tick
verbVerb Forms
Idioms Phrasal Verbspresent simple I / you / we / they tick | |
he / she / it ticks | |
past simple ticked | |
past participle ticked | |
-ing form ticking |
- [intransitive]
(of a clock, etc. )钟表等 to make short, light, regular repeated sounds to mark time passing 发出滴答声;滴答地走时 In the silence we could hear the clock ticking. 寂静中,我们能听到钟表滴答作响。 a ticking bomb 滴答作响的定时炸弹 - tick away
While we waited the taxi's meter kept ticking away. 我们等候时,出租汽车的计程器一直在滴答滴答地走着。
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadverb- loudly
- relentlessly
- away
- …
- [transitive] (British English) (North American English check)tick something
to put a mark (✓) next to an item on a list, an answer, etc. 标记号;打上钩;打对号 Please tick the appropriate box. 请在适合的方框内打钩。 Tick ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to each question. 在每个问题的 “是” 或 “否” 旁打钩。 I've ticked the names of the people who have paid. 我在已付款者的姓名旁画了钩。
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadverb- simply
- mentally
- off
- …
Word Originverb Middle English (as a verb in the sense ‘pat, touch’): probably of Germanic origin and related to Dutch tik (noun), tikken (verb) ‘pat, touch’. The noun was recorded in late Middle English as ‘a light tap’; current senses date from the late 17th cent.
Idioms
the clock is ticking (down)
used to say that there's not much time left before something happens 滴答: 过去常说没有什么时间The clock is ticking down to midnight on New Year’s Eve. 新年前夕,时钟滴答滴答地指向午夜。 The clock is ticking for one mystery lottery winner who has less than 24 hours to claim a £64 million prize. 对于一名神秘彩票中奖者来说,时间不到24小时就能获得6400万英镑的奖金。
tick all the/somebody’s boxes
what makes somebody tick