Planting, Interrupted

We had recently moved into an apartment in New York, and I volunteered to tend the plant containers and window boxes in front of the building.

Back in our old house in New Orleans, I had a private garden — a place to sink my hands into soil, cut roses at dusk, and lose myself in the quiet routine of pruning (修剪). Here, on a busy New York sidewalk, I worried my gardening would be reduced to a performance for people hurrying by. The possibility of people bothering me as they walked by made me uneasy. For me, gardening had always been a private and quiet activity.

"At least you'll get to play in the dirt again," my husband said with a grin, and I decided he was right. Putting on my headphones to discourage possible interruptions from passers-by, I got down to business. Passersby kept their distance at first, but sometimes someone slowed to peer in, drawn by color or scent.

When the plants and flowers were finally in place, I stood back on the sidewalk, sweaty and dirty, to admire what I'd done: the splashes of bold color — goldilocks, marigolds, and roses — were indeed a comforting sight.

A young man stopped, studied my arrangements, and then looked at me as if he wanted to say something. Slightly annoyed, I took off my headphones. "That's beautiful," he finally said. "If you were in Brooklyn, you'd definitely win their flower box contest."

I smiled. His kind words quickly changed my sour attitude. "Really?" I said. "Thank you!" That tiny exchange shifted the day. Later, an older man smiled as he looked at me and my floral creation. "I'd marry you if I wasn't already married," he said, giving me a wink. We both laughed.

注意：

1．续写词数应为150个左右；

2．请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。

Paragraph 1

A week later, while I watered the boxes, a woman cried out with genuine delight.

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Paragraph 2

Seeing her response, I put down my watering can and cut that rose with my careful scissors.

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1. "低头族"产生的原因;

2. "低头族"带来的影响;

3. 提出合理的建议。

注意：

1. 写作词数应为 80 左右;

2. 请按如下格式在答题卡的相应位置作答。

参考词汇:低头族: phubber(People who can't help checking their phones all day are known as phubbers. Phubbing tends to involve not only the young people, but also the elderly. )

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Get off the train and the first thing you meet in Zhongwei, Ningxia, is a warm wind that smells of sand. In other words, the desert is impossible (ignore) for visitors here.

The Shapotou area, famous place, lies between the Tengger Desert and the Yellow River. It has big sand hills, winding (蜿蜒的) rivers, high mountains and green fields. These different (view)come together and show the strong beauty of the north and the soft charm of the south.

In recent years, Zhongwei (try) to build a special travel name by doing new things in the desert. For example, the Desert Legends show brings local tales to life through dynamic song and dance, and the Diamond Hotel (surprise) many visitors with its amazing architecture.

makes these projects good is that they turn a short desert visit into a several-day trip. Travelers can watch bright stars night and join hands-on folk classes in the day.

Now many people choose to sleep in tents on the sand, (turn) this once-quiet place into a busy spot full of life and hope. When the early sun colors the dunes (沙丘) pink and light purple, the smell of (new) made camel-milk tea moves through the tents, and the wish for another (forgettable) day rises with the sun.

Tuan Pham was feeling pretty good about himself as he approached the 12-mile mark of the Long Beach Half Marathon in Southern California. The run was the 47-year-old's seventh such event, and he couldn't wait to 1 at the finish line with his teenage son, who had raced ahead. Pham took another step or two, and that was the 2 thing he remembered.

He couldn't recall staggering or falling face-first to the ground, where he lay 3 as runners skirted him. He had no pulse, nor was he 4. Three blocked arteries (动脉) had caused his collapse. He was clinically dead. If he didn't get help soon, he'd be 5 dead.

The 6 of surviving a cardiac arrest (心脏骤停) outside of a hospital is less than 12%. Pham's only chance of 7 was if someone, say, a cardiologist, happened to pass by.

Well ... Just as Pham hit the ground, Ryan Chiu, a cardiac 8 from Memorial Care Long Beach Medical Center, was leaving a restaurant a few feet away. Dr. Chiu immediately 9 what was happening. He ran to Pham's side and began chest compressions. He 10 the help of a bystander, who took over on compressions (胸部按压) while Dr. Chiu called his 11 and told them to prepare an operating room and gather a surgical team.

Minutes later, a(n) 12 arrived. Medics scooped up Pham and 13 him away to the hospital, with Dr. Chiu following in his own car.

The surgery that Dr. Chiu performed was a success, and Pham is alive and well — well enough to 14 to the route of the Long Beach Half Marathon and pick up where he left off.

"I can't believe the one guy, the first guy, to see me fall, to 15 and give me help, was a cardiac surgeon," Pham told the Post. "What are the odds?"

For a long time, it has been viewed as an unpleasant, even wrong feeling. In ancient times, if someone showed the signs of boredom, they were wrong of "acedia," a feeling of being apart that was seen as rude to the world and its creator. The growth of factories and time-saving devices only strengthened our wish to use time well. Many parents try to keep their children from getting bored, either to stop complaints or because they think boredom wastes a chance to get ahead.

None of these attitudes toward boredom strike me as healthy or beneficial. We need to move past our fear of boredom and start to see it as an unavoidable, necessary, and even advantageous experience. It is a very unpleasant (and short) state that often pushes us to try new ideas. When we take away children's boredom by giving them instant and shallow activities, we greatly lower their chances of learning new and challenging things well.

Instead, we should trust that children will find ways to amuse themselves — and maybe even learn to accept boredom as a gift, a chance to think, to create, to discover. As we learn to sit with boredom, we may find that it is not our enemy but our helper, something we need for a life of meaning and invention.

A. Boredom, at its best, brings creativity.

B. As a culture, we have a bad relationship with boredom.

C. Today, we continue to view boredom with strong dislike.

D. Schools should add more creative classes to prevent boredom.

E. We should not fill every minute of our kids' days with activities.

F. If we were, we were instantly given a task, so we learned to avoid it.

G. Modern technology has made boredom a rare experience for children.

Economists tend to think this is a great development. Cities, they argue, benefit from ‘agglomeration', the consequence of so many people living close by. For one thing, government and businesses can run more efficiently: size helps everything from public transport to the hiring of staff. For another, finding the next big idea is easier when like-minded people gather together.

But have economists overstated the benefits of big cities? That is what a new study by Matthew Turner and David Weil, both of Brown University, suggests. Their analysis applies existing figures of the impact of agglomeration on economic efficiency and the rate of invention to a model of the American economy. This allows the researchers to answer a question: how different would America look if, from 1900 to 2010, no city area had grown to a population of more than 1 million people?

According to their work, the answer is ‘not all that much'. Growth would have been slower, but only a bit: the researchers think that America's total production would have been 8% lower in 2010 than it was in reality. Cities do make residents more efficient, but the size of the city does not matter too much.

City supporters may not fully agree with the researchers' findings, which depend on some guesses. Edward Glaeser of Harvard notes that Turner and Weil believe creating new ideas gets harder over time, as the simplest solutions are used up. This means big cities benefit less than expected from gathering talented people. It's unclear if this trend will keep happening in the future. AI supporters would surely argue that creating new ideas will probably speed up in the next few years.

"Our brain receives information from our senses — sight, touch, smell, sound and taste — so this helps us understand our environment," said Manahil Riaz, a mental health expert in Texas. "To be overstimulated means that our senses have received a lot of information, and now we are feeling stressed as we're receiving this information."

"When you're overstimulated, your prefrontal cortex (前额叶皮质) goes offline," said Emma Shandy Anway, an expert in California. "This part of your brain helps you think clearly when making decisions," she noted. "When we're stressed out, the prefrontal cortex goes from careful and clear-thinking to quick-acting," Anway said. "In these conditions, your brain's not thinking about maintaining relationships or effectively solving problems," Riaz noted. "Instead, it's frightened."

It's normal to feel stressed at times. We're all human, and being a human is hard. "Anytime our nervous system is out of balance, we have to find that way to teach our body that we're not in danger," Anway said. She recommends deep breathing through the nose, "When my breath slows down, my nervous system starts to slow down, and that will, in turn, slow my thoughts down."

It's also important to notice what you give your attention to when you're feeling overstimulated. Practicing mindfulness skills in the moment — like, say, naming three things around you that are green — is a way to calm down when stressed. Besides, tiny routines like a phone-free morning can stop too much pressure before it starts.

"I was actually traveling here when I was 19," Lennox-Hvenekilde told Newsweek. "I had just turned 19 and was traveling with a friend. We realized that there were a lot of people living in these areas of the world who were maybe not rich in an economic sense, but they just seemed extremely free and to have an extremely high quality of life."

Inspired by this way of living, Lennox-Hvenekilde spent years working full-time jobs in Denmark, determined to save enough money to turn his dream into reality. After months of searching, he found the perfect piece of land and bought it with help from local connections.

The land has a natural stream, providing fresh drinking water year-round. It also feeds his crops during dry seasons, a necessity for his fruit farm. He is currently living in a nearby village while he works on constructing a small house on his land. Beyond farming and creating a self-sufficient home, Lennox-Hvenekilde also hopes to be able to give back to parts of the land and attempt rebuilding habitats for the native monkey species.

As he builds his new life in the Colombian jungle, Lennox-Hvenekilde remains optimistic about the future. "I have so many plans and dreams and ideas — it's kind of hard to just put it into words right now, especially since it's all so new for me. But, right now, the plan is simple: plant a bunch of fruit trees, build the house, and take it one step at a time."

On average, surveyed students use 2.1 AI tools for their courses. ChatGPT remains the most common tool used, mentioned by 66% of respondents, followed by Grammarly and Microsoft Copilot (each 25%). Here are most common use cases:

Despite their wide use of AI tools, students were not confident about their AI knowledge, the survey found. Fifty-eight percent of students reported feeling that they do not have enough AI knowledge and skills, and 48% felt poorly prepared for   AI-related work. Notably, 80% of surveyed students said their university's adoption of AI tools does not fully meet their needs.

Students' top AI needs included:

● Universities should provide training for both teachers and students on the effective use of AI tools (said by 73% of teachers and 72% of students);

●Universities should offer more courses on AI knowledge (72%);

●Universities should include students in choosing which AI tools to use (71%);

●Universities should increase the use of AI in teaching and learning (59%).

"With AI being used more widely, universities must now treat it as a basic part of education, not just a tool," said Alessandro Di Lullo, head of the Digital Education Group and an AI expert at The University of Hong Kong. At the same time, he said, "universities need to consider how to effectively improve AI skills to equip both students and academics with the skills to succeed in an AI-driven world."

When I was in middle school, my family moved to Seattle, where my parents started their new business — a small grocery store downstairs in my house. As a girl of shy and reserved nature, I had to take a fresh start to fit into the sophisticated city life.

One sunny day, my school announced an exciting event, a talent show for the local food bank. Students were encouraged to showcase their unique talents in front of the public in the city hall on National Day. A buzz of excitement filled the school as everyone began preparing for the big day. Deep down, I felt a spark of curiosity and a desire to participate. However, my self-doubt held me back, "I don't have any special skills to share."

Days turned into weeks, and the talent show drew closer. I couldn't shake the upsetting feeling until one day Emma, one of the most popular girls in my class, came to me while I was helping in the grocery store after class. "How about singing together in the talent show?" she grinned. "I heard you singing a tune, along the way back home. I can't help following you here." Dear, I couldn't believe my ears. Emma, with personality and popularity, acknowledged my little talent. Since Emma had the world's prettiest voice, I felt like being favoured by fortune.

"You two? The talent show for the food bank?" My mum bent towards us and her face lit up. "Why not practise right now upstairs? I bet you'll be a perfect match." Winking at us, she seemed to know we were thinking alike.

Emma and I embarked on rehearsing almost every single day after school. We brainstormed, exchanged ideas and rehearsed the scene. As the days rolled by, I was feeling pretty good about our act. But the day before the performance, Emma called saying that she had an acute stomachache and was not in any shape to perform.

注意：

1. 续写词数应为150左右；

2. 续写部分分为两段，每段开头语已为你写好。

Paragraph 1:

I was completely knocked out by the news.

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Paragraph 2:

Finally came the big moment.

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