Speak Better English with Harry | Episode 529

Struggling to understand everyday English phrases? In this episode, you’ll learn natural expressions used by native speakers and how to use them in real-life situations. These common English phrases often come up in conversations, TV shows, and daily life. You’ll hear short stories and clear explanations to help you remember what they mean and when to use them.

This episode is great for intermediate and advanced learners who want to speak English more fluently, improve listening skills, and sound more natural in conversations. Perfect for learners preparing for IELTS, CAE, or just looking to improve their spoken English.

Transcript

Hi there, this is Harry.
Welcome back to Advanced English Lessons with Harry, where I try to help you to get a better understanding of the English language, to help you with your conversational skills, your business English skills, interview skills, whatever your goals are, we're here to help.
And for those of you and your friends or family who want one-to-one lessons, well, you know what to do.
Just get in touch, www.englishlessonviaskype.com and you can apply for a free trial lesson and we'll be very happy to hear from you and very happy to help you.

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Okay, so this particular advanced lesson is all to do with idioms and idioms about fruit.
And as usual, we have 10 of them.
I'll give them to you, one to ten, and then I'll explain them and give you an example.
So number one is going bananas.
Because if you catch a glimpse of it, you won't think you're going bananas.
When we feel we are going a little bit crazy or somebody is, or the kids are running around and screaming, oh gee, I'm going bananas.
They are driving me bananas, the noise.
I wish they could go outside and play, but it's been raining cats and dogs, so they can hardly go out there.
They'll catch their death of cold.
So unfortunately, I have to put up with the noise, but I'm really going bananas.
So I can't wait for their father to come home so he can take over and I can have a rest.
Okay, so to going bananas or some project that you're working on could be driving you bananas.
I just can't figure this out.
I mean, I have all the statistics here and I've tried, but it just doesn't make sense.
I think I'll leave it until tomorrow because otherwise I'm just going to go mad.
It is driving me bananas.
To go pear-shaped.
Well, when things go pear-shaped, they go really bad.
Last week, everything went pear-shaped.
If you stand a pear on the table, it's thin at the top and wide at the bottom.
So when things go pear-shaped, things collapse or they fall.
So somebody could have set up a small business a year or two ago and then they run into some financial difficulty.
And when you're talking to the friend and the friend says, oh, how's that business you started?
I haven't seen you for ages.
Oh, that it went pear-shaped very quickly.
We ran into problems with COVID.
And of course, customers didn't come in.
And then we had all sorts of issues with the staff.
It was the worst decision I've ever made.
So it went pear-shaped very quickly.
So when something goes pear-shaped, it goes out of control, just something that you cannot get back to a proper working order.
And we often use it when we talk about businesses, that when we start them off, they start off okay, but then they get into trouble.
So they go pear-shaped.
Or a relationship, how is the relationship with that new girl that he met?
Oh, that went pear-shaped very, very quickly.
Or we could just use it when we're telling somebody, look, I'm always helping you out.
I'm always getting you out of trouble.
So whenever anything goes pear-shaped, you come running to me, but that's it.
You know, you never take my advice.
So you could use it when you're talking to a friend about the advice that you like to give them and they ask for it, but they never take it.
So when things go pear-shaped, that's when they come running to you.
When somebody is the apple of your eye, well, fathers or grandfathers or grandmothers usually say it about their kids or their grandkids.
Oh, he's the apple or she is the apple of his eye.
So the mother talking about the daughter and the father cannot see anything wrong.
Everything she does, it's perfect.
Everything she does is brilliant.
She never makes any mistakes.
Well, you know what her father thinks.
She is the apple of his eye.
No matter what she does, it's going to smell like gold.
Okay, so yeah, so she is the apple of his eye.
Apples and oranges.
Well, apples and oranges are different, very different.
You know all about it from the skin, the color and the taste.
So we use apples and oranges when we're comparing things.
You say, well, you can't compare living in a house to living in an apartment because it's like comparing apples and oranges.
They're very, very different.
Or you can't compare living in the country to living in the city because it's very different.
It's like comparing apples and oranges.
So when two things are very different and you're trying to draw some comparisons, it's really impossible because they're not alike at all.
Okay, so apples and oranges refers to making comparisons that are not quite accurate or right because the two things are very, very different.
A bite at the cherry or a second bite at the cherry.
A second bite at the cherry means to have a second chance.
Okay, so perhaps you went for a job interview and maybe it didn't go so well the first time and you weren't so sure and so maybe the questions didn't suit you.
But then out of the blue, they ring you up and said, you know, we didn't offer you the job the first time, but we've had a second thought and we've got another position.
And perhaps you'd like to have another interview and would you come and meet us next Wednesday?
So you put down the phone and you talk to your partner and you say, you never believe it.
That company, they've rung me again.
I'm getting a second bite of the cherry, meaning a second chance.
I really need to get this job.
So I'll go and brush up on the areas that I thought I was weak on the first time.
And hopefully this time I'll be a little bit more successful to have a bite or a second bite at the cherry to give you another chance, another opportunity.
Or you could be just simply watching a football match and your team is losing one or two nil, getting close to the end of the game.
It's a cup game, very important.
And then out of the blue, your team scores two quick goals and the game goes to extra time and you get a second bite of the cherry.
They've got another opportunity, another 30 minutes to try and get that other goal, in which case they might continue in the cup.
So a second bite of the cherry.
And still sticking to the theme of cherries, the next one, number six, I think it is, is the cherry on top of the cake.
Yeah, so when we make a cake or bake a cake, you know, they usually look and taste very delicious.

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But if we want it to really look perfect, we put a little cherry on the top.
So the cherry on top of the cake is that extra little something that makes something really, really special.
So you could be talking about the perfect weekend or the perfect holiday.
And you're explaining to your friend that you went away with your wife for a weekend or for a holiday that was long overdue.
The weather was perfect, the sun was shining, everything was wonderful.
And what really put the cherry on top of the cake is when you arrived at the hotel, they offered you an upgrade with for no extra charge to a big suite of rooms.
So not only did you have the sunshine, not only did you have the perfect setting, but you also had the perfect room, top floor, beautiful view, balcony, the whole works.
Yeah.
Okay, so that was your cherry on top of that particular cake.
So when you have a cherry on top of the cake or something is the cherry on the cake, it's that little bit of something that just finishes it off.
Yeah.
You could be redecorating your home.
You could be doing some renovations and the cherry on the cake is when your friends come and tell you, wow, that's beautiful.
I've never seen anything like this.
It's really, you've made a really great job.
And they present you with some really nice painting that you can hang above your bed or on the wall.
So that's the cherry on the cake.
Okay, so something just to finish everything off, just to get it absolutely to perfection.
To upset the apple cart.
I can assure you, it wasn't my intention to upset the apple cart.
You might see some movies from time to time when there's a chase, a car chase or a bicycle chase or something, people running through the streets and inevitably there are stalls, market stalls in the street where people are selling fruit and vegetables and somebody trips over, falls into the apple cart and everything falls all over the street.
So that's literally what happens to upset the apple cart.
So figuratively, when we're talking about upsetting the apple cart, it means that we cause some problems that perhaps we didn't mean to.
So we have to quickly apologize.
So perhaps in a business meeting, your colleagues are talking about the launch of a new product and everybody's getting ready for the launch in a few weeks.
And you say, look, I'm really sorry.
I don't mean to upset the Apple cart, but the IT is not going to be ready in time.
We're not going to have that program ready.
We're going to have to delay or you're going to have to delay the launch of this product.
Otherwise, we're going to have huge problems.
We're not going to be able to sell any of these products online.
So that's to upset the Apple cart.
You come along and everybody's really delighted that it's making progress and they're looking forward to that launch, as I said.
But unfortunately, you come in and you upset the Apple cart by telling them that the IT project, the work needed, is not going to be ready.
Okay.
So when somebody upsets the Apple cart, they tell somebody that something's not going to work or something's going to change or something's not going to be as good as they thought it would be.
And then really, that's it.
There's a big, big problem.
So to upset the Apple cart.
And again, the next one about grapes, sour grapes.
Well, nobody likes eating sour grapes.
Yeah, it makes your face twist.
Yeah.
So it's nice to have a nice sweet grape to chew and to eat.
Sour grapes is when somebody behaves badly.
Okay, so they don't get their own way.
They don't get what they want to do and they refuse then to participate.
And so somebody says to them, ah, it's only sour grapes.
So perhaps the kids are playing football at school or netball or volleyball.
And the teacher picks not your son or daughter, but somebody else to be captain of the team.
And then your son and daughter come home and say, oh, I'm not going to play with that team anymore.
And you ask, why?
What's the problem?
Well, they picked John to be captain.
And I wanted to be captain.
So I'm not going to play.
So that's only sour grape.
So just go in tomorrow, congratulate him on being selected for the team and make sure you play as well as you can when the game comes around.
And the same way in the office.
So somebody gets promoted and somebody is overlooked for the position.
So that person refuses to talk or congratulate the person who got the promotion.
And they say, what's up with Mary?
Ah, don't worry.
It's only a bit of sour grapes because she didn't get picked.
She's really happy for you, but she's very disappointed herself.
So when somebody gets let down a little bit, didn't get the promotion, didn't get picked to be captain of the team, then yeah, there's a bit of sour grapes.
They just don't feel so good about congratulating the other person, even though, even though they know it's nothing to do with them.
Then we have a bad or a rotten apple.
A rotten apple quickly infects its neighbor, and we want no more like thee.
Well, you know what happens when you buy a bag of apples.
It happened to me this morning.
I picked up a bag of apples in the supermarket and I was just at the checkout and I was picking up the apples and I noticed that one of them was bad so I took it back because one bad apple will make all the other apples bad within a couple of days.
Okay, so if we have a bad or rotten apple then we have to take it out.
Okay, so if you have somebody in the team in the office who isn't pulling their weight or if you have somebody among your friends who isn't playing ball in the sense that they're not cooperating or helping other people, then that bad or rotten apple can spoil things for everybody else.
Okay, so if there's somebody who doesn't fit into a team at work, usually they find a way to move them to another team or suggest to them that they should go and work in another company because one bad apple can spoil everything else.
So a bad or a rotten apple is not something that we like to see in work situation.
We don't like to see it in the classroom.
We don't like to see it in the family.
Yeah, so there's a bad or a rotten apple.
It turns everything else sour.
It makes everything else go bad.
And it just has a bad influence on everything.
So a bad or a rotten apple.
And then finally, number 10 is to cherry pick.
Okay, so when we cherry pick, we pick the best.
That's literally what it means to pick the best.
Okay, so if you want to pick the best five players or the best 10 players or the best 11 players or whoever you, you get the choice to pick the best.
You cherry pick.
You pick number one and number three and number five because they are the best players.
Okay, so you get the chance to cherry pick, to pick the really good ones.
Okay, so if you go into the fruit store and you're picking apples, not buying them in a bag, you select them, you look them, you check the skin that there's no damage.
So you cherry pick, you pick the ones that are the best, that there's no likelihood of them going bad.
Okay, so cherry pick is an expression that we use to suggest that we always have the ability to pick what we want.
We don't just accept what we are given.
Okay, so if you go to a new company and they're setting up a new marketing division or sales division and you ask the boss, well, this team that I have, am I able to pick my own people?
Yeah, look, you have full freedom.
You have control to pick who you wish.
You can cherry-pick whoever you want.
Okay, so that's our 10 idioms dealing with fruit.
Number one, going bananas or you're driving me bananas.
Number two, the apple of your eye, the apple of your eye.
Number three, apples and oranges, apples and oranges.
Number four, to go pear-shaped, pear-shaped.
Number five, a bite or a second bite of the cherry.
Number six, the cherry on top of the cake, the cherry on top of the cake.
Number seven, to upset the apple cart, to upset the apple cart.
Number eight, sour grapes.
Number nine, bad or rotten apple.
And number ten, the last one, to cherry pick something, to cherry pick.
Okay, so ten particular idioms dealing with fruit.
As I said at the beginning of our lesson, if you have any difficulties and you need to practice or you don't understand any of these idioms dealing with fruit, or indeed if you find a couple of other ones that I haven't included and you want to check and see how you use them, just write to me, contact me at www.englishlessonviaskype.com.
Always happy to hear your contributions, your ideas, and we can include them in future videos and lessons.
Okay, this is Harry saying goodbye.
Thanks for listening.
Join me again soon.