Confusing Words: MISS or LOSE?

Trilling and singing. This is for a TThan Lann from Vietnam who said, "Please don't

sing anymore." I just did. Sing, sing, sing. Hi, Tthan. Anyways. Sorry. I don't want to

lose this opportunity with you guys. I was lucky; I didn't miss this movie by Chris Evans.

Captain America. Great film. Great film. Yeah. I want to do a lesson with you today about

"miss" and "loss".

You noticed I used two examples when I said, "I don't want to lose time with you", and

"I don't want to miss -- or I didn't miss movie." Why? Because many students make a

common mistake of using "miss" and "loss". They might say something like, "I lose my

bus today. That is why I'm late." I can't understand why they would say that because

in English, "miss" and "loss" mean something similar. It means -- Hey, Mr. E. How are you

-- you don't have something. Right? You don't have something. But they come at it from different

angles. When I lose something, it means I have less. See? I have less of it, or there's

a reduce. Okay? But when I miss something, I don't hit, or I don't connect. The target

is here -- "target" is where you're aiming or what you want to hit -- but we move, or

we miss, so we do not hit the target. We should go here, but we go here. "You miss." Okay?

So there's not a hitting or a connection. So that's the basic lesson we're going to

do today. Loss -- oh, sorry. "Lose" and "miss", what are the differences? How are they the

same? So you can speak like a native speaker. Are you ready? Let's go to the board.

All right. Now, I've talked about basically what they mean. "Miss" means to not hit something,

right? Or not make a connection to something. Well, when you lose something, it means you

can't find it, it's missing, or there's a reduction. But there's another difference

as well. Let's talk about the grammar. We use them differently grammatically. And we're

going to work on this now. "Lose." "Lose" is an irregular verb. What that means is it

doesn't follow the standard order or the usual way we do things. Add an S -- right? "Lose,

loses" -- to the present tense -- ING or ED. It's an irregular verb. So when we talk about

the past -- okay? So "lose", the base form, lose is -- oops. Sorry. Before I lose my mind.

I think I lost my mind here. "Lose" is as in, "He loses everything." "Lose" -- base

form. "Losing" -- when you're in the middle of; present continuous. But the past form

is "lost". We change it. It makes it irregular. Okay?

Now, that's the verb form when we use it -- the action. But when we talk about noun, we change

this word "lose" to "loss". Okay? Notice the E becomes an S. They're similar in that something

you cannot find or do not have anymore. Here's an example of using "loss". "His death was

a loss to the company." Notice we use an article to tell you this is a noun. Okay? And he is

no longer here. Remember, I said there's a reduction or less of something? So that's

what we have with "loss" when we use it as a noun. Now, we're going to go over to "miss",

and we're going to look at the grammar for that.

Mr. E is a little confused, but should be finished by now. Okay?

Ready? "Miss" -- it's a regular verb. So "miss", "misses" -- right? So you've got "misses",

m-i-s-s-e-s, like "Mississippi", double S here, right? "Missing" and "missed". No problem

there. As a noun, unlike "lose", it keeps the same form. So it can be a bit confusing

for people because they say "miss" and "miss", and they think, "Oh, noun or verb?" Well,

actually, it's easy. We go here. "The new TV program will be a hit or miss." Once again,

we've got an article to tell us, so you don't have to worry, really. You just look for the

article with this. It's a noun. Or verb; miss watching or miss going, or miss the -- the

usual verb endings, and you know it's a verb. Cool? All right.

So we're going to take a second. And magically, I'm going to come back. What's going to happen

is we're going to look at the combined differences between "miss" and "loss", and I'm going to

clear up that confusion. Ready?

Hey. Did you miss me? I'm back. All right. So the board is changed, and we have to continue

our lesson. So we talked about not making a connection when we talked about missing.

And then, with "loss", we talked about reduction. Right? So let's go to the board over here.

We've got our "lost" over here -- okay? Oh, sorry. "Lose." And we've got over here -- what

do we have? We have "miss". Okay?

So let's talk about differences and similarities. I said before, why they're similar, and why

students make the mistake is something is not there, or you don't have something. But

I love the word "similar" because it tells me something different, and I need to know

that. We noticed in grammar, there's a difference in how they are formed. One's an irregular

verb; one's a regular verb. Which one is the regular verb? "Miss." And we also notice that

with "miss", you keep the same form for the noun as well as the verb. But when we do "lose",

we have to change it to -- what do we change it to? "Loss." Right? Cool.

Now, let's look at how we use it a little differently. So we're going to start off with

"lose" because I don't want to lose you right now, right? That means reduce your attention

on me. Right. So "lose". "Lost" is the past tense, right? In Canada or America and England

for that matter, when you don't have your keys -- you don't know where they are. You

had them somewhere, but they're gone -- you're going to say, "I lost my keys." You can go

to the "lost and found". And if they -- you know, you ask nicely, maybe they have them.

We use, in this case, "lose" or "lost" for keys, your phone -- look at the iTalk. I don't

want to get sued by Apple. It's an iPhone. It's cheap. I'm poor. Anyway. So it's iTalk.

You listen. Okay? iPhone. You lose these things. These are things you can lose. You can lose

a book. You can lose your mind and go crazy. Okay?

Now, the other thing you can lose, which is different, is a game. So when we talk about

games, if you like football or soccer or hockey or baseball, you can lose the game, which

means not win. A lot of in times, people know "win" -- "We win! We win!" -- they don't understand

"lose". Now, we had somebody who did a really great lesson on "lose and loser". Ronnie.

You should go check her out. She's got "lose, loser," and all that. It's a really good video.

Anyway. You can also -- hey, you can lose your job. It's not that your job is disappearing

and you don't know where it is. "I lose my job. I don't know where I leave it. I go find

job." No. What it means is you're fired. The company asks you to leave. And like a game,

it's gone from you now. You don't have it anymore. Good?

Let's look at "miss". "Miss." We said you don't have something, but the ways that you

don't have something are a little bit different. In this case, "miss". We can miss something

like information. Maybe you say something, and I'm working. "Sorry. I missed that. What

did you say?" It means I did not see or hear what you said. I did not lose it because to

lose it means, "I had it, and I don't know where it is anymore." "I missed it", as in

"I did not -- it did not hit my ear or my eye." When you say, "Hey. Did you see that

guy over there?" And I go, "No. I missed him. Who was he?" You know, it's Mr. E and James

coming live. Right? No. Or "did you hear what I was saying?" "No. Sorry. I missed that.

I was watching the television." Meaning I did not get the information. So "miss", in

this case, means to not receive or get information. It doesn't hit you. There's no aim.

Now, what about "miss" for transportation? This is one I hear students make many mistakes

on because they always -- not "always". Bad word. They generally will say, "I lose the

bus; I lose the plane." My response or what I usually say to them is, "How do you lose

a 13 billion-dollar aircraft? It's this big. How can you lose it? Do you need glasses?"

Because what they mean is, "I did not connect." Remember? "Miss" means "connect". Did not

connect. "I did not connect with the train -- which means "to join" -- or the airplane."

So we generally use it for transportation. So when you miss something, you have to listen

for context or how, what, why, and when they're saying it. "Did I miss what you said? I'm

sorry, I missed that. Can you repeat it?" That one was for information. Or I could say,

"Hey. Sorry I'm late. I missed the bus." I did not miss information, I missed transportation.

Okay?

So a quick summary is, "lose" and "miss". When you don't have something because it's

been reduced or you do not make contact or you did not hit what you're looking for, that's

when they have the same kind of meaning. Right? Don't have something. How they differ, or

how they're different, is "losing" is when we basically lose things -- keys and phones,

and we don't have them anymore. But "losing" could also mean your job or a game. Or you

can lose your life. Yikes. Right? It's gone. You don't have it anymore. You're dead. "Missing

something" is to miss information. You don't hit what you're looking for. So the information

was there; you didn't quite catch it.