1BUSY/NOT AVAILABLEto be busy doing something 正忙于(做)某事
Can I call you back – I’m in the middle of a meeting.
我过一会儿给你回电话好吗——我正在开会。
I was in the middle of sorting some papers when the phone rang.
我正在整理一些文件,电话铃响了。
Examples from the Corpus
be in the middle of (doing) something• He's in the middle of a meeting.• I'm in the middle of fixingdinner -- can I call you back?• Todd Dexter was in the middle of the Tet Offensivenear Saigon and had little time to appreciate his surroundings.• The gruntswere in the middle of a fire mission.• The kid who still enrolled at the school where he was in the middle of all that trouble.• I listened to others' crises but didn't want to accept that I was in the middle of my own.• It was in the middle of the miners' strike, and feelings were running high.• Mr Malik was in the middle of a group crowded round Mafouz.• We were in the middle of that when he was called inside to do his homework and I was sent home.• The Z42 is in the middle of the field on printspeed.
→ be in the middle of (doing) somethingat middle1(4)
2if you are in the middle of something, it is happening to you or around you 在进行某事的;处于某事过程中的
At that time Britain was in the middle of a recession.
那时英国正处于经济衰退时期。
The company is in the middle of a takeover battle.
公司正在打一场收购战。
Examples from the Corpus
in the middle of something• The little man was ambling along in the middle of the street, looking around him with an expression of keeninterest.• She was standing in blackness in the middle of a narrow, ice-coldstream.• Why didn't he kiss her quite calmly in the middle of the street?• The group also is in the middle of a $ 45,000 project to renovate a pagoda in the ancientquarter.• Rostov started to feel sickin the middle of the night.• Sometimein the middle of the night I woke with a start, as Clarisa climbed on to the cot.• The grunts were in the middle of a firemission.• One young woman in the middle of the line began to cry.