Why I stopped worrying about my credit score?
If you believed everything you read about your credit score, you'd think it was the most important component of your financial health. Without a good credit score and history, the experts say, it's more difficult qualify for a mortgage(按揭)or a car loan-and more expensive if you're approved for a loan, too, because you won't get the best interest rates. In many states, bad credit can even raise your insurance payments, cost you a rental apartment, or make it harder to get hired. 1.
First off, there are several credit scores out there. While it's important to cultivate your credit scores by using credit responsibly, your FICO credit score may not be the same as what VantageScore reports, and lenders may use a different one entirely, so focusing on one score can be a fruitless exercise. More important as financial reporter Dave Ramsey notes on his blog, your credit score is not a measure of your overall financial health. He writes:"2."
FICO, the most popular credit-scoring agency, users several weighted factors to determine your credit score, including payment history (35 percent), amounts owed (30 percent), length of credit history (15 percent), new credit (10 percent), and credit mix (10 percent). 3.My husband and I enjoyed steady credit scores above 820 for a while. But when we paid off one of our rental properties in 2017, we both saw our credit scores fall by 20 or more points. The sudden drop took place because we completed a 15-year loan and reduced the average length of our credit history tremendously. 4. That’s blackmail. I would rather be debt-free than have a perfect credit score.
Your credit score is certainly important when you’re starting out and likely to borrow money for a down payment (首付) on a home or some other big purchase. But once you’re fairly established financially, it’s much easier to see it for what it really is: a measure of how well you borrow money.
The term ‘dark tourism’ is far newer than the practice, which long predates Pompeii's emergence as a dark attraction. Dr Philip Stone, perhaps the world's leading academic expert on dark tourism, considers the Roman Colosseum to be one of first dark tourist sites, where people travelled long distances to watch death as sport. Later, until the late 18" century, the appeal was crueler still in central London, where people paid money to sit in grandstands to watch mass hangings. Dealers would sell pies at the site, which was roughly where Marble Arch stands today.
It was only in 1996 that ‘dark tourism' entered the scholarly vocabulary when two academics in Glasgow applied it while looking at sites associated with the murder of John F.Kennedy. Those who study dark tourism identify plenty of reasons for the growing phenomenon, including raised awareness of it as an identifiable thing. Access to sites has also improved with the arrival of cheap air travel. It's hard to imagine that the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial and museum would now welcome mare than two million visitors a year were it not for its nearness to Krakow's international airport. Peter Hohenhaus, a widely travelled dark tourist based in Vienna,also points to the broader rise in off-the-beaten track tourism,beyond the territory of popular guidebooks and TripAdvisor rankings. ‘A lot of people don't want mainstream tourism and that often means engaging with places that have a more recent history than, say,a Roman ruin." he says."You go to Sarajevo and most people remember the war being in the news so if feels closer to one’s owe biography(传记)”
Hohenhaus is also a fan of‘ beauty in decay’, the contemporary cultural movement in which urban ruins have become subject matter for expensive coffee-table books and a thousand lnstagram(照片墙)accounts. The crossover with death is clear.“I have always been drawn to ruined things," the 54-year-old says. But while, like any tourism, dark tourism at its best is educational, the example of Grenfell Tower (a London tower block,destroyed by a fire in 2017 with 7l deaths) hints at the unease felt at some sites.“I remember the Lonely Planet Bluelist book had a chapter about dark tourism a while ago and one of the rules was 'don't go back too early'."Hohenhaus says.“I'll be interested to see Grenfell Tower up close.I can see the attraction.But I would not stand in the street taking a selfie(自拍)merrily.”
1.'Dark tourism' can be defined as tourism involving travel to places____________.
A. hardly having access to in ancient times
B. with a history even before human civilization
C. historically related to death and tragedy
D. in Europe famous for cruel but exciting sports
2.Dark tourism came into sight when_________.
A. scholars finally revealed secrets about some historical events
B. people were no more satisfied with ordinary tourist destinations
C. road transportation was able to take people around the world
D. researchers realized the significance of sustainable tourism
3.What is implied in Hohenhaus' words in the last paragraph?
A. People fail to get lessons from disasters causing terrible loss.
B. The media are publicizing the modern city ruins improperly.
C. Visitors are free to take selfies with the ‘beauty of decay’.
D. Some tourists show a lack of respect for dark tourist sites.
4.Which of the following best serves as the title of this passage?
A. Morality mirrored in tourism
B. Tourism boomed with tragedies
C. Ranking of dark tourism sites
D. Proper attitudes to dark tourism
Top Six Most Challenged Books in 2017
Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) in the States tracked 354 challenges (formal attempts to remove or restrict access to library materials and services) to library, school, and university materials and services in2017. Some individual challenges resulted in requests to restrict or remove multiple titles. Overall, 416 books were targeted. Here are the "Top Six Most Challenged Books in 2017”.
1 | Thirteen Reasons Why By Jay Asher Originally published in 2007. this New York Times bestseller has resurfaced as a debatable book after Netflix aired a TV series by the same name. This young adult novel was challenged and banned in multiple school districts, for it discusses self-killing. | 4 | GEORGE By Alex Gino Written for elementary-age children, this Lambda Literary Award winner was challenged and banned because it includes a transgender child. |
2 | Drama Written and illustrated By Raina Telgemeier This Stonewall Honor Award-winning, 2012 graphic novel from a much-admired cartoonist was challenged and banned in school libraries because it includes confused sexual orientation characters and was considered "confusing.” | 5 | To Kill a Mockingbird By Harper Lee This Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, considered an America classical, was challenged and banned because of violence and its use of the N-word to insult black people. |
3 | The Kite Runner By Khaled Hosseini This multigenerational novel praised by many critics was challenged and banned because it includes sexual violence and was thought to "lead to 'terrorism" and "promote IsIam.” | 6 | The Hate U Give By Angie Thomas Despite winning multiple awards and being the most searched-for book on Goodreads during its debut(首秀) year, this young adult novel was challenged and banned in school libraries and curricular because of drug use and offensive language. |
1.These six most challenged books are all________.
A. prize winners or well received by the public
B. written for curious young adults in schools
C. banned and challenged in nationwide libraries
D. involved with violence and aggressive language
2.Which of the following would be removed from school libraries to avoid misleading kids into racialism?
A. The Hate U Give. B. To Kill a Mocking bird.
C. The Kite Runner. D. Thirteen Reasons Way.
3.It can be concluded from the passage that in the States_______.
A. OIF is responsible for the challenges reported from local schools and universities
B. the government is challenged by intellectual freedom in public materials and services
C. issues like mental illness, drug use and sex education really concern the government
D. best sellers and prize winners are often questioned and rejected by the public
What to endure before publication?
It takes a lot to write a novel. Even those who haven’t tried would say, “Well, duh!” to this. But it’s not much the mind space or the considerable time it takes to write a novel that is as discouraging as how many times any writer must go back to the drawing board for yet another draft. To really ready a novel for publication, a writer must spend time with his or her book. Like any promising relationship, you, the writer , must date your novel, take it out to dinner, meet its parents, and see it through its most trying and desperate times. As a writer, you have to stay up all night with your novel crying and talking and sometimes even pulling your hair out before that perfect moment of inspiration can truly help you cross the finish line.
For many published authors I know, myself included, a completed novel takes them about 10, that’s right, 10 drafts, and at least a year of real editing. Will you be spending every single second editing your novel? No, of course not. Just as drafts need some real time on the surgery table, they also need rest in the recovery room. You don’t nurse a relationship by spending every waking second with them until you can’t stand the sight of each other, and you can’t produce a novel by breathing down its literary neck. However, a novel should undergo many drafts---and different kinds of drafts—before declaring it ready for an agent or editor to see.
Everyone has their own way to write a novel, and not all craft advice (or even craft “rules”) should all be followed by everyone, but when it comes to the many drafts of a novel, there are specific things a writer should focus on during each revision to help create a smooth transition from the initial idea to final products.
1.People are discouraged from writing a novel mainly because it requires _____.
A. a good publisher B. too much thinking
C. tons of working time D. frequent revisions
2.What do writers do in the course of creating a novel?
A. They spend every minute with the novel. B. They treat the novel as a lover.
C. They go out with some readers for dinner. D. They hurt themselves to stay awake.
3.By “breathing down its literary neck” in Paragraph 2, the author most probably means _____.
A. writing casually thus failing to take readers’ breath away
B. letting go a single mistake thus annoying the readers
C. X-raying the work thus finding each literary mistake
D. sticking too close to the work thus causing anxiety
4.Which of the following is most likely to come after the last paragraph?
A. The importance of using proper transitional words in writing.
B. The writing experience shared by famous successful write.
C. Tips on how to make ten drafts to complete a good novel.
D. Setbacks writers may suffer if ignoring the craft advice.
Marmoset monkeys exist on a branch of the evolutionary tree that is distinct from the one that led to mans. But they constantly astonish researchers with ________ behavior that seems pretty highly evolved. Their social organization and ________ practices could have been the model for the phrase “It takes a village.” A dominant male and female breed, and their babies are carefully looked after by extended family members who then aren't free to breed themselves.
A new study further ________ the marmoset’s reputation for admirable community values. Researchers report that these caregivers share their food more generously with little ones ________ than when they’re surrounded by the watchful eyes of other community members. In complex societies where individuals band together for ______ protection, researchers have come up with a few widely accepted explanations for selfless behavior. But specific acts, like sharing a delicious cricket(蟋蟀) with a begging baby marmoset, seem to need more ______ explanation
One possibility is that an individual practices ______ as a means of enhancing his status among peers. By ______ that he is so well gifted with material goods that he can give some away, this do-gooder enhances his power within the group. That, in turn, may ______ prospective mates. The other explanation for charitable behavior ______ that kindnesses extended to others are simply the fees of group membership, which offers some future promise of a chance to mate. Failure to share would result in exclusion from the group and a loss of ______ partners. Scientists call this the “pay to stay” model. Importantly, for both of these models to work, acts of kindness must have a(n) ______. That suggests you would see more sharing in group settings; away from judging eyes, a caregiver might be more likely to keep food for himself or herself. And yet, in 2,581 tests conducted with 31 adult and 14 baby marmosets, the ______ appeared to be true
Anthropologists (人类学家) from the University of Zurich carefully documented how often, in groups and in conditions that found caregiver and baby separated from the crowd, an adult would share his or her cricket. When alone with a baby begging for a taste, adult marmosets shared their cricket 85% of the time. When in a group, caregivers offered up their cricket 67% of the time.” Our results show that helping in common marmosets is not driven by reputation management or ______ avoidance, “ the study authors reported Rather, it is driven by a deep-down motivation to help that is more ______ expressed when individuals are alone with young.”
1.A. animal B. careful C. social D. individual
2.A. evolving B. communicating C. organizing D. parenting
3.A. shines B. damages C. affects D. protests
4.A. at play B. in private C. on schedule D. by accident
5.A. adequate B. effective C. continual D. mutual
6.A. creative B. complex C. specific D. official
7.A. generosity B. wisdom C. independence D. governance
8.A. promising B. demonstrating C. pretending D. explaining
9.A. count on B. go after C. appeal to D. benefit from
10.A. assumes B. confirms C. enhances D. concludes
11.A. regular B. dominant C. potential D. previous
12.A. atmosphere B. audience C. feedback D. judge
13.A. statistics B. expectation C. argument D. opposite
14.A. responsibility B. punishment C. arrangement D. difficulty
15.A. strongly B. causally C. delicately D. fearlessly
Young boys are not easily shocked, but 12-year-old Preston Sharp sure knows the feeling.
“Yeah, I was surprised and even disappointed, ” Preston said , Preston’s mom , April Sharp said , “It is the first time I 1. (see) him like this angry and passionate.”
What upset her son so much was visiting his grandpa’s grave in Redding, California ,and realizing that not every veteran(老兵) in the cemetery has a flag. So April told him “son, 2.you are going to complain about something , you have to do something about it or let it go”
Next thing April knew，Preston was taking on odd jobs and asking for donations3.(buy)flags and flowers for every veteran in his grandpa’s cemetery. And when that cemetery4. (cover),he moved on to another，and then another.
Here we are，nearly three years and about 65,000graves later. He does it every week5.the weather is like, rain or shine---especially rain，”They were out there in the rain doing their job, 6. (protect)us,” Preston said. His devotion is infections.
When word gets out7.Preston will be at a cemetery---he has a Facebook page，Preston Sharp/Vet flags and Flowers---people，like Vietnam veteran Fred Loveland, feel8. (oblige)to join in.” It’s amazing.” Loveland said.” What he’s doing brings9.out because we can’t believe a young man in this country is doing what he does，”It is a movement of young and old，of those who served and those who are so grateful for what they did，all led by a proud grandson10.saw an injustice and decided to do something about it.
