中级英语听力lesson 17

Here is a summary of the news.

Shots are fired in a south London street by escaping bank robbers.
Four rock fans die in a stampede at a concert Chicago.
And how an Air France Concorde was involved in the closest recorded miss in aviation history?
    Shots were fired this morning in the course of an 80 m.p.h. chase along Brixton High Road in London. A police constable 1 was injured by flying glass when a bullet shattered his windscreen as he was pursuing a car containing four men who had earlier raided a branch of Barclays Bank at Stockwell. Police Constable Robert Cranley had been patrolling near the bank when the alarm was given. The raiders made their getaway in a stolen Jaguar 2 which was later found abandoned in Croydon. Officials of the bank later announced that ￡16,000 had been stolen.
    Four people were killed and more than fifty injured when fans rushed to get into a stadium in Chicago yesterday where the British pop group Fantasy were giving a concert. The incident occurred when gates were opened to admit a huge crowd of young people waiting outside the stadium for the sale of unreserved seat tickets. People were knocked over in the rush and trampled 3 underfoot as the crowd surged forward. The concert later went ahead as planned with Fantasy unaware 4 of what had happened. A police spokesman said that they had decided 5 to allow the concert to proceed in order to avoid further trouble. There has been criticism of the concert organizers for not ensuring that all the tickets were sold in advance. Roy Thompson, leader of Fantasy, said afterwards that the whole group was 'shattered' when they heard what had happened. They are now considering calling off the rest of their United States tour.
    The United States Air Force has admitted that a formation of its fighters and an Air France Concorde recently missed colliding by as little as 10 feet. The Air Force accepts the blame for what was the closest recorded miss in aviation history. According to the Air Force spokesman, when the Concorde was already 70 miles out over the Atlantic, on a scheduled flight to Paris from Dulles International Airport, Washington, four US Air Force F-15s approached at speed from the left. The lead plane missed the underside of Concorde's nose by 10 feet while another passed only 15 feet in front of the cockpit.
    Forest fires in the South of France have claimed the life of another fireman as they continue to rage in the hills between Frejus and Cannes. Fanned by strong westerly winds the flames are now threatening several villages and many holiday homes have had to be abandoned. The French army was called in yesterday to assist the fifteen hundred fire fighters that have so far been unable to contain the spread of the blaze.
    A demonstration 6 against race prejudice drew thousands of people to central London this morning. It was organized by the Labour Party and the Trades Union Congress under the banner 'United against Racialism'. The march was led by several leading Labour Party and Trades Union officials. It was a column that stretched for over two miles and it took the demonstrators nearly three hours to cover the distance from Speakers' Corner to Trafalgar Square. There were representatives from more than twenty major unions, as well as community workers and various ethnic 7 groups. By the time the march reached Trafalgar Square an estimated fifteen thousand people had joined it.
    Heathrow Airport Police are investigating how a mailbag containing nearly ￡750,000 worth of jewels went missing between Geneva and London. The mailbag was believed to be on its way to a London dealer 8 from a jeweller in Geneva five weeks ago, but it was not realized it was missing until the Post Office reported the fact to Scotland Yard two days ago. The mailbag contained a diamond, an emerald and two rubies 9 valued at ￡635,200 plus a number of stones of lesser 10 value, according to a police spokesman at Heathrow.
    Football. The draw for the semi-final of the F.A. Cup was made earlier today. Liverpool will play Manchester City while Arsenal 11 will meet Nottingham Forest. And that's the end of the news.

    Today I would like to tell you about the effects of old age on health. Actually today a lot of improvements have taken place in the care of old people and old people's health is not nearly so bad as it used to be.
    Probably many of the fears that people have of growing old are greatly exaggerated. Most people, for example, dread 12 becoming senile. But in fact very few people become senile. Perhaps only about 15% of those over 65 become senile. Actually a much more common problem is in fact caused by we doctors ourselves. And that is over-medication. Nearly 80% of people over 65 have at least one serious illness, such as high blood pressure, hearing difficulty or heart disease. And very often to combat these they take a number of drugs and of course sometimes there are interaction among those drugs as well as simply being too many. And this can cause a lot of complications from mental confusions, very commonly, to disturbance 13 of the heart rhythm. So this is a problem that doctors have to watch out for.
    Probably the most ignored disorder 14 among old people is depression. Maybe about 15% of older people suffer from this condition. A lot of it is caused by this over-medication which we mentioned.
    Although it is better now for old people, we have to admit that the body does change as we grow older. The immune system starts to decline and there are changes in metabolism 15, lungs, the senses, the brain and the skin.
    So what should an old person do to counter-act these changes?
    He or she should eat a balanced diet—not too much fat—chicken or fish should be eaten rather than eggs or beef. Eat more high fibre and vitamin rich foods, such as vegetables and fruit.
    The old person should give up smoking if he hasn't already done so. He should also do regular exercise—at least half an hour, three times a week. No section of the population can benefit more from exercise than the elderly.

Carl: I hope I'm not interrupting your work, Mr. Thornton. You must be very busy at this time of the day.
Paul: Not at all. Come in, come in, Mr. Finch 16. I'm just tasting a few of the dishes we'll be serving this morning.
Carl: That looks interesting. What exactly is it?
Paul: That one is fish—in a special sauce. One of my new creations, actually.
Carl: I'm looking forward to trying it.
Paul: I do hope you've enjoyed your stay with us.
Carl: Very much, indeed. We both find it very relaxing here.
Paul: Well, I'm sure there's lots more you'd like to ask, so, please, go ahead.
Carl: Thanks. I notice that you have a sort of team of helpers. How do you organize who does what? Surely it's difficult with so many talented people?
Paul: Everyone contributes ideas, of course, and to a certain extent shares in the decision-making. We all have our different specialities and different ways of doing things, but that's a great advantage in a place like this. If there is any disagreement, I have the final word. After all, I own the business and I'm the boss. But it happens very rarely. I'm glad to say.
Carl: Have you had them with you for long?
Paul: Not all of them, no. Alan's been with me for about five years. I used to have a restaurant on the east coast. Then I got the offer to do a lecture tour of Australia and New Zealand, you know, with practical demonstrations 17, so I sold the business, and then Alan and I looked around for two young chefs to take with us. Tom and Martin have been working for me ever since (Laughs.) Chefs are not a problem, but I'm having a lot of trouble at the moment finding good, reliable domestic staff.
Carl: How long did the tour last?
Paul: We were away for over two years in the end because more and more organizations wanted to see the show, and one thing led to another.
Carl: Had you been considering this present venture for long?
Paul: For some time, yes. During the tour I began to think it might be interesting to combine the show idea with a permanent establishment. And so here we are.
Carl: And what made you choose this particular spot?
Paul: Quite a few people have been surprised—you're not the first. It does seem a bit out of the way, I know, but I didn't want to start up in London. There's far too much competition. Then I decided to go for a different type of client altogether—the sort of person who wants to get away from it all; who loves peace and quiet, and beautiful scenery but also appreciates good food. When I saw the farmhouse 18 I couldn't resist it. I was brought up not far from here so everything just fell into place.
Carl: To go back to the food, Paul. Do you have a large selection of dishes to choose from or are you always looking for new ideas?
Paul: Both. A lot of the dishes had already been created on the tour, but I encourage my staff to experiment whenever possible. I mean I can't keep serving the same dishes. The people who come here expect something unusual at every course, and some guests, I hope, will want to return.
Carl: I know two who certainly will.
Paul: It's very kind of you to say so. Is there anything else you'd like to know?
Carl: As a matter of fact, there is. Your grapefruit and ginger 19 marmalade tastes delicious. Could you possibly give me the recipe?
Paul: It isn't really my secret to give. It belongs to Alan, but I'm sure if you ask him he'll be glad to oblige you—as long as you promise not to print it in your magazine!

Shelagh: Um, it's another one of my adventures as a tourist, um, finding out things you really didn't expect to find out when you went to the place! I went to Pompeii and of course what you go to Pompeii for is, er, the archaeology 20.
Liz: To see the ruins.
Shelagh: To see the ruins. And I was actually seeing the ruins but, um, suddenly my attention was caught by something else. I was just walking round the corner of a ruin, into a group of trees, pine trees, and I was just looking at them, admiring them and suddenly I saw a man halfway 21 up this tree, and I was looking at him so all I could see was his hands and his feet and he was about 20 or 30 feet up. I thought, 'Goodness, what's going on here. Has he got a ladder or hasn't he?' So I walked round to see if he had a ladder. No, he had just gone straight up the tree.
Liz: He'd shinned up the tree.
Shelagh: He'd shinned up the tree. Like a monkey, more or less, except he was a rather middle-aged 22 monkey ... He was, er, he was all of 50 and (Oh God), what's going on here? Anyway, I walked a bit further and saw other people either up trees or preparing to go up trees, and then I noticed a man standing 23 there directing them, a sort of foreman, and began to wonder what on earth was going on, and then on the ground I saw there were all these polythene buckets and they were full of pine cones 24 and of course what they were doing was collecting pine cones, and I thought, 'Well, how tidy of them to collect pine cones to stop the ruins being, um, made, um, made untidy with all these things.' Then I saw there was a lorry ... full of pine cones ... This was getting ridiculous ... They were really collecting them in a big way. So I, um, asked the, er, foreman what was going on and he said, 'Well you know, um, pine nuts are extremely sought after and valuable in the food industry in Italy.'
Liz: For food (Yeah). Not fuel! I thought you were going to say they were going to put (burn) them on a fire. Yes.
Shelagh: Well, they might burn the, er, cones when they've finished with them but inside these cones are little white things like nuts and, er, I realized that they're used in Italian cooking quite a lot in, er, there's a particular sauce that goes with spaghetti, em, from Genova, I think, called 'pesto' in which these nuts are ground up and of course they come in cakes and sweets and things like that.
Liz: So it's quite a delicacy 25.
Shelagh: It's quite a delicacy. And of course I'd never thought of how they actually got them 'cos you can't imagine having a pine nut farm. So what he said happens is that private firms like his buy a licence off the Italian State for the right to go round places like Pompeii—archaeological sites and things—and systematically 26 collect all the pine cones that come off the trees and similarly in the, in the forests.
Liz: And of course they have to go up the tree because by the time it's fallen the, the food isn't any good.
Shelagh: That's right. They're pulling them down and he said they were very good at, um, recognizing which ones were ready and which ones were a bit hard and etc. And each of them had a sort of stick with a hook at the end which they were using to pull the pines off, off the trees but clearly it wasn't enough to sit around and wait till they fell down. You, you had to do something about it. There they were. So that was, er, the end of my looking at the ruins for about half an hour. I was too fascinated by this, er, strange form of er, agriculture.
Liz: Well, what you don't intend to see is always the most interesting.
Shelagh: Much more interesting.

1.       In all humility 27, I accept the nomination 28 ... I am happy to be able to say to you that I come to you unfettered by a single obligation or promise to any living person.
(Thomas Dewey 24/06/48)

2. I'll never tell a lie. I'll never make a misleading statement. I'll never betray the trust of those who have confidence in me. And I will never avoid a controversial issue. Watch me closely, because I won't be any better President than I am a candidate.
(Jimmy Carter 13/11/75)
3. I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult, or expensive to accomplish ... But, in a very real sense, it will not be one man going to the moon. If we make this judgement affirmatively, it will be an entire nation ... I believe we should go to the moon.
(John F. Kennedy 25/05/61)
4. Those of us who loved him, and who take him to his rest today, pray that what he was to us, what he wished for others will some day come to pass for all the world. As he said many times, in many parts of this nation, to those he touched and who sought to touch him: "Some men see things as they are and say 'Why?' I dream things that never were and say 'Why not?'".
(Edward M. Kennedy (08/06/68)
5. Because if they don't awake, they're going to find out that this little Negro that they thought was passive has become a roaring, uncontrollable lion right in right at their door—not at their doorstep, inside their house, in their bed, in their kitchen, in their attic 29, in the basement.
(Malcolm X. 28/06/64)
6. I guess I couldn't say that er I wouldn't continue to do that, because I don't want the Carter Administration, and because I don't want Secretary Vance er to have to take the blame for the decisions that I felt that I had to make, decisions which I still feel were very much in the interest of this nation, er I think it best that I remove myself from the formal employ of the government er and pursue er my interests in foreign and domestic policy as a private citizen.
(Andrew Young 15/08/79)