My grandfather's hammer has been in our family for sixty years. The head is iron, the metal is dark with age, and the handle is wood he cut himself. (11) My father put a new handle on it when I was small. Last year I put on the third. A friend once asked whether it is really the same hammer, (12) almost every part has been changed. I did not know what to say. (13) I think the answer is yes, and that the answer has nothing to do with the wood. A thing that is kept is not the same material year after year, (14) it is the same care, handed from one pair of hands to the next.
Turn on a light and something far away changes. (15) Most of the power in this country still begins with something being burned, and the gas that burns was made by plants that lived long before any person did. When we use it, we are spending a collection that took millions of years to build, (16) it cannot be filled again while we live. Wind and sun are different: they arrive every day whether we use them or not. (17), the question is not only what energy costs today. It is what we are borrowing from the future, (18) from whom, and we must answer it together.
Dad: Look at this before you leave the air conditioner on all night again.
| POWER BILL · July and August |
|---|
| This year: 4,280 |
| Last year, same months: 2,900 |
| Pay before September 15 |
| Pay at any convenience store, by credit card, or give it to the mail carrier |
Wei: That is almost 1,400 more. Was it hotter this year?
Dad: A little. But we also left two rooms cool with nobody in them, plus the KTV night on the west side of the house.
Wei: All right. I will close my door and set it two degrees higher.
Monday to Friday · Room 204 · Lunch time only
Each day you can hold, press and break one material, put your ear close, smell it, and write down what you find.
Write your name and the material on the paper by the door. You do not need to write a complete report; one line about what surprised you is enough. Remember that a large mass of iron is not as light as it looks, plus it can be sharp, so do not fool about with it.
Nothing here is dangerous except the glass, which is why it stays behind the window. If you break something on purpose, you will be asked to leave; if you break something by accident, tell a teacher and nothing more will happen.
Dear Sir,
I am writing about the old piano in the hall. Three keys near the middle make no sound, and the wood on the left side has come away from the iron inside.
I asked a man who repairs pianos. He came last Saturday and looked at it for free. He says the work would cost about eight thousand, and that a new piano of the same kind would be over one hundred thousand. He also said this one was made in Germany about fifty years ago, and that its sound is delicious, minus two soft keys and is the best one the school has ever had, worth keeping.
I know the school has little money. Could the music club raise part of the cost? We would like to try before anybody decides to throw it away.
Chen Ann
Open an old radio and you will find metal pins, a paper map of every line, and space for a hand. Open something made this year and you may find nothing that can be opened at all.
This was a choice, not an accident. A thing that cannot be opened is cheaper to make and is thrown away sooner. For the company that sells it, both of those are good news.
Some countries now ask companies to sell the parts and print the paper maps. It sounds like a small rule. But the difference between a thing you can open and one you cannot is the difference between owning it and renting it for a few years without knowing.