knick-knack, The Knickknack Peddler. shambolic, toff, kick in, in accord, turn-off, chardonnay-glugging, knicker

拍品 30

CHEN YUANDU (1902-1967)

The Knickknack Peddler

CHEN YUANDU (1902-1967)

The Knickknack Peddler
Ink and colour on silk, hanging scroll
Titled, inscribed and signed Chen Xu, with two seals of the artist
85.2 x 50.8cm (33½ x 20in)

注腳

• 陳緣督　貨郎圖　設色絹本　立軸
  
  款識：
  貨郎圖。背擬郎世寧畫法，梅湖居士陳煦。
  

The fantastic Pitt Rivers Museum, the collection of anthropologist Augustus Pitt Rivers, is a one-of-a-kind treasure in Oxford.
The Museum is full of anthropological curiosities, such as the witch in a bottle, reindeer knickers and swedish peasant shoes.



The French lingerie market is the biggest in Europe, according to beancounters at the Institut Français de la Mode, a fashion school, and France is also the biggest European exporter of bras, knickers and the like. French women spend more per head on their scanties than others, just beating the Germans and outdistancing the cheap and cheerful British by a country mile http://econ.st/J3L7IV



In 1996 a new sort of singleton emerged from the page. The chardonnay-glugging, big-knickers-wearing, 30-something heroine of "Bridget Jones' Diary" was a late-20th-century everywoman, neurotic, shambolic and unlucky in love. Nearly two decades on, Bridget is back. The challenge for "Mad about The Boy" is more complex http://econ.st/16uipJK


Congress Ends 5-Year Standoff on Trade Deals in Rare Accord
By BINYAMIN APPELBAUM and JENNIFER STEINHAUER

Approval of long-awaited free trade agreements with three countries offered a rare moment of bipartisan agreement in Washington.



But not just any book! “NurtureShock,” with its Toffleresque title, promises to revolutionize parenthood with “New Thinking About Children.” According to Bronson and his co-writer, Ashley Merryman, who runs a church-based tutoring program for urban youth, “nurture shock” is the panic common to new parents that “the mythical fountain of knowledge is not magically kicking in.”

 《中英對照讀新聞》"Toffs" in red trousers a turn-off for nearly half of Britons 近半數英國人討厭穿紅褲子的「紈褲子弟」

◎俞智敏
Britain’s class-conscious public have voiced their dislike of men in red trousers, associating them with elitism and garish buffoonery, according to a recent survey.
根據最近的一項調查顯示，對階級向來敏感的英國民眾表示厭惡男性穿著紅褲子，並把紅褲子與菁英主義和浮誇的滑稽行為聯想在一起。
Just under half the respondents （46 percent） to a survey released by market research firm YouGov said they don’t like men in red trousers.
在市場調查公司YouGov公布的調查結果中，有近半數（46%）的受訪者表示不喜歡穿紅褲子的男性。
"Gentlemen be warned. Wearing red trousers will not win you many admirers," YouGov said in an article about the sartorial study on their website.
「紳士們小心了。穿紅褲子可不會替你贏來許多愛慕者」，YouGov在其網站上一篇有關男性服裝研究的文章裡寫道。
Words such as "idiot", "odd" and "clown" sprang to the minds of respondents when confronted with the sight of a man sporting red trousers, YouGov said.
看到穿著紅褲的男子時，受訪者的腦袋裡會浮現「白痴」、「古怪」和「小丑」等字眼，YouGov表示。
British Esquire magazine’s Senior Fashion Editor Gareth Scourfield said that although continental men in France and Italy have been getting away with colourful clothes for years, Britons tended to be more reserved. "I think the problem is it has a connotation as a rich man’s casual wear," he said.
英國版「君子」雜誌資深時尚主編史考爾菲德說，雖然多年來法國和義大利等歐陸國家男性穿著色彩鮮艷的服裝都未曾遭受責難，英國人的態度則偏向保守。「我想問題在於它會讓人聯想到有錢人的休閒服」，他說。

Class-ridden connotations for RTs, as they are known to aficionados, are hard to shake off in a country where privileged people are often mocked as "toffs."（Reuters）
被死忠愛好者稱為RT的紅褲子，在這個權貴人士常被譏諷為「有錢公子哥」的國家，恐怕很難擺脫其隱含的階級意涵。（路透）


kick in
1. Contribute one's share, as in We'll kick in half if you take care of the rest. [Colloquial; c. 1900]
2. Also, kick off. Die, as in No one knows when he'll kick in, or He finally kicked off yesterday. [Slang; first half of 1900s] Also see kick the bucket.
3. Begin to operate, as in Finally the motor kicked in and we could get started. This usage was first recorded in 1908.

toff

Syllabification: (toff)

Pronunciation: /täf/

British informal derogatory

Translate toff | into Italian

noun

• a rich or upper-class person.

Origin:

mid 19th century: perhaps an alteration of tuft, used to denote a gold tassel worn on the cap by titled undergraduates at Oxford and Cambridge

 toff：名詞，英國非正式用語，常帶有貶意，指上層階級的有錢人，如Gone are the days when champagne-drinking was just for toffs.（只有上層階級才喝得起香檳的時代已經結束。）

shambolic

Syllabification: (sham·bo·lic)

Pronunciation: /SHamˈbälik/

Translate shambolic | into German

adjective

informal, chiefly British

• chaotic, disorganized, or mismanaged:the department’s shambolic accounting

Origin:

1970s: from shambles, probably on the pattern of symbolic

Chardonnay

Syllabification: (Char·don·nay)

Pronunciation: /ˌSHärdnˈā/

noun

• a variety of white wine grape used for making champagne and other wines.
• a wine made from the Chardonnay grape.

Origin:

French

glug

Syllabification: (glug)

Pronunciation: /gləg/

informal

verb (glugs, glugging, glugged)

[with object]

• drink or pour (liquid) with a hollow gurgling sound:he glugs down half his beer

noun

• a hollow gurgling sound or series of sounds as of liquid being poured from a bottle.
• an amount of liquid poured from a bottle:a couple of good glugs of Dubonnet

Origin:

late 17th century: imitative

knick-knack

noun [ C usually plural ]

 (also nick-nack)

UK 

 /ˈnɪk.næk/ US 

 /ˈnɪk.næk/

 

a small, decorative object, especially in a house:

The shelves were covered with ornaments and useless knick-knacks.

knickers

Syllabification: (knick·ers)

Pronunciation: /ˈnikərz/

Translate knickers | into French | into German | into Italian | into Spanish

noun

• 1 (also knickerbockers) North American loose-fitting trousers gathered at the knee or calf.

• 2 British a woman’s or girl’s underpants.

Phrases

get one's knickers in a twist

British informal become upset or angry.

Derivatives

knickered
adjective

Origin:

late 19th century (sense 1): abbreviation of knickerbockers (see knickerbocker)