【英语早间课堂】我到酷日下乘凉吗？

 各位亲爱的朋友们，欢迎和Juliet一起来趣味学英语。我们今天的话题是——我到酷日下乘凉吗？

 

陆明可谓是祸不单行，事情都乱套了，作业没写完，房租没交上，身份证不见了，电单车又被偷了，正在发愁了。这时候，Alice来问陆明文几个中文成语，看到陆明把整个房间翻得乱七八糟，就说：“What are you cooking?”获悉详情后，看到陆明一直耷拉着个脸，就说：“Just chill¹ out. ”Alice的措辞极为精彩，弄得陆明脑袋是一波刚平，一波又来。那么Alice说的2句话到底是什么意思呢？我们就带着这2个疑惑一起走近Alice和陆明的谈话中来。

 

 

Alice : What are you cooking，Lumming?

 

What are you cooking?

 

Luming : Nothing. It's a little earlier for me to cook myself for supper.

 

什么也没做。对于我来说，做饭还早了点儿。

 

Alice : You are always giving me an irrelevant² answer! (All of a sudden³, it comes to Alice's mind that "What are you cooking" is just popular in America.) Oh , I get it, you don't catch the sentence "What are you cooking?" It means⁴ "What's matter?"

 

你老是答非所问。（突然间，Alice想起了“What are you cooking?”是现在才在美国流行起来的说法。）喔，我知道了你不会这句话——What are you cooking? 它的意思是“发生了什么事？”

 

Lumming : I've got three essays⁵ to do by tomorrow. And I forget to pay my rent and I cannot find my ID card. What am I going to do?

 

我还有三篇论文没有写，我忘记了付房租，我还把身份证弄丢了。我该怎么办呀？

 

Alice : Just chill out——It's not such a big problem. It is a long road that has no turning.

 

Just chill out. 没什么大不了的。车到山前必有路嘛, 否极泰来.

 

Lumming : Chill...out? The sun beats down on us. The temperature outside is much higher than inside.

 

（心理疑惑：chill是“使......变凉”的意思，out是“外面”的意思，难道不成是叫我去外面凉快一下。）现在酷日当头。外面的温度比室内温度高很多呀。

 

Alice : Well, I don't ask you to enjoy the cool. "Chill out" means "to relax, calm down or take it easy".

 

哎...... 我不是叫你去外面乘凉。“Chill out”是“放松，从容不迫，冷静，不烦躁”的意思。

 

Lumming : Thank you a million dollars, Alice!

 

万分感谢，Alice。

1 chill   

vt.使变冷，使冷却，使沮丧；n.寒冷，风寒

参考例句：

• With the chill factor,it's nearly minus forty here.加上风寒指数，气温接近零下40度。
• The bad news cast a chill over the whole family.这坏消息使全家人感到沮丧。

2 irrelevant   

adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的

参考例句：

• That is completely irrelevant to the subject under discussion.这跟讨论的主题完全不相关。
• A question about arithmetic is irrelevant in a music lesson.在音乐课上，一个数学的问题是风马牛不相及的。

3 sudden   

n.突然，忽然；adj.突然的，意外的，快速的

参考例句：

• All of a sudden he turned about and saw me.他突然转过身来看见了我。
• The horse was badly frightened by the sudden noise.那匹马被突然而来的嘈杂声吓坏了。

4 means   

n.方法，手段，折中点，物质财富

参考例句：

• That man used artful means to find out secrets.那人使用狡猾的手段获取机密。
• We must get it done by some means or other.我们总得想办法把它干完。

5 essays   

n.散文( essay的名词复数 )；（作为课程作业，学生写的）文章；企图；（用来刊登的）论说文

参考例句：

• Holmes used an informal, chatty tone in his essays. 霍姆斯在文章中语气轻松随便。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Almost all of Luxun's essays were directed at the enemy. 鲁迅的杂文绝大部分是对准敌人的。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》