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I’m Susan Clark with the Special English program WORDS AND THEIR STORIES. 我是 Susan Clark，这里是美国之音慢速英语词汇掌故节目。 A woman from Japan was telling a friend about her trip to the United States. The woman had visited major businesses and investment companies in New York City and Chicago. 一位日本妇女在向朋友讲述她的美国之行。她参观了纽约和芝加哥重要的商业和投资公司。 “I studied English before I left home,” she said. “But I still was not sure that people were speaking English.” “虽然我去之前学过英语，”她说，“但是我还是不确定他们说的真的是英语。” Her problem is easy to understand. Americans in business are like people who are in business anywhere. They have a language of their own. Some of the words and expressions deal with the special areas of their work. Other expressions are borrowed from different kinds of work such as the theater and movie industry. 她的问题很容易理解。美国的商人和其他地方的商人一样，他们有自己的语言。一些词语和表达方式和他们特殊的工作领域有关。而其他的一些表达方式则是从不同的行业借鉴而来，如戏剧和电影行业。 One such saying is get your act together. 其中有一个说法是 get your act together。 When things go wrong in a business, an employer may get angry. He may shout, “Stop making mistakes. Get your act together.” 当生意出了问题，雇主可能会很愤怒。他会大吼：“机灵点儿（Get your act together），别犯错。” Or, if the employer is calmer, he may say, “Let us get our act together.” 或者，如果雇主脾气好点儿，他会说：“我们要集中精神做事（Let us get our act together）。” Either way, the meaning is the same. Getting your act together is getting organized. In business, it usually means to develop a calm and orderly plan of action. 不管怎么说，意思都是一样的。Getting your act together 就是要好好筹划。在商业运营中，它就意味着行动要稳健有序。 It is difficult to tell exactly where the saying began. But, it is probable that it was in the theater or movie industry. Perhaps one of the actors was nervous and made a lot of mistakes. The director may have said, “Calm down, now. Get your act together.” 我们很难追溯这种表达的起源。但它很有可能是起源于戏剧或电影行业。也许当时有一个演员很紧张，总是犯错误，导演就安慰说：“别紧张，仔细想想你的角色该怎么演。” Word expert James Rogers says the expression was common by the late nineteen seventies. Mister Rogers says the Manchester Guardian newspaper used it in nineteen seventy-eigh