Responding to people’s news – how annoying!
Short, fixed expressions
Continuing our series on responding to people’s news, how should you respond when someone tells you about something annoying that happened to them. In this entry, we take another look at short responses that aim to empathise with the speaker’s feelings.
Our students often talk about the “catch-ball” difficulty of handling English conversation. Like in a game of tennis, they want to return the serve quickly, smoothly and efficiently. English has plenty of short, fixed expressions to allow you to achieve your goals. You should definitely try to learn these short responses and practise using them with other English speakers. As a result, your English conversation ability will sound very natural and spontaneous, in response to whatever question or comment comes your way.
Let’s look at 4 expressions, all of them expressing annoyance, with useful follow-up comments or questions.
Scenario 1 –
“What a pain!”
This is an informal expression to express that some given situation is annoying.
A: I wanted to do a Zoom meeting, but the client wants to meet in person. That’s a two-hour round trip for a 30-min conversation.
B: Oh what a pain.
Is there no chance of a compromise?
Commentary:
- An exclamatory “Oh!” is often heard at the start of the expression; a lead-in to the main expression
- “Is there no chance of …?” is a useful question to offer suggestions in a difficult situation.
Scenario 2 –
“That’s a hassle”
A: I have no choice but to take 4 buses to get to my destination as the train drivers are on strike.
B: Really?! That’s a hassle.
Just what you need.
Commentary:
- The response has the same meaning as “what a pain”, but is neutral language.
- “Just what you need” – an ironic meaning
Scenario 3 –
“What a nuisance.”
A: The builders are doing repairs next door, so it’s a bit noisy at the moment.
B: Oh what a nuisance.
Do you know how long it will go on for?
Commentary:
- “What a nuisance” – interchangeable with “hassle” and “pain”
Scenario 4 –
“How frustrating.”
A: My computer suddenly crashed and I had to spend 2 hours re-writing my notes.
B: Oh no! That’s so frustrating.
The same thing has happened to me. The problems of technology.
Commentary:
- Of these 4 expressions “how frustrating / that’s frustrating” arguably expresses the strongest emotion, so we tend to reserve use of this one to situations that are particularly annoying where our goals are considerably thwarted.
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