump of metal is unusual, but has a purpose. The castle houses the International Bureau of Weights and Measures and that piece of shining, circular metal is its holiest relic. It is the defining mass (质量)against which all other kilograms are measured. This is the international prototype, or standard, of the kilogram. The IPK, in short.

　　Dozens of carefully weighted copies of the original have been made. They are stored around the world and used to standardise individual nations’ weights and measures systems.

　　But the days of the IPK, in its current form, are numbered. The International Bureau of Weights and Measures has decided to replace this single physical specimen with a more fundamental measurement – based on electric current – in order to define the mass of an object. The king of kilograms is about to be dethroned.

　　“One key reason for doing this work is to provide international security,” says Bureau spokesman Paul Robinson. “If the castle burned down tomorrow and the kilogram was destroyed, we would have no reference left for the world’s metric weights system. There would be chaos. The current definition of the kilogram is the weight of that cylinder in Paris, after all.”

　　Another major motivation for the replacement of the IPK is the growing need to be able to carry out more and more precise measurements. “Drug companies will soon be wanting to use ingredients that will have to be measured in terms of a few millionths or even billionths of a gram,” says Robinson. “We need to be prepared to weigh substances with that kind of accuracy.”

　　1.What do we know about the IPK from the first two paragraphs?

　　A. It’s cared for with great devotion.

　　B. It’s used in religious ceremonies.

　　C. It’s beautifully designed and decorated.

　　D. It’s the most valuable metal in the world.

　　2.Which of the following best explains “dethroned” underlined in paragraph 5?

　　A. rebuiltB. removed

　　C. destroyedD. upgraded

　　3.What is a reason for replacing the current IPK?

　　A. To protect the metal cylinder from damage.

　　B. To make taking measurements more economical.

　　C. To provide all countries with the same standard.

　　D. To satisfy the increasing demand for exactness.

　　4.What can be a suitable title for the text?

　　A. No more kilos

　　B. A heavy technology

　　C. The future of the kilo

　　D. The history of measures

　　二、七选五

　　It was the 20xx “super storm” in New South Wales that restored my faith in people.

　　During a break in the weather, I stupidly decided to drive into town to buy some groceries. However, as I left the supermarket and drove back, the weather took a turn for the worse. 1. Having nowhere to go, I spotted a young man in his front yard assessing the situation. He quickly waved to me to come and park in his driveway.2.

　　The man, who introduced himself as Trent, then invited me to wait inside his house with his wife, Kayti and their two daughters. I told him I was concerned about the damage to my car, as the continuing rain was starting to turn into hail (冰雹).Trent then grabbed a blanket from his garage and covered my car. 3. Fortunately, his efforts saved my car from being damaged by the hail.