TASK DEFINITION: Write a question from the passage such that it identifies a character (a person or a thing) in the passage.
PROBLEM: I first experienced a loss of sexual desire several years ago, just after I turned 40. For a long time, I thought it was me. I thought maybe it was my age.
After reading every book and article I could find on sex, relationships, and marriage, I started to wonder if maybe it wasn't me. Maybe it was my marriage, maybe it was my husband.
I never wanted to be "that woman". The one that screwed around on her husband. But, I had an affair about six or seven years ago. It didn't last long. But, that's when I knew my marriage was over. It wasn't a lack of sexual desire, it was a lack of desire for my husband. I didn't want him or the marriage. There was nothing wrong with my sex drive.
I told my husband that I'd had an affair. He changed for about a month or so. He was very loving and attentive. But it didn't last. He loves differently than I need to be loved and it's just not in him to love me that way.
A few months after I ended the affair, I got involved with someone else. I know. I shouldn't have. I've experienced things with this other man that I never thought possible. Felt things I thought were only possible in movies.
He's a romantic. Not flowers or candy or jewellery, but he talks and listens. He hears me. He tries to understand me and give me what I need. Deep, intimate conversations. Looking into one another's eyes. Soft caresses. Words of adoration. These things he gives me almost daily.
I never knew I needed romance because I'd never had it. This is how I need to be loved.
After having felt this way, I can't stay in my marriage. It's not fair to either of us.
I'm not sure what happened.
Did we grow apart?
Did one or both of us change?
Do people's needs change as they get older?

SOLUTION: Who does the author have deep, intimate conversations with?

PROBLEM: One student started packing up at the beginning of a lab exercise. I asked him where he was going. He said "I'm going to fail this class anyway, so I have other things to do." It was true that he wasn't doing well, and we had addressed this previously, but his attitude was completely defeatist. He had given up.
So, there, in the middle of class, before he could get away, I said "Well, yeah. You will certainly fail if you don't even try. I thought you were graduating at the end of this semester."
"I'm supposed to, but I won't, because I'm going to fail physics. All I need is a D." (He was right; his major didn't require knowing any physics but they put it in the curriculum as a kind of gatekeeper course. Most students took physics much earlier in their studies than he did.)
"If you have already decided to fail, I can't stop you; you're an adult. But you can make an appointment with me anytime. You already know that. You can email me. It's my job to help you understand, but you have to come to me. You are an adult. It would be very inappropriate of me to follow you around, inviting you to office hours. And you must do the homework and the labs."
He stayed for the lab. I notified his counselor about what was going on, and she called him in and said the same things that I said.
Next class he moved from the seat at the edge of my peripheral vision, to the middle, started working his ass off, and he passed. For a while I thought he was closing in on a C, but he got his D and graduated.
And I didn't give him anymore of a grading break than I give any of my students.

SOLUTION: Who thought he was going to fail?

PROBLEM: The drive up to Rick's place in the hills always made me sick. Just after he bought the house with his ill gotten gains from his band's over-hyped, over-marketed, and over-bought sophomore Disc, he drove me out to see it in his beautiful but nauseating '70 Datsun 240 Z. All the smog combined with the pinball effects of winding up the hill at teeth-numbing speeds had me puking for an hour after we got there.
I took the last turn at the top of the hill and watched the rising sun crest over the black blocks of the city, her angel wings soiled and cheapened with the soot of 12 million get-away drivers. Rick's house came into view out of the fog, its large glass panes sparkling like the last clean surface of an oversized ashtray.
I parked between a blue hatchback and Rick's favorite toy: a 350 horsepower Impreza he had smuggled here from Japan. All his more expensive rides were in the garage, collecting dust and gaining vintage resale value.
I rang the bell. I waited and watched a couple of squirrels fight over a small treasure in the bushes. The door opened.
"Dingo."
"Hey, Luna."
Her job as Rick's assistant was to take care of his place while he was out being a rock star. She made sure all his bills were paid, his animals were fed, and that the subsequent fallout from any parties she might have in his absence didn't leave any lasting damage.
She was pretty by most standards, gorgeous by others. Short with a tight schoolgirl body and raven hair that teased her avian shoulders. But by whatever standard, her beauty was like a rare and exotic bird she kept caged behind the bars of her perfect teeth. As soon as she opened her mouth it flew away.

SOLUTION:
Who was gorgeous by some standards?

