20090622 -- The Picnic (1)

The Picnic

Come on, everybody! We're going on a picnic!

"Anthony, I have a surprise," cried Auntie.
It's a beautiful day and we’re going on a picnic."
"Oh, boy,” danced the little ant. "I love picnics."
"All ants love picnics," cried Auntie.
"Are you ready? We'll pick up your cousin Tyrant on the way."
Anthony stopped in his tracks. "But Auntie," he sighed,
"Tyrant isn't nice. He picks on everyone. And besides,
he complains all the time too. He picks apart everything.
Does he have to come along?"
"Yes, of course," smiled Auntie.
"After all, he is your cousin. But don't worry,
we'll have a wonderful time," Auntie promised.
"Now, hurry! Pick up your feet and come along ... let's march!"

So they pick up cousin Tyrant and join a line of other ants.
They marched a long way.
Marching, marching, marching.
And as usual, Tyrant picked on Anthony the whole way.
He stepped on his toes.
He called him names.
He tried to pick fights.
And as usual, he complained too.
"Are we there yet?" he whined. "I'm tired. I'm hungry.
And I have to go to the ..."
Just then, the commander ant picked up the scent of a picnic basket.
The long lines of ants picked up speed -- marching, marching, marching.
They finally arrived at the picnic.
"Well, it's about time," griped Tyrant.
"Mmmm, mmmm." smiled Auntie,
"Just look at all this food. Why there are sandwiches, potato chips,
fried chicken, cakes, watermelon, pies and more!" "Yahoo!" cheered Anthony.
"Can we pick and choose whatever we like, Auntie?"


call names
call someone names 謾罵某人
names 罵人用的難聽話
eg: Calling people names is unkind and impolite.
eg: Bullies at school call him names and beat him up a lot.

whine v. 發牢騷
whining
whine about
eg: That little baby whines if he doesn't get what he wants.
eg: Sandra's mother told her to stop whining.
eg: Adam whined about how terrible his boss was.

gripe v. 發牢騷
eg: Max griped about having to go to work on the weekend.
eg: Patrick is griping about his little brother again.

gripe n. 不滿/牢騷
eg: My main gripe is that the heater(暖氣) doesn't work in the hotel room.

pick up

stop in one's tracks
-> frozen / not wanting to move

Tyrant
-> usually means that leader/goverment leader who leads with force is not interested in hearing what the people want

//== Chat room ==//

He stepped on his toes. 踩到腳趾頭(雙關:冒犯踩到別人痛處)(侵犯到他人的工作)

keep someone on their toes (使某人墊腳站在腳尖上，動物做這種動作時，為警覺的狀態)使某人專注於他的工作