The Long and Short of It

    Although I had never met him, I knew that my grandfather had been five feet, six inches¹ tall, while my stately grandmother stood five feet, eleven inches. As a teen-ager leafing through old photographs with Grandma, I finally realized how unusual they must have looked together .
    "Grandma, " I asked, "how could you have fallen in love with a man five inches shorter than you?"She turned to me. "Honey," she said, "we fell in love sitting down, and when I stood up, it was too late."Notes:
    (1) stately adj.高贵的(2) leaf through迅速翻阅；浏览(3) teen-ager.十几岁的人(4) fall in love with爱上；坠入爱河Exercises:
    根据短文选择正确答案：
    ① The child had never met______ .
    A. the grandfatherB. the grandmotherC. the fatherD. the mother② The grandmother was _______taller than the grandfather.
    A. five feetB. six inchesC. four inchesD. five inches③ "Leafing through" in "leafing through old photographs" means______ .
    A. to turn page by pageB. to put leaves in an albumC. to took forD². to take out from④ The child realized________ .
    A. how strange they must have looked togetherB. how wonderful they must have looked togetherC. how shameful³ they must have looked togetherD. how unusual they must have looked together⑤ From the passage we can see that______ .
    A. the grandmother loved her husband deeplyB. the grandmother regretted⁴ to have married⁵ her husbandC. the grandfather had been out for at least ten yearsD. the grandfather had been dead for nearly eight years
42.来龙去脉
尽管我从未见过我祖父，但我知道他身高五英尺六，而我高贵的祖母身高五英尺十一。十几岁的时候，我和祖母一起一页一页地翻着老照片，我终于认识到他们在一起是多么不同寻常。
    “奶奶，”我问道，“你怎么会爱上一个比你矮五英寸的人呢？”
    她转过脸来看着我。“宝贝，”她说，“我们是坐着相爱的。当我站起来的时候，已经太晚了。”

1 inches   

n.英寸（相当于 2。54 厘米，一英尺有 12 英寸）( inch的名词复数 )；少量；[复数]身材；（数量、距离、程度等）少许

参考例句：

• The water is only a few inches deep. 这水只有几英寸深。
• 1.14 inches of rain fell last night. 昨晚的降雨量为1.14英寸。

2 Ford   

n.浅滩，水浅可涉处；v.涉水，涉过

参考例句：

• They were guarding the bridge,so we forded the river.他们驻守在那座桥上，所以我们只能涉水过河。
• If you decide to ford a stream,be extremely careful.如果已决定要涉过小溪，必须极度小心。

3 shameful   

adj.可耻的，不道德的

参考例句：

• It is very shameful of him to show off.他向人炫耀自己，真不害臊。
• We must expose this shameful activity to the newspapers.我们一定要向报社揭露这一无耻行径。

4 regretted   

adj.后悔的

参考例句：

• Pierre told them some things he later regretted telling. 皮埃尔告诉了他们一些事，他后来感到后悔。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They regretted agreeing to the convocation of that meeting. 他们后悔同意召开这个会议。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 married   

adj.已婚的；与…结婚的

参考例句：

• I heard John got married.我听说约翰结婚了。
• They got married last autumn.他们在去年秋季结婚。