下面的文章作者是《文学城.美语世界》网友LILAC09. 感谢他的贡献。  

   俺混坛也有俩个多月了，得到很多同学的帮助和鼓励，俺也该回报回报了，（俺寻思俺也没少回报 :)），总之，以前俺逗笑的多，今天俺严肃的谈点学习正事。

   俺的英语大多是从看美剧和小报来的。

俺不爱看小说学英语，俺看小说是一口气，不过夜，尽追求故事情节，故事完了, 激情没了, 就再也不想回头琢磨。 再说，中国人为学英语读的还少吗？可成效又怎样呢?

俺不爱看什么英语谚语大全之类的参考书，这和背字典一个德行，没有context，难记，记住了，用的时候也想不起来。

    如果一个词语是从context里学来的，你就很容易在相同的context里把它用出来。而且，如果是听出来的，映像就特别深, 因为中式英语缺的就是听的刺激，能听就不要看。这就是我什么爱看情景剧学英语。在美国，说是有语言环境，其实大多数时间都是猫在小格间里，偶尔和同事说话，还是被印式英语忽悠。俺只有看美剧了，里面五花八门，好听又好玩。俺看的时候会把听来的词，句子记下来。等俺回头再看这些东东时，它们不在是单个不相干的词语，而是情景和对话的重现。当俺想用一个这样学来的词时，俺对它有信心。

    有时间，俺会把有意思的剧情写下来，发表点看法。这个比较难一点，因为你听的都是ABCD的对话，转成故事，你要有很多自己的东西在里面，但很练写作, 也提高口语，特别是是生活口语。下面就是俺的一个活例子，有够臭够长

In his company conference meeting, George was pigging out on the cocktail shrimps while other attendees only had a plate of plain salad in front of them. Reilly, one of George’s co-workers couldn’t stand it any more and mocked him, “George, the ocean calls. They are running out the shrimps”. George didn’t know what to say to retort, dumbfounded like a damn fool. Everyone in the meeting started laughing side-splittingly at Reilly's joke.

George was so fumed at the taunt that he couldn’t stop thinking about it when he was driving home. Suddenly, a sharp comeback popped into his head, “ Then the jerk store called. They are running out of you.” When he later on showed this comeback line to the rest of the gang, they were not quite enthused as George. Jerry thought the moment had gone and George should move on. Elaine just didn’t quite get the line since there were actually no “jerk stores”. Kramer suggested an even more racy line –“just tell him, you just had sex with his wife”.

George just couldn’t let it go and he must revenge on Reilly with his own SMART line. When he got to know Reilly transferred to working for Firestone, another company in Ohio, he flied hundreds of miles from New York to Ohio out of his own pocket money just to zing this guy. Upon arrival, he set up the meeting and even brought his own shrimps. That is so funny and sarcastic. George usually was such a cheapskate that he wouldn’t over tip the waitress one dollar more when he once hit big money on the stock investment.

In the meeting, George put up some moronic proposal and at same time stuffed his mouth with a bunch of shrimps. It was so irritating and gross. He was setting up the trap for his prey by recreating the similar encounter. When Reilly finally brought up that shrimp line, check out the look on George’s face. He almost couldn’t contain his self-satisfaction and excitement. He stopped eating with ease, stood up, dabbed his mouth with a napkin and then delivered his long-planned comeback line with an I’m-gonna-nail-you-big-time tone, “While the jerk store called. They are running out of you.” My hat off for Alexander’s (who played George) wonderful acting.

However, Reilly, unruffled at all, retorted quickly, “What’s the difference? You are the all-time best seller.” The whole room was burst into laughers again. It was so unexpected. George was at the end of his rope and blurt out Kramer’s line, “I had just had sex with your wife”. The whole room was quiet down. The manger stood up and whispered to George in a stone-cold tone, “ His wife is in coma”. You can imagine how pissed off George was. This was just reminded of an interesting saying “go for wool and come home shorn”. Did George learn his lesson? No. On his way home from the airport, he kept murmuring to himself something. Suddenly, it looked like he was hit by some new enlightenment. He swung his car madly and headed back to the airport…

He would never get it - this is a mismatched game that he could never win.

When I just came US, I liked watching Friends a lot. I didn’t care much about Seinfeld. What the fuss about it? How come it could be called the NO1 US hit sitcom. It was wacky, insensitive, and hard to understand. The wardrobe was so last century, let alone the hairdo. As my English gets better, I can get more out of Seinfeld. I’m totally hooked up by it. Friends even becomes kind of sappy to me. Especially after season 6, it really goes downhill. Before when I was told Friends was the queen and Seinfeld was the king. I would nod along. Now I have to say that Seinfeld is the groundbreaking No.1 sitcom in US entertainment history, which has had no match before. And it may take many years for a new one to catch it up. The last Seinfeld episode was aired on 1998. Eleven years passed, it still has been actively re-run on NBC. Every time I re-watch an episode, I can still get new stuff out of it and get cracked up. It is an absolutely amazing show.

It is a non-traditional, non-conventional show with no sentimentality or moral lecturing. In regular sitcoms, you see husband and wife bickering, lovers fooling around,  and friends poking fun at each other. The bottom line here is no matter how weird or crazy the plots are, you can always sense the moral foundation and common social believes they are based on. “Family comes first.” “ True friends will be with you ups and downs.” “ One day, you will meet the one and fall in love no matter how cynical you are.” In Seinfeld, you can never find these. Seinfeld is not a show about friendship, relationship, or family. It is show about nothing. It mocks all kinds of trivial things in daily life in an outrageously exaggerating and wacky way with a great sense of black humor. Just like what the show did with the George’s obsession with the comeback. That is the kill of the show. Believe or not, many people feel relate to the characters in the show on the certain level, especially to George, a 40 years old, short, bald man who lives with his parents. What a loser! He is selfish, empty, petty and coward. You dislike him, you look down your nose at him, but he will get you eventually. Everyone has a mini-version George inside his body.

In this episode, I feel I can totally relate to George on the comeback part. When I get into some argument with someone, I sometimes find myself tongue-tied and don’t know anything witty or sharp to throw back until it is over. Then I have my comeback line. But it is just way too late. I have lost the moment. I have to forget about it no matter how unwilling I’m. It is just killing me. I won’t go out of my way like what George did. I know it is foolish and childish. Thank God. I can still control myself. Deep down, I kind of admire George’s persistence and obsession for revenge. That is why I like to banter with people in forum. I can put my retort 20 minutes later. I can even answer back the next day. The expiration date for on line comeback is so lenient. It fits me well. :)