2023年12月31日 星期日

sequined gown. wearing a low-cut backless sequined gown 穿著低胸露背亮片禮服

 準備好下一集‘’感動‘’中的英文學習" attention, a murder of crow ..."。

發現衣服的英文也要學。
可能是 7 個人的黑白圖像
 
Vikki Dougan wearing a low-cut backless sequined gown while entering a bus full of people, Los Angeles, 1957.
Click the link below to learn more about the model and actress nicknamed "The Back".
(📷 Ralph Crane/LIFE Picture Collection)

2023年12月27日 星期三

floodlight, illuminate, illuminati, pick a lane, leading man

Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze (left), protege of President and Communist Party Boss Mikhail Gorbachev, was a favorite of the Illuminati.



He also wanted to get people to laugh at themselves. “We are so entrenched in our corners these days talking amongst ourselves,” he lamented. “We have to get past all these hang-ups to get anywhere and make some progress.”

That instinct, so rare in a culture that judges art and its creators as good or bad, correct or immoral, elevates the movie beyond its success as an audacious and very funny bit of entertainment. What “American Fiction” does is what art should do: illuminate a universal truth about ourselves.


The “passive” sign is not studded with light-emitting diodes like so many others in Times Square, but will be lighted by 16 300-watt floodlights. It will feature custom-printed opaque vinyl sheeting bearing the red-and-white Ricoh logo. The sign will be green, nevertheless, a message “to customers, other companies and the world that resources and energy can be used creatively,” Mr. Potesky said. “The point is that there are ways of being environmentally friendly to the planet, even on a billboard.”


lane 你的知識經驗技能 你在擅長的領域發表意見


Illuminati (plural of Latin illuminatus, "enlightened") is a name that refers to several groups, both historical and modern, and both real and fictitious. Historically, it refers specifically to the Bavarian Illuminati, an Enlightenment-era secret society founded on May 1st, 1776. In modern times it is also used to refer to a purported conspiratorial organization which acts as a shadowy power behind the throne, allegedly controlling world affairs through present day governments and corporations, usually as a modern incarnation or continuation of the Bavarian Illuminati. In this context, Illuminati is often used in reference to a New World Order (NWO). Many conspiracy theorists believe the Illuminati are the masterminds behind events that will lead to the establishment of such a New World Order. Confusing the issue further is the fact that there are also several modern fraternal groups which include the word "Illuminati" in their names.

il・lu・mi・nate


━━ vt. 照らす; イルミネーションを施す; 明らかにする; 啓蒙する; (写本などを)彩飾する, (最初の文字)を色彩[金銀]で飾る; 光彩を添える.
il・lu・mi・nat・ed ━━ a. イルミネーションを施した; 彩色した.
il・lu・mi・nat・ing ━━ a. (問題などの)解明に役立つ, 啓蒙的[啓発的]な; 明るくする, 照らす.
il・lu・mi・nat・ing・ly ad.
il・lu・mi・na・tion ━━ n. 照明; 光量; (pl.) イルミネーション, 電飾; 光源; 【光】=illuminance; 解明, 啓蒙; (普通pl.) (写本の)彩飾.
il・lu・mi・na・tive
 ━━ a.
il・lu・mi・na・tor ━━ n.




floodlight
n.
  1. Artificial light in an intensely bright and broad beam.
  2. A unit that produces a beam of intense light; a flood.
tr.v., -light·ed or -lit (-lĭt'), -light·ing, -lights.

To illuminate with a floodlight.

n. - 泛光照明, 泛光燈, 強力照明
v. tr. - 用泛光燈照亮

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - フラッドライト, 投光照明灯, 投光照明器
v. - 投光照明灯で照らす

floodlight





stole sb thunder, Stealer, purloin, pilfered, steal a march, stealing the election

China is the linchpin of the multitrillion-dollar consumer-electronics industry. But under a weighty combination of commercial and political pressure, foreign companies are beginning to pluck to look beyond China for growth https://econ.trib.al/cOLFYKB
Illustration: Vincent Kilbride
China: For years, the Thousand Talents recruitment plan attracted U.S. scientists with grants. Federal prosecutors now say China used the program to purloin sensitive technology.



Alexander Calder
The Stainless Stealer, 1996
Stainless steel and aluminum
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC



Wilkie Collins gives the reader all the necessary pieces to the puzzle, but they are so cleverly disguised that his surprise ending takes the breath away. The elements that make up The Moonstone—a purloined jewel that carries a mysterious curse, an indefatigable British police sergeant, a drama of theft and murder in a spacious country house—have been repeated, in varying guises, throughout much of the avalanche of detective fiction that followed Collins's immensely popular 1868 novel.



purloined cup

Daily chart: Retail theft

Shoplifters of the world

Nov 11th 2009
Laptops Steal Netbooks' Thunder
Pricier, more powerful notebook computers are sucking some of the steam from netbooks, the low-priced darlings that helped fuel sales for the PC industry in the past two years.

From Economist.com

Where theft hits the retail trade hardest


INDIA'S retailers suffer the highest levels of theft, according to the “Global Retail Theft Barometer” survey of 41 countries. Losses from a combination of shoplifting, worker and supplier theft, and accounting errors amounted to 3% of all retail sales. This “shrinkage” cost global retailers almost $115 billion in 2009, up by 5.9% from the previous year. Much of this increase was caused by a rise in shoplifting, particularly in America and Europe. Branded clothes and fashion accessories were the most prized items globally, with items for the car and home-improvement goods a close second. In Europe the most pilfered grocery item is luxury cooked meat.
Alamy



Protests Flare in Tehran as Opposition Disputes Vote

By ROBERT F. WORTH and NAZILA FATHI
The streets of Iran’s capital erupted in the most intense protests in a decade as riot police officers clashed with demonstrators who accused Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of stealing the election.



Once the software was available, Foras started pushing carriers and handset makers to install it on their phones. Last year, Samsung Corp., trying to steal a march on market leader Nokia Corp., added an Irish-language handset to its line. "They're fabulous tools for us," says Mr. Mac Craith. "It facilitates the Irish language as a communications tool for every day -- not just in the classroom."

Home wrecker, husband stealer!

這是許多年來第一次進入BBC的學習英文網 聽一則短劇

Home wrecker, husband stealer!
真妙語

Definition

wrecker Show phonetics
noun [C]

說笑

wrecker

(rĕk'ərpronunciation
n.
  1. One that wrecks or destroys: a wrecker of dreams.
    1. One who is in the business of demolishing old buildings.
    2. One who dismantles cars for salvage.
    1. A person, vehicle, or piece of equipment employed in recovering or removing wrecks, especially a truck with a hoist and towing apparatus used in towing disabled or wrecked vehicles.
    2. One that salvages wrecked cargo or parts.
    1. One who lures a vessel to destruction, as by a display of lights on a rocky coastline, in order to plunder it.
    2. A plunderer.

WordNet: stealer
Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.The noun has one meaning:
Meaning #1: a criminal who takes property belonging to someone else with the intention of keeping it or selling it
Synonym: thief

http://www.bbc.co.uk/china/learningenglish/flatmates/index.shtml

Episode 135: A mobile mystery
Alice:So how was it?
Khalid:I can't quite believe I'm saying this but it actually wasn't that bad!
Alice:Really? That dentist must have been something special. Oh, sorry Khalid, excuse me. Oh it's Paul. Hello darling. Haven't heard from you in ages. What have you been up to?
Woman:Who am I speaking to?
Alice:I beg your pardon? Who am I? Who are you, more like it?
Woman:No, I asked you first.
Alice:No, you phoned me. So you must know who I am but I don't know who you are. You're calling from Dr Paul Laver's phone. Have you stolen it?
Woman:If there's any stealing going on, it's you who's doing it.
Alice:What are you talking about?
Woman:Home wrecker, husband stealer!
Alice:Mrs L



steal a march
Gain an advantage over unexpectedly or secretly, as in Macy's stole a march on their rival department store with their Thanksgiving Day parade.
This metaphoric expression comes from medieval warfare, where a march was the distance an army could travel in a day. By quietly marching at night, a force could surprise and overtake the enemy at daybreak. Its figurative use dates from the second half of the 1700s.
Use or appropriate another's idea, especially to one's advantage, as in It was Harold's idea but they stole his thunder and turned it into a massive advertising campaign without giving him credit. This idiom comes from an actual incident in which playwright and critic John Dennis (1657-1734) devised a "thunder machine" (by rattling a sheet of tin backstage) for his play, Appius and Virginia (1709), and a few days later discovered the same device being used in a performance of Macbeth, whereupon he declared, "They steal my thunder."

steam
n.
    1. The vapor phase of water.
    2. A mist of cooling water vapor.
    1. Pressurized water vapor used for heating, cooking, or to provide mechanical power.
    2. The power produced by a machine using pressurized water vapor.
    3. Steam heating.
  1. Power; energy.

v., steamed, steam·ing, steams. v.intr.
  1. To produce or emit steam.
  2. To become or rise up as steam.
  3. To become misted or covered with steam.
  4. To move by means of steam power.
  5. Informal. To become very angry; fume.
v.tr.
To expose to steam, as in cooking.

[Middle English steme, from Old English stēam.]


STEAL
v., stole (stōl), sto·len (stō'lən), steal·ing, steals. v.tr.
  1. To take (the property of another) without right or permission.
  2. To present or use (someone else's words or ideas) as one's own.
  3. To get or take secretly or artfully: steal a look at a diary; steal the puck from an opponent.
  4. To give or enjoy (a kiss) that is unexpected or unnoticed.
  5. To draw attention unexpectedly in (an entertainment), especially by being the outstanding performer: The magician's assistant stole the show with her comic antics.
  6. Baseball. To advance safely to (another base) during the delivery of a pitch, without the aid of a base hit, walk, passed ball, or wild pitch.
v.intr.
  1. To commit theft.
  2. To move, happen, or elapse stealthily or unobtrusively.
  3. Baseball. To steal a base.
n.
  1. The act of stealing.
  2. Slang. A bargain.
  3. Baseball. A stolen base.
  4. Basketball. An act of gaining possession of the ball from an opponent.
idiom:
steal (someone's) thunder
  1. To use, appropriate, or preempt the use of another's idea, especially to one's own advantage and without consent by the originator.
[Middle English stelen, from Old English stelan.]
stealer steal'er n.
SYNONYMS steal, purloin, filch, snitch, pilfer, cop, hook, swipe, lift, pinch. These verbs mean to take another's property wrongfully, often surreptitiously. Steal is the most general: stole a car; steals research from colleagues. To purloin is to make off with something, often in a breach of trust: purloined the key to his cousin's safe-deposit box. Filch and snitch often suggest that what is stolen is of little value, while pilfer sometimes connotes theft of or in small quantities: filched towels from the hotel; snitch a cookie; pilfered fruit from the farmer. Cop, hook, and swipe frequently connote quick, furtive snatching or seizing: copped a necklace from the counter; planning to hook a fur coat; swiped a magazine from the rack. To lift is to take something surreptitiously and keep it for oneself: a pickpocket who lifts wallets on the subway. Pinch suggests stealing something by or as if by picking it up between the thumb and the fingers: pinched a dollar from his mother's purse.



pil·fer (pĭl'fər) pronunciation
v., -fered, -fer·ing, -fers.
v.tr.
To steal (a small amount or item). See synonyms at steal.

v.intr.
To steal or filch.

[From Middle English pilfre, spoils, from Old French pelfre.]
pilferage pil'fer·age (-ĭj) n.
pilferer pil'fer·er n.(pər-loin', pûr'loin') pronunciation


purloin

v., -loined, -loin·ing, -loins. v.tr.
To steal, often in a violation of trust. See synonyms at steal.

v.intr.
To commit theft.

[Middle English purloinen, to remove, from Anglo-Norman purloigner : pur-, away (from Latin prō-; see pro-1) + loign, far (from Latin longē , from longus, long).]
purloiner pur·loin'er n.