Shayna Oliveira是EspressoEnglish.net的创始人。这个网站能帮助你提高你的英语(精品课)水平，别担心你没有太多时间学习，网站上的课程十分简短而实用！学生们大爱Shayna优美的嗓音和她从实际出发的教学风格。她本人来自美国，现居巴西的萨尔瓦多。

#1 – “You can count on me!” /“你可以指望我！”

This means “You can depend on me” – I can be trusted to be responsible and get the work done, or do what I say I will do.

这句话的意思是“你可以依靠我”——我是一个值得信赖且负责任的人，会很好地完成任务，做好我承诺过的事情。

Note that in English we say count on and depend on – don’t use the prepositions in, of, or with in these expressions.

需要注意的是，在英语里我们说“count on”和“depend on”——这个搭配不能用其他的介词，比如in、of或者with。

#2 – “The deal fell through.” / “交易没法继续了。”

     To fall through means that a plan will not go forward. Something happened to make it fail, or make it impossible to proceed. We often talk about plans, partnerships, or deals falling through.

     Fall through的意思是某项计划不会再有进展。因为某些原因导致计划失败，或者无法继续推进。常用的搭配有plans（计划）、partnership（合作关系）或者deals（交易）+falling through（失败）。

#3 – “Can you fill me in on what happened?” / “你能详细告诉我发生了什么吗？”

To fill someone in on something means to tell that person the details about that topic.

Fill someone in on something的意思是告诉某人某件事情的细节。

      This phrasal verb is different from fill in for someone, which means to substitute that person; take their place temporarily. For example, if your colleague is sick, you might fill in for her at a meeting.

     这个动词短语和fill in for someone的意思不同，后者的意思是替换掉某人；暂时取代他的位置。例如：如果你的同事病了，你可能会代替她（fill in for her）参加会议。

#4 – “I’ll talk to the director and sound her out.” / “我会和主管谈谈，看看她怎么说。”

      To sound someone out means to find out the person’s opinion about something, or reaction to it. Sound out often implies that you try to discover their opinion carefully, perhaps by bringing up the topic in an indirect way and seeing what they say instead of asking directly.

     Sound someone out的意思是弄清某人关于某事的意见或者对于某事的反应。Sound out通常包含的意思是：你谨慎地通过试探来搞清他们的观点，也许是间接地提起某个话题，然后看看他们会说什么，而不是开门见山地直接询问。

#5 – “Please hold off on starting the project until it’s approved.” / “请等待批准后再开始项目。”

     To hold off on doing something means to delay, to wait. This phrasal verb is often used with “until” later in the sentence, to show that you need to wait to do the activity until something else happens.

     Hold off on doing something的意思是“拖延，等待”。这个动词短语后面常常会和until搭配使用，意指你得等到另一件事发生，才能去做某件事。

     #6 – “I’m not sure where that file is, but I’ll try and track it down for you.” / “我不太清楚那个文件在哪，不过我可以试着帮你找到。”

      To track something down means to search for it and find out where that thing is. We can also use it for people – track someone down – when you look for the person to discover where he/she is.

      Track something down的意思是寻找某个东西并找到它在哪。这个短语也可以对人使用，当你想找到某人在哪时就可以说“track someone down”。

      #7 – “We’re going to team up with a non-profit organization.” / “我们将要和一家NGO合作。”

      To team up means to join together, work together.

 Team up的意思是一同工作，协力合作。

#8 – “The meeting was called off.” / “会议被取消了。”

This simply means the meeting was canceled.

 Call off的意思很简单，就是取消。

 #9 – “Let’s not rule out that option.” / “我们别排除那个选项了。”

        To rule something out means to eliminate something from consideration. So this phrase is saying that we shouldn’t stop considering that option; we should keep that option inside the range of possibilities.

Rule something out的意思是不再考虑某件事。因此这个短语是在说我们不应该停止考虑那个选项，我们应该把它保留在可能性范围内。

#10 – “Tim is heading up the new initiative.” / “Tim是新项目的负责人。”

This is an informal way to say that Tim is the leader, the person in charge, of the new initiative (project).

 这句话是一种非正式表达，意思是说：Tim是一个新项目的领导，即管事的人。

        Don’t get head up confused with heads up. To “give someone a heads up” means to give them an alert or warning in advance of a possible problem.

        别把head up和heads up搞混了。“give someone a heads up”的意思是提前给某人一些提醒和警告，以避免可能发生的问题。