Hello, this is Jack Farm to Fluency, and this is episode 32
of the To Fluency podcast. It's great to have you here
today. Now this episode is something a
little bit different because what I'm going to do is take a
recent podcast episode, episode 30, where Kate and I talked
about fall or autumn, whichever way you want to say it.
And what I'm going to do is take key phrases from that lesson and
then teach you these phrases with more examples.
So to get the most out of this lesson, this episode, I
recommend listening to episode 30 if you haven't done so
already, finish this episode. So listen to this episode now,
then listen to episode 30, and if you want, listen to episode
32 again. So yeah, this episode is going
to explain some very key phrases, some advanced phrases
that I think you're really going to find useful.
So you're going to hear a clip of Kate and I talking, and then
you're going to hear me explaining what the key phrase
from that clip means. So let's get started.
This is your favorite season? It's my, well, one of my
favorite seasons. I actually really like.
I really like the transition from summer to fall.
Kate said, I really like this transition from summer to fall,
so I thought that fall was her favorite season.
But she said, well, nearly, but it's that transition from summer
to fall because that's the sweet spot here, which means the
temperature is just right where you can go outside and being
comfortable, it's not too hot and it's not too cold.
And I think I agree with Kate here.
So the word transition means to change from one thing to
something else. Another example is I know a lot
of people who become online teachers and at first they find
this transition from traditional in person lessons to online
lessons difficult. So they find this change
difficult, They find this transition difficult.
A few of the warmer beverages and soups and things that are
more hearty and comforting. #2 hearty and comforting.
So Kate was talking about food here and she's talking about
hearty food, which basically means in my mind it's when food
is is warm and it's very filling and satisfying.
So think of things like lasagna, chilies, and stews to get a
better idea of what a hearty meal is.
Then just Google search hearty meals and see which recipes come
up. A similar word from the UK is
stodgy. It's not exactly the same, but
it it's very similar. And to have a stodgy meal in the
UK means to have lots of carbohydrates and it's warm and
it's filling things like pies or bangers and mash.
But it started to get a little bit cooler at night.
You. It started to get a little bit
cooler at night. So start to get this is a verb
pattern. Now what's interesting about
this verb pattern is that you have the infinitive and the
gerund after the word and they both mean the same thing.
So you can say it started to get a little bit cooler at night or
it started getting a little bit cooler at night.
Another example is I've started working out again, which is true
or I didn't actually stop, but let's say I stopped, I've
started working out again or I've started to work out again.
Now Kate also used the word get there and get means become and
again it's talking about a transition of change.
Another example is he started to get a bit angry.
He started to get a bit angry. I don't know why.
For example, the TH sound, it's going away in London.
Yeah, because that's. Right.
Yeah, nothing. Nothing.
Instead of nothing. Oh so that TH sounds going away
and you can see on a map how now this one isn't an expression or
a word to learn. Instead, it's just something
interesting where in the UK people are predicting that the
TH sound might disappear within 50 years because a few years ago
or a long time ago, only a certain amount of people made
the F sound instead of the TH sound.
For example, saying free instead of three.
Now, sometimes I do this especially when I speak quickly
and the map that I'm going to leave a link to in the
description shows that that this is spreading throughout the UK
throughout or throughout. But yeah, definitely check out
that link because it's interesting and it shows other
evolutions of the English language in the UK.
No, I can't do an impression of you.
You know it. I want to be able to do a good
impression of you. And I think in general I do do
decent impressions, but your accent is very hard for me.
So Kate can't do an impression of me.
She tries. It's not always that accurate.
She really wants to be able to do an impression of me.
And to do an impression of someone means to imitate the way
that someone speaks. We can also say to do an accent,
to do an accent, which means to imitate an accent.
Now, some people say that I can do a good New York accent.
I live in New York. I've got my dog, I've got my
car, I go to the park, I like coffee.
I need to work on this a little bit.
And the way I'm doing this actually is using my method to
listen, repeat, record, compare method where you listen to a
phrase, you record yourself repeating it, and then you
compare it to the original and make changes.
Now this is a method you can use to learn English as well, and
there is a link to the method a video in the description.
But let's start with Halloween. Halloween is huge in the USI I'm
always shocked every year just by how big it is and how early
people have to get prepared for. Halloween is huge in the US.
It's huge, which means it's very popular.
Now, big, huge, huge normally means very big and you can say
Halloween is big, Halloween is huge.
Both of these words mean popular in this case.
Another example is he's huge on Instagram, which means he's very
popular on Instagram. He has a lot of followers on
Instagram. And another one is although
Oasis were huge in the UK, they weren't very popular or well
known in the US. Here's a question, were Oasis
popular where you are? Are they still popular?
Leave a comment below. No.
You said people will come back and egg your house if you don't
leave candy for people. Now to egg a house means to
throw eggs at a house, and this is very naughty, Can get in
trouble if you like people's houses, but it does happen.
Some kids do do this. People will egg a house or egg a
car. And again, this just means to
throw eggs at a house or a car. And I was worried that people
would egg our house or Kate said people are going to egg our
house if you leave out carrots instead of candy.
I I was never going to leave out carrots instead of candy.
But yeah, I don't, I still don't like kids getting so much candy
at Halloween. Everyone dresses up, right?
Parents. Children.
Yes. Most parents.
Yes. And it's hard to get an outfit
in the week running up to Halloween because every
everything's sold out, which is why you often do it six weeks
before everyone dresses up. To dress up means to wear a
costume. Now the phrase of verb dress up
is specific to the UK and and probably Australia and Ireland,
but it's not used in the US because in the US you say to
wear a costume, to wear a costume.
But I remember people in the UK saying what you're going to
dress up As for Halloween, what you're going to dress up As for
Halloween. And this is true.
Some of my friends hate dressing up.
They hate dressing up. And you know, every year I just
run out of time a little bit. But I think that you can get so
creative and do something really special but.
Every year I just run out of time.
So to run out of time means that you have no time left because we
normally leave it to the last minute, which means we do things
just before a deadline when it comes to making costumes for
Halloween. So we always run out of time.
We don't have enough time to make a costume.
Now listen to these two examples.
We're running out of sugar and we've run out of sugar.
So if we're running out of sugar, it means we still have a
little bit of sugar left, but soon we won't have any left.
And if we say we've run out of sugar, it means we have no
sugar. I had a whole design with like a
headpiece and a Cape in my tentacles and in the end all I
ended up wearing were like some tights that I never had time to
stuff. Kate's still talking about a
costume here, saying all I ended up wearing was tights.
Now to end up doing something means to conclude something with
a particular action. And it's, it's kind of hard to
explain how to use this, but this, I think this example is
really going to help you imagine that you haven't seen somebody
in a while, but the last time you saw them, let's say two
months ago, they were telling you about their vacation and
that they wanted to go on a vacation, but they weren't sure
about where they wanted to go. And then you see this friend
again today and you say, oh, where did you end up going on
vacation? Where did you end up going on
vacation? Where did you finally decide to
go on vacation? And they say, we ended up going
to Preston. Another example is we were going
to go out last night, but we ended up staying home and
watching a terrible TV show. And sometimes it's been rainy
and cold and they just want to eat the candy and then they get
the sugar rush. And then the next day at school,
you know, as a former teacher, the day after Halloween was the
worst day to teach to get a sugar rush.
This means to to get that uncontrollable energy after
eating too much sugar. It's where kids especially get
hyperactive and they can't sit still and they shake and they're
constantly moving. But then after a sugar rush,
normally you get a crash. And this is where you just feel
tired, sometimes cranky, sometimes children get cranky
after a sugar rush. We, the person who used to live
in the house that we live in now, it was known as the best
house in the neighborhood because they had all these
decorations. But they didn't leave them for
us. The neighbor got them.
So then they put up all these new decorations.
And yeah. The person who used to live in
the house where we live now. So the person who used to live
in our house means the person that lived in our house in the
past. And people often get confused
between used to be used to and get used to.
For example, I used to live in Spain.
So in the past I'd lived in Spain.
I am used to living in America because I've been here for 10
years and I'm accustomed to living here.
I'm used to living here, but I'll never get used to people
saying yoghurt instead of yoghurt.
I'm not going to make that transition.
What happens when the leaves fall?
We'll say on three, 123, 123, bag them up.
We'll put them in compost. To bag something up means to put
something in a bag next. It's a little bit crisper, it's
more crisp and there's a little bit of a chill in the air at
night. Yeah, chill in the air.
What? What do I say when I come
outside and it's there's a chill in the air and it's not humid?
Kate talked about the weather, saying it was crisp and there
was a chill in the air. Now, if something is crisp or if
the weather is crisp, it means that it is cold but also clear.
So you can imagine those winter days when it's cold but clear.
So the sun is shining. And if there's a chill in the
air, it means it's not too cold, but you're uncomfortable due to
the cold and you need to put some more layers on.
You need to put some more clothes on.
Yeah, I've, I remember celebrating my birthday here and
it was really warm. And I said I've never had a
warm, sunny day my birthday in my life.
But it can be hit and miss. It could be cold near the end of
October. I was talking about my birthday
here and how sometimes at the end of October where we live,
it's warm and sunny, but sometimes it's cold.
So the weather can be hit or miss, meaning it's inconsistent.
It can be good or bad. Another example is that
restaurant is is hit or miss. Sometimes you get something
great, sometimes the food is terrible.
Usually it depends on what you order.
OK, so those are the phrases. I hope you found them useful.
Now I forgot to mention, but what I have done is I have left
the key phrases from this lesson in the description like I
normally do. And while you're in the
description, then check out the links that I leave there because
I have some great resources for you.
Things like my book, the five step plan for English fluency, a
link to my YouTube channel, and also a link to my paid program,
the to fluency program. OK so if you found this useful
then please just copy this link and share it with a friend and
also.