Example sentences of "[adv] they [vb past] been [v-ing] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
|---|---|
| 1 | Ruth had no idea how long they had been driving when Sean turned the horses off the road on to a narrow side track . |
| 2 | Perhaps they had been discussing me . |
| 3 | I mean when you 're on picket line it 's very depressing it 's very heart breaking unless you get some comedian or something you know it gets er y you do n't know what to do with yourself and perhaps they 'd been taking pots of this paint I 'm not saying . |
| 4 | So they 'd been playing cat and mouse game and er it has n't paid off you know . |
| 5 | So they 'd been talking about it already . |
| 6 | Bicker was there , looking as tired as if he and not they had been riding and fighting in the past three days . |
| 7 | Well me Auntie Jean and me Mum got passed once , like they 'd been going down and scrubbing it from side at bath and everything . |
| 8 | Now there is nothing to prevent plural continuation here ( e.g. They had been working hard for hours ) , but the incidence of such continuations was less than 5% , and continuations mostly were confined to singular references with individuals being in relatively stereotypical roles with respect to each other . |
| 9 | So far they had been doing nothing more than ‘ just walking the dog , Guv ’ . |
| 10 | Latterly they had been feeding him by dropping his fodder from a loft above the stall , and lowering down pails of water on a string . |
| 11 | Maybe they 'd been meeting in secret for a while . |
| 12 | Then they had been sinking on to the bed and , between kisses and caresses , peeling the clothes hungrily from one another , until at last they lay naked , side by side . |
| 13 | Yes that , I think that 's possibly true , er , I was talking to Cambridge there about oh fifteen , twenty minutes ago and they said it was raining with them , and then they 'd been talking over to somebody over in Coventry and it 's , it 's snowing there |
| 14 | True , there had been a few unhappy minutes when they 'd been having coffee in Karlovy Vary when she and Ven had reared up at each other . |
| 15 | They did n't fire a response in her , but it felt nice , like when they had been holding hands . |
| 16 | Instantly , three athletic-looking youths sprang from a doorway where they 'd been idling just a short distance along the road . |
| 17 | You 'd go to a school where they 'd been doing French or Latin for two or three years and you had n't done any at all . |
| 18 | They were vague shadowy figures , rather like her own mother had been , except that she remembered them slightly better because , when she had been about eight years old , Granny Tremayne had driven her over to Newquay where they had been staying . |
| 19 | The two teams arrived in the northern capital from Beijing where they had been competing in the Asian Games . |
| 20 | Kevin Brown , Patrick Seymour and Lou Collins ran into the listening-post from the cots where they had been lying dozing . |
| 21 | The twins sprang up from where they had been sitting by Chola 's side and ran round the hearth to have a closer look . |
| 22 | They were all three at the table where they had been sitting at a meal , the curry soup before them , a dreadful static group , posed as for a stage set . |
| 23 | But I did discover where they had been coming in — through the stable and into the wall — and where they had resided when I pulled down the ceiling lathes in the dairy and a load of old nests and rat droppings fell on to my head . |
| 24 | A fraction of a second later a wash of flame played over the stones where they had been standing . |
| 25 | And as I continued to think about how we rarely get the measure of little children , I suddenly realized why they 'd been making so much din . |