特的谈话激发了作者去买袜子送给无家可归的人。

　　2．Which is TRUE about the author according to the passage?

　　A．He believed it felt good to help the homeless.

　　B．He went to Ross to buy a pair of socks for Albert.

　　C．He handed out socks to the homeless as Christmas gifts.

　　D．He was often questioned about why he gave out socks.

　　解析：选A　细节理解题。根据最后一段的第一句"It's extremely satisfying to operate 'under the radar' to help make some people's lives a little bit easier."可知，作者乐意帮助那些无家可归的人。

　　3．What could be the best title for the passage?

　　A．Santa Claus brings Christmas gifts

　　B．Kindness is rewarded with kindness

　　C．Every sock helps make somebody's day

　　D．Socks are passed on from hand to hand

　　解析：选C　标题归纳题。通读全文并根据最后一段的第一句"It's extremely satisfying ... a little bit easier."可推知，本文主要讲的是作者通过给无家可归的人送袜子来做慈善，以改善他人的生活的故事，故选C。make sb.'s day表示"使某人非常高兴"。

　　B

　　When saying or writing out numbers, the British put an and before the tens and units (个位数), as in one hundred and sixty­two or two thousand and three. In the United States it is considered correct to drop the and, as in one hundred sixty­two or two thousand three.

　　In counting, it is common in both varieties of English to count in hundreds up to 1,900 - so 1,200 may be twelve hundred. However, Americans use this pattern for much higher numbers than is the norm in British English, referring to twenty­four hundred where British English would most often use two thousand four hundred.

　　In the case of years, however, twelve thirty­four would be the norm on both sides of the Atlantic for the year 1234. The year 2000 and years beyond it are read as two thousand, two thousand (and) one by both British and American speakers. For years after 2009, twenty ten, twenty twelve etc. are becoming common.

　　For the house number (or bus number, etc.) 272, British people tend to say two seven two while Americans tend to say two seventy­two.

　　When referring to the numeral (数字) 0, British people would normally use nought, oh, or zero, although nil is common in sports scores. Americans use the term zero most frequently; oh is also often used. When a phone or account number is being read aloud, 0 is nearly always pronounced oh in both language varieties for convenience.

When reading numbers in order, such as a telephone number or serial number (序列号),