时间:2018-12-11 作者:英语课 分类:原版英文小故事


英语课

Alvin was walking down 6th Street on a hot sunny day when he saw smoke coming out of the street. He could smell the smoke, and it was getting thicker. It was coming out of a storm drain. Alvin used his cell phone to call the fire department.


“The storm drain is on fire!” he said. The fire department asked for his whereabouts and he said he was near 6th and Main. They said they’d be right there to investigate the situation. Alvin didn’t have to be anywhere, so he waited for the firemen to arrive. He was curious himself as to what could possibly be burning beneath the street. As far as he knew, there wasn’t anything beneath the street except concrete. And everyone knows that concrete doesn’t burn.


A fire truck arrived a few minutes later. “Are you the man who called?” asked the driver. Alvin said yes. By now Alvin could hear crackling sounds, like wood burning. The firemen didn’t seem to consider it an emergency.


“What do you think it could be?” Alvin asked the driver.


“Oh, we know what it is. We have to take care of a problem like this every few months. It’s the homeless people in their houses.”


Homeless people have been living under the streets for years. Using their knowledge of the storm drain system, they set up their own “bunkers” beneath the streets. These living areas frequently contain tables, mattresses 1, chairs, and sofas. The residents often “borrow” electricity by connecting to a live wire above ground to power their own lamps and even TVs underground. Either this borrowed electricity or a discarded cigarette causes an occasional fire.


Alvin watched as a couple of firemen lifted a manhole cover and descended 2 beneath the street with a fire hose 3. A few minutes later, the black smoke turned white. Shortly afterward 4, the firemen reappeared with a homeless person who seemed to have just been woken up.


 



1 mattresses
褥垫,床垫( mattress的名词复数 )
  • The straw mattresses are airing there. 草垫子正在那里晾着。
  • The researchers tested more than 20 mattresses of various materials. 研究人员试验了二十多个不同材料的床垫。
2 descended
a.为...后裔的,出身于...的
  • A mood of melancholy descended on us. 一种悲伤的情绪袭上我们的心头。
  • The path descended the hill in a series of zigzags. 小路呈连续的之字形顺着山坡蜿蜒而下。
3 hose
n.输水软管,长统袜;vt.浇园子,用管冲洗
  • Connect the hose to the tap and turn on the tap.把水管接在龙头上,打开水龙头。
  • After raining,I always hose the yard out.雨后,我总是用软管把院子冲干净。
4 afterward
adv.后来;以后
  • Let's go to the theatre first and eat afterward. 让我们先去看戏,然后吃饭。
  • Afterward,the boy became a very famous artist.后来,这男孩成为一个很有名的艺术家。
学英语单词
agricultural emulsifier No.600
annual allowance
ash colour body
atomic resonance line
bathygadus garretti
cerellatron
cessationist
character display unit
character flaw
combining tee T
crune
decemvirates
decrescendoed
dial phones
dicriminalize
dictyostelids
disarthrosis
dome nut
dominant product
door widely open
drilling platforms
duck gizzard spiced
Eschau
family Liparidae
farysia olivacea
five-tire car
fore-slow
frame drum
genus sclerodermas
Google Alerts
grass-earth
Gross-Hehlen
gutter market
heading axis
heater cathode leakage
helicosporium nematosporum
Hiburi-shima
holder in due corse
instrumental roles
invoice outward
Inzegmir
iwconfig
Jack Pudding
keratolysis neonatorum
Lahmu
lay emphasis up on
liquid-gas distributor
liquor pericardii
locking ring mount
logarithmic unit
Lottigna
lubricating compounds
macrophthalmus serenei
Manari
monoeciously
nafi
native-americans
no bit
nonformalizable
nonprecise
oil supply line
open-cell foam
operating earning rate
over-riding
periblems
pit working line
point-focused electron gun
pointing control
prehepaticus
primary local membr-ance
production break
promulging
Put you in mind
restabilization
rub someone's nose in it
russian monetary units
scopulary organelle
secondin'
selection of stars
sketchball
slimline type
small and medium-sized enterprise
specification statement
stator ring
Suiko
sulphuricacid
supplementarity
tabular
tele-robotics
televisings
toplin
toxophilic
transitological
treble agent
trutch
twibit
uncorporated
USDAW
wassenburg
wicked problems
wild oat grasses
wing-handed