Lesson38 A Stop Sign
Sam was a farmer. He was born on his farm and had lived on it all his life.
He had married his neighbour's daughter, and they grew fruit and vegetables.
Sam got up at five o'clock every morning to gather them and take a load offto the market in his truck.
There were very few vehicles on the country roads at that time of themorning and Sam knew how to get to the market very well. So as he was goingalong, he was always thinking about everything except his driving.
One morning he was thinking about what crops to plant for the next year'sharvest, and whether to try something else. After a few kilometres, Sam cameto an intersection with a stop sign. He always crossed the road withoutstopping because there was never any traffic on it at that time of themorning.
But this morning a young policeman whom he had never seen before signalledto him to stop a hundred meters beyond the crossroads.
The policeman said to him, "Didn't you know that there was a sign tellingyou to stop at the crossroads before going over the main road?""Oh, yes," answered Sam, "I knew that there was a sign at that point,because I go to market along this road every morning.
But what I didn't know was that you were here."
intersection 十字路口，交叉点
signal 发信号，用动作示意
停车标志
萨姆是个农夫。他出生在他的这个农场，一辈子都没离开过。他娶了邻居的女儿，两人种植水果和蔬菜。
萨姆每天五点起床，采摘蔬果，然后装一卡车送到市场上去。
清晨的那个时候，村里的路上没有多少车，而且萨姆对去市场的路很熟悉。因此在去市场的路上，他总是在想除开车以外的事情。
一天早晨，他正在想下年种什么庄稼能丰收，是否试着种些其他作物。开车走了几公里后，萨姆来到一个有停车标志的十字路口。因为早晨的那个时间从来没有其他车辆经过这里，他总是不停车就闯过去。但今天早晨，通过十字路口几百米后，一个从未见过的年轻警察向他示意停车。
警察问他：“你不知道那个指示牌是说，驶入大路前要在十字路口停车吗？”
“噢，知道，”萨姆回答，“我知道那儿有个指示牌，因为我天天早晨走这条路到市场，但我不知道的是你在这儿呀。” |