Question: One of the traditions which is now a necessary part of Christmas is a that of Father Christmas, or Santa Claus. According to the modern legend, he is a magical figure who visits all the children of the world during the night before Christmas Day, leaving presents which they find the next morning. He flies through the night sky in a sledge pulled by reindeer, and enters houses by climbing down chimneys. This strange legend is based on the life of a man called Nicholas, but in fact we know very little about him. Historians think he was a Christian bishop in Turkey in about 285--350 A.D. One of the stories about him is that he helped three poor girls. No one would marry them because they were so poor. To provide them with money for their weddings, Nicholas secretly dropped some gold coins down the chimney of their house. After Nicholas died, he was made a saint by the church.(The name Santa Claus thus comes from St Nicholas.) His feast day was celebrated in December, and parents started giving their children secret presents from St Nicholas. Over the years, this custom became part of our Christmas traditions.

Recently, a psychologist has claimed that Father Christmas is "the perfect fantasy" for children. According to Professor Anthony Clare, children love the character of Father Christmas because he is like an ideal father: he loves children and gives them presents, but he never criticizes them, is never angry, and children do not even need to thank him for the presents. Other writers, however, point out that Father Christmas can be a frightening character to some children. Jane Bidder says that some children are terrified of this fat, bearded old man. It can certainly confuse many children. As parents, we warn our children to be careful of strangers and never to let them into the house, and yet we tell children that a strange man will come into their bedroom at night! Some children can become very worried about this idea and fear that he is a kind of burglar.

Most children, however, understand from their parents and from the media that Father Christmas is basically a _ character, and look forward to his annual visit with joy and excitement. 1. How did the legend of Santa Claus start?
2. What was his name?
3. How does he get into people's houses?
4. When did Nicholas live?
5. Why did he want to help the poor girls?
6. What is the theory of why children like Santa Claus so much?
7. What makes him so ideal?
8. Do all children feel that way about him?
9. Why not?
10. Why would they be frightened?
11. What did Nicholas drop down the chimneys?
12. Did he tell anyone that he was doing this? Provide a numbered list of answers.
****
A numbered of answers: 1. a Christian bishop in Turkey
2. Nicholas
3. down the chimney
4. 285--350 A.D.
5. to provide them with money so they could get married
6. he is like an ideal father
7. he loves children and gives them presents, but he never criticizes them and is never angry
8. no
9. he can be frightening to some children
10. they may think he is a burglar
11. gold coins
12. no

Q: Roger Federer and Serena Williams have been named as 2009' s world champions by the International Tennis Federation(ITF) after topping the year-end rankings.

Federer, who wins the honour for the fifth time, completed a career Grand Slam at Roland Garros before winning his 15th Grand Slam ride at Wimbledon.

And Williams won the Australian Open and Wimbledon, her llth major success.

The pair will receive their awards at the annual 1TF world champions dinner in Paris in June.

Federer regained the world number one ranking from Rafael Nadal after his Paris victory and his Wimbledon win over Andy Roddick saw him surpass Pete Sampras' haul of Grand Slam titles.

He was also runner - up at the Australian Open and the US Open and helped his country retain its Davis Cup world group status.

" It is an honour for me to be named ITF world champion for a fifth time.It was an incredible year for me both on and off the court," said the 28 - year - old Swiss star whose wife Mirka gave birth to twin girls in July.

"To win my first Roland, Garros title, break the all - time Grand Slam record and regain the number one ranking is amazing.It means a lot to me to finish the year again at the top."

Williams takes _ for the first time since 2002.As well as her Grand Slam wins, she won the season - ending WTA Championships in Doha.sealing the top ranking in the last event of die year.

She also took the doubles year award with sister Venus after taking their career total to 10 Grand Slam titles.In doing so, she joins Lindsay Davenport and Martina Hingis as the only players to become singles and doubles world champions in the same year.

American twins Bob and Mike Bryan were named as the men' s doubles world champions for the sixth time in seven years.

1. Bob and Mike Bryan
2. Yes
3. Twins
4. American
5. No
6. Six

Numbered questions:
1. Who were the 2009 champions in men's doubles?
2. Are they related?
3. How?
4. What's their nationality?
5. Is this the first time they've achieved this?
6. How many times have they done it?

input: C++ (pronounced "cee plus plus" ) is a general-purpose programming language. It has imperative, object-oriented and generic programming features, while also providing facilities for low-level memory manipulation.

It was designed with a bias toward system programming and embedded, resource-constrained and large systems, with performance, efficiency and flexibility of use as its design highlights. C++ has also been found useful in many other contexts, with key strengths being software infrastructure and resource-constrained applications, including desktop applications, servers (e.g. e-commerce, web search or SQL servers), and performance-critical applications (e.g. telephone switches or space probes). C++ is a compiled language, with implementations of it available on many platforms. Many vendors provide C++ compilers, including the Free Software Foundation, Microsoft, Intel, and IBM.

C++ is standardized by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), with the latest standard version ratified and published by ISO in December 2014 as "ISO/IEC 14882:2014" (informally known as C++14). The C++ programming language was initially standardized in 1998 as "ISO/IEC 14882:1998", which was then amended by the C++03, "ISO/IEC 14882:2003", standard. The current C++14 standard supersedes these and C++11, with new features and an enlarged standard library. Before the initial standardization in 1998, C++ was developed by Bjarne Stroustrup at Bell Labs since 1979, as an extension of the C language as he wanted an efficient and flexible language similar to C, which also provided high-level features for program organization. The C++17 standard is due in July 2017, with the draft largely implemented by some compilers already, and C++20 is the next planned standard thereafter. 1. What are the biggest strengths of C++?
2. What kind of language is it?
3. What do companies like the Free Software Foundation offer?
4. Does anyone else offer those?
5. Who?
6. Who standardizes it?
7. What was the last version when this article was written?
8. Which version came out in 2014?
9. Which on should come out in 2017?
10. What month do they expect to see it?
11. Who created C++?
12. Where did he work?
13. When did he start working on it?
14. Was he trying to improve something?
15. What?
16. When was it first standardized?
17. What was the official name?
18. What was the next version?
19. What was made bigger in C++14?
20. How do you pronounce C++? Return numbered answers in your output.

output:
1. software infrastructure and resource-constrained applications
2. a general-purpose programming language.
3. C++ compilers
4. yes
5. Microsoft, Intel, and IBM.
6. the International Organization for Standardization
7. C++20
8. "ISO/IEC 14882:2014" (informally known as C++14)
9. C++17
10. July
11. Bjarne Stroustrup
12. Bell Labs
13. 1979
14. yes
15. an efficient and flexible language similar to C
16. 1998
17. "ISO/IEC 14882:1998"
18. "ISO/IEC 14882:2003"
19. standard library.
20. "cee plus plus"