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bland
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  • Dan let the new headmaster maul the fingers of his right hand; Dan looked into the pretty-blonde blandness of Sam's vacant, detached smile.†   (source)
  • Despite all this, his blandness was perfectly tolerable, even soothing.†   (source)
  • Aria smiled blandly—striped cotton boxers, of course—but snapped her attention back to Ezra.†   (source)
  • There is no question of skipping this meal; on the contrary, for ten evenings the three of them are strangely hungry, eager to taste the blandness on their plates.†   (source)
  • Emily glares at me, and I smile blandly back.†   (source)
  • Goldie said something sharp-sounding in Spanish to Marco V, who shrugged blandly and headed back into the package room.†   (source)
  • Those "unnatural" feeds make chickens with mushier and blander meat.†   (source)
  • And he didn't like the way that hose hung so blandly on the wall.†   (source)
  • I thought of Mike Evans, holding out his jacket, and the blandness of his face, plain plain plain.†   (source)
  • Pete Ramirez was a blandly handsome man a few years older than Mae, whose office seemed to have no desk, no chairs, no right angles.†   (source)
  • "I'm not going to do anything," he replied blandly.†   (source)
  • Clary smiled blandly at him.†   (source)
  • When she was done she held it tightly in her lap and looked blandly at her mother.†   (source)
  • "Indeed," Tantalus said blandly.†   (source)
  • He would putter blandly along, then suddenly, unexpectedly, as if to remind himself he was still in charge of something, he would burst out like that, his intentions right, but his manner stubborn and relentless, forcing distances between us.†   (source)
  • This emotional detachment and blandness in certain areas is other evidence of his mental abnormality.†   (source)
  • But it was too late, really, to do more than blandly compound her error: "I mean, from what we're told, most men with a sexual bias toward men love their mothers and hate their fathers."†   (source)
  • The Illustrated Man looked left, found no pleasure in the Skeleton, who simply looked thinner; found no pleasure looking right to a Dwarf who blandly dwelt in squashed idiot madness.†   (source)
  • The next day I was summoned to the head office, where thecommander blandly informed me that the case had been investigated and dismissed.†   (source)
  • On my nights to cook I made the blandest things I could think of: broiled white fish and mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese, to give our taste buds a chance to grow back.†   (source)
  • A fish tank was set into the wall, and a blandly pretty blond receptionist sat behind the desk.†   (source)
  • Nothing important," the chief engineer said blandly, making sure everyone could hear.†   (source)
  • "Bombs away," said Louis blandly.†   (source)
  • It wasn't much more than a meandering dirt lane, one car wide in spots, cutting through the blandness of sagebrush and ducking down to an anemic border river.†   (source)
  • Milkman had to blink twice before their faces returned to the vaguely alarmed blandness he was accustomed to.†   (source)
  • She shrugs blandly and lets me off the hook.†   (source)
  • "Investment is a game of luck," says Luke blandly.†   (source)
  • Seivarden had said to me before we left the room, blandly, still irritated, that of course I wouldn't want to rush out to tea.†   (source)
  • You don't want to overwork yourself, young feller," he said blandly.†   (source)
  • He's been very kind to us," Annie said, as blandly as she could.†   (source)
  • The magus suspected that the very blandness of his voice covered over some ugliness the way a covering of leaves can hide a pit trap.†   (source)
  • Max nodded blandly.†   (source)
  • "I was too busy," said Dr. Ferris blandly.†   (source)
  • Oh, I don't mind roughing it," she said blandly.†   (source)
  • Jalil asked blandly.†   (source)
  • "Looks like the finale," she said blandly.†   (source)
  • "We will now overthrow the Authority," he said blandly.†   (source)
  • Rachel Levy, head of the center's publicity department, thought blandness and a trace of obfuscation would be the best approach, but Hannah overruled her.†   (source)
  • As the experiment progressed, this blandness led to a degree of boredom and a consequent loss of appetite and I was forced to seek variety in my methods of preparation.†   (source)
  • And yet, within hours, one of the state's top officials blandly announced that they were looking for the communists and black outside agitators who had caused it.†   (source)
  • ?" interjected the Overlord blandly.†   (source)
  • For she had undergone her own educating at a time of nerves, blandness and retreat among not only her fellow students but also most of the visible structure around and ahead of them, this having been a national reflex to certain pathologies in high places only death had had the power to cure, and this Berkeley was like no somnolent Siwash out of her own past at all. but more akin to those Far Eastern or Latin American universities you read about, those autonomous culture media where…†   (source)
  • And that is that your refusal to admit responsibility in the death of Bobby Weed is the same as that of those Germans who disavowed the Nazi party even as they watched blandly and unprotestingly as the thugs vandalized the synagogues and perpetrated the Kristallnacht.†   (source)
  • JAMES [BLANDLY]: But her table manners are the best she has.†   (source)
  • (BRADY nods, blandly) That's a pretty neat trick.†   (source)
  • Lee spread his hands and smiled blandly.†   (source)
  • "He came to redeem us," he said and blandly reached for her hand and shook it and said he must go.†   (source)
  • "Well, that little black devil, you better call him Old Nick," Papa said, "There's three alike," Claudie said blandly, as if kittens were all in the world she had on her mind.†   (source)
  • As her bare feet slid along the cold, clean linen and she felt its cold, clean blandness beneath her and above her, she was taken briefly by trembling and by loneliness, and remembered touching her dead mother's cheek.†   (source)
  • Her stomach shuddered, but she kept her voice bland.   (source)
    bland = uninterestingly steady (lacking stimulating characteristics)
  • a bland little drama
  • Ed Regis smiled blandly and pushed a button.†   (source)
  • 'Not that I'm aware of,' said Harry blandly.†   (source)
  • We don't charge the people we represent anything," I said as blandly and politely as I could.†   (source)
  • And bleached skulls stared blandly up at them-cattle, coyotes, deer, rabbits.†   (source)
  • You always told me you weren't really the head of the vampires," Simon said blandly.†   (source)
  • "Nahuseresh has said a woman cannot rule alone," Attolia said blandly.†   (source)
  • "The point is," he continued blandly, "I've dealt with a lot of cops over the years.†   (source)
  • Steve just stood there by the door, grinning blandly, distinctly unwarriorlike.†   (source)
  • Still smiling blandly, Bonnie dropped her chin onto her laced fingers.†   (source)
  • I wasn't myself at the time," Jimmy answered blandly.†   (source)
  • JAMES [BLANDLY]: She only dug Martha's eyes out.†   (source)
  • "Well," Papa said, blandly clicking up the team, "lucky you don't.†   (source)
  • "Veracity?" says Verringer blandly.†   (source)
  • "Five members of the heretical sect of Quakers have been arrested," he says, smiling blandly, "and more arrests are anticipated."†   (source)
  • Dementors are not to be fooled by tricks or disguises — or even Invisibility Cloaks," he added blandly, and Harry and Ron glanced at each other.†   (source)
  • His build was pudgy, his suit blandly corporate and married-with-kids-looking; and his sad-sack demeanor gave me the creeps.†   (source)
  • It was one anodyne sentence that caught her attention now—not for what it said, but for what it blandly tried to conceal.†   (source)
  • "She would like me to attempt a session of Neuro-hypnosis, with Miss Marks," says Dr. DuPont blandly.†   (source)
  • This was the time of hygiene lectures, and of practicing blanket-baths on life-size models—Mrs. Mackintosh, Lady Chase, and baby George whose blandly impaired physique allowed him to double as a baby girl.†   (source)
  • "Well, you know, I could always have Thanksgiving with you guys, if you'd rather," I said blandly, leaning back against the kitchen counter.†   (source)
  • — CHAPTER NINETEEN — The Lion and the Serpent Harry felt as though he were carrying some kind of talisman inside his chest over the following two weeks, a glowing secret that supported him through Umbridge's classes and even made it possible for him to smile blandly as he looked into her horrible bulging eyes.†   (source)
  • "Not feeling well?" said Mr. Vogel blandly—balding midwesterner in rimless glasses, prim in his reefer coat, tough luck to you if he was the banker and you were late with the mortgage.†   (source)
  • What if the heart, for its own unfathomable reasons, leads one willfully and in a cloud of unspeakable radiance away from health, domesticity, civic responsibility and strong social connections and all the blandly-held common virtues and instead straight towards a beautiful flare of ruin, self-immolation, disaster?†   (source)
  • I said blandly.†   (source)
  • The screen blandly recorded strike and then proceeded to rerun a tape of the sequence, showing the dart moving through the air, and hitting Hall's shoulder.†   (source)
  • Lieutenant Awn, who had been exposed to several Tanmind theories about the Orsians, managed a neutral, even almost curious expression and said, blandly, "Oh?"†   (source)
  • The gunslinger looked back blandly.†   (source)
  • We're back for more," he said blandly.†   (source)
  • On the sidewalk, the musicians stood idly together, still fanning themselves with their handkerchiefs, their faces blandly watchful, ignoring the occasional panhandlers, and the policeman who walked up and down with his lips pursed and his eyes blind with unnameable suspicions and fears.†   (source)
  • "Believe so," she says blandly.†   (source)
  • "Certainly," chairman agreed blandly.†   (source)
  • The gunslinger began to eat steadily, almost blandly, chopping the meat apart and forking it into his mouth, trying not to think of what might have been added to cut the beef.†   (source)
  • Prof not only let her get away with it; he encouraged her, letting her talk when other people wanted to—then blandly put her proposal to a vote when hadn't even been seconded.†   (source)
  • In a discipline in which athletes bored newsmen to death with clichés and blandly politic statements, Pollard was a singularly fresh interview, articulate, irreverent, and self-deprecating.†   (source)
  • She looked blandly innocent.†   (source)
  • …the first contact of its kind in my life, the feel of that little Baptist hand on my prodigiously straining shaft, and I capitulated immediately, drenching us both, which to my surprise (given her general squeamishness) she didn't seem to mind, blandly swabbing herself off with my proffered handkerchief But after three nights and nine separate orgasms (three each night, counted methodically) I have become very close to being desensitized, and I realize that there is something nearly…†   (source)
  • Immediately, her mother and sister were there to interpose a blander timetable.†   (source)
  • That would account for their blandness, the absence of bitten fingers, their level blue-eyed gaze.†   (source)
  • He look even blander under bright light.†   (source)
  • He looked at her with deadly blandness.†   (source)
  • Those self-important women gained local immortality for the blandest, the most timid of eccentricities—walking a cat on a dog's lead, riding about on a man's bike, being seen with a sandwich in the street.†   (source)
  • I felt a jab of fear at the base of my spine, though I took care to keep my eyes on my plate: white rice and stir-fried vegetables, the blandest thing on the menu.†   (source)
  • He was broadshouldered and bored-looking, in a soft gray coat, and despite his age there was something petulant and cherubic about him, overly ripe, soft white hands and a soft managerial blandness.†   (source)
  • "Is that so," I said, with resolute blandness; in the antiques trade, I had daily occasion to deal with insinuating old gents of his stripe and Mrs. Barbour, who had not let go my hand, only squeezed it tighter.†   (source)
  • "Come on, Willie," he said, blandly, quietly, "you've got a girl, haven't you?"†   (source)
  • "Do you really think so?" said Toohey, smiling blandly.†   (source)
  • And then he saw Mr. Bradley come to visit the site, to smile blandly and depart again.†   (source)
  • It was difficult blandly to overlook them; to abolish their significance in the landscape; to continue, as one walked by the sea, to marvel how beauty outside mirrored beauty within.†   (source)
  • And Ellen didn't even know where he had gone, believing blandly and volubly that he had gone to Memphis or maybe even to Saint Louis on business, and Henry and Judith not even caring that much, and only he, Bon, to know where Sutpen had gone, saying to himself Of course; be wasn't sure, he had to go there to make sure, telling himself that loud now, loud and fast too so he would not, could not, hear the thinking, the But if he suspected, why not have told me?†   (source)
  • When he came back he was smiling blandly, saying that there had been a mistake, just as he had thought.†   (source)
  • To this eloquence the Bishop returned blandly that he had not come to deprive the people of their religion, but that he would be compelled to deprive some of the priests of their parishes if they did not change their way of life.†   (source)
  • They were dominated by the weary and degrading egotism of life, which is blandly philosophical over the death of the alien, but sees in its own the corruption of natural law.†   (source)
  • "As to why I have made no further advances," he pursued blandly, as though she had not signified that the conversation was at an end, "I'm waiting for you to grow up a little more.†   (source)
  • Chang smiled blandly.†   (source)
  • When well-meaning people complimented him on his bravery in running the blockade, he blandly replied that he was always frightened when in danger, as frightened as were the brave boys at the front.†   (source)
  • So he went on smiling blandly—her hand resting casually on the black sleeve of his dinner jacket, her thigh against his as she stood beside him, her pose possessive and intimate, made flagrantly intimate by her air of not noticing it, while she told an admiring circle what she thought of the Cosmo-Slotnick Building.†   (source)
  • Cranly turned his pale face to Stephen and said blandly and bitterly: —PER PAX UNIVERSALIS.†   (source)
  • She hadn't energy enough to caper before them, to smile blandly at Juanita's rudeness.†   (source)
  • "What the devil is that?" asked Sir Percy, blandly.†   (source)
  • "Good-morning, Bishop," greeted Holderness, blandly, baring his head.†   (source)
  • "Of course I may have exaggerated your happiness—one never knows," he continued blandly.†   (source)
  • "I guess he must have forgotten," exclaimed his wife blandly.†   (source)
  • "About fifteen, I think," replied Gilbert blandly.†   (source)
  • "It's no use, John Clay," said Holmes blandly.†   (source)
  • Julia, who had gone half way down one flight, came back and announced blandly: "Here's Freddy."†   (source)
  • Sir, it's all one to me," he said, blandly, waving his hand.†   (source)
  • "Ah—your dress-maker; just so," he said blandly.†   (source)
  • "You ruined me, did you?" he inquired blandly.†   (source)
  • "A castle argent is certainly my crest," said he blandly.†   (source)
  • There is a class of men in Bristol monstrously prejudiced against Blandly.†   (source)
  • "Maybe you could get something in the stage line?" he blandly suggested.†   (source)
  • I think we'll manage to get a good effect,' Lena replied blandly.†   (source)
  • Cranly gazed after him blandly and vaguely.†   (source)
  • "That is how I interpret the note, citoyenne," concluded Chauvelin, blandly.†   (source)
  • She looked up at him and added quite blandly.†   (source)
  • Mrs. Fawley again," replied Arabella blandly, pulling off her glove and holding out her left hand.†   (source)
  • However, she blandly admitted that such was the fact.†   (source)
  • "How do you do, Mrs. Fawley?" she said blandly.†   (source)
  • "I will—I'll look for your mother," said he blandly.†   (source)
  • "Is Mr. Drouet in?" said Hurstwood blandly.†   (source)
  • "Oh, very well," said Mr. Withers, blandly.†   (source)
  • "How are you getting along?" he would blandly inquire.†   (source)
  • He met them all blandly, becoming deft in excuse.†   (source)
  • Seats clicked, ushers bowed while he looked blandly on.†   (source)
  • " 'tis quite on the understanding that the young woman is willing," said the sailor blandly.†   (source)
  • Toward evening on the second day, what does he do but blandly fetch out a dirk from inside his robe!†   (source)
  • "Good evening," Maximov ventured blandly on the left.†   (source)
  • [He winks with lightning smartness at Mrs Warren, and regards his father blandly].†   (source)
  • "This is my excellent friend Mr. Newman," he said very blandly.†   (source)
  • 'Good news!' cried Mrs. Sparsit, blandly.†   (source)
  • "The gentleman looked like winning, as I said," observed the chapman blandly.†   (source)
  • "One must have faith," the sister blandly rejoined, gazing through her spectacles.†   (source)
  • He was blandly tapping his fingers on the table, and casting his eyes up at the window.†   (source)
  • "It's only me, Sir, come to return a book," she said blandly, as she entered.†   (source)
  • "Saint Laurence on a gridiron," added Laurie, blandly finishing the sentence.†   (source)
  • As Nippers, looking very sour and sulky, was departing, Turkey blandly and deferentially approached.†   (source)
  • "I am thinking of marrying," she then observed blandly.†   (source)
  • Count Ilya Rostov smiled blandly and nodded approval.†   (source)
  • "Now then, what is it, my young woman?" he said blandly.†   (source)
  • So for one brief moment you did believe that I really exist," the gentleman laughed blandly.†   (source)
  • Having listened to her mother's objections, Helene smiled blandly and ironically.†   (source)
  • "Her name I don't give," he said blandly.†   (source)
  • 'No, 'm, I won't,' said Lena blandly.†   (source)
  • She blandly agreed; and the next evening, when he sought to prove that surgery was all rot and most surgeons merely good carpenters, she agreed more amiably than ever.†   (source)
  • I tried to get him to talk of the incident, but he blandly asked me questions as to what I meant, and led me to believe that he was completely oblivious of the affair.†   (source)
  • MRS. PEARCE [blandly] Oh, nothing, sir.†   (source)
  • Weeks had listened politely, with smiling modesty, till Hayward finished; then he asked one or two insidious questions, so innocent in appearance that Hayward, not seeing into what a quandary they led him, answered blandly; Weeks made a courteous objection, then a correction of fact, after that a quotation from some little known Latin commentator, then a reference to a German authority; and the fact was disclosed that he was a scholar.†   (source)
  • "Ah, not for me," said the chaplain blandly, "for I have been watching you and Miss Honeychurch for quite a little time."†   (source)
  • I think, myself, it is more pleasant to do business with people who are clean and healthy-looking," she admitted blandly.†   (source)
  • I got her through my old friend, Blandly, who has proved himself throughout the most surprising trump.†   (source)
  • "Indeed, Doctor," said Holmes blandly.†   (source)
  • "Oh, really?" blandly.†   (source)
  • But she was enough ridden by the current youth worship, the moving pictures with their myriad faces of girl-children, blandly represented as carrying on the work and wisdom of the world, to feel a jealousy of youth.†   (source)
  • He gave him one week after his return to enjoy the limousine, then blandly called on him in his laboratory.†   (source)
  • And then Jephson, running one of his large strong hands over his face and looking blandly and nonchalantly around upon the court and jury, the while he compressed his thin lips into a long and meaningful line, announced: "The prosecution may take the witness."†   (source)
  • …offensive briskness of the man who has numerous engagements, or the yet more offensive quietness of the person who is amused by his inferiors; master technicians, readers of papers at medical congresses, executives and controllers, unafraid to operate before a hundred peering doctors, or to give well-bred and exceedingly final orders to subordinates; captaingenerals of medicine, never doubting themselves, great priests and healers; men mature and wise and careful and blandly cordial.†   (source)
  • "You will excuse me," said Holmes blandly, "but I could not help overhearing the questions which you put to the salesman just now.†   (source)
  • Well, to make a long story short, we got a few hands on board, made a good cruise home, and the HISPANIOLA reached Bristol just as Mr. Blandly was beginning to think of fitting out her consort.†   (source)
  • "O no, no, Tess," he said blandly.†   (source)
  • Gottlieb opposed it, Sondelius roared about it, Martin worried about it, but Leora went, and—his only act of craftiness as Director of the Institute—Gottlieb made her "Secretary and Technical Assistant to the McGurk Plague and Bacteriophage Commission to the Lesser Antilles," and blandly gave her a salary.†   (source)
  • The visitor said blandly: "The doctor."†   (source)
  • At that I gave up all attempts at commentary and read straight on: Blandly himself found the HISPANIOLA, and by the most admirable management got her for the merest trifle.†   (source)
  • "I am much obliged to you for your anxiety about me," she said blandly when the maid had gone; "but it is not necessary you should feel it.†   (source)
  • I told him it was a question not of weeks but of months, that if we were not back by the end of August Blandly was to send to find us, but neither sooner nor later.†   (source)
  • She so warmly and modestly assured Ross McGurk of the merits of Gottlieb and of her timorous devotion to him, she so purred to the flattery of Rippleton Holabird, she so blandly answered the hoarse hostility of Terry Wickett by keeping him from getting materials for his work, that the Institute reeled with intrigue.†   (source)
  • 10 The Voyage ALL that night we were in a great bustle getting things stowed in their place, and boatfuls of the squire's friends, Mr. Blandly and the like, coming off to wish him a good voyage and a safe return.†   (source)
  • John Trelawney Postscript—I did not tell you that Blandly, who, by the way, is to send a consort after us if we don't turn up by the end of August, had found an admirable fellow for sailing master—a stiff man, which I regret, but in all other respects a treasure.†   (source)
  • "Yes," said Hurstwood, lying blandly.†   (source)
  • "I've had experience enough," said Hurstwood blandly, but he felt a little diffident about referring to Fitzgerald and Moy.†   (source)
  • The manager smiled most blandly.†   (source)
  • The latter smiled blandly, but somewhat blankly; the visitor had a handsome face and a large, fair beard, and was evidently an Englishman.†   (source)
  • I protested that I had no views of that sort, and that no such scheme was entertained in my behalf by anybody; but Uriah insisted on blandly replying to all my assurances, 'Oh, yes, Master Copperfield, I should think you would, indeed!' and, 'Oh, indeed, Master Copperfield, I should think you would, certainly!' over and over again.†   (source)
  • Then Dr. Johnson blandly assured us that education was needful solely for the embellishments of life, and was useless for ordinary vermin.†   (source)
  • 'It is an order,' said Kim blandly.†   (source)
  • "You see, my dear," added Miss Sarah Pocket (a blandly vicious personage), "the question to put to yourself is, who did you expect to thank you, my love?"†   (source)
  • 'It is designed to attract our attention, my dear; at least,' rejoined Mrs Nickleby, drawing herself up, and patting her daughter's hand more blandly than before, 'to attract the attention of one of us.†   (source)
  • Mr. Bumble nodded, blandly, in acknowledgment of Mrs. Mann's curtsey; and inquired how the children were.†   (source)
  • It was a common trick with the boys—particularly if a stranger was present—to pretend a cramp and howl for help; then when the stranger came tearing hand over hand to the rescue, the howler would go on struggling and howling till he was close at hand, then replace the howl with a sarcastic smile and swim blandly away, while the town boys assailed the dupe with a volley of jeers and laughter.†   (source)
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