Your English Five a Day #6.2

E112: Are you ready to enhance your daily English conversations with some new key words and phrases? This episode promises to do just that, with a deep dive into the meaning and usage of common terms like "day to day", "come to a grinding halt", "vast array", "arduous", and "exertion".  We have a special treat in store for you this Saturday - a lively discussion titled "Quirky, not Turkey" that ties together all the vocabulary from the sixth week. So join us on Week 6 Day 2 of Your English Five a Day as we journey together through the wonderful world of English vocabulary and a dash of fun!

⭐ ENGLlSH LIKE A NATIVE PLUS ⭐

Join English Like A Native Plus - a membership allowing you to access the bonus episodes, plus a weekly email with the most recent podcasts' transcript.
Become a PLUS member here: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2038858/subscribe

If you enjoy this podcast, please leave a rating/review - it is a simple, free way to support us.

Transcript

The Disappearing Day

Speaker 1 0:01

Hello, you're listening to the English Like a Native podcast. My name is Anna and this particular episode is week six, day two of your English Fiver Day, a lovely new series. Well, it's not that new anymore we're on week six but it's a lovely series that helps you to have a deeper understanding of some vocabulary and learn some new vocabulary as we dive deep into five pieces of vocabulary every single day of the week, and all this vocabulary will be revisited once again during our Saturday episode. You see, we're going to be linking everything together, which is fantastic. It means that you're hearing the vocabulary multiple times and hopefully that will help it to stick, so all you have to do is listen. So let's kick off today's episode with our very first adjective, and it's the adjective day to day, day to day that's spelt D-A-Y, and then a little hyphen, t-o-2 hyphen day D-A-Y, day to day. So if something is described as being day to day, then it means that it happens pretty much every day as a regular part of your job or your life. So if you describe this as your, this is my day to day life. If you're describing what you do all the time, then you could say, yeah, well, this is my day to day life. I wake up early, I run around after the children, I clean up, I make snacks all the time. It's just endless snack making and endless cleaning. I take them to school, I bring them home from school and make more snacks and do more cleaning. That's my pretty much my day to day, my day to day chores, my day to day responsibilities. Okay, so here is an example sentence. Part of your day to day responsibilities are to check all the emails, keep the diary up to date and respond to any important queries. Do you think you can handle that? Alright? Moving on to an idiom, this is to come to a grinding halt. To come to a grinding halt, spelling is C-O-M-E. Come, t-o-t-a. Grinding, g-r-i-n-d-i-n-g. Grinding halt. H-a-l-t. Halt Come to a grinding halt. If something comes to a grinding halt, then we're describing a situation in which something gradually slows down, loses momentum and then stops completely. So it just ends, it just ceases, and it's usually to do with something that should be progressing. So, for example, if you were learning to play the piano and you were taking lessons three times a week and you were doing lots and lots of practice, but then I don't see you for a few months and when we finally reconnect, I say to you hey, how's your piano lessons going? How's your progress with the piano? You must be really good. Now you might say to me no, I mean not long after I last saw you, which was months ago, my piano playing came to a grinding halt. My piano teacher became ill and was unable to meet me, and yeah, so I haven't really played the piano. I've been so busy. So it's all come to a grinding halt. We were supposed to progress but we haven't. It's all stopped. Here's another example of how this might be used. What's happened to the building of the HS2 railway line? It seems to have come to a grinding halt. They're never going to hit the completion deadline at this rate. And for those of you unfamiliar with what's going on in the UK in terms of projects and building work, the HS2 railway line is a huge project to connect the north and the south via this really fast railway line. It's been quite a rough ride, I would say, trying to get this thing built, because it's cost an awful lot of money. It's had huge delays, particularly over the COVID times. They've missed deadlines and they've had to now say that they're not going to build it as far north as they had originally intended. So it's not even going to be the fantastic connecting railway line it was supposed to be. So the HS2 railway line. There you go. A little bit of British culture there as well. Okay, so let's move on. Next we have an adjective. Well, there's an adjective and a noun. Two together it is vast array. This is a collocation. They live together these two words vast and array. If something is vast, then it's large, it's wide, and an array of something is a variety of things. So a vast array is a large range or variety of things. This is spelt V-A-S-T. Vast Array is A-R-R-A-Y. Array. Vast array, vast array. So here's an example sentence oh, there's such a vast array of flowers here I don't know which ones to choose for the wedding. Please help. So a huge range of things. Moving on to another adjective oh, we are adjective heavy today. So this is the adjective arduous, arduous. Arduous is spelt A-R-D-U-O-U-S. Arduous. If something is described as being arduous, then it's difficult. It needs a lot of energy and effort. Ugh, arduous. So it's not something that's easy or fun. Here's an example sentence. Why are Monday mornings so arduous? It takes me at least two hours to get motivated when I get into the office. And finishing on a positive note, we have the final word in our list today. It is exertion. This is a noun and it's spelt E-X-E-R-T-I-O-N. Exertion. Exertion means to use a lot of mental or physical effort. Here's an example sentence my gym routine takes such a lot of exertion I sometimes feel like giving up, but I know it will be worth it in the long run. Okay, that's our five for today. Let's recap. We had the adjective day to day, which describes something that happens on a regular basis, pretty much every day. Then we had the idiom come to a grinding halt, which means that momentum slows or is lost and something that should be progressing stops altogether. We then had the collocation vast array. A vast array is a large range of things. We then had another adjective arduous, that something is difficult. When something is difficult needs a lot of energy and effort. And, finishing with the noun exertion, when something uses a lot of mental and physical effort. Okay, repeat after me for pronunciation Day to day Come to a grinding halt, vast array, vast array, rattling halt again, exertion. Okay, let's bring all five words and phrases together in a little story. This is a fictitious story, by the way. Let's go. What is your day-to-day life like? Do you wake up at the same time each morning, gulp down your tea or coffee and a slice of burnt toast, take a shower, get everyone dressed, feed the kids, grab your phone, keys, bag and rush out of the Wait? You forgot the kids. Hurry the kids out of the door, get them to school and then make the commute to work? If so, I know how you feel. All that exertion, and it's not even 9am. I need more coffee. I always find that when my day doesn't start off right, it impacts. Every hour that follows. What should be an easy task at work becomes an arduous challenge, and it takes twice as long to complete. My usual flow of creativity comes to a grinding halt. All those ideas I had late last night have gone. Why didn't I write them down? I always tell myself to keep a pen and paper handy so whenever something pops into my head I can record it. I'm sure I've missed out on a lot of potential content, because I think what a great idea. I must remember to write that down tomorrow. Then, when tomorrow comes, I've forgotten everything. There's no time like the present. This is what I should remember. Do it straight away. My brain is always on overdrive, so I am constantly thinking of what new and exciting things I can work on next. I don't want to be one of those people who offers the same as everyone else. I like to think outside the box, to think differently, unconventionally or from a new perspective compared to others. Some days I can sit and create wonders. Other days I'm at a complete loss. I can't seem to get past switching the computer on. On my desk I have a vast array of stuff, as well as my computer extra screen which I need because I have so many tabs open and they don't all fit on one screen and camera. I also have coloured pens for highlighting interesting vocab, sticky notes to jot down messages and ideas when I remember them, dictionaries, research papers, an academic diary to keep track of what I'm supposed to be doing, three charger cables one for my phone, one for my headphones and one for my microphone and a drawer full of snacks to fuel my productivity. I barely break for lunch, especially when I'm in mid-flow and things are going smoothly. I sneak in a 4pm chocolate bar to beat that afternoon slump and when I'm happy I've done enough for the day, the computer goes off and I walk away ready to start work all over again when I get home on the kids' homework. The evening goes too soon. Where has the day gone? And my last thought of the day as I'm getting into bed Don't forget to write that idea down. It was one of your best yet. Oh yes, right Now, what was it? Oh no. And that brings us to the end of today's episode. I do hope you found today useful. Don't forget we bring all this vocabulary from week 6 together in our Saturday episode. This week's episode will be called Quirky, not Turkey, so look out for that. Until next time, take very good care and goodbye.