составить пересказ текста. The terrible truth
We all enjoy a day out at the beach, but these days you are likely to find much more there than just sand and sea! Many of the thousands of people that visit beaches every year leave behind food wrappers, cigarette ends, drink cans and toys like buckets, spades and beach balls. These can then be blown or washed into the sea and become marine litter. Marine litter can also come from ships, fishermen, drains and factories.This litter doesn't just look horrible - it's dangerous, too!
Litter harms Wildlife and People
Marine mammals such as seals, sea lions and dolphins are very curious animals who like to examine unusual objects in the sea.This is how they get mixed up in the litter, which causes them injury and stops them from finding food or swimming away from their enemies. Birds, fish and mammals can also confuse litter for food and eat it. Sea turtles, for example, often eat plastic bags because they look like jellyfish, one of their favourite foods. This then fills up the turtle's digestive system and makes it feel full, so it stops eating and starves. 100,000 marine mammals and nearly a million seabirds die either from getting caught in or eating litter each year! Many of these creatures are already threatened or endangered species. In addition, litter is dangerous for people as they can cut themselves on glass or metal. Marine litter can also block boat propellers, which is dangerous and very expensive to repair.
So ... next time you go to the beach, make sure you are part of the solution, NOT the problem! Take ALL of your litter home with you and consider taking any other litter you can see around you too. If you live near a beach, you could even organise a Beach
Clean-up Day.
Contents
The Reader of Books Mr Wormwood, the Great Car Dealer
The Hat and the Superglue
The Ghost Arithmetic The Platinum-Blond Man Miss Honey
The Trunchbull The Parents Throwing the Hammer
Bruce Bogtrotter and the Cake
Lavender The Weekly Test
The First Miracle The Second Miracle Miss Honey’s Cottage
Miss Honey’s Story
The Names The Practice
The Third Miracle A New HomeThe Reader of Books
It’s a funny thing about mothers and fathers. Even when their own child is the most disgusting little blister you could ever imagine, they still think that he or she is wonderful.
Some parents go further. They become so blinded by adoration they manage to convince themselves their child has qualities of genius.
Well, there is nothing very wrong with all this. It’s the way of the world. It is only when the parents begin telling us about the brilliance of their own revolting offspring, that we start shouting, "Bring us a basin! We’re going to be sick!"
School teachers suffer a good deal from having to listen to this sort of twaddle from proud parents, but they usually get their
own back when the time comes to write the end-of-term reports. If I were a teacher I would cook up some real scorchers for the children of doting parents. "Your son Maximilian", I would write, "is a total wash- out. I hope you have a family business you can push him into when he leaves school because he sure as heck won’t get a job anywhere else." Or if I were feeling lyrical that day, I might write, "It is a curious truth that grasshoppers have their hearing-organs in the sides of the abdomen. Your daughter Vanessa, judging by what she’s learnt this term, has no hearing-organs at all."
I might even delve deeper into natural history and say, "The periodical cicada spends six years as a grub underground, and no more than six days as a free creature of
sunlight and air. Your son Wilfred has spent six years as a grub in this school and we are still waiting for him to emerge from the chrysalis." A particularly poisonous little girl might sting me into saying, "Fiona has the same glacial beauty as an iceberg, but unlike the iceberg she has absolutely nothing below the surface." I
think I might enjoy writing end-of-term reports for the stinkers in my class. But enough of that. We have to get on.
Occasionally one comes across parents who take the opposite line, who show no interest at all in their children, and these of course are far worse than the doting ones. Mr and Mrs Wormwood were two such parents. They had a son called Michael and a daughter called Matilda, and the parents
looked upon Matilda in particular as nothing more than a scab. A scab is something you have to put up with until the time comes when you can pick it off and flick it away. Mr and Mrs Wormwood looked forward enormously to the time when they could pick their little daughter off and flick her away, preferably into the next county or even further than that.
It is bad enough when parents treat ordinary children as though they were scabs and bunions, but it becomes somehow a lot worse when the child in question is extraordinary, and by that I mean sensitive and brilliant. Matilda was both of these things, but above all she was brilliant. Her mind was so nimble and she was so quick to learn that her ability should have been obvious even to the most half-witted of
parents. But Mr and Mrs Wormwood were both so gormless and so wrapped up in their own silly little lives that they failed to notice anything unusual about their daughter.
Dear James,
I am sorry, I have not written. I am moving to London. I received your beautiful book on Java language programming art on September 3. But I had to leave Madrid the next day on September 15. I was very happy that you sent me your address again because I had left your address in a box of papers in Madrid to be sent to London later.
On October 15, I will move to London.
My address will be 04532, London, Bond street, 6-43
With best whishes,
Michael
[ перевод ]
Дорогой Джеймс!
Извини меня, что не писал. Я переезжаю в Лондон. Получил твою прекрасную книгу о программировании на Ява 14 сентября. Но на следующий день мне пришлось уехать из Мадрида. Я очень рад, что ты снова сообщил мне свой адрес, так как я оставил его в Мадриде среди моих документов, которые позднее должны были быть отправлены в Лондон.
Я перееду в Лондон 15 октября.
Мой новый адрес будет: 04532, Лондон, Бонд-стрит, 6-43
С наилучшими пожеланиями,
Михаил