Larry患了重感冒，李华带着鸡汤去看他。李华今天要学两个常用语，blah和bounce back.
LL: Hi, Li Hua, it is so nice to see you. I just wish I didn’t feel so blah.
LH: Blah? 你得的不是感冒吗？
LL: I do have a cold, Li Hua. But “blah” is a word that describes how you feel when you have a cold or are sick – Blah is the feeling you have when you are really tired and have no energy.
LH: 我知道了，blah是不舒服，生病时浑身乏力的意思。
LL: That’s right, Li Hua. I certainly wish I didn’t feel so blah. I haven’t been able to sleep very well with this runny nose and cough… (Cough, cough)
LH: 你好可怜。我知道睡不好觉的感觉。别说感冒了，就是平时，睡不好觉我都会觉得blah.
LL: Yeah, I’ve got a pretty good case of the blahs. I don’t feel like doing much of anything.
LH: 我给你熬了点儿鸡汤，或许你喝了会感觉好一些。
LL: Thanks, Li Hua. Mmmm…This soup is great, Li Hua. It has a lot of flavor – not like my mom’s soup. Sometimes her soup can be a little blah.
LH: 你妈的汤怎么会是blah? 我以为blah不是指浑身乏力吗？
LL: You can also use blah to talk about a thing. When referring to a thing, blah means something that isn’t very good or interesting.
LH: 你是说你妈熬的汤没味啊。你没当着她的面说过吧？
LL: Actually, I have. My mom’s blah cooking is a joke in my family. My mom really doesn’t like spicy food, so many dishes she cooks are very blah.
LH: 还好你没觉得我的汤也是blah. 你现在感觉怎么样？
LL: I’m feeling a little less blah, thanks to you, Li Hua. So, how has your day been, anyway?
LH: 没什么新鲜的。外面又湿又冷，我一直在家里批论文。I’ve been having a blah day.
LL: Say, have you had some of the soup you brought, Li Hua? It is just the thing to cheer you up when you are having a blah day!
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LL: Now that I’ve had a nice bowl of hot soup, Li Hua, all I need to bounce back is a good night’s sleep.
LH: 你要bounce back弹回来，那一定得有张蹦蹦床罗。
LL: Ha, ha. That’s funny, Li Hua. While you can bounce on a trampoline, to “bounce back” means to recover from something. In this case, I am looking forward to bouncing back from this cold.
LH: 原来你说的bounce back是复原的意思。只要你多吃多睡，用不了多少时间，就会象原来一样生龙活虎。
LL: I am expecting to bounce back in a day or two. Then I will head back to work.
LH: 幸好你只是感冒。你知道我的一个学生得了肺炎。
LL: Wow! One of your students has pneumonia? That is a pretty serious illness. It will take several weeks before he will be able to bounce back.
LH: 还有，我另外一个学生上星期刚刚割了阑尾。I don’t expect he’ll be bouncing back very quickly either.
LL: You are right. It takes more time to bounce back from surgery or an injury than it does from a little cold.
LH: 真希望生病不会影响到他们的成绩。
LL: If they are good students and work hard, I am sure they will bounce right back from a few bad grades.
LH: 有时候，遇到让人失望的事情也很难重新振作起来。
LL: That’s true. It took my Uncle Bob a long time to bounce back from his divorce.
LH: 那你叔叔Bob离婚后是怎么重新振作起来的呢？
LL: Well, he stayed very positive through the whole experience, and instead of thinking about the divorce, he put his energy into spending time with his children and doing things he enjoyed. That really helped him bounce back.
LH: 保持积极的态度、多跟家人在一起，做喜欢做的事情。Larry, 这些真是好建议。
今天李华学到了两个常用语。一个是blah, 指全身乏力或是没滋没味。另一个是bounce back, 指恢复过来。