'Tick Tock Tick' / Do you waste time? Learning English with Mr Duncan

Up out of bed at the crack of dawn.

I rub my tired eyes with a weary yawn.

First I'll check my email and look at the news.

Then it's down to some work

those minutes I can't lose.

I glance at the clock and to my utter dismay.

Tick tock, tick. It's already midday.

Where did the time go?

What happened to the day?

My mind was distracted and the time slipped away.

Let's look at a video of an old angry cat.

I'll get some work done after looking at that.

I watch one short clip

and then one more and one more.

Oh, my God. What's the time?

It's quarter to four.

Where did the time go?

What happened to the day?

My mind was distracted and the time slipped away.

I had so much to do, but I wasted the time.

Well, there's always tomorrow.

I'm sure things will be fine.

Up out of bed at the crack of dawn.

I rub my tired eyes with a weary yawn.

First, I'll check my email and look at the news.

Then it's down to some work

those minutes I can't lose.

I glance at the clock

and to my utter dismay.

Tick tock tick...

It's already midday.

Where did the time go?

What happened to the day?

My mind was distracted.

And the time slipped away.

Time is a curious thing.

It is all around us.

It is everything.

It forms the fabric

of all events,

past, present, and future.

Yet we often find that there is never enough of it.

We always seem to run out of time.

It is that abundance of time that causes us

to never have enough hours in our day to complete our plans.

But why is this so?

Why do we always seem to run out of time?

The answer to that question is easy.

We often fritter away and waste the time we have.

However much we try to deny it.

We are all capable of wasting time

You know how it goes.

You wake up in the morning with such good intentions and plans for the day,

but lurking in the shadows, waiting to catch your eye is that thing

preparing to jump out and grab your attention

We call this thing a 'distraction'.

It is something that diverts your attention away from the things you should be doing,

the important things that need to be done can fade away quickly

from your mind because of a distraction.

You might be distracted for just a few minutes.

But more often than not, you will become so engrossed in the new activity

and your mind will be so distracted that the time will slip by.

And before you know what is happening.

A whole hour has gone by.

Or even worse. A whole morning

The frustration caused by wasting time

comes from our own consciousness of how little time we have.

You might describe time as a commodity,

something valuable and overall limited.

We only have a short time in this world, so every hour, minute

or even second, a person fritters away

is indeed a waste of valuable time.

To fritter away is to waste or squander.

The word 'fritter' as a verb is waste.

A person who takes up too much of your time

might be described as a timewaster.

Someone who wants to stand talking to you

about uninteresting topics might be described as a timewaster.

That person is taking up your time.

They are using up your precious moments for no good reason.

I'm sorry I can't hang around here talking to you all day.

I have things to do.

Today we are looking at words and phrases connected to wasting time.

A time waster will waste time.

They will waste another person's time.

They do not value time as much as others.

A time waster might be described as lazy

if they waste time by being inactive.

A lazy person wastes time.

They do not put their time to good use.

A fruitless task or a pointless activity

will often be described as a waste of time.

A person might squander their time.

They waste their time and in doing so,

they also waste part of their only life.

That person is wasting their life away.

Something we feel is or was a waste of time.

Can be expressed in many ways.

'Well, that was a big waste of time.'

'That's an hour of my life I won't get back.'

'Well, that was a big fat nothing'

'What a waste of a day.'

A futile action might be described

as a waste of energy or a waste of time.

You have put a lot of time and effort

into something, but you've gained nothing.

It was a waste of time.

It all came to nothing.

Do you ever waste time?

Come on, be honest.

It would be fair to say that we all waste time

especially when there appears to be plenty of time to waste.

A morning looking at your email messages that might lead to you watching a YouTube video

or maybe a dozen of them.

It is easy to become distracted and waste an hour

or even a whole morning doing something you did not intend to do.

Sometimes we look for a distraction

so as to avoid doing something unpleasant or tedious.

Whatever the reason and however much time we waste,

there is one common factor that always occurs.

Eventually we end up regretting wasting that time.

That moment of time comes only once and it was wasted.

We will never get it back

Talking of time.

It is time for me to leave you.

I hope this lesson has not been a waste of time

and I will see you again very soon.

This is Mr Duncan in England saying Enjoy English

and of course...

ta ta for now