Ken and Anthony were friends when they were young. They 1 to high school together. When they were eighteen, they went to college in different cities, and then they2 touch (联系).After few years later, they met each other again.

One morning Ken was3 a newspaper. In the newspaper, he saw a notice for a book reading at local bookshop. He was 4 to find that the writer was his friend Anthony. Ken 5 to see how his old friend was.

When Anthony was on the stage (舞台). Ken almost didn't 6 him. Anthony was very fat, and had little hair. When Anthony was in high school, he was very handsome. Ken felt 7 for Anthony's looks but happy with Anthony's talent. Anthony's 8 was quite good.

When the reading was over, Ken stood in line with the others 9 for Anthony to sign (签名)a copy of his book. When it was up to Ken, Anthony found him and hugged his long lost friend. They didn't see each other for many years, so they decided not to lose touch again and planned to10 once a month for breakfast on Saturdays.

Do you know something about tree rings (年轮)？Do you know they can tell us what the weather was like even hundreds of years ago?

A tree will grow well in a climate (气候) with lots of sunshine and rainfall (雨量) And little sunshine or rainfall will limit (限制) the growth of a tree. We can see the change of climate by studying the tree rings. For example, to find out the weather of ten years ago, count (数) the rings of a tree from the outside to the inside. If the tenth ring is far from the eleventh ring, then we're sure that it was sunny and rainy most of that year. If it is close to the eleventh ring, then the climate that year was bad.

Tree rings are important not only for studying the history of weather but also for studying the history of man. Many centuries ago there lived a lot of people at a place in New Mexico. But now you can find only sand but no trees, no people. What happened?

A scientist studied the rings of the dead trees there. He found that the people had to leave because they had cut down all the trees to make fires and buildings. Because all the trees had gone, the people there had to move.