LEARN ENGLISH (almost) Every Day | LIVE from England | Thursday 1st December 2022

They say that December

is one of the most crucial months of the year.

As winter approaches, everything becomes

cold and icy.

Are you ready for dunk, Simba?

Here we are. Yes.

For those wondering what is going on, we are here

for the whole of December.

We can share those cold nights together

and could look nice and warm.

It is December the first 2022.

Hello there.

Oh, you will either love that music or hate it.

Personally, I think it's really, really good hat.

Here we go again. Way back.

Oh, my goodness.

I can't believe it. Hi, everybody.

As my voice already starts to break down.

Isn't it great?

Where's my water? Mm.

They say that the broadcaster's

worst nightmare is their voice

failing whilst they're presenting.

And here I am, already having difficulty with my throat.

Hi, everybody. This is Mr. Duncan in England.

How are you today?

Are you okay? I hope so.

Are you feeling happy?

I hope you are feeling good today.

Because we are with you.

Not just today, but also for the whole

of December almost.

I can't stress

enough the fact that it's almost every day.

So we are here today and we have a very busy weekend as well, Saturday and Sunday.

We will be with you live on Saturday

from the Much Wenlock Christmas Fair.

And on Sunday we are with you as usual for 2 hours.

And then lots and lots of other times as well

during the month of December.

Or should I say don't December?

Yes. Can you see what I did there?

We are back together again.

Of course, it's not just me.

Joining me also here in the studio,

I've given him his own corner,

a special place for him to live.

Mr. Steve,

of course, he is here right now.

Hello.

Hello, everyone.

Well, Mr. Duncan, this is so different.

I am stuck in a corner of the studio all on my own.

I can see you, though.

I can see Mr.

Duncan peering over the top of one of your big screens.

Well, you control everything.

Like it. Like somebody that's in control of everything.

Yes. Yes.

Oh, Mr. Duncan, this is very exciting.

Something new for December.

Am I going to be here every day?

Well, it just, you know, I've.

I got the option of being here or not.

It's up to you. Really.

Right. Well, we'll.

We'll keep that as a surprise for all of the viewers.

So you may have already noticed things are slightly different with the studio.

Mr. Steve is over there and I'm over here.

And, well, all I can say is it's nice to see Mr.

Steve here.

And also we have the live chat.

Already, Steve, it's very busy.

Mr. Duncan The live chat is very, very busy today.

First of all, can I say congratulations?

Guess who was first today?

First on the live chat.

It's Claudia.

Congratulations to you.

Done.

Claudia.

You're very keen to be on their first day.

Obviously, no cooking going on at the moment.

Maybe later. Yes. I'm just wondering what is going on?

Are you cooking something today, Claudia?

We'll find out.

People are, too.

They were talking about the weather.

Oh, which is interesting, Mr. Duncan.

Amateur chess.

Amateur chess. Hello? Amateur chess.

You must obviously be quite clever if you're playing chess.

Maybe we could do a game over the Internet.

Can I just ask you a question?

Are you somehow slumping back?

No, I don't know.

I do do bizarre things because you want me to move.

I'll go on tiptoes.

Well, that's better. Yes.

I don't know what you were doing then. That's right.

It looks as if you're starting to get down on your hands and knees.

Well, I do move around anyway.

Amateur chess. Who's in Algeria? Hello?

So that. It's very cold there.

Well, interestingly enough, Mr.

Duncan, I saw a news report yesterday

that talking about long term weather forecasts,

which, of course, as we know on the story, ously unreliable.

But they are in the UK.

I think ten days ahead is about the maximum that they can predict.

But they are saying that we are going to get a blast

of cold weather from the east.

They are predicting another beast from the east.

And I'm not talking about a certain leader in Russia.

I'm talking about something that they called a number of years ago.

I can't remember when it was.

Now we had this blast of very cold

air from the east, which of course, to

the east of us is basically sort of Russia and most of Europe.

But a lot of cold weather, of course, comes from that part of the continent.

And we always worry when we start to get easterly winds in the winter

because it means snow, it means cold winds.

And they are predicting what they are calling it a beast from the east

who is going to come and

and increase our heating bills quite significantly? Mr.

DUNCAN Which is quite good because the price of oil is dropping.

So that'll be good for us.

So yes, it's cold, it's getting cold.

But we are warm in the studio, Mr.

Duncan, and we are going to warm you up with our cheer

and happiness throughout December.

So that is the message that I'd like to get across at this point.

Mr. Duncan. Well, I think you did it very well

since Mr..

Mr. Steve and myself, we are here and we will be with you a lot of times during the month

of December, things might seem a little different,

but it's still the same old us, I'm afraid myself.

And also Mr. Steve.

Can you believe it's December already?

Steve I know.

I've got to start thinking about Christmas presents.

Are and I think we pointed out on Sunday

or I might have pointed out on Sunday that there is one.

Well, I'm not having to buy very many Christmas presents.

I think the only person I'm going to be buying Christmas presents for is you, Mr.

Duncan. Oh, good.

I don't think there's anyone else that I need to buy Christmas presents for.

Well, there's no one else that you should be.

Well, because, I mean, we don't. Within the family.

My mother.

I used to buy her a Christmas present, but my sister and

I stopped buying Christmas presents a number of years ago.

For each. Other. For each other.

Because it seemed pointless, because we'd always buy each other things which we didn't really want.

It just became very difficult.

So we still do birthdays, but we don't do Christmas anymore or Christmas presents.

I don't buy Freda Christmas present for friends.

We've stopped that because it just seemed pointless buying rubbish.

Yeah.

But I spoke to somebody the other night at a rehearsal who has 11 grands children,

11 grandchildren, so they

have to buy at least 11 presents for them.

So I do feel the pain of mine.

Mind you, maybe you enjoy it

if you've got a large family and you have to buy lots of presents

for children, four grandchildren, 11.

That's a lot of presents that they've got to buy. Yeah.

Let's face it. They buy for each other. Steve.

It's all about kids, really. Black kids.

It isn't adults.

Well, why would adults be so worried about Christmas?

I think it is more about the kids, to be honest with you.

I mean, I don't remember and I feel slightly guilty about this.

I don't remember buying my parents Christmas presents.

I don't remember it at all.

I don't think I ever did.

And now I feel really mean and horrible because of it.

You didn't buy Christmas presents. For who?

Your parents. My parents.

Oh, I used to wear.

I used to make them things. I used to make something

out of

clay.

Your paper or something? Clay.

I used to make them things which I'm sure that they treasured.

Although, strangely enough, I can't find them anywhere.

So I imagine it got thrown out.

Which I'm pretty sure they did not end up in the wastepaper bin.

It was Jimmy's birthday.

I don't remember when that was, but apparently this is Jimmy's first Jemmy from Hong Kong.

Hello.

His first live chat since his birthday.

Oh. So when was your birthday?

It wasn't last Sunday, was it?

I don't think so anyway, but

happy birthday for whenever that was.

We missed that. One.

So please tell us when your birthday was.

Jemmy in Hong Kong. Very nice.

So what excitement have you got in store, Mr.

Duncan, for today's.

How long are we on for, by the way? Today.

About an hour.

About an. Hour. I've already told you this.

I know.

I was for everybody else.

Well. Well, he doesn't know.

No one cares, really, how long we're on for as long as we're here.

We are here.

And we are here not just today, but also on Saturday

and on Sunday as well.

And next week we will be popping up

during the month of December, doing some some special thing.

Are you on tomorrow?

No. Oh, okay.

No, not here tomorrow.

I just said we're back on Saturday and Sunday.

It's Saturday.

And of course because Saturday we've got something special lined up haven't we Mr..

Don't we all, we all talk about that.

Well I've already mentioned that.

I just mentioned it.

Good, good.

And then when Christmas fair

is coming up on Saturday

and we will be there live, hopefully

it all depends on whether we can get a signal.

And also, if we if we don't get beaten up by someone as well, hopefully.

But yes, we are at the much Wenlock Christmas fair on Saturday and

I'm excited to be

honest and the reason why I'm so excited is because we will have a chance once again to sample

some of that lovely junk food

that they serve every single go.

Yeah, beef burgers, hot dogs.

I still don't know why they call it a hot dog. Why?

Maybe it looks like a sausage dog.

You know, one of those dogs with a very long bodies and short legs.

I'm not sure it's a sausage in a bun, but they call it a hot dog.

We don't know where the dog where where the dog bit comes from.

That's what I mean. Maybe it means it's awful meat. Yes.

Well, that's the point I'm making. It's very strange.

It's something you eat.

Actually has the word dog in the name.

Yes. And it's effectively pork.

So it's not dog meat.

But yes, we will be there.

If the weather is good, we will be live.

But we, Mr. Duncan, if not, we will record it.

Even if it's snowing, even if the wind is blowing and it's freezing cold, we will be there.

You will have a chance to watch two people freeze

to death live on YouTube, so don't miss it.

On Saturday from 2 p.m.

we will be live at the much Wenlock Christmas Fair.

Claudia is working so she won't be able to be there live.

But you'll be able to watch it later.

Yes, hopefully.

And we'll probably show excerpts on on Sunday as well

from all the fun that we will have at the fair on Saturday.

It should be very good fun, miss. I'm looking forward to it.

I'm not sure what to wear.

What shall I wear?

Lots, lots of warm. Clothes, lots of clothes.

I seem to remember from previous because I think the weather's going to be pretty

much as it is today, which is virtually no wind.

We've had no wind.

No well, at least outside we've had no wind for several days.

There's a sort of northeasterly wind

and it's a sort of light breeze.

It's been very foggy, very misty, very November.

I would say this is like November weather rather than December.

But yeah, it's I'd like to be in Italy.

Francesca says

that it's not so cold in Rome at the moment,

so I'm sure it will be a lot more pleasant.

But of course they did have some terrible weather last week and that caused

a landslide on one of the Italian islands.

That was absolutely terrible, terrible pictures.

But what I noticed also they mentioned a few times in the report,

I don't know how true it is, but many of the buildings were actually built illegally.

So maybe that's one of the reasons why some of the buildings didn't survive.

But, yes, a terrible, terrible event that took place last week.

And the weather at the moment here

is not too bad, but it's going to be cold on Saturday.

It's going to really feel as if winter is in the air.

I think so.

Rajinder Singh is says hi from India

good evening rather so it must be evening time there which probably.

Yes, that will make sense.

You're ahead of us.

Seven, probably 5 hours or so, I would think.

Or more, yes.

I would imagine it must be about maybe ten or 11:00 at night.

It must be so.

Thank you for watching.

Is that quite a few people on that I didn't recognise today.

Probably because we on on a different day

and maybe some new people are finding us.

So yeah, fantastic.

Some names that I don't recognise.

So yeah, please feel free to

write things in the live chat.

We love to hear what you're thinking and feeling

as we progress through this lesson today.

It feels very odd being over here. Mr. Duncan.

Yes, I'm sort of I'm having to hold up a pad over some writing on the back of this.

Okay. All right.

That's interesting.

I Mr.

Duncan's written things on the back of this pad, so I'll have to be careful not to hold it up.

So, yes, I haven't got a table to write on.

Maybe we can fix that for Sunday.

Mr. Duncan. I'm not moaning. I'm not moaning.

Just, you know, I feel a little out of place stuck in this corner by the toilet.

I spent the whole day well

with your with your stomach at the moment.

I did notice this morning because yesterday last night, Mr.

Steve made the most amazing meal with lentils, potatoes

and and every vegetable that exists on this planet.

And to be honest,

it's really made my stomach very active.

And also Mr.

Steve's stomach as well. Definitely.

I left the skins on the potatoes, which is supposed to be good for you.

Yeah, we had lentils with brown rice, broccoli,

uh, potatoes with the skins left on.

So, as you can imagine, that's a lot of fibre. Yes.

So those little bacteria to work on in our guts.

So, as I said, it's not windy outside, but it is definitely windy inside.

Yes, inside, inside.

Mr. Steve's inside.

Mr. Steve's underpants.

From 7:30 p.m. in India.

Okeydokey, says Rajendra said.

Thanks for that. So what time is it here? How far to?

About 5 hours. About 5 hours ahead?

Yeah, it's about halfway to Malaysia, which is 8 hours ahead.

So that's that's about right.

I can see Mr.

Duncan, it's quite strange looking at you from this.

I can actually look at you and you can look at me. Yes, I know.

I'm not sure I like that. Really.

I can actually look straight into Mr. Steve's.

I can see if I'm getting upset or unhappy about something you've said.

Which happens virtually all the time.

Well, so far, so good.

As I was mentioning earlier, Steve, it is already December

this year has gone by so fast.

And you know what they always say?

You know what they say, Steve?

What?

You have to look at me.

I can't see it.

Time flies when you're having fun.

Time flies when you're having fun.

Apparently, this is what a lot of people say when they are having a good time somewhere

and then they realise that it's actually later than they thought.

And people will often say time flies

when you're having fun.

So that can only mean that if you're not having fun,

would you say that the opposite?

Definitely. Mr. Duncan. Definitely.

So how would you express that?

Uh, I don't know.

We need to think of a nice sort of rhyming

passage that will describe

the feeling that time seems to lag or seems to slow down.

If you're doing something that you don't enjoy, you could like work. Yes.

At school or something like that.

I in fact, we are discussing with a colleague

today about work

and how when it's boring,

how time seems to drag out

and it just, you know, when you're bored,

you can watch the clock, the hands seem to almost go backwards.

Yeah, but yes, when you're having fun and you're not thinking or worrying about anything,

time seems to go faster

when you're bored or you are unhappy.

Time seems to go slower. I think so.

Why do we need a rhyme?

It doesn't necessarily have to be a rhyme.

Because this isn't a rhyme.

It doesn't rhyme. It's just a proverb.

Time flies when you're having fun.

So you might say that time drags

when you're not having fun.

Time drags it goes slowly.

So you you actually used a pretty good word there, Steve.

Drags. Drags.

It feels like it's something's holding it back,

slowing it down. Yes.

But yet doesn't the time seem to drag but drag it?

In fact, we sometimes we sometimes joke, don't we, Steve? Yes.

Well, what if we realise that the day is not going as fast as we thought?

Maybe we think that it's 4:00, but then when we look at the clock, it's only 2:00.

Yeah. And normally we have a little joke with each other.

We normally say the day, this day today is dragging.

Yeah.

Even though it isn't, because we're actually secretly, we're relieved

that the day is not coming fast.

We're actually glad that we still have a lot more time of the day to enjoy.

But yes, it's a good phrase to use if time seems to be going slowly.

Oh, isn't the day dragging?

Isn't the day dragging or isn't the evening dragging?

Or isn't this meeting dragging? Hmm.

It just means it's going on for longer than you would imagine.

Yeah. Something happens in your mind when

you're bored or you're not

switched on to something that you're doing or watching.

You can be watching a film maybe, and it's boring.

The time seems to drag and it's almost a feeling, isn't it?

It's a palpable feeling that you have

when time seems to be dragging.

Yes, it's a good phrase to use, Mr. Duncan.

Oh, we're having that feeling now.

Well, I certainly hope not, Mr. Duncan.

I hope that our viewers don't feel that time is dragging

or we'll be losing them quite rapidly.

Good.

Thank you for drawing attention to it.

So time flies when you are having fun, when everything is good,

it seems to go rather fast, I suppose.

Also now, since you stopped working, Mr.

Steve, this is a serious question, by the way.

A very serious. Question. Yes, yes.

Very serious.

I'm being serious.

Now, you want me to think?

Do you find that time is going

faster or slower since you stopped working.

About the same?

I would say, because

I'm not getting up till 11:00.

That's not true now.

So I've got a lot of jobs that I have given myself to do.

So even though I'm not doing the job as such,

I am still doing lots of tasks,

things around the house, things in the garden.

I write things down, the night before.

I've always done this that I want to do that particular day because I find if I write

something down, then it's almost like my brain

is is constantly reminding me that I wrote down.

I said that I would do those things today and I find I achieve a lot more

if I write things down almost like a list of goals.

It could be anything.

It could be, you know, write email to a friend.

It could be

dig weeds out of garden

or check the level of oil in tank.

I just write everything down and then I like to cross them off my list as I go through the day.

And then at the end of the day, it feels like I've achieved something.

So at the moment I haven't run out of things

to put on my to do list.

That's what you call it, isn't it?

If you a list of things that you want to do that day.

Yes, you call it a two to do list

and t0da to do list.

Things that you. Want to.

Do, things that you want to do, or things that must be done,

I think so.

They say time goes faster the older you get.

Oh, that's what they say. Yes.

But then I don't know if that's true or not because.

Well, apparently scientists have worked out why we feel that way, because,

of course, many of your memories of your life are not kept with you.

So most of the things and I always think this is slightly depressing, but most of the things

that have ever happened to you in your life,

you've actually completely forgotten about. They've gone.

And as you get older,

because those gaps are there,

when you look back, it seems the illusion is

that time has been much shorter

than it actually was in reality,

because your memory isn't able to store everything that you've done every single day.

Imagine all the things you do everyday. Steve Just.

Just simple things.

Having breakfast, getting up, doing certain things, going to the shops,

all of these events that happen every day and they take time.

You have to take time to do them.

But your brain isn't going to bother

storing all of that information because it's it's just routine, it's mundane.

So as you get older, because there are

those gaps in your memory,

because you don't remember all of the things you've done, the illusion

is that the time is much shorter and that that's really why

we tend to have more memories of our childhood.

Our childhood memories seem to always stay with us because at that time

you are absorbing more information, you're remembering more things.

But as you get older, of course, you don't need to keep learning and remembering things.

So what happens eventually is you have these strange gaps in your memory.

It's amazing that. What you're finding, you're getting it already, Mr. Duncan.

Now you're speaking from experience.

Well, yes, well, well, apparently this is what scientists are saying.

Because because it's a bit like having a videotape of your life, but it's been edited.

So if you edit out those bits that have been deleted

or not remembered by your brain, the videotape will be much shorter.

That's a bit scary, Mr. Duncan.

It is.

It's actually just an illusion, though.

So that's the comforting thing.

It is an illusion created because you don't remember everything in your brain.

It's like watching an edited film.

That's why it's important to carry on

doing things and being busy in your later years.

And as we know, Louis is a great example

of somebody who is always doing something, always

occupying his life with new things, and

despite being, let's say, a senior citizen

and finding his life full of new things,

new experiences coming on here onto the live stream.

And thus, hopefully he feels as though

his life is progressing at about the same speed as it always did.

And of course, I should say can I just say so young?

Can I just say Steve hello to Louis Osmond

is here today.

Louis says time goes faster as you get older.

He's saying that it goes faster.

Yes, maybe, maybe, maybe you're doing too much then you're not bored enough.

You need to get a bit bored and then time will pass more slowly.

But I think. It will appear to.

That is the unfortunate paradox I think of getting older

is that the you want to use your time effectively,

but then the time seems to go faster.

So there is a strange, almost like a paradox or an unfortunate

occurrence where the more busy, the busier you are, the faster time goes.

So I suppose people who have the lives and do little every day,

their lives must seem very long,

but not particularly exciting.

That is the paradox.

If you want to appear that your life is is

extending for longer, you have to be bored.

But then the life would be not very worthwhile.

So it's best probably to fill your life with lots of things.

Belarus's Claudia rather says

I have to look

at photographs to remember what I've been doing and that.

Yes, that's brings up an interesting point because Mr.

Duncan's films, everything is always photographing everything and filming things.

And what I've found is that if now I can look back

and see and remember things that I'd forgotten that I was doing.

So it's important.

I think I don't bother you see, I'm very, very poor

at, for example, keeping a diary.

Some people keep a diary of everything they've done every day

so that they can look back and that will jog their memory,

jog the memories, so that if you look at something like a photograph

and suddenly those events come back to my income, come back into your mind again,

it's just sometimes a photograph or something written down well.

Oh, yes.

Oh, yes.

I remember we did that, didn't we. Well, I.

Think the memory.

I think social media and we were talking about this the other day about people

who share things on their Facebook site or their Twitter feed.

And I think these days, social media

has become almost a sort of diary.

So people are saying or recording things they've done or showing photographs

and then, of course, because the website is always there,

we hope that the pictures and the memories are also there as well.

And it's very easy to check when those things happen because of the dates.

Maybe that's why I should get on social media, Mr.

Duncan, and put photographs on there just for myself so that I can remember

what I did a month ago or two months ago or three months ago.

It's a very good I hope I hope that.

Claudia, you remember how to how to fix people's teeth

when you somebody opens their mouth and.

Oh, I can't remember.

How do I how do I feel that that cavity?

Well, fortunately, that's why dentists take X-rays, you see.

So they've got a permanent a permanent reminder

of each patient's teeth.

I'm only joking.

This isn't good. We've already.

What time is it?

Yes, we've already managed to blast our way through nearly half an hour.

Yes, well, more than that. 35 minutes.

So since Mr.

Steve has retired or he's taking a rest

from working, you might say that you now have this

you time on your hands.

Yes, you have time on your hands.

I love this expression, actually, because it means that you can take it easy.

It's a very positive.

And I suppose it's it's a positive phrase

that tells us that we can take it easy today.

There is nothing more satisfying.

And I'm sure you will agree with me, Steve, there's nothing more satisfying than than working hard

and then knowing that you can take a rest at some point,

that you can have a little bit of time to yourself.

You have some time on your hands.

Time on your hands, yes.

That means you have spare time. Yes.

You would think that I had time on my hands, but so far it is not in fact, what I've been

thinking is what a lot of people who retire say,

even though I probably haven't retired, it feels like it that they imagine how they used to fit

in all the things that they used to do outside

work and be able to work at the same time.

Because I mean, I've been doing so many things in the garden and around the house

that I can't imagine how I could fit work in.

And of course, the answer what I used to do

is rush around at the weekends or in the evenings,

frantically trying to get those jobs

done that I wanted to do in the garden or around the house.

And that became quite a stressful thing because I would be trying to fit them all

in, jam all those jobs into the weekend, but now I don't have to, so it's quite good.

I can spread them out and be more relaxed.

Maybe I'm just spending longer on each task than I otherwise would have done.

Well, you certainly have given yourself some big things to do as well.

I mean, I have to say I'm pretty impressed.

And please make note that I am saying something nice to Mr.

Steve. You might notice I'm being very nice.

Remember this, must remember this and be.

Very nice to Steve today.

Have you noticed and I think you've done an amazing amount of work

in the garden planting those trees, for example.

It's incredible.

So now every day we can look out the window

and we can slowly see those trees growing,

getting taller, stronger

and over the next two or three years, Steve and also myself, we can

we can relax and watch those trees flourish.

Hopefully, hopefully, as long as the frost doesn't kill them, the beast from the east doesn't.

I might have to go out there and put some protective

matting around the top of the soil so that the frost doesn't get into the.

Yes, that's the only problem now, because winter's coming and small plants

maybe young trees,

they might have a difficult time if we have a very

strong or cold winter.

I'll go out there and put an electric blanket on them to warm the soil.

I have covered the soil in anyway.

That's a bit boring.

Yes. Yes, I will go on about my plants and.

I'm just I'm just saying is impress impressive how you've you've done all that work.

So you have been filling your time.

And I suppose that's another expression about time

you sometimes fill your time.

So that means you are doing something during that period.

So maybe you have afternoon where you have

very little to do, maybe you don't want to relax.

So instead you find something to do.

So instead of having time on your hands where you can relax,

maybe you find that you have some time that you want to fill you.

Fill the time you use the time for a thing.

Somebody might.

A neighbour or a friend might say, Oh, can you help me move house

or can you help me with some DIY in the house?

And you might say, well yeah, I've got time on my hands at the moment.

Quite happy to do that or help out as a charity.

Somebody might say, Oh, do you want to get involved in a charity?

Would you like to help

after school with the children?

And you might say, Well, yeah, actually I've got time on my hands at the moment.

I could I could help you with that.

It's a good phrase to use.

Also what you might say to somebody.

Oh, have you have you got any time on your hands at the moment to help me,

you know, move some boxes or some whatever it might be you might call up a friend.

So if you've got some time on your hand at the moment, I want to decorate a room and,

you know, would you be able to come and help me or something like that?

Well, you might you might ask a person when they are free,

so when they have some spare time.

So you ask a person if they are free

next weekend because you want them to help you with something.

Can I say hello to Carmen for today?

So who says I love your lessons very much?

I am from Brazil and I am 75.

But I love idioms.

I know a little Spanish and French, but

English is in the first place.

Oh, thank you.

Good afternoon, Mr.

Duncan and Mr. Steve.

Thank you, Carmen. It's very nice to see you here.

And I suppose it's a good moment to mention

that we are with you quite a lot during this month.

We are sharing the weekend with you on Saturday

we will be at the much Wenlock Christmas Fair, having some fun eating lots of

awful junk food,

but also delicious food.

Lewis says

Could anyone define the word eternity?

Isn't it a perfume?

But it's a pretty eternity.

Well, I suppose eternity is a little bit like infinity.

So the symbol, you know, the symbol

for infinity, it's like a number eight on its side.

That's right.

So you go on and on.

And the idea is the reason why the symbol is

an eight on its side is because you can go round and round.

It seems to go on forever.

So it's never ending.

You can go round and round and round and round forever.

So eternity is forever.

It's a very, very long time.

Yes. Well, it's it's it's you might even say it's never ending.

Yes, exactly.

And it's time that has no end.

So maybe you might say that

if you are if you are in love with someone, you might

you might pledge your love for someone

and you will say that your love will last

till the end of time or for eternity.

Indefinitely is another one,

although indefinitely can also mean

for a certain period until things change.

So it's not quite the same thing indefinitely.

It can mean for a long time, or it can mean

until those things change back to how they are.

But infinity or eternity

is is the concept of time

never ending, going on and on and on.

So you can sometimes think of eternity of just being a very, very long time.

But that wasn't me.

And you can use the word say, for example,

you're in a boring meeting at work.

You can say, oh, this meeting

is going on for an eternity.

And that's just indicating that it's going seemingly forever.

When is this meeting in Iran?

It's just it's like an eternity.

So you can use that that phrase to me in

just a very, very long time or almost immeasurably.

But it also is a perfume, a brand of Persia

by a certain celebrity whose name I can't remember.

But. Yes, and it just means a very, very long time.

Probably Infinite Eternity by Calvin Klein.

Calvin Klein. There we go.

But yes, it would have had a capital E, presumably

if it were referring to a particular person.

Yeah, but yeah.

Eternity.

Oh, this meeting is going on for an eternity.

Oh, this live streamed by Mr.

Duncan seems to be going on for an eternity.

That's true.

Yes. Which nobody, of course, would ever say.

But I'm just using that as an example.

Somebody said whose name I can't read because I think it's in Cyrillic. Hmm.

Why don't you speak about the World Cup?

Well, that's Arabic.

Yeah. Oh, Arabic. Sorry. Yes.

We can't actually read your name.

I can't read Arabic.

I do apologise.

And I know why.

I know why you want us to talk about the World Cup.

Because I suppose we should mention it briefly.

We're not big football fans, Mr. Steve and myself.

We don't really follow football as it is.

But I suppose it's worth mentioning that England did very well.

The other night playing Wales, and a lot of people predicted that they would win.

I think it would have been very embarrassing.

It would have been a disaster.

It would have been very embarrassing if England had not won that particular match.

So so there we've mentioned it now and.

We've mentioned it. Yes.

Yeah. I'm sort of we're not football fans.

We don't really follow it.

But at the same time, I am interested.

So I had a rehearsal the other nights, but when the England match was on, so I wasn't

I wouldn't have watched it, but somebody had it

on their phone, sort of sneakily looking at it while we were rehearsing,

we were all quite interested as to what was happening.

So yeah, I mean, feel free if you want to talk about it in the live chat, feel free to talk about.

I'm just wondering, I'm just wondering, Steve, whether it was more

from the political.

Yes. Could be. Yes.

Yeah. We know that there's a lot of.

So maybe maybe you were thinking that we weren't mentioning it of that.

But but no, we're just not very interested in football.

We have spoken about the controversies around the World Cup in previous live stream.

So we we have already spoken about that

and covered that subject because, Mr.

Duncan, if you're new to this channel, Mr.

Duncan is doing live streams quite regularly,

at least twice a week and through December, virtually every day.

Yeah.

So quite often we've already spoken about

certain current events, one of them being the controversies

around the World Cup I, Qatar.

I hope that during this month

we will be able to do around 20.

So I'm aiming my aim is to

do 20

live streams this month, including two next weekend, saturday.

We are live at the Christmas fair

freezing all of our little parts off.

So I think it might be quite cold next Saturday.

So yes, we will be wearing lots of clothes to be honest.

And Steve will be there as well. Yes.

Yes. Luis makes a point that you can't actually

when there is a saying, you can't define the word eternity.

I think he probably means you can't imagine what it would feel like

because we are time bound as human beings.

We don't live forever.

So we can only really think in terms of maybe

the average age is, what, 75?

So thinking beyond that is very difficult concept for us.

Maybe if you're a turtle or a sponge living in the sea

who live for a very long periods of time.

Turtles. Don't they live for 200 years or something.

Yeah. Well, did you say did you see the video?

There's a video at the moment going around the Internet of of a snapping turtle.

And this particular turtle is I think it's about 101 years old.

And it's the cat.

Now, if you imagine in your mind, what a 101 year old snapping turtle,

turkey turtle might look like,

that is the image.

That is exactly what it looks like.

It did look as if it was 101 years old, to be honest.

And we also found out why they're called snapping turtles,

because they snap they they try to bite or snap in everything they see.

So this is going by Beatrice.

Oh, she's going to watch the rest of it later.

She got a medical exam.

So thank you for sharing that with this.

Good to have a check-up to make sure that you are in perfect health so that your

your life can continue for much longer.

That's then

that's one way of looking at it. Yes.

So Beatrice's time on this earth hopefully will be a lot longer

because she's had a medical examination

and might pick up something that needs attending to.

You have such a way with words.

Oh, yes, that's it.

That's why I'm on. Hey, Mr. Duncan. Yes?

I got your check-ups.

All right, and we'll see you maybe on Saturday.

What else are we going to talk about today, Mr. Duncan?

Oh, we have lots of things to talk about, Steve.

When a person puts on a performance and I always like to think

that this is a type of performance which you say.

I don't know what you mean, Mr. Duncan.

That's not performing there.

That's just that's just shouting.

I know. I'm just joking.

Performing and performing.

Now, that's one of the things I used to always say about teaching.

If you're standing in a classroom in front of lots of

sometimes very hard to please

students staring at you, you might find that you have to put on a bit of a show.

So I always think teaching is a little bit like performing.

You are standing on a stage in front of your audience,

except you are not in a theatre,

you are actually at the front of a classroom

and your audience, all the students.

So I think sometimes teaching is a little bit like

putting on a show.

I think so, yes.

You've got to you've got to be doing something that is probably not

the way you would normally behave, even if you have to.

Whenever there's a group of people and you have to say something in front of that group of people,

you have to put on some kind of performance.

You have to do something above and beyond what you would normally do

if you just talking to, say, a friend 1 to 1. Yes.

Otherwise it gets a bit boring for people.

You might even have to exaggerate

slightly to do that.

So I always think that you need whatever you're doing if you are,

I suppose if you're giving a lecture or maybe if you are doing a presentation.

Steve I can tell you a little story here.

I remember way back in was it 2009 team,

we went to Paris and Steve was called in

because we were actually having a lovely free trip from your company, weren't we?

But somebody that I no longer worked for.

Steve had to give a speech.

You you had to give a presentation

because you'd been awarded a prise.

Of a yes, probably.

Were you there? I can't remember. I wasn't at the presentation.

No, I was standing on a street corner in Paris.

That's right.

Doing a live. Stream showing that easy.

Yes, I was.

No, I wasn't on the chancellor's.

I are you about your by the hotel. That's correct.

That's it. Yeah.

And I stood on the street corner but Steve had to give this presentation

and you had to talk about why I you were so great at your job and you had to.

I remember you, you being rather annoyed because you really wanted to rest

and walk around Paris, but instead you have to give a presentation.

But they always seem to like you doing it.

Don't know.

I don't know why, but anyway, that was interesting.

I was speaking to somebody today

a an ex

colleague of mine that left a couple of years ago and went to work for another company.

So I used to work for a French company

and, you know, great company to work for.

And he's now and he worked for the same company as I did for many years.

He went to work for an American company, and he said the difference in

when they have to go to conferences,

sales, conferences was immense.

He said.

When when you used to, because I've never worked for an American company,

I've only ever worked for a French company.

Well, for the last 26 years

and I always thought our conferences were quite relaxed.

It would be a bit of, you know, bosses presenting from the front

and a few workshop ups, but then you would get quite a lot of time to yourself

to explore wherever you were and maybe go for drinks with colleagues and things.

So work wouldn't start just sort of 9:00 in the morning and we'd be finished by sort of four.

And sometimes it was just the morning.

It was quite relaxed, very continental, very French.

And he's now working for this American company.

And he said, when you go to conferences at this company,

they start at 8:00 in the morning, they go through to 6:00 at night.

And it's constant lectures from bosses

and this, that and the other workshops.

And they're doing sort of twice as much

and they don't get any time to the sounds at all.

Yeah.

So he said he had to go to Athens

last month for a work conference

and was there for three days and didn't even go outside the hotel.

They only had like an hour off an evening.

So what's the point of going all the way there?

Well, and but that just shows you the difference between

when I said to him, well, were you achieving a lot more?

If you were doing a lot more than you would have done

when you were working with a French company we used to work for.

Were you achieving a lot more were you doing more practise selling?

Did you learn a lot more?

And he said, no, absolutely nothing.

He said, because most of the lectures were just from the front.

So it was you sitting there all day with various people

coming on giving lectures, and of course you get bored and you switch off.

Yeah.

And it's point this information about how the company is doing in

some of the far flung country you're not interested.

So yeah the relaxed approach

and giving you time off to get to know colleagues and socialise

was a much nicer experience working for the French company.

And I suppose that's one of the things we always think about with

the French culture is a lot more relaxed

and laid back in certain situations, whether it's family,

social gatherings or I suppose also in the workplace as well.

You might find a very similar situation.

We only have 5 minutes Steve.

That's what used to annoy me quickly about and Brexit, Mr.

Jim was that people were, you know, in this country that a lot of the people

who wanted to leave Europe were saying, oh, we to be British, British.

And I used to keep saying to them, well, you look at France, Germany, Italy,

all the other countries in Europe, the French people aren't any less French,

the German people aren't any less German.

Just because they're in the EU, they're still French, they're still German.

Didn't make any difference.

We wouldn't have been we were never any different.

So that was it was a pointless argument. But there we go.

The culture is is is not going to go away.

It's always going to be there and it's vital.

And in 5 minutes that we've got.

Mr. Juncker 5 minutes, it seems that time has flown.

Mr. Duncan.

Well, everyone's life experience is different.

No one has the same life.

You might meet a random person in the street and find out all sorts of things

about the world that you didn't know just from their own experiences.

So I often think that culture is not groups of people.

Quite often you can find, culture can be an individual.

One person can offer a lot to other people just from their own personal experiences.

But it's much easier.

It's much easier to group people together.

I think that's true.

I think it's easier to group people together and just say

that is the society that is the group of people.

But within those groups, there is a lot of individuality.

People who have their own experiences.

So we all have something to offer each other.

But I think these days we've become a little bit too obsessed

with that sort of thing where we put people into groups.

And if you appear to have a certain

point of view, then you are immediately placed in that group.

But I think we all have things to offer.

We are all individuals and each one of us,

maybe each one of us has our own culture, our own way

of perceiving the world around us.

We've got Mary here from Canada that moment as well.

Mary Fir Yes, we've got all sorts of new people as well

from Iraq.

We've got Shehab Ahmed from

Iraq, lots of new people to take us here.

Of course, Beatrice has gone, I think, hasn't she?

F f h h knew you would like to know

who small f small little angels like Jesus.

Okay, Steve.

Question.

This is this is how the closing moments of our show is going.

Oh, I thought you might carry on for a bit longer.

Sometimes we extended we never seem to be going up.

Seemed to be more people joining Mr. Duncan.

Okay.

Okay.

Thanks for bringing that to us.

So when you put on a performance, we often say that you should give a little bit

more exaggerate slightly, maybe give it some sparkle.

Do you like that, Steve Sparkle?

I like a few sparkles. Mr.

Sparkle is a great word because you might say that it's something that is flashing

or has lots of lights or maybe something that is flickering sparkle.

But also if you are putting on a performance, if you are performing in some way,

you might need to have a little bit of energy as well, some sparkle.

You bring something extra

to the performance, another one.

And I like this one, Steve, especially during the early part of the year

when we have all of the awards ceremonies.

Glitz, glitz.

I like that one as well.

So glitz when people are attending

an important function or a dinner party

or maybe there is an award ceremony taking place, we often use the word.

Glitz, not with Hollywood.

When they're doing the Oscars glitz.

It just is a way of making something seem more than it is

glitz and sparkle.

Maybe the more glitz and sparkle you have, sometimes

the less substance there is in the subject that's being talked about.

Because really, I mean, awards ceremonies for films.

I mean, I know films are we like to watch films, but

it's real life, is it?

I mean, I'm being conservation.

So I mean, you're not talking about yeah.

So you've got to sort of make it glitzy and sparkly

and all of the the ladies have nice

have dresses on that make them look

stand out from the crowd

and they might have a hat on at a jaunty angle

hat or they might have lots of glitter on.

And because something like the Oscars, it's an event that I mean,

it's really nothing going on, is that I mean, it's awards for a film.

I mean, and so you have to make it seem more than it is.

Well, isn't that just. What it.

Is? Show business when you think about it?

Yeah, show business is just everything is exaggerated.

And I think it's it's much harder now to keep people's attention.

And that's one of the reasons why the Internet is is the place

where people go now for their their quick fix, because quite often

you can watch something that just lasts for a few seconds.

Now, if you go over to Tik Tok, the average video is is around about 10 seconds.

So it's amazing.

But I think, yes, sometimes it's very hard to capture people's attention.

He's another another one razzmatazz.

Oh, right. Oh, yes. I like that word.

When you think of showbusiness razzamatazz, you have to put on a performance.

You have to give it slightly more than you would you would in real life.

When you talk to people in real life, you might say that it's it's it's a normal

moment or maybe not particularly interesting,

but when you are putting on a performance, you have to have a little bit of razzmatazz.

Lots of lights, lots of music, that sort of

upbeat music, glitter lights,

sound, lots of things to distract you.

Razzmatazz.

Yes, it's often use in I mean, if you're giving a speech at work

or a performance, you've got to do a presentation somewhere

they don't.

People just want boring slides with with sort

of just bullet points all the way through.

You've got to if you want to engage people and get people's interest,

you've got to add some spark or a bit of razzmatazz

or something, because if you haven't got people's attention,

you might be convey saying the most

wonderful information to a group of people.

Important, wonderful information.

But unless it's done in a way that is engaging to the audience,

then they are switch off

and won't take in that information.

So you have to do something.

You have to bring something out of yourself to make that information come across in a way.

And what they say is that if you want your presentation to have impact

and impactful presentation,

you want to engage all the senses. Hmm.

So you want you want the sound.

You want people's hearing to be engaged.

You want the visuals to be engaged,

particularly when you're doing it.

It's difficult to get your taste in. Yeah.

Yes. Your sense of smell may, you know, if you're doing a presentation,

but certainly you want something to capture the attention. Yes.

To because then people's senses are heightened.

And when your senses are heightened and your interest is there,

then you will be more likely to take that information in.

And information just from sound

isn't necessarily going to go into your brain and be easy to remember.

That's why speaking. Visuals sound. Like Steve.

Engaging all the senses. Yeah.

That's why it's hard to give speeches.

I think there are many people who who can remember words

and give a speech, but they don't make it particularly interesting for you.

So I can think of lots of people who I could listen to for hours and hours.

I suppose one of my favourites must be Christopher

Hitchens is sadly no longer around, but he he has the most amazing

or had the most amazing ability to convey his thoughts

and feelings and never, never in a dull way.

So he's he's a he's one of those people I always think of.

So it is very hard to convey information,

especially if you are giving a speech and people are sitting watching you.

So sometimes you do have to turn on

a little bit of that charm.

Of course, if you're really some people naturally have that.

If you're if you really deeply believe in the subject you're talking about, normally

you'll be excited about it and you will,

you know, that will be that will come across to the audience.

I speak as a people.

They don't necessarily add any glitz or glamour to their presentation,

but it's because they're so sincere about what they're talking about.

Then you remember it and it becomes very engaging to watch.

Talking of things that are engaging.

We will be with you on Saturday and we will be with you from 2 p.m.

UK time on Saturday with

a live stream

from the much Wenlock Christmas Fair.

Definitely that's what we are doing on Saturday.

We will be part of it.

It will be very interesting to find out what actually happens because the weather

and also hopefully we will get a mobile signal so we can actually do it.

So we will see what happens.

It's time to say goodbye, but we will be back with you on Saturday.

It will begin

at 2 p.m. on Saturday.

I think we will just keep it the same.

Even though we are at at a live event,

we will keep it in the same form and we be with you from 2 p.m.

on Saturday.

Life at the Much Wenlock Christmas Fair.

Thank you. Mr. Steve.

Okay, Mr.

Duncan.

Bye by Sea Rule and I shall be joining Mr.

Duncan on Saturday. So I'll see you.

I shall see you there at 2 p.m.

as well. Maybe we can. Some glitz and glamour

to make up for

the boring, staid Christmas fair that is in much Wenlock.

But it's it's not really it's not really it's quite exciting.

It'll be it'll be interesting because it's a sort of a cultural

event, it's a sort of a local event.

So it will hopefully be quite engaging for you

to see what people do in the country in much.

Wenlock Around Christmas time, yes, it's a cultural event.

I think we've we don't want to build it

up too much just in case it is it is very boring.

The music will be dancing anyway, all sorts of things.

We've got to go, Steve.

But Mr. Duncan, see you on Saturday.

Thank you, Steve.

And there he goes.

Make make the most of those last moments

as you're looking at the handsome face,

those those eyes drawing you in.

Thank you, Mr.

Steve.

And there he was. Mr.

Steve was here and now he is not.

See you on Saturday.

I will be with you from 2 p.m.

UK time and of course until the next time we meet.

You know what's coming next? Yes, you do

enjoy the rest of your Thursday

and I hope December will be a good month for you.

And of course...

ta ta for now.