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Words about Pencils
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E: Hi, welcome to "Let's talk". In the next few programs we are going to be talking to you about office equipment and tools. But we've thought we would first start with our wonderful, most important tool which is the "pencil".
R: Yeah. It's used at home and in the office and in the school. I bet you are taking notes with them right now. Pencils have an old history and it's very interesting we've learned a lot about pencils.
E: Yeah. It dates back a long way and it originally comes from Latin "penicillus", and it's sounds like "penicillin" , which is an antibiotic but it's not. It means little tail, and originally of course the writing improvement was brushes like in China, but in Latin the word for a small brush with a very fine point is little tail "penicillus" and also I guess you can say that the point of a pencil is like a little tail.
R: It's interesting to think the maybe they were like the "毛笔".
E: There is another Chinese connection here with pencils, and that is in the US, pencils are usually painted this color yellow.
R: That's true. But why do you think the American pencils are yellow?
E: Well, American pencils have been painted yellow since the 1890's. It's been a long history. And they're painted yellow actually connected with China. They are painted yellow because the American found out the yellow was a sign of respect.
R: The royal color.
E: Yeah, the emperor.
R: Now of course originally people were writing with lead and lead is poison and is very messy. So they've changed from lead to graphite because it is used for anywhere anytime under water and upside-down. It's sort of our most basic tool.
E: Pencils are really nice because you can erase them.
R: In America there is also a difference, have this little erasers. In British English that's called the "rubber" and in American English we called it "an eraser". And there is also a verb "to erase", to take away. And they like to have them on the end of the pencils either with metal or you add one but that's not true in Europe usually and in China you use your own eraser, it doesn't attach to the pencil.
E: Yeah. This is the European one, see no eraser, Chinese one no eraser. But ever since I was a child we've always had this pencils that have eraser or the rubber on the top.
R: We have some idioms actually with pencils. One comes from a habit "chewing on your pencil", and that's a bad habit we all have, it's not good for our teeth.
E: That means if your chew on your pencil, means you are nervous. So you might say "Oh, look he's chewing on his pencils he must be very nervous."
R: And another good one we thought of is " I'll pencil you in ". " I'll pencil you in " might sounds like you're drawing, but it really means I'll write an appointment with you in my calendar. Because it's pencil, it might change, it's not "inking you in".
E: But we don't say "inking you in".
R: No. "pencil you in" means we have a date but it could change.
E: Right. And so that's a really important one now we don't say "I'm gonna pen you in", an unchangeable date, we never say that its always "I'm going to pencil you in "or "I'll write you in". "Write you in " sounds a little more permanent than "pencil you in".
R: That's funny. There is also vocabulary. There are different kinds of pencils. This is Eyln's beautiful set of colored art pencils and of course that's for art. But we also use this is a pencil case and I'm sure you have pencils in a pencil case.
E: To take to school. This one is called "a mechanical pencil". "Mechanical" because you can put the lead in and then push it out. You have lots of you have pencils like this mechanical pencil, and then if you need to add more lead you can. Notice that we still say "pencil lead", the word for this stuff that's in your pencil is called "the lead" even though it's not made of lead anymore. The first pencils were made of lead, they found that you could write with lead and that was in the 1200, about 800 years ago. They were writing with lead but lead is dangerous. People often used to lick their pencils, I think it wasn't very dark and to make them darker they'd actually lick their pencils to make the lead darker, the writing darker.
R: Lead is poison so they switched to graphite. So pencils today have graphite in them. And there is easy to sharpen, this is Eyln's pencil sharpener. So sharpener, case, colored pencils, mechanical pencil and actually if you put on to make up everyday, the females in our audience, you maybe using an eyebrow pencil, make up pencil or lip pencil. That's more vocabulary for you.
E: Yeah. So we hope you've enjoyed our discussion of pencils, maybe you've learned a little history too. We'll see you again next time.
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谈谈办公用品
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我们要谈一些有关办公用品的话题
我们想先以最重要的工具“铅笔”开始
人们在家里 在办公室 在学校都要用它
我想你也正在用它记笔记呢
铅笔有很长的历史了
有关它的许多事情都很有趣
没错 它的历史可追溯很远
最初来自于拉丁文的"penicillus"
听起来像"penicillin"（青霉素）
那是一种抗生素
"penicillus"的意思是小尾巴
人们最初的书写工具是毛刷状的
这有点像中国
在拉丁文中 把有精致细尖的毛笔
称作"penicillus"小尾巴
你可以看到铅笔的尖端像个小尾巴
有趣的是它们就像毛笔似的
铅笔与中国还有其他联系
在美国 铅笔通常被染成黄色
对 你觉得这是为什么呢
在美国这是从19世纪90年代就开始的
已经有很长的历史了
实际上它们被染成黄色
就与中国有关
美国人发现（在中国）黄色表示尊敬
是皇家的颜色
最初人们用的铅笔含有lead（铅）
可是铅有毒而且容易把东西弄脏
因此人们用石墨（graphite）代替了铅
石墨可以在任何时间和地点被应用
无论在水中还是在笔尖朝上时
这使铅笔成了一种最基本的工具
铅笔很好用 因为你可以擦掉它
这里有个区别 美国的铅笔带块橡皮
英国人叫它"rubber"（橡皮）
而我们美国人说"eraser"
有个动词"erase"是“去掉”的意思
他们将橡皮装在铅笔的末端
套上个金属套或只套上橡皮头
但在欧洲和中国橡皮和铅笔是分开的
对 这个是欧洲的铅笔 没有橡皮
中国的也没有
在美国 我小时候就用装上橡皮的铅笔了
这里还有些有关铅笔的习惯用语
其中一个来自于一个习惯
"chewing on your pencil" 咬铅笔
这是个坏习惯 对我们的牙齿不好
意思是说 如果你咬铅笔 意味你很紧张
你可以说 他正在咬铅笔 他一定很紧张
另一个是 "I'll pencil you in."
听起来好像是与画画有关
实际是 我要把和你的约会写进日历里
因为是用铅笔写的 所以可以改
并非是 用墨水记录
实际上我们从不说 "inking you in"
"pencil you in"是指可以改的约定
对 很重要的是我们从不用
“用钢笔记录” 来表示 不可改的约定
我们从不那么说 只说 "pencil you in "
或者 "I'll write you in"
"write you in"比"pencil you in"
听起来更持久些
真有意思 这里还有些不同的铅笔
这是Eyln的一套漂亮的彩色铅笔
是用来画画的
这是铅笔盒 pencil case
你肯定把铅笔都放到铅笔盒里
带到学校去
这是"mechanical pencil"自动笔
因为你可以把笔芯装进去再推出来
你可以准备许多这样的笔芯
在需要的时候添上笔芯再用
要注意的是我们说"pencil lead"
笔心的材料称作 "lead"
可它并非用铅做成的
从前的铅笔是铅做成的
人们13世纪的时候发现可用铅写字
那是800多年以前了
他们那时用铅写字可用是很危险的
人们写字时常舔铅笔
我想可能是觉得它写出的字太浅
而让它的颜色深一些
人们就舔舔他们的铅笔
这样颜色就深一些了
铅是有毒的因此现在改成了石墨
现在的铅笔里都是石墨了
削尖它也很容易
这个就是Eyln的削铅笔刀
削铅笔刀pencil sharpener
铅笔盒pencil case
彩色铅笔colored pencil
自动笔mechanical pencil
还有 每天都化妆的女性观众注意了
你也许要用"eyebrow pencil" 眉笔
"make up pencil" 化妆笔
"lip pencil" 唇妆笔
还有很多的词呢
希望你喜欢我们关于铅笔的话题
可能你还学到了一点历史知识
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