Learn the English Phrases TO THROW IN THE TOWEL and TO GIVE UP

5,402 views ・ 2020-08-06

Bob's Short English Lessons


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

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- In this English lesson,
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I wanted to help you learn the English phrase,
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throw in the towel.
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When you say in English
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that you are going to throw in the towel,
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it means that you are going to quit something.
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It means that you are going to stop doing something.
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Here's a funny story.
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The first year that I made YouTube videos, the first year
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in early, I think it was in early 2017.
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I started in January.
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By March of that year, I was ready to throw in the towel.
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I was ready to quit.
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I wasn't feeling good.
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Not a lot of people were watching the videos.
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Some people were, but compared to today, no,
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not a lot of people.
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And so I was ready to throw in the towel.
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I was ready to quit.
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I was ready to stop doing YouTube.
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I also got a little bit sick.
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I got a little bit sick at that time,
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and so I took, I think, eight or nine months off.
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For about eight or nine months, I didn't do YouTube at all.
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So I kind of gave up a little bit,
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but I didn't completely throw in the towel.
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The other English phrase I wanted to teach you today
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was the phrase give up.
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And this means the same thing.
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When you quit something, when you stop doing something,
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you can say that you give up.
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So I didn't give up completely.
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I did stop making videos for a little bit,
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but the following year in 2018,
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I started making videos again.
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And then I started to not feel well again,
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and then I was ready to throw in the towel again,
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not because I was doing badly on YouTube.
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I was getting quite a few views,
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but because I wasn't feeling good.
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So I was ready to give up.
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I was ready to throw in the towel.
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And so I ended up, long story short, I had heart surgery,
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I took some time off again.
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And then later that fall of that year,
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after they had fixed things up,
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I started making videos again.
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And the rest is history, we say in English.
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So in English, if you say
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that you are going to throw in the towel,
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it means that you are going to quit doing something.
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If you say that you are going to give up,
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it means that you are going to quit doing something as well.
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Kind of a funny phrase, isn't it?
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It has the word give in it,
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but it actually means to quit something.
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So anyways, hopefully you are not feeling disappointed
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when you are learning English.
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Hopefully you are not ready to throw in the towel
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and hopefully you are not ready to give up.
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Let's look at a comment from a previous video.
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This comment is from Laura Diniz.
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Laura says, "Hey Bob, could you help me
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with pronouncing numbers?
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For example, third, fourth, 40.
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It's so tricky for me. Thanks in advance."
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And my response was, "Sure, I'll use this comment
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in the next video."
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So Laura, thanks for that comment.
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Yeah, here are some ways to pronounce numbers.
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You'll just have to try and shadow what I say.
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So the first video I made was in January 2017th.
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2017, sorry.
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I'm trying to teach numbers and I'm saying them wrong!
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Today I put out my 15th video for "Wednesdays with Bob,"
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which is for members only on my other channel.
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But let's go with first, second, third, fourth, fifth,
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sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth,
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10th, 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th,
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15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 20th.
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So there's your first 1 through 20 when you are talking
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and using numbers in that way.
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So anyways, I can't go over or do a complete lesson
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on numbers, Laura, but hopefully that was helpful for you.
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Certainly for English speakers saying numbers like sixth,
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like the other day I had my fifth sandwich
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and then I ate my sixth sandwich.
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Sixth is a really hard word
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for English speakers to say as well.
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So even if you are a native speaker,
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you still struggle sometimes with numbers.
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And then you asked about the number 40.
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So I'll just go quickly.
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10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100.
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There you go. I counted by tens all the way up to 100.
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Anyways, hopefully this was a good little lesson for you.
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Hopefully you're having a good day today.
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I'm Bob the Canadian, thank you so much for watching.
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If you're new here, subscribe.
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It's a good thing to do.
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You get notified when I make a new video.
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See ya tomorrow.
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