VOA慢速英语:'Hair' – More Than a Rock Musical

Now, the VOA Special English program, WORDS AND THEIR STORIES.

A listener named Rita wants to learn about expressions with the word "hair." So we will tell a story.

Yesterday when I woke up, I looked in a mirror.  I looked very neat and organized.  Not a hair was out of place.  But today when I woke up, I knew I was going to have a bad hair day.  My hair was standing up in all the wrong places.  I thought I would be unhappy all day and things would not go well. I work at home so I just hoped that my computer would work right and not have a bad hair day also.      

I was very tired because I did not sleep well last night. I made the mistake of watching a horror movie on television.  The movie really made my hair stand on end.  It was about a house possessed by evil spirits. The thought of having to live alone in a house like that was so frightening it was enough to curl your hair. I will say it another way: watching that movie was a hair-raising experience.

I prepared a meal for my children but they were behaving badly. I turned on the television so they would be quiet. I did not want them to be difficult or to get in my hair while I was working on the computer.

My children were making so much noise that I could not work.  I was getting angry.  In fact, I was ready to pull my hair out.  I told them to please be quiet or I would punish them. But they knew I would not harm a hair on their heads.

I decided to make myself some strong coffee so I could work better. But my drink was so strong that it could put hair on your chest. 

Finally, I got back to work. I was writing a proposal for a project. I knew that I was very close to finishing the proposal.  Success was very close – within a hair's breadth. My supervisor called me to discuss the project.  She wanted to argue about very small differences and unimportant details.  But I told her not to split hairs.

Later, I got a telephone call from a friend whom I had not seen in a long time. In fact, I had not seen hide nor hair of him in months.  So I was glad to know that he was all right.

I worked all day and finished my project. So I decided to celebrate, have some fun and let my hair down.  I played some old recordings, and my children and I danced around the room. The recordings are from my favorite musical, a show called "Hair." It takes place during the nineteen sixties when many young people wore their hair very long.

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This VOA Special English program was written by Shelley Gollust.  I'm Faith Lapidus. You can find other WORDS AND THEIR STORIES at our Web site, hxen.net.