大学体验英语听说教程3原文-Unit-4-script

Listening —Speaking Book 3

Unit 4

Warm Up

1. My family is a little unusual. Some people might even say we’re nuts.

2. My mother is extreme when it comes to neatness. She can’t stand to see even a speck of dust in the house.

3. Mom is really strict with us when it comes to household chores. Every day, we have to do a couple of hours of chores to keep things neat.

4. My father loves to barbecue. He’s definitely a fanatic. He can’t live without his barbecue grill.

5. One time, I accidentally broke Dad’s grill. He completely freaked out. He was so upset, he couldn’t even wait a day to buy another one.

6. My sister, Alicia, is a vegan. She not only avoids meat, but also any animal products, like milk and eggs.

7. Sometimes Alicia and Dad argue because they have opposite interests. She’s as devoted to her vegetarianism as he is to his barbecuing.

8. Some of my other relatives are a little strange, too. I’ve got an aunt who thinks she can see the future and a cousin who does four hours of bodybuilding exercises every day!

9. My family might be a little irritating to some people, but they don’t bother me much. After all, they’re the only family I’ve got.

Listening Task

1. My sister is a really strict vegan. It’s not for religious or health reasons. It’s just she’s j ust a little nuts. Every time she comes over for a family dinner we have to make a special dish just for her. And if, like, the fork we’ve used to serve some meat even touches her plate for a split second, she freaks out and has to get another plate. Recen tly, she started this new thing where she can’t even eat any vegetables that are cooked. They have to be raw. And she put her cat on a vegan diet, too. The poor thing only eats vegetables. Every time I go over to her place, the cat looks at me with these s ad eyes, like, “Meat … please?”

2. My cousin Pat is a professional clown. He goes by the name Patty Cakes. He gets hired to do special events like kids’ birthday parties. The thing about Pat is that he just can’t stop being a clown even when he’s not working. He’ll show up at his friend’s house and start making balloon hats for everyone. And then there’s his pet duck, Phoebe. Pat uses Phoebe in his clown act, but sometimes he doesn’t have time to take her home after work, so he just brings her along whereve r he’s going. It’s just so strange to see Pat walk in somewhere with Phoebe following behind him wearing a diaper.

3. My Aunt Samantha collects dolls. She’s a real fanatic. Most people have hobbies, you know, like sports or music or movies, but Aunt Samantha spends all her money on dolls. She has one room in her apartment completely devoted to Barbie dolls. I mean, the whole room is wall-to-wall Barbies! She’s got over a thousand of them lined up on shelves from floor to ceiling. The dolls are all in perfec t condition. She stores them in their boxes and never takes them out. It’s kind of scary, actually. When you walk into that room, you just feel surrounded by them. It’s like they’re all watching you or something.

4. My brother Andrew is really into TV and movies and, um ... How can I put this nicely? He can get pretty extreme about it. He’s always pretending to be a character from a movie or TV show. Now, when he was twelve or thirteen, he used to watch the TV show Star Trek all the time, and he’d go around talking exactly like Mr. Spock. Like if I’d say, “Andrew, get out of my room. I’m studying. You’re so irritating.” And he’d say, “Irritating? Ah, yes, one of your earthling emotions.” Stuff like that, a line right out of Star Trek. Now, sometimes, it’s funny. Like now he’s doing Harry Potter voices. But we worry about him a lot. I mean, does he even know who he is? He’s always acting like someone else.