The A to Z English Podcast

In this episode, Jack discusses five common English idioms and describes their meanings.https://atozenglishpodcast.com/idioms-2/Share your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat! https://forms.gle/zKCS8y1t9jwv2KTn7If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Listen to the episode and write the definitions of the idioms.Sit tight:Pitch in: Go cold turkey:Face the music:Ring a bell: Discussion Questions:How do you feel when someone tells you to sit tight? Have you ever worked on a group project and one person did not pitch in? Have you ever gone cold turkey on something: cigarettes, alcohol, sugar, etc.? What did you go cold turkey on? How did you feel? Have you ever had to face the music for something you did wrong? Idioms A to Z 2: Idioms with verbs 2 Full Transcript: https://atozenglishpodcast.com/idioms-2/Jack: Hey everybody! Welcome to the A to Z English Podcast. We have another special episode for you today. We are going to look at another five idioms and I will explain the meanings of the idioms and I’ll even use some examples in sentences so let's go ahead and get started. Uh the very first one that we have is sit tight and what does that mean the expression or the idiom sit tight sit tight. Everybody knows sit me and sit like sit down um and you know what the adjective tight is right. Um if a shirt is too tight it's too small right but what does that mean together sit tight sit tight well we use this expression when we want somebody to wait and we want them to wait patiently. Don't be over excited. Just relax sit down and relax or you can just say just sit tight just wait sit tight um. For example if there are a line of people waiting for help okay and so uh somebody needs help you have the person helping those people they have to help the first person first and the second person and then the third person but if somebody in the back of the line like number five in the line uh tries to you know I need help right now please help me right now uh. Sorry sir uh please sit tight. I have to help these four people first and then I will help you so you're asking that person to please relax please wait patiently or just say to them sit tight. I will help you as soon as possible sit tight just wait patiently so there you go that's our first idiom is to sit tight and I would say this is a pretty common expression and it's not necessarily rude. Um it's not exactly polite either but it's something that you can definitely say to somebody when they're not being patient and they're not waiting patiently you just say excuse me please just sit tight and I will I will be with you as soon as I can okay so sit tight. Um number two our second idiom is pitch in so to pitch in what does that mean to pitch in pitch in. Pitch in um pitch in is just another expression or another way to say help you know um if you are it's kind of like not just helping someone but helping a group okay so let's imagine that you have a group project at school and you have to divide the workload into let's say you have five people in the group so every person should do about 20% of the work right and another way we could say that is everybody should pitch in by if you say pitch in means they should help they should do their share of the work and sometimes we use this expression. If everybody would pitch in we can finish this job very quickly so let's say you have some kind of like cleaning the house if one person cleans the whole house it takes a long time but if the whole family pitches in, if everybody pitches in then you can clean the house much more quickly and it's much easier much faster better for everybody right so if the children pitch in they clean the room the husband pitches in. He vacuums the floor and the wife pitches in and she washes the dishes and if everybody pitches in if everybody helps then the job can get done a lot faster and so we use pitch in as an expression that means to help or assist. Usually the group okay to pitch in um so there you go that's our second idiom for today. We're going to move on to idiom number three and idiom number three is to go cold turkey. Now none of these idioms that we're talking about today are related okay. They don't really, these are all just random uh idioms okay and so I’m not trying to connect them to each other um but these are this one's a a strange one okay to go cold turkey, go cold turkey and I will put these uh idioms in the show notes or in the descriptions in the description of the podcast so that you can actually read the idioms as well. What does it mean to go cold turkey to go cold turkey means to quit something usually a bad habit immediately so for example if you know someone who smokes cigarettes and they can't stop smoking because they are addicted. They are addicted to cigarettes. They are addicted to nicotine, the drug in a cigarette, um if somebody says I am going to quit cold turkey or I am going to go cold turkey that means they are going to stop immediately right now. They're not going to slowly stop okay, slowly stopping would be today. I will smoke five cigarettes next week. I will smoke four and the next time I’ll smoke three and slowly tapered off. No cold turkey means I’m done right now forever. I quit cold turkey. It could be cigarettes. It could be alcohol. It could be illegal drugs. I mean it could be sugar um it could be you know anything negative you know and then a negative a bad habit um in you and they say I’m going to quit. I’m going to go cold turkey means I’m not slowly stopping. I’m stopping right now immediately so that's what it means to go cold turkey okay cold turkey um again a pretty common expression in English we use this when people quit something right you know immediately. Um number four, number four the idiom is face the music. Face the music so to face the music. What does that mean to face the music? Well I’ll let you think about it for example. Some face we know face the noun face is you know your face, your eyes, your nose, your mouth, your face right but face is also a verb and it is a verb that can mean to confront something right to look something or to um to not run away from something okay so if you're scared if there's something kind of scary or something if you face it, you don't run away. You just look right at it. You face it okay and that's a verb to face something. To face the music means you did something wrong. Now you have to face the punishment and so in English we have an idiom that says you have to face the music you have to. You have to admit I did something wrong. I made a mistake. I need to receive punishment for my mistake. I’m not going to run away from it. I’m going to face the music even if the consequence or the punishment is really bad. We still say or some people who have integrity will face the music they say yes I did it. I did the bad thing and whatever happens, I deserve it and that is facing the music okay, not running away but facing the music and um you know we use this expression when you know criminals people who are you know steal things or whatever and they get caught and they have to go to see a judge or whatever we say. Well that person has to face the music, you have to face the judge, face the punishment, again sometimes people do it because they want to you know face the music because they have integrity sometimes people get caught and they have no choice okay, like a criminal, somebody who steals something and the police catch that person and then now that person must face the music. They don't have a choice, so sometimes we face the music by choice, sometimes we have no choice and we have to face the music but either way we can use this idiom and it has that meaning and my last idiom um the last idiom on my list is ring a bell and everybody knows what a bell is right? Ringing a bell, ding dong ding dong, ring a bell but this when we're using it as an idiom, it has a different meaning, okay? It's not, we're not literally ringing a bell but if I say if I’m uh trying to think of something but I cannot remember or somebody says something and it reminds me of something I can say ah that rings a bell that rings a bell that that that helped me remember something. So to ring a bell or sometimes we use it in the negative and somebody says you know. For example my friend says do you remember, uh the do you remember last year when you spilled coffee on your shirt and I don't remember that um, it doesn't ring a bell, it doesn't ring a bell. I don't remember, I that I have no memory of that okay and then maybe my friend says you know no it was the you were wearing a green shirt. I remember it was a green shirt, ah the green shirt, yes, that rings a bell so now when I think of the green shirt that I spilled coffee on last year that rings a bell that helps me remember that situation that that happened a year ago, five years ago, or 10 years ago so to ring a bell just means something that causes you to remember some kind of memory from the past okay and then if we use it in the negative doesn't ring a bell, it means that even though the person is trying to help you remember, you can't remember that memory. You don't have that memory so you, it doesn't ring a bell and so there you go. Those are five new idioms and we're going to continue to make these idiom videos each week and I will continue to put the idiom in the show descriptions you can listen to my definitions and then you can write your own definition of the idioms and you can share them in our Whatsapp group. If you look in the show notes, you will find a link to our Whatsapp group. We have many active members in the Whatsapp group and if you want to become a participant in that and join in that Whatsapp group you can talk to several native speakers who are teachers in Shaw English, the A to Z English Podcast and we are active in that Whatsapp group so you can feel free to interact with us talk with us and uh we can discuss these five idioms that I shared with you today so with that uh we will I’ll say goodbye and I will see you for the next episode of idiom, A to Z Idioms. Thanks everybody. Bye bye!Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this special episode of The A to Z English Podcast, we talk with May, a dedicated English student and an active member of our Whatsapp group. (Link here: https://forms.gle/zKCS8y1t9jwv2KTn7)It's a great conversation, so you won't want to miss it!https://atozenglishpodcast.com/interview-with-may-fong/If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Listener Interview 001: May from MalaysiaFull TranscriptKevin: Hi everybody! Welcome to A to Z English. Today Jack and I are trying something new. We're gonna be starting to interview our listeners and we have our first listener today who is May Fong from Malaysia actually and May hi.May: Good evening!Jack: Hi!May: Good evening!Jack: Thank you for joining us. This is very cool.Kevin: Yes, thank you.May: Thank you for inviting me too!Jack: It's our pleasure yeah well yeah yeah.Kevin: I agree and because we are on an English podcast of course I'd like to know well how long have you been studying English for?May: Um yeah, obviously I'm learning English from school during my school time. That means from primary until secondary school but then um after study I have honestly I've forgotten most of my English like grammar tenses and all that okay and then I started to reinforce all my English language skills since 2020.Kevin: Oh, so just a couple years?May: Yeah. Where at that time I got a study grant from Malaysia okay it's it is basically a three-month English course so yeah I studied it and with one um e-learning company so okay yeahKevin: That's great and it's a Malaysian company?May: It is not a Malaysian company actually, it's um I can call it national company. Jack: So how long was the gap where you stopped studying English and then you started again? Was it like five years or longer than that?May: Honestly, I had not been studying English since the day I left school. I should say that so yeah I'm speaking English on a daily basis but then I just I just speak. I don't know whether what or whatever I speak is correct or not and why do we why do I say things in such a way, so yeah, I just speak English but uh I understand.Jack: So after school you continued to use English? You spoke English but you weren't studying formally until 2020? You started studying again more formally?May: Okay yeah for me I study again.Kevin: Okay and so you if you started studying a couple years ago again and first you started studying with that program right with that three-month course which is great, but now you listen to podcasts and thank you for listening to our podcast of course but what other, how do you self-study? What do you do to = help you improve?May: Okay. I will watch videos on YouTube okay basically where the moment I finished that the online class so I did I did not stop there so uh every day I will go to YouTube and then I will search for whatever video that I think interesting and important for me to learn.Kevin: Yeah and are these videos specifically English videos like English grammar pronunciation or is it just some other random video that you're interested in but it's in English?May: Um I started learning grammar learning then from there and then I search for also search for listening daily conversation vocabulary lessons and anything any I mean almost anything just anything that English language.Kevin: Sure okay and I'm curious to ask, you said you watch a lot of YouTube videos but something that you have told us is that you are visually impaired right? It's hard for you to see the screen and you have a voice screen reader reading to you which is very cool. So what do you find useful about YouTube? You're not really watching the videos, right? You're just listening to them.May: Okay on YouTube all the videos okay I can see all the video most of the video come with audio so I will just listen to the audio and then whenever there is a word that I don't understand I will read this subtitle. From there I can pick up the words. Then I will go and look into the dictionary. That's how I learn.Jack: Oh wow, so you as you watch the videos, everything that you understand you keep running the video but if you find a word that you that you're not familiar with you will look it up and find the definition and then go back to the video and then finish the video?May: Yes correct. I will pause the video and then I will check it out on the dictionary. I'll check it out in the dictionary then that's how I live.Jack: That's great! A great way to do it is checking the dictionary for anyone yeah.Kevin: Did you learn any interesting words today?May: Um not today.Kevin: That's okay, um but soon.May: Usually I will do my, I'll start learning at night time like um after 8 00 pm okay 8 pm so I'll go on YouTube and see what is interesting.Jack: And how many hours do you spend every day on learning English and watching videos or podcasts?May: Um I have no specific hours of day. About one or two hours.Kevin:  Nice! Wow, that's great. One or two hours every day is very good. I need to do more Korean every day, I do maybe two minutes, very small. That's funny, um, so May you're very busy on our Whatsapp group. How and and that's great we we love to encourage our listeners to participate I in the website. It's good to see.Jack: Yeah it's great to see and um how as uh um as a person who is visually impaired, how do you how do you do that? How do you participate do you um do you record your voice usually or do you type? I mean how does what does the what is the technology that you use to interact on our Whatsapp group?May: Okay there's a software. Basically, it's a screen reader okay um different type of software like on my laptop the software I use is called NVDA basically this this software will read whatever things appear on the screen okay. Let's say when I'm browsing a website so when I move the cursor around the software read for me okay what is currently showing on the screen whether it's a link it's a heading it's a there's some chat box of um something that I can click on to get more details things.Kevin: So, you move the cursor around the screen and it gives you a kind of uh um of mental a mental picture mental like information so you can kind of get an idea of what is on the screen well what about images. Does it also describe images as well?May: Okay it is depends on the website and the apps created by the provider. KSM created it in a very friendly way of redline user where they labels all the images with proper words so for that kind of a picture. Yes the system or the screen reader will describe but sometimes they are also challenges for me as a blind user where the I mean the provider did not label all the images graphic so that is the challenge for me.Kevin: Yeah may that's something that I've seen because for our website our A to Z English podcast website I'm the person who makes the website and so I've seen when I put up a picture or when I put something up it often tells me make a good description for blind people and so I have to remember so if if my website is not good enough yet please tell me and I will go add better descriptions but we don't have too many pictures yet.May: It is good if you can consider this people with disability. I mean the need of people with disabilities so that you know yes can also read whatever on your website.Kevin: So it is actually good. Yeah I will I will keep that in mind for people like you so thank you for the reminder.Jack: Yeah I noticed that you also like to post memes as well and uh is that is that a challenge to because uh it seems like you have you're really good at uh posting memes as well is that because the picture description is really good or okay?May: For the picture that I posted, I mean, they're all the pictures that I post every morning. I got it from a Facebook page okay yeah I mean on Facebook what I most of the picture and it can be I mean the screen reader can describe it properly so that's how I got it and I post it in the group. I share it in the group.Jack: So you search on Facebook and you find something that's funny and and interesting and then you put it into the Whatsapp group.May: Yeah I shared it if there was a group and also some of my friends like morning greetings.Kevin: That's great and why do you enjoy using our English Whatsapp group? How is that helpful for you?May: Every day okay actually I was learning English with Robin's channel. like Shaw English Daily English homework.Kevin: Yeah he's great.May: That's all very good. So from there I was you guys who always joined the what's up good job there was some bro so I I clicked the link to join the group and that's how I come into the group yeahJack: How do you uh how do you listen to the podcast? Do you listen to it on your smartphone or do you listen to it on the computer? I'm just curious. What's your favorite way to listen to a podcast?May: It can be done in both way actually but most of the time I'll listen at home. That means I will use my laptop to listen.Kevin: Uh so are you listening from our webpage?May: Yes from your webpage.Kevin: Oh that's great! That means I need to make the webpage better if you're using your own page.Jack: Blame Kevin blame Kevin.Kevin: Yes that's my um that's for me you you said that you have this special software that helps you describe the screen.Jack: And how like how long have like what was the process I I'm guess I'm wondering like when did you how long have you been visually impaired is this something that was from the time you were born or did it happen later in life? Did you lose your sight later?May: I was blind since I was born so that means when I was kid I started to learn I mean at that time there is no computer no internet right I think so we will learn for blind people. We will learn some uh braille. Have you heard about it?Kevin: Yes of course.May: Braille is a method for to assist blind people to read. It's a traditional way actually. It's a traditional way and actually it's um we are still using it until it until now the only thing is nowadays we have computer so we have um screen readers so most of the time we are using them.Kevin: Yeah and I know Jack and I talked in an episode not too long ago about technology and it's so amazing because when I was a kid the technology would be impossible for blind people to use the internet and now you browse the internet just as well as anyone else.Jack: You're a pro internet user and meme sharer and on social networks. I'm sure you're much better than I am at browsing the internet. I'm not very good with computers to be honest.Kevin: Yeah we're we're old people.May: Yeah okay they're actually this can do most of the things for blind like the light useronly sometimes there are challenges but of course overall it helps.Jack: Yeah that's what fantastic to hear. Yeah what is the what's maybe the biggest challenge um when using a screen reader? It's something that you if you if you could design your own software is there something you would change to improve it?May: The biggest challenge I could say will be when the provider created the website um as I mentioned earlier not friendly to blind users like they didn't label the image and the graphic and then one more thing is um they I mean uh for your information blind user doesn't use a mouse when navigate while navigating a computer all right so yeah so we use only keyboard only keyboard that means we have to remember most of the keyboard commands.Kevin: So you do know all of the pro commands, at least the main keyboard command the important ones?May: Right of course you'll need oh yeah when something is created on they created something where we can only click by the mouse or move around by the mouse that is the biggest challenge sureKevin: Interesting right yeah well May this is all very interesting to hear. It's so very cool that you're able even without being able to see the internet you're able to watch YouTube's from Robin's channel and you're able to listen to our podcast. That's so fantastic what the internet does for you today. I have one final question for you if because again we're an English learning podcast if you could give everyone a tip, what would you tell someone who wants to learn English how can they how can they learn what do you think was helpful?May: Um well there's a lot there's a there are a lot of free um learning channel learning tips learning exercises learning lessons on the internet so you just have to browse through it that's all you can learn okay actually yeah like The A to Z English Podcast.Kevin: Yep of course. Yeah that's great, so May, thank you very much for joining and for everyone else out there who's listening, we have a Whatsapp channel that we were talking about here and if you want to come and talk to us in our Whatsapp channel and maybe even talk to us here on an interview episode you can find all of the links and everything from our hopefully friendly website absolutely thanks very much nice to talk to you!Jack: thank you so muchWhatsapp Group Link: https://chat.whatsapp.com/H4LaiLAUc5SEiaxBp16aEpSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this episode, Jack discusses five common English idioms and describes their meanings.https://atozenglishpodcast.com/idioms-01/Share your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat! https://forms.gle/zKCS8y1t9jwv2KTn7If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Listen to the episode and write the definitions of the idioms.Hit the books:Hit the sack:Twist someone's arm:Stab someone in the back:Lose your touch: Discussion Questions:How often do you hit the books to study English?What time do you hit the sack?Have you ever twisted someone's arm to get what you want?Have you ever stabbed someone in the back? Have you ever been stabbed in the back?Have you lost your touch in regard to a skill or talent that you used to have? Full Transcript: https://atozenglishpodcast.com/idioms-01/AtoZ_Idioms001.mp3Speaker1: You're listening to the A to Z English podcast. Hey there, A to Z. Listeners, this is Jack. I am flying solo today. Unfortunately, Kevin is not feeling well. He is under the weather and so he'll be back soon. But for today you are stuck with only me. So we are going to do a special episode today and today's special episode is called A to Z Idioms. And we are going to look at five different English idioms. And then I am going to give you some examples and I'm going to explain the meanings of the idioms. And so I will also put the idiom descriptions in the show notes, in the descriptions of the podcasts, so you can go right in there and see the idioms and then see what the definitions of those idioms are. So I will provide that for you. And as as usual, we will I will also provide a full transcript of today's podcast, which is just me. So anyway, let's go ahead and get started. So our first idiom is hit the books. So what does that mean to hit the books? Hit the books? Now I think everybody knows what the verb hit means. To hit something is to take make a fist and to punch it or hit it. You could also use an object to hit something or somebody. And but that's not what hit the books means, right? Because why would anybody want to hit a book? Right. When we say hit the books in English, what that means is it means to study hard to go and study your textbooks.Speaker1: And so if we're if I were to give you an example of a conversation between two people, you could imagine that one person is calling his or her friend and they call and say, Hey, are you busy? Would you like to go see a movie tonight? And then you say, Oh, I'm sorry, I can't. I have a test tomorrow. I really need to hit the books. And hit the books means I really need to study. And so hit the books is a very common expression in high school and university, especially in America. I've heard it many times, I've used it many times myself, and it's a very common expression for students. For students. Now, do you have to be a student to use this expression? No. You know, sometimes adults, people who have graduated from university, people like yourselves, you are studying English right now. And if you are studying English and you are taking an English class or something and you have a test coming up soon or a homework assignment or something that you need to prepare for, you could use this expression with your friend. You can say, I'm sorry, I'm really busy, I need to hit the books or I have to hit the books. I have to study. I really have to study. So there you go. That is idiom number one. Hit the books. Hit the books. And I've got another idiom which is also using the verb hit.Speaker1: So we use this. This is a common verb in several different expressions and idioms in English. And the second one is hit the sack. And this one is a very common one to hit the sack. And I'll let you think about this one for a second just to I don't want to give away the answer to quickly. What does it mean in English if somebody says, hit the sack, hit the sack. Well, hit the sack means to sleep. And I think if if you think about this expression or this idiom, it kind of makes sense when you're so tired and you're so tired that you just collapse. You fall down on your bed. Or a long time ago, before we had modern comforts like beds and things like that, people would sleep on sacks, you know, with some maybe some straw or something to make it a little bit softer. And to hit the sack means to go to sleep, you know, to fall almost. It's almost like falling on your bed, you know, collapsing. You're so tired. You just want to hit the sack. You don't want to do anything else. You don't want to talk to your friends. You don't want to make any phone calls. You don't want to watch television. You don't want to eat a snack. You probably don't even want to have dinner. You just want to go to sleep. You just want to hit the sack.Speaker1: So hit the sack. And here's a quick conversation example that you might, you know, that you might have with somebody, for example, if you are talking to your friend on the telephone at night and it's getting later and later and later. And finally, you're so tired, you say to your friend on the telephone, I'm sorry, but I need to hit the sack. I'm so tired. I need to hit the sack. I need to go to sleep. And so hit the sack, go to sleep. Those have the same meaning. So if you use this in English, native English speakers will understand you. It will make your English sound more sophisticated. Or maybe sophisticated is the wrong word. But you will sound more like a native speaker because we often use these kinds of idioms to express ourselves in English. And so if you say hit the sack and people will know what you're talking about, but you'll also sound a lot more like a native speaker. So these are great little useful idioms that you can throw into your conversations. All right, then, let's keep moving. Let's go on to number three, our third idiom. We are going to do five idioms today. So the third one is. Twist someone's arm. So twist someone's arm. Now, obviously, if we're talking about literally twisting someone's arm, that means you're hurting the other person, right? You're taking their arm and you're twisting it. You're turning it so that they're arm, so that they're in a lot of pain.Speaker1: But that's not what this expression means. This is an idiom. Idioms are metaphors. They are expressions or words and phrases that have different meanings than the literal meanings. And so. To twist someone's arm is to kind of how can I say this, to encourage someone strongly to do something that you want them to do. So, for example, if you if you want to go see a movie, but your friend doesn't really want to. Now let's, let's use one of our let's use the old an idiom that we already learned today. Let's say, for example, your friend says, I can't go to a movie tonight. I have to hit the books. I have to study. And you continue to push your friend, you're like, Oh, come on, no, let's go see the movie. Come on. You know, you love this movie. You know you love Tom Cruise. Oh, it's going to be such a good movie. Come on, please, please. Let's go, let's go. Come on. No, no, no. You don't need to study. So all of that stuff that I'm doing right there, all of my encouragement or trying to persuade my friend to do what I want my friend to do, that is an example of twisting my friend's arm. I am twisting my friend's arm. I'm trying to force my friend to do what I want to do. And so, you know, and it's not I don't need to even say the the the idiom to my friend, just the action of what I'm doing, trying to convince my friend, really pushing my friend to do what I want that person to do.Speaker1: My friend might say, stop twisting my arm. You're you're trying to twist my arm. You want me to go to the movie? But I'm really busy. I need to hit the books, so please stop twisting my arm. So twisting my friend's arm is trying strongly to convince my friend to do what I want that person to do. And we all do this. We all we all twist people's arms, right? We always try to kind of push someone or force someone to do something that we want them to do. And in English, we have just given it an idiom, an expression to describe this situation. And so that is to twist someone's arm, to try to force someone or push someone or encourage someone to do what you want them to do. So twist someone's arm. That's number three. And let's go to number four. Okay. Now, number four, this one is this one sounds really terrible. This one really does sound bad, but it's another very common idiom in English. And the idiom is to stab someone in the back and stab, stab, stab means to stick a knife into a person's body. So to stab someone. And if you stab someone in the back. It means that they're you know, they cannot see. Right. You're not looking behind you. We look forward. So if somebody stabs you in the back, usually we use this expression when a friend does something bad to you and you don't expect it, it's a surprise.Speaker1: So your friend surprises you by doing something really bad to you? It could be, say, gossiping about you. It could be telling your secret to somebody else. It could be stealing something from you. And if that happens to you, if your friend does something really bad to you behind your back secretly in English, you could say he or she stabbed me in the back. That's that's the feeling that you have when somebody does something like that to you, especially a friend, you know, somebody that you trust and they do something really bad to you and they they lie about you, and they tell a secret to somebody else that, you know, they break a promise. And so we use the expression stabbed you, stabbed me in the back, or she stabbed him in the back or he stabbed her in the back. He he broke her trust or she broke his trust. He gossiped about her or she gossiped about him. And so that is the meaning of stabbing someone in the back. It's not it has nothing to do with real violence. But again, these are all metaphors. These are all expressions or idioms that describe the feelings that you get when these situations occur. And so our last idiom for today. Is lose your touch to lose your touch. And what does that mean to lose your touch? If somebody says, I lost my touch, I lost my touch.Speaker1: This is a very interesting one. This one is not bad like a lot of the the other ones that we studied today. To lose your touch means. To lose an ability that you used to have, but now you are not as good at something as you used to be. So, for example, when I was young, when I was in my teens, when I was a teenager, and in my early twenties, I was a basketball player. I played basketball in high school and I also played basketball in university. And I played at a competitive level, a pretty high level. And now that I am 45 years old, this is 20 to 25 years later, I've lost my touch. I'm not as good as I used to be. If I try to play basketball, I cannot play as well as I did before. And so I can use the idiom. Lost my touch. I lost my touch. I'm not good at that anymore. And so I would like you listeners out there to think about some of the things that you used to be really good at. And maybe because you haven't practiced or because you have gotten older, or for whatever reason, you're not as good at that thing as you used to be. You can use the expression, I lost my touch. I lost my touch. I'm just not as good at that as I used to be.Speaker1: And I used to have a skill or a talent for that, but now I just don't do it as well. And so in that case, you kind of shrug, shrug or sigh and you say, Ha, I lost my touch. And so there you go. Those are our five idioms for today's episode, and this is the A to Z idioms, episode number one. And what I would like you to do is you can go to our website A to Z English podcast dot com, you can listen to the episode, you can find the transcript, you can leave a comment. You can also find a link on our home page that will take you to our WhatsApp group. And we have a very active WhatsApp group where students will listen to the episodes of our podcast and they will ask questions, leave comments and even leave answers to the discussion questions that we provide at the bottom of our transcript. So if you look at the transcript, you can read the transcript of the episode, and then at the bottom you'll find some vocabulary, you'll find some some discussion questions, and you can leave those answers. You can put your answers in the WhatsApp group and we will read those and reply to you in the WhatsApp group. So I guess that concludes today's episode. Thank you very much everybody for listening and we will see you next time for another episode of A to Z Idioms. Thanks a lot, everyone. Bye bye.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this episode, Kevin and Jack ask an important question about the universe: are aliens real? You have to listen to find out what their answers are.https://atozenglishpodcast.com/do-you-believe-in-aliens/Share your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat! https://forms.gle/zKCS8y1t9jwv2KTn7If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Quick Chat Episode 15: Do you believe in aliens? Full Transcripts, Key Words, and Discussion Questions Kevin: Welcome to an A to Z English Quick Chat where Jack and I are gonna surprise each other with a topic for the day and just see where the conversation goes. Check our site for a study guide with vocabulary notes, discussion questions and more as well as links to our Whatsapp or Facebook pages. And you can join in the conversation there. So Jack what do you want to talk about today?Jack: All right, well I have a good topic for us uh Kevin. I want to ask you a question here: Do you believe in aliens?Kevin: Do I believe in aliens? And when you say let's define this. I think first, what do you mean aliens? Do you mean like bacteria living on another planet or like some creatures that are as smart as us traveling through space and visiting Earth…Jack: Yeah, I'm talking about uh life forms that are much smarter than we are um intel intelligent life forms that are advanced so uh advanced life outside yeah in in another universe or oh sorry in in the universe but in another galaxy um you know.Kevin: So maybe in our galaxy too. Our galaxy could be an argument right? Quite huge um yeah I mean I yes just to just to break it down I think definitely. I think for me I'm a big sci-fi fan. I know you are as well and although I've seen a lot of other science documentaries that talk about this from. Did you ever see the movie contact?Jack: Yes, I love the movie Contact.Kevin: Yeah, it's yeah, it's a really cool one and I think it was in the movie Contact where they looked up at the skies and they said you know is there life out there and they said more or less like if there's not, it's a waste of space.,Jack: True yeah.Kevin: That's a good, there's good, there's so many stars and galaxies and they're discovering more and more planets every day that it seems like how could there not be. I mean there's trillions and trillions and trillions of stars out there. Like it seems uh amazing to think that we're the only one in all of that.Jack: I agree and it's infinite. It goes on, it seems to go on forever and ever like there's, no there's no stop to the expanse of space and so if are you telling me that in all of that area that massive amount of just space, there's nothing, there's not, one of those stars is a sun of another uh you know uh planetary system that there are no planets that can uh sustain life and uh you know it might be there might be some that had like you said before that are just small organisms and it's not advanced life but if they have you know just simple life forms, then there must be planets out there that have advanced life forms are bound to happen.Kevin: If yeah and I think that simple life will have to exist and if simple life exists and eventually it will become not simple life like we are. The difficult or more interesting question is like do you think do you think aliens have ever you know so many people think that aliens have come to planet Earth and like abducted people and things do you think that that's happened do you think we've been contacted by aliens?Jack: Yeah, this is a very popular conspiracy theory in the United States uh the Roswell uh story right?Kevin: Area 51.Jack: Area 51, right, where supposedly an alien spacecraft crash landed uh in that area. Now is that in your, is that in New Mexico? Is that that's next to Arizona right? Yeah Roswell New Mexico okay and so there's also a big a large military installation around there right? I think there's, okay and so supposedly within this military base they have tried to reverse engineer a spaceship that is so far beyond our technological capabilities and so things that we are able to build. Our spacecraft are so much slower and so much less sophisticated than what this machine is and I think although the alien uh craft that crashed in Roswell doesn't work that was able to teach us some very sophisticated and advanced uh technology that we never even thought about using and so some people believe that's what some people believe right and so I’m probably I'm not gonna say I don't believe it and I'm not gonna say I do believe it. I am on the fence as we say in English. I'm on the fence. What about you? where are you?Kevin: I mean yeah, I can't say yes or no for sure on that one. I do think it's I'd say it's unlikely. I don't think aliens have actually come to Earth because if they have, I don't think it would could have remained a secret in the same way like if it happened, people would know about it. This isn't like a superhero movie where aliens come down and somehow no one knows about it for you know hundreds of years. like we would probably know and I do think alien life exists. Intelligent life probably exists somewhere in the universe but the universe is again so big that the odds of them finding us or us finding them are like finding a needle in a haystack. It's tiny that it's a you know 0.0001 chance of finding something because there's just so much out there you know they could point their telescopes like we are we're pointing our telescopes up into the galaxy and we find nothing because there's so much to look for and we're and we're constantly beaming messages out into space to see if we can get some kind of response or some kind of you know that signal will reach some intelligent life and it doesn't seem like we've ever gotten any definitive evidence of it. It's just there's been some strange things that have happened but there hasn't been that contact with an alien life form that would confirm, at least nothing that we know.Jack: Yeah.Kevin: I’m not sure if you've ever seen it. I’ll have to try and find the map for you. There's um like you've been talking about, we've been beaming things out into space for 100, so years now with all of our TV and radio, but even all of that compared to the size of our galaxy let alone the universe, it's been going out for 150 years. It's a tiny amount like it's not gone very far right and so if there are aliens out there, unless they're very close to us which is possible, but who knows unless they're very close to us, they haven't noticed it yet you know. It's impossible for them to have seen it because it just doesn't go far enough right, so I think that there's aliens out there. I don't think they've been to Earth yet, and I don't know if they ever will be because it's just so big. it's like yeah trying to find one seashell, one specific seashell in all of the ocean.Jack: Yeah, you know, like I saw this show when I was five. Where did it go, the thing is, the thing I hope for is like just given enough time and enough effort that eventually something will happen where there will be some sort of intersection um or the other the alien species will be so advanced that they'll be able to travel at speeds that we cannot even imagine. Right now, um, you know I mean we've only been you know flight has only been possible for a hundred years. In America, I mean wasn't it the Wright Brothers who invented the airplane only 100 years ago.Kevin: Just over.Jack: Yeah yeah or just over 100 years ago, so the fact that we now have um you know little airplanes like Cessnas that can fly all over the place. We have giant jumbo jets that can transport hundreds of people.Kevin: To the moon.Jack: Yeah, then we can go to the moon. Um, it's really, it's amazing to think about what we've accomplished in just a hundred years so. If I fast forward two or three hundred years um, it makes me wonder if we're not going to, it just seems inevitable to me, like I just think that there will be we will at some point we find out that there is intelligent life but like you said, the ability for us to meet is so difficult because the distances are just, that's so incredible, but it's ridiculous yeah, the fact that space seems to go on infinitely makes me think there just have to be other places that are habitable for either human beings or other species of life form and so that's yeahKevin: There's two interesting thoughts about that that could take us a long time, but let's not do too long. One you said other species, other types of life, that's a very interesting one. Like for what we know, all life needs water for example right? But it's possible that there's some other crazy life that we can't even imagine that doesn't even need water out there, so maybe we're looking in the wrong place. But just to finish up, I’ve got one final question that to take this assuming that there is intelligent you know super advanced aliens out there Jack and assuming that eventually we will contact them do you think they'll be friendly? Jack: You know that's a good question. Again, I’m on the fence about this one. Uh I'm not sure if they look at what we're doing to our planet, the way we destroy our planet and the way we treat our planet so poorly. I wonder if they you know will look at us and say why are you not taking care of your planet um right? You know or the other side of that issue is maybe they did the same thing to their planet and they want to take our planet and use it for themselves, and so we become a lower species on the uh totem pole uh and so we become kind of working for them. So, it's kind of scary. I don't know what you know in the movies the aliens usually are the bad guys you know. They're coming to take our resources and they're coming to uh you know strip our planet of its of its natural resources and stuff like that and uh I prefer the other uh version where aliens just want to communicate with us and understand us and it's more like a they're just seeking information about the planetary systems and they come across Earth and they see human beings and they appreciate us for what we are you know um so we can we can only hope that they will be friendly because if they're more advanced than us, then if they're not friendly, we're in trouble.Kevin: Exactly, exactly. That's right, that's right all right well, yeah, I hope that they're friendly and let's see what happens. At least we do have some friendly people that we talk to in our chat room every day so have we got any listener mail.Jack: Um, yes, we want to talk to you today. We have some listener mail and I would like to talk about uh phobias. S, this one is from, let me see here, Layla. And Layla was talking about her phobias and she has a phobia of escalators which is interesting um and she says as soon as she, yeah, she says as soon as she thinks about escalators, her heart starts beating so fast And she says uh fortunately she has outgrown this phobia. Or at least she has tried to, I think. She's still, there's still a little bit of the phobia there, and uh she says in Dubai there are a number uh a big number of malls and they all have escalators and uh so she uses the stairs to go to the next floor the first floor the second floor and so uh or sometimes she says her sister-in-law will help her by holding her hands so that's the uh that's uh Layla's phobia. Yeah, so thanks for thank you for sharing that Layla.Kevin: Cool, all right well thanks everybody for listening, and we'll come back and talk to you more about aliens next time. Remember to check our webpage and our Whatsapp group for you to join in the discussion all right.Jack: Bye, bye.  Key Words:  Universe: all existing matter and space considered as a whole; the cosmos Bacteria: Microscopic single-celled organisms Expanse: the distance to which something expands or can be expanded. Sustain: support physically Intelligent life: beings that can learn and understand things Finding a needle in a haystack: The act of trying to find something very small in a very large area Infinitely: without limits; forever Discussion Questions:1. Do you believe in aliens?2. Do you think aliens have visited Earth?3. Do you want aliens to exist, or would you prefer humans to be alone in the universe?Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this episode, Kevin and Jack talk about what technology was like back when they were young! The conversation started to go long, so expect more discussions about tech from these two oldies later on. We also had some listener mail from episode 10 about your favorite things!https://atozenglishpodcast.com/technology-from-the-80s-and-90s/Share your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat! https://forms.gle/zKCS8y1t9jwv2KTn7If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Full Episode TranscriptKevin: Welcome to an a to z English Quick Chat. We're going to surprise each other with a topic for the day and just see where the conversation goes. Check out our site for a study guide, for vocabulary notes, discussion questions and remember we've got links to Whatsapp, a Facebook page and all of our other social media where you can check in the conversation. So. Jack, we've been talking with a lot of our listeners in our Whatsapp group actually and something I’ve found interesting is that there's a lot of young people in there.Jack: That's right.Kevin: And we are old compared to some of them and it, I kind of think it would be interesting to talk about technology because even one thing in our Whatsapp group so many of our listeners are doing voice memos in there and I'm just not used to that.Jack: yeah right.Kevin: Like i do text like I like typing and that voice message is weird and it feels like that's where tech is going and so tech has changed so much in our lives, I mean. When we were kids, we had no internet.Jack: I didn't have the internet um even actually my whole uh school career you know elementary, middle and in high school.Kevin: Cool. So, when did you get? When did you get your first computer in your house?Jack: Oh, I never had a computer.Kevin: When you were growing up you never had a home computer?Jack: I never had a home computer. I had a word processor. So, imagine if you have a computer but you take away everything fun and interesting about it and just leave the whatever's left over the unfun part the you know typing and papers and printing papers and think documents, yeah that's what that's what I had was a word processor that was, it's basically a typewriter with a little bit of editing that you can do.Kevin: And just for everyone listening. Just so you know, Jack and I are both oldies, but Jack has me. He's older than me by uh five years so not a huge difference but when it comes to technology, we were both born right when you know home computers and internet and things were starting to move around the world, and so we're even though we're only a few years apart there's a significant difference because for me, Jack, we had a we had a personal computer in my house when I was in I'm pretty sure we had one in elementary school when I was when I was in elementary school and it was a very simple computer. It had like no Windows. it was a DOS system, so you know there was no graphical interface which most of our listeners probably can't imagine like if you wanted to play a game or if you wanted to open the word processor, you would have to type. You just come, you'd open it up and it would just be a black screen with the letter c colon forward slash and you would just type text and you would just go like you'd say like go to word processor folder. Open word processor, you know in different text but basically that you'd have to type theJack: Type in the command basically.Kevin: Right exactly! Yeah, yeah, so, we had that when I was in elementary school and then I do remember connecting not to the internet but I remember connecting to a BBC. It was a bulletin board, something not the BBC from England.Jack: Oh, okay a different BBC. I was thinking that…Kevin: Yeah yeah, no this is a different BBC. It was just basically a bulletin board and it was I don't even remember exactly how they worked. You would dial in with your modem, and so you'd use the phone line and dial in and you'd connect to someone's server where then sometimes they had games, sometimes they just had chat rooms where you could talk to your friends and like very simple stuff, but I remember doing that in in elementary school.Jack: Oh, I did that in elementary school with my uh, on my friend's computer. So, my friend had a computer, and he was talking about using expressions like the internet or uh and I didn't understand any of it. I didn't know what that was.Kevin: Yeah right.Jack: And so he we were able to uh like you said go to some uh someone's private server I suppose right? He would share some kind of game and it was always just like a very simple kind of like not even, not even Super Mario level, you know, grab, it was a couple squares actually.Kevin: Kind of you know speaking of that, did you have, did you ever have any video game systems?Jack: Yeah, we were, I was a hardcore video game guy, Like, I love the original Nintendo. So, I started with the uh, I can go, I can go back really far here for our listeners because I was there at the very beginning. I bought Pong at a garage sale when I was in elementary school, and my television and Pong is basically two… it's like tennis or ping pong, and you move the cursor up and down, and it knocks the ball back and forth that was it. That was like the first video game.Kevin: It really was the first video game. I mean if you bought it from a garage sale like you bought it obviously used of course because I think that came out in the 70s at some point originally.Jack: Yep, it was sitting in somebody's garage for a long time, and I just bought it for like a dollar or two dollars and brought it home.Kevin: Nice!Jack: And we had that for a little while, but it got boring quickly, and then my parents bought me an Atari which was very popular in the 80s as well. Um, I think Nintendo and Atari had kind of a battle and Nintendo obviously won, but uh yeah, it was uh you know it was one of those things where we didn't know at the time which one would be the uh you know the winner, so the Atari. I had like Pac Man and all and it was it was a fun. It was very fun. They had great games, so yeah.Kevin: I never had an Atari. My brother and I, we did buy the first Nintendo, the NES, the Nintendo entertainment system and we bought that not when it was, because again, we're a couple years younger, so we bought that like a couple years after it was first released. So, it wasn't a brand new product, but it was still the video game system, and yep, We had that with the original Mario and Duck Hunt of course.Jack: Yes!Kevin: Yeah, and yeah, so we had those original Nintendo systems as well, so I mean that's a computer. That's the original tech. Now I mean computer systems and video games today are obviously so much different.Jack: Yeah, and I think a lot of it has to do with if your parents are into you know uh computers and stuff like that, so when you're young, if you're you know in my generation, because I'm old. In the 1980s, some people did have computers, but it just wasn't very common. None of my friends, you know, other than my one friend who did have a computer, but even when we played games it wasn't computer games. We would play Nintendo or Atari, so yeah, they were separate. They weren't, it wasn't a gaming system.Kevin: It was a video game always, not a computer game, it was a video game.Jack: Exactly.Kevin: I guess that's a good point about if your parents were connected to it. I think although my mom and dad weren't super techy necessarily, they, my mom at least, had a connection with it because my grandfather way back in the day, he was one of the first binary programmers for Eastman Codex, so like my mom has stories of him bringing back you know like a book of ones and zeros and ones and zeros and ones and zeros and finding the problem in the code of the ones and zeros code.Jack: Wow.Kevin: So at least my mom like understood you know tech is a thing and computers are a thing and this will be the future, and we need to go from there.Jack: Yeah, yeah, I mean that that is really interesting because I you know as time went by um my friends, some of my friends started to get computers when I was getting into like high school and stuff like that okay um but my family just wasn't, we were not computer people. And so I was very much like kind of afraid of computers. They were too, they were just mysterious to me and I didn't know how to operate them, and so I would write my papers either by hand, so I would just write my essays you know handwritten, or I would uh type it on a word processor or a typewriter. So okay, yeah, I got and I took uh, even in high school, I took two or three typewriting classes, so like how to type basically, yeah, how to type. So, basically just a big room full of typewriters, and we would just type documents, just copy.Kevin: Oh wow!Jack: Yeah, look at it and then type it and I you know I kind of uh proudly can say I got up into I think I was 75 words a minute, something like that.Kevin: That's pretty good. That's, that's quite fast. I type I think I type around that speed now actually after years of practice, you know, like that's a pretty good speed. I learned that's funny to compare them. I learned typing from a program called Mario teaches typing, and speaking of Mario, because of course you know I was a Mario fan and so I had like you know on one of my early computers, we had a program that was Mario teaches typing, and it was like the original Mario game right where Marios is running from the left to the right side of the screen but for each Goomba or each bad person or each you know block that you have to jump or whatever it starts with a letter.Jack: Yeah.Kevin: You know so it's like you have to hit whatever and you're jumping over you jump on them and then it starts to get more complicated and faster. It becomes a word or a sentence or and it's faster and faster and otherwise Mario dies if you if you don't get it, so I learned typing not from just yeah copying text but from like a game basically. I gamified typing.Jack: Yeah.Jack: I'm kind of curious to our listeners out there um how did you learn to type? Like what you know, do they teach? You know, for the younger generation, I imagine that computers are in schools everywhere, so if you know go to school now, you have access to a computer. My daughter was uh using a computer from the time she was you know uh five years old, so she can you know scroll on a screen and she can do all kinds of uh you know computer you know things on a computer that I could never do even as an adult. Now I’ve learned to do it because I had to, but it was, it's just interesting to compare my childhood to my daughter's childhood.Kevin: So along with typing, I'd be curious how, it depends on the age of our listeners as well, like what kind of phone they first had when they had a cell phone because remember like you and I, we never had a cell phone until we were quite late. I had my first cell phone here in Korea in 2007 or 2008. And I remember original cell phones. They actually had like a keyboard right like actual physical buttons. You know the phones today. It's just all on the screen. But I remember teaching at an academy and one of my young students, she was probably like your daughter's age like 13 or 14 something like that and because there were physical buttons, it's like a keyboard. You can feel where your thumbs are on it. Uh, I remember I was teaching her something and I saw her hands under the table just going away and she was able to type very fast without looking at her phone keyboard as well, and like I asked, I was like get your phone really quick. I wasn't angry. I was like hold on. I looked at it and she had typed like a full sentence, a full paragraph, not looking at this little nine button keyboard down under her.Jack: Using the uh, is it called qwerty is that what the old text message?Kevin: qwerty, no qwerty is the keyboard that you use right now.Jack: Oh, okayKevin: Because look at your keyboard, Jack. The top and bottom that the keyboard is QWE.Jack: Oh, okay i thought qwerty was where you press the three times and it you get uh it's like yeah.Kevin: qwerty is your keyboard because if you look at the thing.Jack: I just noticed that it said, yeah I’ve never put that together before today.Kevin: No, I'm not sure what though. I don't know the name of that three like you know where the button has abc and then cef and yeah you have to like go through all of those, um, I don't know the name of that offhand, but yeah, it, she was using that system and it was just crazy quick and very impressive. But Jack, I mean this is this technology topic, I think we could carry this, we could talk about this for days, and we haven't even gotten away from our like elementary school let alone when we were in high school let alone when we actually had the real internet and things like that. I think we'll have to uh part two this one or maybe uh turn this into a multiple uh episode conversation. This is definitely gonna be a part two part three part four because I mean tech is such an interesting part of our lives and you and I have seen it from where there really wasn't any tech or very little at least to now most of our listeners just are you know have always had tech like always in their lives and the way that like games and things are all combined now with your computer and everything, and so in your smartphone.Jack: So, I think uh we covered video games we'll talk about uh some other uh examples of tech.Kevin: Yeah, we'll have to get back to the early internet. I mean just one last thing because the interesting thing about the internet is I remember going online right now you're just always online. you're always on the internet. When we were younger, it was like I'm gonna use the internet and you would have to go and log into it and turn it on and now even that is different. Like, internet is just everywhere, it's yeah ubiquitous…Jack: I don't know how yeah I lived without it for so, you know as long as I did.Kevin: And that's and that's what we can talk about because there's so many things that like our phones do today for us that we somehow did without many years ago, and it's interesting to compare because I remember doing without it, but I don't know in retrospect why exactly, yeah but let's come back to this later because we've got to get to some listener mail of course. We do have some listener mail, so you go ahead and get to that. Who have we heard from this week?Jack: So, today I'm going to read listener mail from one of our listeners named Salomeh and Salomeh writes in uh regards to the episode of uh what are your favorite things and so for her, she said, in the past few years my favorite things were reading pdf books from her computer and cell phone so that kind of goes along with our episode. Reading books on your phone, yeah reading books on your phone, reading books on your computer, she enjoys surfing the web, playing computer games and drinking coffee. So, I think surfing the net, you know surfing the internet and drinking coffee has to be one of the most fun things you can do.Kevin: They go together very well, coffee and the internet. Nice, and that was episode 10 right? what are your favorite things.Jack: Yes, that's right.Kevin: For now, let's go ahead and wrap up. So, for everybody, thanks for listening. Remember to go join our Whatsapp group. It's linked on the webpage. You can join in the discussion as well. Tell us what you think. Ask questions, reply to the discussion, or if you have any topics, anything that you want us to talk about, anything, we'll go from there. So, everybody thanks for listening and we'll see you next time!Jack: Bye, bye! Key WordsWord processor: a machine that lets users create, save, and print documentsCommand: an order or instructionGarage sale: a sale of used or unwanted goods; normally held in a person’s garage or yardUsed: not new; an item for sale which was owned by a previous personBrand new: new; an item for sale which has never been previously owned Discussion Questions1. How did you learn to type?2. How old were you when you first used the internet?3. How old were you when you got your first smartphone?4. Do you enjoy playing computer games? Why or why not? Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this episode, Kevin and Jack talk about what super power they would most want. What about you? And how would you use your new power for good?Visit our website and get a free study guide to go along with the episode:https://atozenglishpodcast.com/if-you-could-have-any-super-power/Share your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat!If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this episode, Kevin and Jack talk about Superstitions. What are some interesting superstitions in your country?Find a link to our study guide here: https://atozenglishpodcast.com/what-are-your-superstitions/Share your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat!If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Everyone has regrets. It's a normal part of growing up. In this episode, Kevin and Jack talk about what they would change if they could go back in time. You can download a study guide for this episode by following this link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dcfzyrg2iDIHqaN5duIV4zOyUo7uTLBa/view?usp=sharingShare your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat!If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this episode, Kevin and Jack talk about the things that they spend too much time on. Anything you just can't get enough of?Share your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat!Find our free study guide here: https://atozenglishpodcast.com/?p=1556If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

In this episode, Kevin and Jack talk about their first jobs when they were young. How old were you when you had your first job? Did you like it?Share your answers to the discussion questions in our WhatsApp group chat!You can find the study guide here: https://atozenglishpodcast.com/part-time-jobs/If you could take a minute and complete a short survey about the podcast, we would be very appreciative. You can find the survey here: https://forms.gle/HHNnnqU6U8W3DodK8We would love to hear your feedback and suggestions for future episodes.Intro/Outro Music by Eaters: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/eaters/the-astronomers-office/agents-in-coffee-shops/Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-a-to-z-english-podcast/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy