3.5 HOURS of English Conversation Practice - Improve Listening Skills

let's work on your English listening skills  you're about to hear a real unscripted unedited  

conversation between me and my friend Nikki we're  both from the UK and the topic of our discussion  

is holidays and traveling enjoy so Nikki we  recently went camping not not me and you but my  

family went camping just for a weekend as a kind  of uh like a taster to see how we as a a family  

with young children coped with camping I went  camping as a kid I'm sure you did as well um but  

I've not done it as an adult with young children  and I always thought that it might be quite a  

stressful experience but you've kind of encouraged  me to give it a try because you're quite a  

seasoned camper aren't you yeah yeah we've um I  did go camping um they were all my family holidays  

existed of was camping um and then when I met  Neil my husband we went camping and then having  

children we went camping throughout cuz it was  affordable oh so that's the main that's the main  

draw probably yeah and there's also so many lovely  parts of this country to explore and my husband  

loves going on walks and Hikes and climbing and  stuff like that so he's very outdoorsy isn't he he  

is yeah and um so going to cornall and all around  the South Coast we've done a lot of that have you  

ever had any like horrific camping experiences  that have made you go maybe camping's not for me  

anymore yeah that's usually to do with the weather  right we've had quite horrific storms when we've  

been camping in cormal yeah on on the clifftop  and you know very windy lots of rain and when  

it's windy if you've got a tent that's got very  fine thin canvas it flaps and that's very noisy  

and we changed our tent and we got um we were in  a trailer tent and that was quite old school heavy  

canvas um Iron well metal poles and so there was a  lot of squeaking and rocking and stuff so that was  

um it's very noisy and then you get the flooding  as well if things are touching the side or we were  

down we were always camping down downhill a bit so  the floods would come down and get the run off of  

all the rain water yeah yeah I would have thought  that by now now that thing about you know touching  

the side of the tent so if you're inside the tent  and you touch the side of the tent um anyone who's  

been camping will know it can let the rain water  actually come in which is a bit of a nightmare  

when you're using blow up beds we've got these  enormous blowup beds so when we went camping  

recently uh our beds were really pushing out on  the sides and unfortunately in our three nights  

I think it was that we were camping we did have  thunderstorms um and so that's always a concern  

but I would have thought by now technology would  have moved on so that tents now don't have that  

but I guess it's about it being breathable I don't  know yeah cuz even if it hasn't rained you've got  

condensation as well and you only I think because  of the Brea in and the body heat and then the  

difference in the air temperature from night  um you touch the sides and it can be wet coming  

through yeah I remember going to um Aken kagua  which is a mountain in Argentina I think I've got  

that right I went there I was there um and we we  were walking up to a base camp there and a little  

beyond that and so we had to stay overnight maybe  we had two nights on the mountain side and we were  

in these uh big teepee tents and it was well set  up it was this huge tent and within the tent it  

could sleep about 16 people and there was like all  sorts of different hikers there from all over the  

world and Nick and I this is like our first coup's  Adventure um um and they had bunk beds set up just  

very basic bunk beds not very comfortable and you  would just like grab a bunk bed uh with your so  

all open plan all open plan just beds beds in the  middle and beds all around the outside and that  

thing you said about condensation was what we  like had to deal with on the two nights we were  

there there were a couple of beds that seemed  like they were the best beds in the house um  

we're like why is no one taking these beds these  are like really like prime location in the right  

part of the tent but we realized you know you  throwing your stuff on and they were quite wet  

and you're like oh why are they wet what's going  on here let's choose another bed um but then in  

the night there were these pools of condensation  from all the breathers in the tent because there  

you know maybe 10 bodies there it's really cold  outside cuz it's snowy there's like a glacia there  

and there's snow on the mountain so it's cold  that's all this condensation in this in this tent  

just meant in at some point in the night you had  this drip drip drip and you might have to change  

bed because you're getting covered in someone's  breath pretty gross um but yeah so you your bad  

experiences have always kind of hinged on if it  was bad weather the weather really yeah and do you  

ever go camping like as a romantic thing just you  and Neil or is it always a big family and friends  

kind of venture uh well before we had children  we did go camping together in the Lake District  

and then off to Blackpool for a couple of nights  and it's nice because if youve got a small tent  

and you're very basic camping yeah you can pack  down and go off somewhere else and um but I think  

if I wanted romance now I'd probably go a bit more  deluxe and maybe glampin or a caravan um not a  

caravan a camper van all right okay so five years  ago for our 20th wedding anniversary we hired we  

got a train to Edinburgh and then hired a camper  van and traveled the west side of Scotland very  

which was lovely and that was again you you  pitched somewhere every night you could pitch  

up on the roadside by a lake or a lock um or you  could go to a campsite as well yeah and do you do  

you hook up do you need to hook up or like do you  have like toilet stuff that you have to empty or  

how does that stuff work so if you are on the road  side it is pretty basic so you you squat by the  

find a bush somewhere yeah um but you've got  your electric and gas on board so you don't  

need Electric hookup oh right so you have  like a gas canister yeah right okay if it's  

just for one night but and then when the the  van is running we're charging our phones and  

things so um that that was fine but every  now and then you know you wanted a decent  

shower and a bit of luxury when you're going to  the L so you would go on a campsite yeah yeah  

very nice I've not done a camper van we we thought  about it and you can just hire them on like Airbnb  

you can hire them go travel to a place hire a  van do what you did just travel around an area  

and bring it back I think that might be a good  option yeah um and glamping is certainly well it's  

a new it's like a fad isn't it although I think  it's you know here for the long term yeah which  

is just like glamorous camping glamping they tend  to be like um yur is the word for these more kind  

of uh long-term permanent tent structures they're  still canvas but they're more permanent often made  

with put up with what wooden poles and you have  a little bit of luxury in there so there might  

be electricity provided proper bed a bed which is  really important and then maybe like a rug or some  

sort of flooring within so you're not just on the  like dirt floor uh so that's that's the glamour  

that's as far as it goes um so you're obviously  really into camping which I always found initially  

quite surprising because you're quite a glamourus  I would say you know yeah well you always like you  

have nice clothes and you always like present  yourself really nicely you come across as like  

well caring about how you work you wear nice  jewelry you always do your hair really well  

and um you know you visit the hairdresses often  you like to treat yourself um and so I always  

thought that that was a bit of a a disconnect  because you you seem you know like you prefer  

like a fstar hotel where you'd be pampered but  do you ever do that kind of stuff do you do the  

hotel holidays and I've never done a hotel holiday  with my family right um with children or or with  

extended family so I've been on a city break and  stayed in a a lovely place or apartments and we've  

done holidays abroad where we've stayed in Villas  right but I've never apart from our honeymoon I've  

never done allinclusive Hotel high-end Hotel it's  always like self catering yeah so this year we're  

going to Santorini and we're staying in two places  on the island and it's breakfast included right um  

but there isn't anywhere to cook so we can't shop  we and cook we which I'm fine with because I don't  

want to do shopping and cooking and washing up so  um yeah we'll just be eating out there'll be some  

lovely places I'm sure okay and do you avoid the  all inclusive holidays because of the cost no it's  

more because my husband doesn't want to be tied  to one hotel providing the food if the food's not  

great right and you've you feel like you've got to  stay there then because you've paid for it within  

the holiday cost but you can get some hotels that  have got like 12 restaurants and all different you  

know different areas different types of food but  l a variety yeah choose from yeah I've never done  

that yeah I I haven't but for me it's always  been because of the cost um I've always kind  

of tried to look for budget friendly options when  going on holiday so often like last minute deals  

or sometimes half boarded or bed and breakfast if  we're doing a hotel or when we went to Argentina  

it was literally just going from hostel to hostel  uh I don't think I do that these days as you get  

older you think you have yeah what is it like  less patience or you just want a little bit more  

security when you're traveling yeah especially  when you've got a family with you as well yeah and  

then when you're even older still and you haven't  got family and like Neil and I are just starting  

to Holiday without our children we want a bit more  luxury now so we can go to from extremes so we  

would go camping and really rough it but we would  also we've been looking at um holiday holiday  

with jacuzzi on the balcony or you know hot  tubs and private swimming pools and stuff so  

yeah there's a nice flip side to having a bit  of luxury now and again hot tubs are the the  

rage at the moment aren't they I think even in  Center Parks you can just get your normal like  

Lodge or a luxury Lodge with a hot tub it's like  you have to have a hot tub to make your holiday  

super I had a holiday in Center parks for my 40th  birthday and decided to spend that extra cash  

get a hot tub but for the whole week that I was  there for my 40th birthday it was really bad  

weather so I remember being like come on everyone  in the evening once the kids were asleep to my  

mom my dad my partner Nick like come on get your  swimming costumes on we're going outside in the  

hot tub and they're like Anna it's really stormy  and cold like yes but I paid for it we're going  

to enjoy it and it's hot when you get in it's just  cold when you get out it was lovely it was lovely  

but it was it was quite unusual M so we've got a  hot tub in Santorini a really nice big shaped hot  

tub but um I'm I'm assuming that if it's so hot  you can also have it cold yeah to refresh you you  

wouldn't want to be getting in a hot tub middle  of the summer in Santorini so I think they're more  

in those hot places I think they're more for like  the evening aren't they for just in the evening on  

watching the sunset yeah yeah that would be nice  and so Neil is really he's he's really outdoorsy  

isn't he we said that he likes going out hiking  and stuff like that have you accompanied him on  

these kind of really adventurous like hikes  and trips CU he does a lot of weekends away  

doing like camping and things yeah so he kind of  knows my limits so he wouldn't take me to probably  

Snowden or something like that he takes my younger  daughter she can keep up with him I would I can't  

do a few flights of stairs so really without um  you know needing to break and have a pause to get  

my breath back but I did climb oh what was it um  sir Arthur's Mount s Arthur's chair in Scotland  

yeah so that was like a mini Mountain some people  call it a hill but I I needed hiking sticks to get  

up walking sticks yeah um and I did find that  easier actually and also coming down there very  

useful and I think if I had those more on walk-in  holiday or hikes um it would be easier yeah I use  

those Nick and I use those when we are when we're  walking because especially when if it's like not  

steady underfoot if it's a little bit Offroad yeah  um and there's like loose stones and gravel and  

things then uh having sticks can really just help  you to keep your balance yeah especially me I get  

quite dizzy so is Neil does he has he got quite  a lot of patience when he's out walking with you  

on the occasions that he is does he kind of take  his time or is he always kind of saying come on  

keep up like cracking the whip um no I think he  is quite patient because he likes to look around  

and absorb what's around him as well and he loves  looking at the trees and or for foraging yeah when  

you you forage for different things he recently um  went on a Bushcraft kind of therapy course and he  

learned a lot about the different foods that you  could use like Nettles that you could use to make  

a healing or you can make soap with Nettles  you can make a healing ointment with I think  

it's Nettles as well which you wouldn't think  because they sting you if but you can actually  

eat them and they don't sting in your mouth um  nettle tea and different soup if you're out in  

the wild he loves he would love to do sustainable  living and living off grid like being Bear Grills  

kind of thing and yeah he would he really would  amazing when we went when we went on our um on our  

Argentina holiday we went up to what was the name  uh there's a really famous glacia and I'm just  

terrible for not to be not being able to remember  the name of it but there's a really famous glacier  

oh no that wasn't the one okay cut start again um  when we went to Argentina there was a day when we  

went to do a full day hike and at the end of I  think it was like a 5H hour walk there and at  

the end of it there's this big this big bowl  and a a glacia and it was beautiful it was a  

hard hike we got there and we took our little  buns and burner and our plan was to get there  

to get a chunk of ice and and and boil it down  to make cup of tea with glacial water which we  

did and then that was it that was our goal just  get there have glacial tea and then walk back um  

it was it was beautiful how was that tasting  just lovely I mean it's really you know it's  

really probably very old very old water um but no  I mean everything up there in the mountains tends  

to be a lot fresher than especially in London what  you get out the pipes here I Dre to think when we  

first moved into this house that we're in we had  a a lead pipe I don't know if you were aware of  

that we had a lead pipe which provided our water  and these days you're not supposed to have lead  

piping for your water because the lead seeps into  the water and it can give you lead poisoning uh  

and so when we had someone come around to check  our plumbing uh they said you realize you've got  

a lead pipe in the house for your water you need  to get that changed so we did yeah so I'm sure  

glacial ice provided much cleaner water than  we get out of the Taps yeah sure um any anyway  

coming back to holidays last question what is the  best holiday experience you've ever had can you  

pinpoint it we had so many it's hard to pick one  yeah I mean a holiday probably to remember for us  

was um Disney Disney World in Florida oh you went  to Disney World um yeah we did two weeks and that  

was when my oldest daughter who's nearly 22 she  turned nine while we were out there and I had a  

birthday out there cuz we're four days between  right um and we did a week well I can't remember  

what we did we but we we did Universal and the  Magic Kingdom and Epcot um and we stayed in a  

hotel not really a hotel um like apartments that  had a communal pool right um a bit out of the Park  

District and then we spent a couple of days in  Clear Water as well with the near the beach and  

stuff so that was that was lovely so that was just  the four of you that was the four of us your two  

daughters and it was exhausting yes is exhausting  your youngest daughter would have been she would  

have been nearly five right really for her yeah  um and it was lovely because there so there's four  

years between them um and the older one was old is  old enough to remember it and old enough to still  

be uh young enough to still be mesmerized by the  princesses and and she got glammed up in the bibid  

B boot Boutique and um and we went swimming with  dolphins for for for her birthday was that in one  

of the parks that was in Discovery Cove which is  like a special dolphin um place when you can swim  

with a stingr and the Sharks wow so that was  beautiful amazing um so that was lovely it was  

exhausting having two young children but it was  lovely to experience the magic through them yeah  

and to to I wouldn't like to do it now nowadays um  I can't remember any of the rides and the things  

like that but I just remembered like the parades  the fireworks um and the food was amazing really  

that's good cuz often I find with theme parks I  I feel like they fall down on the food especially  

the ones that we go to around here the not that  we're surrounded by theme parks but we um we  

we are in the South so there's quite a few theme  parks close by uh and it always tends to be that  

kind of very fast food kind of food that's kind of  mass-produced not very healthy yeah not very tasty  

stuff well I think we ate out in a few restaurants  and also we were in for ourselves in the evening  

so we didn't eat so much of Park food we would  make picnics and um take our own pack lunches and  

then come back and eat or eat out outside of the  Park yeah for that reason probably but I remember  

the portions being huge and I remember Lauren um  being given a pizza and then a cup of Parmesan  

cheese oh wow and there's a photo actually of  her but she said um do I have to eat all this  

cheese because she thought that was for her and  that was part of the meal but I said no that's  

just to shake on um but the yeah the portions were  huge but it was just lovely lovely experience yeah  

good but my favorite holiday aside of that would  probably be the tour in Scotland which I never  

thought I would have enjoyed t in Scotland in a  camper van um but we were really lucky to have  

some beautiful weather yeah and it was pre just  outside of the season with the midges all coming  

into so it was it was really lovely and it was  out of the school holiday so it wasn't so busy  

um beautiful beaches and every every turn that  we made or every Hill that we went over there  

was a different view so sometimes it felt like  we were in the Rockies yeah sometimes it felt  

like we we were just in film sets just it was  amazing and you never knew where you were going  

to sleep the next night because you're moving on  yeah so it was really good to to see a lot of it  

and different experiences yeah I spent a lot of  time tour in Scotland as an actress when I when I  

first left College uh maybe two three years and we  had the same like experience that even though it  

was you know the winter time there'd be days when  you know I think Sunny winter days are beautiful  

anyway uh you know it's crisp and the colors  are different uh but in Scotland it it's such a  

beautiful landscape they've got so much to offer  quite extreme Landscapes at times but it's also  

largely untouched the population is not very large  and and so there's lots of Countryside that's just  

as is and and the colors up there in like in the  AUG sorry in the Autumn and the winter are are  

stunning and we would be trying to find these  remote little primary schools to go and do our  

pantomimes to and be just finding these stunning  roads that we were driving along and amazing  

scenery and just thinking wow you know this  is this is really unexpected because you think  

Scotland in Winter you just think lots of rain  just endless Tor of rain yeah but but not always  

the case well anyway thank you for sharing all  your thoughts and and experiences for the holiday  

it's been a pleasure yeah it's taken me back to  some lovely memories yeah it's been nice now it's  

time to dive a little deeper into some of the  things that were said during that conversation  

let's start so Nikki we recently went camping not  not me and you but my family went camping just for  

a weekend as a kind of uh like a taster to see how  we as a a family with young children coped with  

camping I went camping as a kid I'm sure you did  as well um but I've not done it as an adult with  

young children and I always thought that it might  be quite a stressful experience but you've kind  

of encouraged me to give it a try because you're  quite a seasoned camper aren't you to describe  

someone as a seasoned something a seasoned camper  a seasoned traveler means that they have a lot of  

experience in doing that thing yeah yeah we've  um I did go camping um they were all my family  

holidays existed of was camping um and then when  I met Neil my husband um we went camping and then  

having children we went camping throughout cuz  it was affordable oh so that's the main that's  

the main draw the main drawer this is using the  word draw to encourage to entice to pull in if you  

draw something to you then you bring it in it's  not about taking a pencil or a pen and making a  

picture it's all about encouraging something to  come towards you so what draws you to a certain  

activity so I asked or I said rather that's the  main draw that's the main thing that makes you  

want to go camping probably yeah and there's also  so many lovely parts of this country to explore  

and my husband loves going on walks and Hikes  and climbing and stuff like that so he's very  

outdoorsy isn't he he is yeah to be outdoorsy I  think this is quite self-explanatory but it means  

that you are the kind of person who is very  comfortable and enjoys being outdoors doing  

outdoor kinds of activities you could be someone  who likes outdoor climbing or paragliding hiking  

mountain biking so if you're outdoorsy you enjoy  out outdoor activity are you outdoorsy and um so  

going um to cornal and all around the South Coast  we've done a lot of that yeah camping have you  

ever had any like horrific camping experiences  that have made you go maybe camping's not for me  

anymore yeah that's usually to do with the weather  right here Nikki said that's usually to do with  

the weather to do with this little phrase means  related to or that's what it's about so if I say  

why is your friend upset have I upset her then  you might say no no it's got nothing to do with  

you or what you said it's actually to do with her  family she's had a Fallout with her family so it's  

to do with it's related to connected to something  else um we've had quite horrific storms when we've  

been camping in cormal yeah on on the clifftop  and you know very windy lots of rain and when  

it's windy if you've got a tent that's got very  fine thin canvas it flaps and that's very noisy  

and we changed our tent and we got um we were  in a trailer tent and that was quite old school  

heavy canvas um Iron well metal poles here Nikki  described the old heavy canvas of a tent being  

old school if you describe something as old school  it's similar to being old-fashioned but it's got a  

sense of coolness to it so something in the past  was quite cool but it's still found occasionally  

today and it's still cool then we call it old  school for example if I decided to go out wearing  

fashion that was the fashion back in the '90s  and I was listening to some of the best songs  

on my Walkman then you might say wow Anna's pretty  old school and so there was a lot of squeaking and  

rocking and stuff so that was um it's very  noisy and then you get the flood in as well  

if things are touching the side or we were down  we were always camping down downhill a bit so  

the floods would come down and get the runoff of  all the rain water yeah yeah now here I said get  

the runoff of all the rain water the runoff when  talking about rain is when all the rain lands on a  

surface and it comes together and literally moves  moves off the surface where it's come together so  

for example the roof of a building when it rains  it rains all over the roof but the rain tends  

to roofs tend to be sloped because of rain and  there's usually guttering so there's usually some  

sort of open pipe that will collect the runoff so  the runoff is the movement of water usually we use  

this when talking about rain all the water moving  collectively after rainfall I would have thought  

that by now that thing about you know touching the  side of the tent so if you're inside the tent and  

you touch the side of the tent um anyone who's  been camping will know it can let the rain water  

actually come in which is a bit of a nightmare  when you're using blow up beds just in case you're  

not familiar with the term blow up bed is an  inflatable bed it starts off flat and you although  

you don't blow it up with your mouth usually you  have a foot pump actually are blowup beds you plug  

in press a button and it just goes and it  inflates we've got these enormous blowup beds  

so when we went camping recently uh our beds were  really pushing out on the sides and unfortunately  

in our three nights I think it was that we were  camping we did have thunderstorms um and so that's  

always a concern but I would have thought by now  technology would have moved on now here I said by  

now I thought that technology would have moved on  here the phrase of verb move on means to advance  

or progress you might say that food processing  technology hasn't moved on in the last decade I  

don't think that's true but if it were true if  food processing equipment hasn't progressed in  

10 years then you could say it hasn't moved  on or it has moved on quite considerably so  

the tents now don't have that but I guess it's  about it being breathable I don't know yeah cuz  

even if it hasn't rained you've got condensation  as well and you only I think because of the Brea  

in and the body heat and then the difference in  the air temperature from night um you touch the  

sides and it can be wet coming through yeah um  so I remember going to um aan kagua which is a  

mountain in Argentina I think I've got that right  I went there I was there um and we we were walking  

up to a base camp there and a little beyond that  and so we had to stay overnight maybe we had to  

nights on the mountain side and we were in these  uh big teepee tents and it was well set up it was  

this huge tent and within the tent it could sleep  about 16 people and there was like all sorts of  

different hikers there from all over the world and  Nick and I this is like our first Coupes Adventure  

um and they had bunk beds set up just very basic  bunk beds not very comfortable bunk beds if you're  

not familiar with this phrase refers to two beds  that are stacked one on top of the other these  

are very popular with children because if you have  a number of kids and you don't have enough rooms  

or much space within your house then you can put  two beds in a room and provide sleeping space for  

two children and you would just like grab a bunk  bed uh with your was it all open plan now Nikki  

asks if it was all open plan within this tent if  something is open plan we use this to describe  

lots of houses or accommodation open plan means  means that the rooms aren't really separated that  

you've got a big space that everyone is just in  and all the functioning areas are just open within  

that space so an open plan living area in the  downstairs of a house would mean that the kitchen  

and the dining and the living room area are not  separated by walls they're all in one big open  

space all open plan just beds beds in the middle  and beds all around the outside and that thing you  

about condensation was what we like had to deal  with on the two nights we were there there were  

a couple of beds that seemed like they were the  best beds in the house now this phrase might seem  

confusing because I said that these beds seemed  to be the best in the house when we talk about  

something being of the house or the best in the  house we're normally just saying it's the best in  

that space so for example when you go to a theater  or some sort of entertainment venue you then you  

might buy the best seats in the House ah these are  the best seats in the house or I can't believe you  

bought these seats they're the worst seats in  the house I mean it's a theater not a house but  

we still say the best seats in the house when you  are at a restaurant you could request house red or  

House White which means the red wine that is the  common red wine that they sell in that particular  

restaurant or their common default white wine  would be their house White um we're like why is no  

one taking these beds these are like really like  prime location in the right part of the tent prime  

location this phrase is often used when talking  about houses or accommodation prime location is  

like the best location either because it's the  most convenient or it's the most desirable maybe  

it's close to facilities that people like to be  close to like a gym or a nice park a river or a  

train station to commute into the local town town  I kind of sarcastically used this phrase to say  

that some beds were in the best part of the tent  the prime location of the tent but we realized  

you know you thrown your stuff on and they were  quite wet and you're like oh why are they wet  

what's going on here let's choose another bed now  here I used the phrase of verb go on I said what's  

going on here or what's gone on here to go on in  this context means happen often people will say  

what's going on or what went on yesterday there  was a lot of people hanging around on the corner  

of the street what went on or what was going on  during that time they're basically asking what  

happened what was happening tell me um but then in  the night there were these pools of condensation  

from all the breathers in the tent because there's  you know maybe 10 bodies there I talked about  

condensation from all the breathers here the  word breathers is not a typical way to refer  

to a group of people but here I'm just refering  referring to a group of people that are breathing  

condensation is where moisture in the air hits  a cold surface like a window and turns back into  

liquid so if you have moisture or water droplets  on the insides of your windows on a cold morning  

that's condensation it's really cold outside cuz  it's snowy there's like a glacia there and there's  

snow on the mountain so it's cold and so all this  condensation in this in this tent just meant in at  

some point in the night you had this drip drip  drip and you might have to change bed because  

you're getting covered in someone's breath pretty  gross um pretty gross this means very unpleasant  

or really disgusting pretty gross I also used  the phrase of verb hinged on to hinge on means  

that something that changes the balance it's  an important point that could flip the balance  

like like a hinge of a door a hinge will either  mean that a door is open or closed if a situation  

hinges on a specific Factor then it relies on that  factor to determine the outcome your experience of  

camping has always hinged on the weather that's  how I should have phrased that so the weather  

can either make it an amazing experience or a  terrible experience but yeah so you your bad  

experiences have always kind of hinged on if it  was bad weather the weather really yeah and do you  

ever go camping like as a romantic thing just you  and Neil or is it always a big family and friends  

kind of venture okay I used the word Venture here  instead of Adventure Venture just refers to an  

activity but it often has this sense of risk or  uncertainty attached to it so you might consider  

camping a bit of a venture you don't know if it's  going to be an amazing experience where the sun  

is shining every day it's the perfect temperature  and there's no wind and everything is wonderful  

or if it's going to be thunderstorms high winds  that will blow your tent away terrible rain that  

will wash your tent away it's a bit of Adventure  so there's risk involved in this activity uh well  

before we had children we did go camping together  in the Lake District and then off to Blackpool for  

a couple of nights and it's nice because if you've  got a small tent and you're very basic camping you  

can pack down and go off somewhere else and um but  I think if I wanted romance now I'd probably go a  

bit more deluxe and maybe glampin or a caravan  um not a caravan a camper van all right okay  

interesting here Nikki said the word Deluxe  Deluxe is another way of describing something  

that's luxury or like better than the standard  and glamping as I explained in the conversation  

is a combination of the word glamorous and camping  so it's a glamorous version of camping so 5 years  

ago for our 20th wedding anniversary we hired we  got a train to Edinburgh and then hired a camper  

van and traveled the west side of Scotland very  ni which was lovely and that was again you you  

pitched somewhere every night you could pitch up  on the roadside by a lake or a lock Nikki used the  

word pitch when talking about putting up the tent  to pitch or to pitch up is the verb that we use  

when talking about setting up your tent or your  camper van or your Caravan so where you decide to  

stop for a certain period is where you pitch and  that area is often known as your pitch so when you  

are going camping you will pay for a pitch and  when you arrive they'll say your pitch is over  

there and you go to your pitch and you pitch up  your tent um or you could go to a campsite as well  

yeah and do you do you hook up do you need to  hook up or like do you have like toilet stuff  

that you have to empty or how does that stuff work  now I use the phrasal verb hookup so to hook up  

when we're talking about camping is to connect  your electricity so particularly if you have a  

caravan or a camper van you will have electrics on  board in the actual vehicle and all you need to do  

is connect the main wires to the Main's electric  there'll be a Main's box box somewhere and then  

you are powered I recently went camping and we  decided to get a pitch with Electric hookup so  

that we could take our wires and we ran a wire  from the box over to our tent and then we had  

multiple plugs that we could actually then plug  in our little mini fridge charge our phones and  

have a light that we could just switch on and  off nice and easily and we didn't have to rely  

on battery power so if you are on the road side  it is pretty basic so you you squat by the side  

find a bush somewhere um here Nikki is using the  word squat if someone is caught short meaning that  

they need the toilet but there's not a facility  around so they're nowhere near an actual public  

L then they may need to find somewhere to squat  they're probably going squat in the bushes or  

somewhere private that they can find with my  children I call this a wild Wei they need a wild  

Wei or they have a wild Wei if we are nowhere near  any public facilities but you've got your electric  

and gas on board the phrase on board just means  it is literally on the vehicle so we talk about  

being on board a ship on board a bus so when you  are on something it is on board or you are on  

board so you don't need Electric hookup oh right  so you have like a gas canister yeah right a gas  

canister for anyone who doesn't know is a tub or  pot that contains gas we call it a gas canister  

okay if it just for one night but and then when  the the van is running we charg in our phones and  

things so um that that was fine but every now and  then you know you wanted a decent shower and a bit  

of luxury when you're going to the L so you would  um go on a campsite yeah yeah very nice I've not  

done a camper van we we thought about it and you  can just hire them on like Airbnb you can hire  

them go travel to Place hire a van do what you  did just travel around an area and bring it back  

I think that might be a good option yeah um and  glamping is certainly well it's a new it's like a  

fad isn't it although I think it's you know here  for the long term yeah a fad is something that  

becomes popular quite quickly in popular culture  so lots of people are talking about it it becomes  

the thing that is in all the magazines in news  articles everyone's posting pictures about it on  

social media it's a fad often fads are shortlived  which is just like glamorous camping glamping ah  

glamourus so I refer to Nikki as a glamourus a  glamour pus is a way of describing a person who's  

quite glamorous who is always well-dressed always  has their hair done nicely just looks glamorous  

Nikki is definitely a glamourus they tend to be  like um Ys is the word for these more kind of uh  

long-term permanent tent structures they're still  canvas but they're more permanent often made with  

put up with what wooden poles and you have a  little bit of luxury in there so there might  

be electricity provided proper bed a bed which is  really important and then maybe like a rug or some  

sort of flooring within so you're not just on the  like dirt floor uh so that's that's the glamour  

that's as far as it goes um so you're obviously  really into camping which I always found initially  

quite surprising cuz you're quite a glamourus  I would say you know yeah well you always like  

you have nice clothes and you always like present  yourself really nicely you come across as to come  

across as this is a phrasal verb that means how  you are perceived by other people I believe that  

I am warm and friendly and helpful but I might  come across as grumpy and selfish so how you come  

across is how other people see you which might  be different to how you think you are portraying  

yourself how do you come across well I hope um not  like well caring about how you look you wear nice  

jewelry you always do your hair really well and um  you know you visit the hairdresses often you like  

to treat yourself um and so I always thought that  that was a bit of a a disconnect because you you  

seem you know like you prefer like a fstar hotel  where you'd be to be pampered is to be treated  

in a way that's quite relaxing so if a woman  talks about getting together with her friends  

for a night of pampering then they're probably  referring to having their nails done doing their  

toenails maybe uh putting a nice treatment on  their hair probably a Face Pack they might hire  

in a masseuse or someone to do a face facial  Head and Shoulders massage to be pampered my  

partner gave me a whole hour to myself to enjoy  a nice bubble bath with rose petals in it and a  

glass of wine and some nice chocolates my favorite  chocolates and I felt like I was being pampered I  

had some time to relax but do you ever do that  kind of stuff do you do the hotel holidays and  

I've um I've never done a hotel holiday with my  family right um with children or or with extended  

family so I've been on a city break a city break  is a short trip normally two three or four nights  

in a major city so a city break might be a weekend  in bath or Edinburgh maybe a trip over to Paris  

for a few nights that would be a city break and  stayed in a a lovely place um or apartments and  

we've done holidays abroad where we've stayed  in Villas right um but I've never apart from  

our honeymoon a honeymoon is the holiday that you  take after you get married so it's the holiday the  

married couple will take after they have their  wedding ceremony never done allinclusive Hotel  

high-end Hotel it's always like selfcatering an  allinclusive hotel is or an all-inclusive holiday  

would be a holiday where you have the hotel  that includes your breakfast your lunch and your  

dinner so your three meals of the day and usually  drinks would be included so you can go to the bar  

and get any drinks at any point on an allinclusive  holiday high-end means luxury so something that is  

a highend would be more expensive it would be  better quality and self-catering is where you  

have an accommodation which has a kitchen so that  you can cater for yourself so you can cook and you  

have a fridge to store food in yeah microwave  oven that kind of thing yeah yeah so this year  

we're going to Santorini and we're staying in two  places on the island and it's breakfast included  

right um but there isn't anywhere to cook so we  can't shop we and cook we which I'm fine with  

because I don't want to do shopping and cooking  and washing up so um yeah we'll just be eating  

out to eat out this just refers to going out to  a restaurant or Cafe for your meals there'll be  

some lovely places I'm sure okay and do you avoid  the allinclusive holidays because of the cost no  

it's more because my husband doesn't want to be  tied to to be tied to something means to be stuck  

like either you feel obliged to stay somewhere  or with someone you're tied to them or that you  

have to stay with a certain thing because you've  paid for it so the reason that Nikki's husband  

didn't like the idea of an allinclusive holiday  was because he didn't want to be tied to with the  

same restaurants the same options for food he  didn't want to be committed to the hotel food  

one hotel providing the food if the food's not  great right and you've you feel like you've got  

to stay there then cuz you've paid for it within  the holiday cost but you can get some hotels that  

have got like 12 restaurants and all different you  know different areas different types of food but  

lots of variety yeah choose from yeah I've never  done that yeah I I haven't but for me it's always  

been because of the cost um I've always kind of  tried to look for budget friendly budget friendly  

this just refers to something that is Affordable  for your budget if something is budget friendly  

it's a nice way of saying cheap or cheaper options  when going on holiday so often like last minute  

deals or a last minute deal refers to something  that you buy at the last minute and it's extra  

cheap because it's last minute so for example if  you book a holiday you would often book it months  

in advance you book your flights you book your  hotel however if you are daring or you something  

changes at the very last minute and you decide  to book today for a holiday where the flights  

go out in 2 days time then that's a last minute  holiday and because it's so last minute because  

you're booking it last minute it's going to be  cheaper therefore it will be a deal so you could  

go to your travel agents and say hey I'm free this  weekend do you have any last minute city breaks do  

you have any last minute deals on city breaks  sometimes half boarded or bed and breakfast if  

we're doing a hotel half board is a holiday where  you pay for the hotel and breakfast and lunch is  

usually included but not your evening meal maybe  in some cases it's a different combination bed  

and breakfast is just your breakfast included with  the accommodation or when we went to Argentina it  

was literally just going from hostel to hostel  uh I don't think I do that these days as you  

get older you think you have yeah what is it like  less patience or you just want a little bit more  

security when you're traveling yeah especially  when you've got a family with you as well um yeah  

and then when you're even older still and you  haven't got family and like Neil and I are just  

starting to Holiday without our children we want a  bit more luxury now so we can go to from extremes  

so here Nikki got confused between two phrases  so she started with one phrase but then changed  

her mind and moved to a different phrase and then  together that didn't quite make sense she says we  

can go to from extremes what she started saying  was we can go from one extreme to another that's  

one phrase we can go from one extreme to another  so if we're talking about temperature to go from  

one extreme to another is to go from freezing cold  to boiling hot so you can say oh our weather it  

goes from one extreme to another on Sunday it was  snowing on Monday morning it was a heat wave but  

we can also say to go to extremes which just means  you move to the extreme of whatever the situation  

is so we would go camping and really rough it  here she said really rough it to rough it is  

is kind of like a colloquial slang phrase meaning  to do things that aren't luxury like to sleep on  

a camping bed or to sleep on the floor but maybe  you're eating very basic food just cooked on an  

open fire that would be to rough it the word  rough we would often also use for people if  

they are sleeping on the streets so someone who  is homeless we would say they're sleeping rough  

but we would also we've been looking at um holiday  holidays with jacuzzi on the balcony or you know  

hot tubs and private swimming pools and stuff  so yeah there's a a nice flip side here Nikki  

said a nice flip side so when we talk about the  flip side we're talking about the opposite end we  

can use many different phrases here we can say on  the one hand you've got this but then opposite to  

that or opposing that on the other hand we have  this so for example you might say on one hand I  

really like hot weather but my opposing view is  on the other hand it does make all my food go  

off really quickly and it kills my plants but on  the other hand I hate the hot weather so you're  

introducing opposing sides so you can also say I  really love the hot weather but on the flip side  

turn it over I hate the hot weather to having  a bit of luxury now and again hot tubs are the  

the rage at the moment aren't they I think here I  cut a phrase in half I said HT tubs are the rage  

at the moment what I should have said is they are  all the rage at the moment so if something is all  

the rage then it means that it's very popular  right now it's what everyone's talking about  

everyone's excited about right now even in Center  Parks you can just get your normal like Lodge or a  

luxury Lodge with a hot tub it's like you have to  have a hot tub to make your holiday super I had a  

a a holiday in Center parks for my 40th birthday  and decided to spend that extra cash to get a hot  

tub but for the whole week that I was there for  my 40th birthday it was really bad weather so  

I remember being like come on everyone in the  evening once the kids were asleep to my mom my  

dad my partner Nick like come on get your swimming  costumes on we're going outside in the hot tub and  

the light in case you're not familiar hot tub  refers to that tub of water that you sit in to  

relax so it's not a bath you would normally have  this in a social area like a Garden or sometimes  

in hotels places that you might go to celebrate  may have a hot tub so you would usually wear  

swimming costume in the hot tub and it's normally  got Bubbles and the water is warm and you go in  

there with your friends or your family to talk  and relax and have a nice time like a Jacuzzi Anna  

it's really stormy and cold like yes but I paid  for it we're going to enjoy it and it's hot when  

you get in yeah it's just cold when you get out it  was lovely it was lovely but it was it was quite  

usual so we've got a hot tub in Santorini a really  nice big shaped hot tub but um I'm I'm assuming  

that if it's so hot you can also have it cold yeah  to refresh you you wouldn't want to be getting  

in a hot tub is in the middle of the summer in  Santorini so I think they're more in those hot  

places I think they're more for like the evening  aren't they for just in the evening the watch the  

sunet yeah yeah that would be nice and so Neil is  really he's he's really outdoorsy isn't he we said  

that he likes going out hiking and stuff like that  have you accompanied him on these kind of really  

adventurous like hikes and trips CU he does a lot  of weekends away doing like camping and things  

yeah so he kind of knows my limits so he wouldn't  take me to probably Snowden or something like that  

he takes my younger daughter she can keep up  with him here Nikki says she can keep up with  

him to keep up with someone in this context means  to stay with them walking or cycling or whatever  

it is doing that activity at their pace so they  are not moving out ahead of you you are staying  

with them going at their Pace if you're walking  down the street with someone and they are falling  

behind you might turn around and say keep up come  on or they might say no slow down I would I can't  

do a few flights of stairs she also said I can't  do a few flights of stairs so a flight of stairs  

refers to a set of stairs in the average house  that has an upstairs and a downstairs there will  

be a flight of stairs if you're in a building that  has many floors there will be several flights of  

stairs without um you know needing to break  and have a pause to get my breath back but I  

did climb oh what was it um sir Arthur's Mount sir  Arthur's chair in Scotland yeah so that was like  

a mini Mountain some people call it a hill but I  I needed hiking sticks to get up walking sticks  

yeah um and I did find that easier actually and  also coming down there very useful and I think  

if I had those more on walk-in holiday or hikes  um it would be easier yeah I use those Nick and  

I use those when we are when we're walking because  L when if it's like not steady underfoot if it's  

a little bit Offroad okay off-road refers to  anything that's not on the usual track so if  

you're walking in the countryside you might be  walking down a Country Lane but if you go off the  

lane just in the Open Fields where there's no set  place to walk then you are off-road this is more  

often used to talk about driving if you're driving  off-road or cycling off-road then you're not  

going on the usual track you're going kind of  free wherever you want to go if you're skiing  

this is called off piece yeah um and there's  like loose stones and gravel and things then  

uh having sticks can really just help you to  keep your balance um yeah especially me I get  

quite dizzy um so is Neil does he is he got quite  a lot of patience when he's out walking with you  

on the occasions that he is does he kind of take  his time or is he always kind of saying come on  

keep up like cracking the whip to crack the whip  to crack the whip means to flex your authority to  

tell someone come on work harder so it's to use  your power or your powers of persuasion to make  

someone work harder so I'm your teacher if you  are in my class and you're not doing any work  

you're just daydreaming I might come over and  say hey work harder or you'll be in detention  

that's me cracking the whip I wouldn't do that  obviously but that would be cracking the whip no I  

think he is quite patient because he likes to look  around and absorb what's around him as well and he  

loves looking at the trees and or for foraging  to forage is where you go out into the wild and  

you find food that is wild like berries off the  trees you might find mushrooms rooms growing in  

The Woodlands to find food that is growing  naturally in the wild it's not the same as  

growing food purposefully in your allotment or in  your garden if you grow your own carrots and pull  

them out that's not foraging foraging is going  searching for it where nature put it yeah when  

you you forage for different things he recently um  went on a Bushcraft kind of therapy course and he  

learned a lot about the different foods that you  could use like Nettles a nettle is this lovely  

stinging plant that stings your skin if you brush  past it yeah that you could use to make a healing  

or you can make soap with Nettles you can make  a healing ointment with I think it's Nettles  

as well which you wouldn't think because they  sting you if but you can actually eat them and  

they don't sting in your mouth um nettle tea and  different soups if you're out in the wild he Lov  

he would love to do sustainable living and living  off grid like being be grills kind of thing and  

yeah he would to live off grid is to be off the  internet and uncontable untraceable in the modern  

world some extreme cases to live off grid is to  be completely off electricity or anything that's  

provided by The Wider community so if you are  living in a remote place where you have a well for  

your own water or a river or stream where you get  your own water you have a a fire that you collect  

wood so you don't have any central heating you  have no electricity you don't have internet or  

a telephone line you are off grid be grills is  a popular character he's a real person but he's  

well known for being kind of like an outdoorsy  wild man he can survive in all sorts of different  

environments he goes and lives off- grid and has  all these adventures and so he's quite famous in  

popular culture right now Bear Grills is known  as the adventury outdoors survival guy you really  

would amazing when we went when we went on our um  on our Argentina holiday we went up to what was  

the name uh there's a really famous Glacier and  I'm just terrible for not to be not being able  

to remember the name of it but there's a really  famous GLA here oh no that wasn't the one okay cut  

start again um when we went to Argentina there was  a day when we went to do a full day hike and at  

the end of I think it was like a 5 hour walk there  and at the end of it there's this big this big  

bowl and a a glacia and it was beautiful it was  a hard hike we got there and we took our little  

bunson burner a bunson burner this is something  that reminds me of science class back in school  

and college a bunson burner is a little device  where with a flame it's got a little gas pipe that  

connects to a gas canister or the MS the gas mes  and it's a little single flame and you can heat  

things on top of it so a little bunts and burner  and our plan was to get there to get a chunk of  

ice and and and boil it down to make a cup of tea  with glacial water which we did and then that was  

it that was our goal just get there have glacial  tea and then walk back um it was it was beautiful  

how was that tasting just lovely I mean it's  really you know it's really probably very old  

yeah very old water um but no I mean everything up  there in the mountains tends to be a lot fresher  

than especially in London what you get out the  pipes here I Dre to think when we first moved  

into this house that we're in we had a a lead pipe  here I talked about a lead pipe the pipe being  

the tube that brings all water into the house if  there's a a pipe burst somewhere then the water  

board have to come out and fix the pipe a lead  pipe lead is the material so it's a material that  

carried water from one place to another I don't  know if you were aware of that we had a lead pipe  

which provided our water and these days you're  not supposed to have lead piping for your water  

because the lead seeps into the water and it can  give you lead poisoning to seep into something is  

like to to move and spread so something seeps into  the water then it absorbs almost into the water it  

gets out and spreads uh and so when we had someone  come around to check our plumbing plumbing is the  

overall term that refers to anything to do with  water so your Taps your pipes your boiler anything  

that provides water in your house or deals with  water in your home is Plumbing uh they said you  

realize you've got a lead pipe in the house for  your water you need to get that changed so we did  

yeah so I'm sure glacial ice provided much cleaner  water than we get out of the Taps yeah um anyway  

coming back to holidays last question what is  the best holiday experience you've ever had can  

you pinpoint it to pinpoint is to find an exact  thing so if I have a general pain in my body but  

I don't know what's calleda in it I'd say I can't  pinpoint what the problem is but there's something  

wrong I've got some sort of weird sensation in my  back I'm very uncomfortable but I can't pinpoint  

exactly where the pain is we had so many it's  hard to pick one yeah I mean a holiday probably  

to remember for us was um Disney Disney World in  Florida oh you went to Disney World um yeah we  

did two weeks and that was when my oldest daughter  who's nearly 22 she turned nine while we were out  

there and I had a birthday out there cuz we're 4  days between here Nikki says we're 4 days between  

what she actually meant was there are four days  between our birthdays right um and we did a week  

well I can't remember what we did we but we we  did Universal and the Magic Kingdom and Epcot  

um and we stayed in a Hotel not really a hotel um  like apartments that had a communal pool right um  

communal means shared by a wider group of people  so if you are staying in a hotel but it's only a  

onear hotel and you don't have an on Suite so you  don't have a bathroom as part of your room you  

have to use a communal bathroom so everyone in the  hotel uses this one bathroom a bit out of the park  

district and and then we spent a couple of days  in Clear Water as well with the near the beach  

and stuff so that was that was lovely so that was  just the four of you that was the four of us your  

two daughters and it was exhausting yes it is  exhausting your youngest daughter would have been  

she would have been nearly five right really mag  for her yeah um and it was lovely because there so  

there's four years between them now this is a very  typical thing for natives to do Nikki said there's  

four years between them there's that contraction  would be there is four years between them rather  

than there are four years between them because  saying there are there are there are Contracting  

there are it's much harder we don't really do it  we could say there are four years between them  

but that takes longer so we tend to contract and  change there are to there is or theirs so if you  

hear that or see that written in a transcription  never write write it but if you see it written in  

a transcription it's because when we speak to  make it easier we just change there are there  

are it's easier to say there's there's four years  between them um and the older one was old is old  

enough to remember it and old enough to still  be uh young enough to still be mesmerized by  

the princesses and and she got glammed up in the  bibity B boot to get glammed up means to become  

more glamorous so to make yourself look nice and  look glamorous for an occasion so we often get  

glammed up if we're going on a night out or for  a nice meal or event like a wedding Boutique and  

um and we went swimming with dolphins for for  for her birthday was that in one of the parks  

that was in Discovery Cove which is like a special  dolphin um place when you can swim with a stingr  

and the Sharks wow so that was beautiful amazing  um so that was lovely it was exhausting having  

two young children but it was lovely to experience  the magic through them yeah and to to I wouldn't  

like to do it now nowadays um I can't remember  any of the rides and the things like that but I  

just remembered like the parades the fireworks  um and the food was amazing really that's good  

cuz often I find with theme parks I I feel like  they fall down on the food now I use the phrase  

of a fall down on to fall down on something is  to perform badly in an area so if I say you were  

doing really well but then you fell down on the  grammar section of the test then that would be the  

area where you stopped performing well where you  started performing badly especially the ones that  

we go to around here the not that we're surrounded  by theme par but we um we we are in the South so  

there's quite a few theme parks close by uh and  it always tends to be that kind of very fast food  

kind of food that's kind of mass-produced not very  healthy yeah not very tasty kind of stuff well I  

think we ate out in a few restaurants and also we  were catering for ourselves in the evening so we  

didn't eat so much of Park food we would make  picnics and um take our own P lunch and then  

come back and eat or eat out packed lunches is a  really common term especially if you've got school  

AED children a packed lunch I'm sure you can guess  is a lunch that you pack up and take with you so  

if you are going from home to school or from home  to work or out on a day trip you might decide to  

take a packed lunch you make some sandwiches you  wrap them up you put them in a box and you take  

your packed lunch box outside of the Park yeah  for that reason probably but but I remember the  

portions being huge and I remember Lauren um being  given a pizza and then a cup of Parmesan cheese oh  

wow and there's a photo actually of her but she  said um do I have to eat all this cheese cuz she  

thought that was for her and that was part of the  meal but I said no that's just to shake on um but  

the yeah the portions were huge but it was just  lovely lovely experience good but my favorite  

holiday aside of that would probably be um the  tour in Scotland which I never thought I would  

have enjoyed tour in Scotland in a camper van um  but we were really lucky to have some beautiful  

weather yeah and it was pre just outside of the  season with the midges all coming into mides  

midies refer to these tiny little flies like gnats  and they bite and there's loads of them and they  

come out in the warm summery weather especially  where there's water so if there's a lake or a  

stream you'll often find swarms of midies and gats  and they get in your face and then they bite you  

so it was it was really lovely and it was out of  the school holiday so it wasn't so busy now Nikki  

talks about being out of the school holidays  so we talk about being in the school holidays  

and out of the school holidays These are times of  the year if you're booking a holiday in the school  

holidays we're talking about when the schools  are broken up when the schools are not happening  

when the kids are off school that's in the school  holidays if you don't have kids then you will try  

to book your holidays out of the school holidays  so you don't want to be booking during the time  

when the kids are off because everywhere  will be twice as expensive and really busy  

um beautiful beaches and every every turn that we  made or every Hill that we went over there was a  

different view so sometimes it felt like we were  in the Rockies sometimes it felt like we we were  

just in film sets just here Nikki referred to the  amazing views as being similar to that of a film  

set a film set would refer to something that looks  beautiful as it would do in a film so they have  

these amazing sets but it's just a film set but in  real life sometimes views can be so beautiful it  

looks perfect like it was made for a film like a  film set it was amazing and you never knew where  

you were going to sleep the next night because  you're moving on yeah so it was really good to  

to see a lot of it and different experiences  yeah I spent a lot of time touring Scotland as  

an actress when I when I first left College uh  maybe two three years and we had the same like  

experience that even though it was you know the  winter time there'd be days when you know I think  

Sunny winter days are beautiful anyway uh you  know it's crisp and the colors are different ah  

interesting I referred to the Views that I saw as  being crisp like the winter days being crisp when  

I talk about the day being crisp I'm referring  both to the weather being mild so it's not hot and  

oppressive and it's not too cold and windy it's  just a little bit crunchy in the air it's a little  

bit cold in the air but not too cold also if it's  a bright cold day if the Sun is out everything is  

a bit crisp so literally the leaves will be dry  and laying on the ground so when you walk on them  

they'll be crispy and crunchy but also the colors  are vibrant so everything has a very hard Edge you  

can see everything very clearly because the sun  is so clearly showing all the edges it's crisp  

well defined uh but in Scotland it it's such a  beautiful landscape they've got so much to offer  

quite extreme Landscapes at times but it's also  largely untouched the population is not very large  

and and so there's lots of Countryside that's just  as is and and the colors up there in like in the  

a sorry in the Autumn and the winter are stunning  and we would be trying to find these remote little  

primary schools to go and do our pantomim ah  a pantomime a pantomime is a wellknown British  

tradition this is a theater show that happens  around the winter around the Christmas holidays  

usually sometimes after Christmas as well into  January and a pantomime has origins in Comedia  

deatte it's a very big style of audience  interaction and comedy and songs it's a  

whole lesson all on its own so it's a a theater a  style of theater show to and be just finding these  

stunning roads that we were driving along and  amazing scenery and just thinking wow you know  

this is this is really unexpected because you  think Scotland in Winter you just think lots of  

rain just endless Tor of rain but but not always  the case well anyway thank you for sharing all  

your thoughts and and experiences with holidays  it's been a pleasure yeah it's taken me back here  

Nikki said it's taken me back it's something takes  you back then it reminds you of something in the  

past oh this song takes me back This song reminds  me of a time in the past to some lovely memories  

yeah nice were you a teacher's pet back at school  um for some of them no well no no no what about  

you uh yes in English I was definitely the teacher  pet and in like PE I was the golden girl because  

cuz I did all the clubs and took part in every  extracurricular activity that was going I was  

generally a good girl not a naughty girl it's a  funny word isn't it naughty because like we use it  

to mean cheeky a lot for children I don't think we  I think naughty just means um like badly behaved I  

think adults being naughty is different to being  a criminal yes yes whereas cuz if you break the  

rules at school you're a naughty boy or you're  a naughty girl but if you're a grownup and you  

call someone a naughty girl then it's got almost  like a it's like Hanky Panky isn't it like it's  

like um sexual connotations sexual connotations  so as a child I wasn't a naughty girl but I did  

hang around with I don't I did hang around with  some of the naughty kids there was one time when  

I started a new school and I was trying to hang  out with a cool crowd and they were all behind  

the bike shed having a sneaky Siggy but I was  being the lookout for them I was trying to help  

them out because I wanted to get in with them and  so I was looking out for them and then one of the  

girls asked me to hold one of the cigarettes for  a moment and the moment I took the cigarette in  

hand was the moment like the head of department  or someone quite senior in the teaching staff  

walked around the corner and literally caught me  red-handed even though it wasn't my cigarette and  

of course I protested I was like it's not mine  it's not mine but I had it in my hand do you  

think you're friends saw the teacher coming maybe  maybe they were just like setting me up for a fall  

but even in those circumstances like I wasn't  the kind of person who would dob other people in  

I was a good girl but I kept my mouth shut when  I needed to I used to hate the word dobbing did  

you yeah as a kid it was like I always thought  it was something that people got off neighbors  

right or um Home and Away saying you're going to  be dobing me in well what word would you use like  

to rat to rat someone out or I think as when  you were younger you just say like telling the  

teacher or something but then I'm telling I'm  telling on you yeah be like you're telling or  

whatever and then I think when you're bit older  like you're going to Grass me up oh grass up yeah  

absolutely yeah we used that one a lot when I was  a kid don't grasp me up I was a goody two shoes  

actually I don't remember ever getting a detention  or you really were a good DET yeah I really was I  

really was I have no idea how many detentions  I got really oh so you were a bit of a naughty  

boy yeah I got in a few fights and all this kind  of stuff you know boys trying to find their place  

in like the hierarchy of the of the year and  there was 150 kids in my year so there was a  

lot of people finding their places and things and  then when you got a bit older like those sorts of  

things mostly disappeared I wasn't very good at  doing my homework I was a bit bored I think just  

always test the limits you know I didn't I didn't  mind saying things that may maybe were a bit on  

the edge get me in a bit trouble with the teachers  and things you weren't expelled were you no I was  

never expelled I think you've got to be horrible  to be expelled I suspended maybe three times you  

were suspended three times I think so yeah what on  Earth did you do to get suspended for a whole week

well were you a teacher's pet back at school  teacher pet describes the student who is the  

teacher's favorite student so they might get  special treatment or the teacher may just  

behave in a more kind and friendly way towards  that student the teachers pet in like PE I was  

the Golden Girl here I mentioned being the Golden  Girl in PE PE stands for physical education it's  

the lessons that involve Sports and being physical  that we do at school and being a golden girl is  

like being a very well behaved and well-liked girl  a golden girl but if you're grown up and you call  

someone a naughty girl then it's got almost like a  it's like Hanky Panky Hanky Panky this kind of fun  

slightly naughty phrase refers to to behaving in  a very intimate and sexual way with somebody else  

the act of Hanky Panky could literally replace  the word sex so did you have Hanky Panky last  

night sex basically a bit of Hanky Panky but  Hanky Panky can also refer to just the acts  

that are sexual that aren't necessarily sex so  a bit of a bit of tickling and rolling around  

Hanky Panky and they were all behind the bike  shed having a sneaky Siggy but I was being the  

lookout for them I was trying to help them out  because I wanted to get in with them here I used  

the phrase Siggy meaning cigarette so you might  hear different uh like slang terms like Sig [ __ ]  

Siggy cigarette I use the word Siggy just off the  cuff I also said Lookout to be a lookout is to be  

the person who stands guard while something is  happening watching to make sure that no one is  

coming or that no one can see and if someone is  coming the lookout is supposed to tell whoever is  

doing the deed someone's coming quick now normally  there'd be a lookout if uh a gang were committing  

a crime like robbing a bank there'd be someone on  Lookout at the front or I always think of Mir cats  

when I think of a lookout because Mir cats will  spend their time doing what they're doing but one  

mere cat will have the job of being the lookout  and he stands up tall and he looks to the sky  

to look for predators and if there's a predator  he will warn the others and they'll all quickly  

Scurry away into safety I also said I wanted to  get in with the group to get in with them to get  

in with a group of people is to become one of them  so be liked by a group of friends so that they  

want you to be in their group they like talking to  you they invite you to do the things that they're  

doing to get in with them and literally caught  me red-handed even though it wasn't my cigarette  

I was caught red-handed to be caught red-handed  is an idiom that describes being caught or found  

in the act of doing something you shouldn't be  doing so if I'm in my kitchen no one's around and  

there's a big slice of cake in the fridge that I'm  not supposed to eat because it belongs to someone  

else or maybe I'm on a diet and then I think no  one's looking and I've got chocolate all over my  

face and someone walks in as I'm just licking my  fingers but I still have chocolate on my face then  

I've just been caught red handed caught in the  act maybe they were just like setting me up for  

a fall to set someone up for a fall is to prepare  someone to then allow them to fail just like you  

would set up Domino and as soon as you finish  setting up your dominoes you knock them down and  

they all fall down in some circumstances people  will set other people up for a fall so they'll  

put them in a situation where they know they will  fail it's not pleasant but it happens but even  

in those circumstances like I wasn't the kind of  person who would dob other people in to do someone  

in it's possibly clear now because of the context  but to dob someone in is to tell someone that  

that person was doing something wrong so if we are  friends at school and you break the rules and I go  

and tell the teacher that you've broken the rules  I am dobbing you in to do in I always thought it  

was something that people got off neighbors right  or um Home and Away Nick mentioned neighbors or  

Home and Away now these are two very famous soap  operas maybe not as famous now with the younger  

Generations but certainly when I was growing up  up in the '90s neighbors and Home and Away were  

very popular everyone of my age will know what  I'm referring to if I say neighbors or Home and  

Away these are so popers that were just common  place in the British household when I was growing  

up Neighbors everybody needs good neighbors closer  each day Home and Away you're going to Grass me up  

oh grass up yeah absolutely yeah we used that one  a lot when I was a kid on the subject of dobbing  

someone in we also have other phrases that were  very common one particular one is grass up now if  

you grass someone up it's the same as dobbing them  in you're telling tales on them you're telling  

someone they did this they did something wrong in  order to get them into trouble that's the reason  

that you would Gras someone up if you committed  a crime and I went to the police then I'm  

essentially a grass I am a grass I've just grassed  you up you really were a good teach yeah I really  

was to be a goodie to shoes to be a goodie two  shoes it's often actually used as a phrase um  

that has a negative connotation if someone's a  goody two shoes it means that they're disliked a  

little bit because they are too good they really  play to the rules and just always try to be the  

gold Golden Girl or the Golden Boy and they don't  have any problems with grassing someone up dobbing  

them in so that they can win brownie points so  they can be favored by Authority so sometimes  

people don't like a goodie two shoes also a goodie  two shoes is someone who maybe never lets their  

hair down they never take risks and that can be  associated with not being fun so it's good to  

follow the rules and do as you're told but being  a goody two shoes maybe is a step too far yeah I  

got in a few fights and all this kind of stuff you  know boys trying to find their place in like the  

hierarchy of the of the Year here I use the word  hierarchy hierarchy a hierarchy is a system that  

orders people in terms of status and Authority  so in a school at the top of the hierarchy will  

be the Headmaster or the head mistress below  them will be the heads of departments so the  

head of maths the head of English the head of  languages the head of PE physical education  

and then below that you'll have all the other  teaching staff and below that you might have  

the prefects which are the the model students  the goody T shoes students who are happy to take  

on extra responsibilities and then you have the  students that's the hierarchy the system of State  

and Authority I was a bit bored I think for the  always test the limits you may have missed it but  

I said uh so you always test the limits if someone  tests the limits it means that they see how much  

they can do before getting into trouble so if  you say to me Anna bedtime is 9:00 on the dot  

and that's the rule stick to it but then one night  I stay up till 2 minutes past night 9 and I don't  

get into trouble so the next night I stay up till  4 minutes past 9 nobody says anything so the next  

night I really push the boat out and I stay up  till 10 past 9 then I get into trouble Anna I told  

you bed time is at 9:00 on the dot you're really  pushing the limits here don't test me so to test  

the limits is to see how far you can go before  things change you weren't expelled were you no  

I was never expelled the word expelled not a good  word this means that you are permanently removed  

from a school or educational setting because of  bad behavior so if you've done something very  

serious then you are asked to leave the school  and you may never come back suspended maybe three  

times you were suspended three times I think so  yeah to be suspended means to be asked to leave  

for a short period And this is a punishment for  doing something quite bad but not so bad that you  

are expelled it might be that you are only allowed  to be suspended two or three times and if you are  

continuously breaking those rules then eventually  you'll be expelled suspension is for a short  

period you're asked to leave school expulsion to  be expelled is a permanent ban what on Earth did  

you do to get suspended for a whole week and here  I said what on Earth did you do what on Earth um  

to add on earth into a question like who on Earth  what on Earth where on Earth why on Earth if you  

slide in on Earth after those dou questions then  you're really exaggerating the fact that you're  

surprised or shocked by what you are trying to  understand if you are doing something that I  

think is crazy I'd say what on Earth are you doing  or if you walk into my house and I don't know who  

you are I'd look at you and say who on Earth are  you and what on Earth are you doing in my house so  

it adds an additional level of shock or surprise  to your question I broke a bone mhm um in fact  

I've broken lots of bones but do you remember  this is a test now because I've told you about  

this before but do you remember my biggest break  I do I think I could pass the test I believe you  

had a uh spiral fracture of your femur wow okay  I'm surprised because normally you don't listen to  

anything I tell you um but yeah well done I spiral  fractured my FEMA do you remember which leg it was  

was no it was my left gone 50/50 on that could  I you could have just tried went with outright  

failure from you just gave up yeah so I was I  must have been like 10 or 11 years old I was  

still at primary school so hadn't moved on to  high school I was giving someone a piggy back  

in the playground and I was the horse and I said  how fast do you want to go and she said as fast  

as you can go so I was like noay and it was I  think it was Autumn because we had like muddy  

do you remember like like playgrounds they'd  always have these like sunken bits where maybe  

they hadn't done the foundations properly right  yeah like sunken concrete poor work and so yeah  

and then they'd always get full of mud and then  when it rained they just like little muddy puddles  

and then this muddy puddle was full of leaves  but it started to dry slightly so I'm running  

around as fast as I can with this big girl on my  back and uh and my foot caught so some leaves and  

I slipped and went like into full scissor splits  kapow and because of the weight of this girl on my  

back I was quite flexible but she kind of made me  go straight down all the way full splits oh really  

um could you do full splits at that point I cuz  that's a lot yeah for somebody that can't I could  

if I was warmed up but and at a push completely  at a push but that was too much of a push it was  

too quick with weight and so yeah I got this  really complex fracture all the way down my  

femur I remember going down and then I blacked out  and then I remember coming to and everyone stood  

around me and I pulled my leg in front of me and  tried to get up and then my leg felt like it was  

just full of concrete it was like a dead weight  just hanging off my body and the teacher was  

completely unsympathetic and just came up and was  like oh stop being a hypochondriac pull yourself  

together pull yourself together she dragged me up  off the floor and I tried to put weight on it and  

again it felt like a dead weight and it I just  collapsed and I started like crying and winging  

and just saying please just leave me here just  leave me I was being very melodramatic I wait  

until home time and it was raining and she's like  don't be so ridiculous you've got to come in it's  

raining and so my friend left me the other teacher  went to get another teacher and they had my arms  

over the shoulders and dragged me in doing wonders  for your injury I'm it could have made it much  

like it could have splintered the bone so we were  very lucky yeah that was quite a significant break  

and saw me in traction in the hospital for months  what does that mean intraction is when you're uh  

you know when you've got like the leg wrapped up  and then it's it's held up it's like suspended  

like like those cartoons that people get run over  by trucks yeah and they're just there in the beds  

like like puppets neck brace yeah absolutely  so I was stuck in bed and I couldn't roll over  

because my leg was in traction um I got really  bad had bed saws oh it was really uncomfortable  

especially like 11 years old I was going insane  yeah yeah but then when I got into a wheelchair  

amazing and on crotches I was like Speedy  Gonzalez on you couldn't stop me so it it  

really stands out as one of my most significant um  my most significant accidents I may have had many  

I broke my toe while I was with you didn't I yeah  that was weird that we had two small children at  

the time we had nappy bin bags and you put the  nappies in this bin and just keep on stuffing  

them in until it's completely full and then you  tie it off and you pull it out and it's big like  

a big snake of pooy nappies yeah Y and um and so  you then said I'll take it downstairs and I said  

I'm sure I probably very gentlemanly offered you  some help no no and I said well be careful and  

you're like oh I'll trip over this and I'm like  well carry it properly the next thing I hear  

ah a toe well I knew instantly because my when  I fell my legs went out to the side and with our  

little banisters going down that's what they're  called isn't it the banisters going down the side  

the rail the banister is the bit on the top it's  the I guess the rails the rails yeah probably in  

the banister the foot closest to the banister and  the rails had caught like two or three toes had  

caught and obviously i' kept going but my toes  were caught and I heard the crack I heard it and  

I felt it and then when I looked at my foot as  I came to a stop I looked at it and my toe was  

just pointing out at a right angle to my foot I  like yeah that's definitely broken and it was so  

painful I always think that in those situations  when someone's dislocated something or broken  

something to a point where it's really um sitting  on the wrong angle that you would just you're in  

pain anyway you just grab it and snap it back into  place but I couldn't let anyone come anywhere near  

me I said do not touch it this is horrendous even  when I got to the hospital I was like don't touch  

my toe I think you have to do that within the  first like five seconds before the swelling  

sets like if you if you cut your hand and you've  got skin hanging off yeah the first thing I do  

is just tear it off oh because if you leave it on  it's it's like Perpetual longer term just pain and  

discomfort it's better to just get it off right  let's now Deep dive into some of that vocabul  

so let's go through again and I will stop when  there's something to explain let's go I broke a  

bone M um in fact I've broken lots of bones but  do you remember this is a test now because I've  

told you about this before but do you remember my  biggest break I do I think I could pass the test  

I believe you had a uh spiral fracture of your  femur wow okay I'm surprised because normally  

you don't listen to anything I tell you um but  yeah well done I spiral fractured my FEMA do you  

remember which leg it was no fracture I talk about  fracturing my femur the femur is the biggest thigh  

bone and I fractured it a fracture is like a crack  through a structure but the structure remains  

in place so here we're talking about bones I  cracked the bone but the bone didn't change shape  

everything held together just like if you knock an  eggshell the eggshell might fracture you might see  

a crack appear in the eggshell but the eggshell  may still hold together it doesn't necessarily  

come apart they would need a little more pressure  for that so I was lucky I fractured my femur but  

it stayed in place it was my left gone 50/50 on  that could I you could have just tried went with  

outright failure from you just gave up here Nick  said I could have gone 50/50 on that what he meant  

was there was a 50% chance that he would have  been right no matter what he had guessed left or  

right it was one of them so he was saying 5050 I  could have been right so I should have just tried  

I should have just guessed left or right and  I might have been correct yeah so I was I must  

have been like 10 or 11 years old I was still at  primary school so hadn't moved on to high school  

I was giving someone a piggyback in the playground  piggyback a piggyback is the act of having someone  

jump up on your back and they normally put their  legs around your waist and they put their arms  

around your shoulders or around your neck and you  hold them and you walk them so that's a piggy back  

to give someone a piggy back and I was the horse  and I said how fast do you want to go and she said  

as fast as you can go so I was like noay and it  was I think it was Autumn because we had like mud  

do you remember like like playgrounds they'd  always have these like sunken bits where maybe  

they hadn't done the foundations properly right  yeah like sunken concrete poor work and so yeah  

and then they always get full of mud and then when  it rain they just like be little muddy puddles and  

then here and Nick said poor workmanship poor  workmanship is something that's being crafted  

in a bad way so if I haven't done a good job at  making whatever it is I'm making making then you  

can say that's poor workmanship that shows poor  workmanship like if I'm Plastering a wall and  

then painting it and I don't allow the plaster to  dry properly before throwing the paint on it it's  

going to look bad it's not going to be a good  job and you say the paint's a bit shoddy the  

the plaster all looks a a bit rushed that's poor  workmanship so when time and effort have not been  

put into creating something that results in poor  workmanship this muddy puddle was full of leaves  

but it started to dry slightly so I'm running  around as fast as I can with this big girl on  

my back and uh and my foot caught some leaves  and I slipped and went like into full scissor  

splits kapow scissor splits now the splits is  when you separate your legs out and they go in  

opposite directions like flat against the floor  your legs go fully flat against the floor in  

opposite directions there are two types of splits  that you can do scissor splits is where one leg  

goes forwards and one leg goes backwards just like  a pair of scissors but the other splits are called  

box splits that's where your legs both go out  to the sides so one out on the left one out on  

the right I I did the scissor splits and because  of the weight of this girl on my back I was quite  

flexible but she kind of made me go straight down  all the way to be flexible to be flexible just  

means that you you can bend very well so if you  can stand up straight with your knees locked and  

bend down to touch the floor with the palms of  your hands then you are probably quite flexible  

full splits oh really um could you do full splits  at that point I cuz that's a lot yeah for somebody  

that can't I could if I was warmed up I mentioned  being warmed up we warm up before working out or  

before per warming so we will often warm up our  voice or warm up our bodies it's just the act of  

doing some movement to get the blood flowing and  to get everything ready to perform or to work out  

but an at a push completely at a push but that  was too much of a push it was too quick here I  

said at a push this is a phrase that means if I  really have to or at the very extremes of my ab  

so I can lift 50 lb at a push if you really  pushed me to my limits if I really was trying  

very very hard I could lift 52b so I might be  able to go that extra little bit further if I  

have to or if I'm being strongly encouraged to  or I'm really trying to motivate myself to go  

beyond my own limits with weight and and so yeah  I got this really complex fracture all the way  

down my femur I remember going down and then I  blacked out here I use the phras of verb black  

out I said I blacked out so if you black out it  means that you faint or become unconscious now  

this is not the same as going to sleep although if  you're extremely tired or maybe you've had a few  

drinks then you might say oh I completely blacked  out last night but it is quite extreme so this is  

usually reserved for when you have an ACC accident  if you're hit in the head or something shocks you  

so much that you suddenly fall unconscious this  is blacking out to blackout and then I remember  

coming to and everyone stood around me after  that I said when I came to to come to in this  

context is when you wake up after blacking out or  after fainting so you're unconscious for a little  

while and you finally open your eyes and you're  back in the room you have come two and I pulled  

my leg in front of me and tried to get up and then  my leg felt like it was just full of concrete it  

was like a dead weight just hanging off my body  I describe my leg here as a dead weight when we  

talk about dead weights we just mean a weight or  the weight of something that is not moving so like  

an inert object imagine if you were carrying  a huge sack full of potatoes that's a dead  

weight it's just a weight that doesn't help you  at all which is different to picking up a child  

of the same weight they move and they're more  Dynamic and so they're slightly easier to lift  

because they kind of help you by gripping on and  adjusting their body and and being as light as  

a feather in their mind but if something is a  dead weight then it doesn't help you at all and  

in this case my leg was like cut off my brain  had said don't move this leg so it's like my  

brain had stopped my muscles from responding and  my leg was just hanging off my body and it was  

really heavy so my leg was a dead weight and the  teacher was completely unsympathetic and just came  

up and was like oh stop being a hypercondriac  pull yourself together pull yourself together  

she dragged me up off the floor and I tried to put  weight on it and again it felt like a dead weight  

and it I just collapsed I describe myself here  as a hypochondriac a hypochondriac is somebody  

who is extremely worried about their health and  they're usually the kinds of people who go oh no  

look I I've got to cut on my finger do you think I  need to see a doctor it might be infected I might  

get septicemia I might die so a hypochondriac is  someone who is excessively concerned and worried  

about their own health and Nick goes on to say  pull yourself together this is a command that you  

would give someone to say stop panicking or stop  being emotional you need to be calm and you need  

to think straight and you need to stop reacting in  such an emotional way way so if I am talking to my  

friend and she starts getting really upset and  emotional and behaving in an erratic way I might  

have to say to her look pull yourself together  it's not that bad they don't have tea and coffee  

that's okay you don't need to get emotional pull  yourself together it's not the kind of thing that  

you should use Loosely because it can upset people  if it's a sensitive moment if they're genuinely  

upset about something that deserves to be upset  about telling them to pull themselves together  

can seem like you don't care I would only use  that if you think someone is being melodramatic  

I'll explain that in a minute or over the top not  really thinking logically they're just letting the  

emotions get the better of them and I started  like crying and winging and just saying please  

just leave me here just leave me I was being very  melodramatic okay here I say winging and I use the  

word melodramatic to winge is to complain or cry  in often a consistent and annoying irritating way  

oh oh Mom I'm hungry mom mom my tummy hurts I'm  really hungry I'm really hung that's winging stop  

winging I was winging about the fact that my leg  hurt and I didn't want to go inside which was you  

know valid but to be melodramatic is to be overly  dramatic to be over over the top in your reaction  

oh my leg is falling off leave me here don't  touch me that's a little bit melodramatic okay  

so I was being over the top in my reaction and I  was winging I'll wait until home time and it was  

raining and she's like don't be so ridiculous  you've got to come in it's raining and so my  

friend left me the the teacher went to get another  teacher and they had my arms over their shoulders  

and dragged me in doing wonders for your injury  I'm sure it could have made it much like it could  

have splintered the bone so we were very lucky  here Nick said that would do wonders for your leg  

so to do wonders for this is used in a sarcastic  way here but you can use it in a in a way that's  

not sarcastic so to do wonders for something  means that it almost works miracles on the thing  

it it does a fantastic job so for example a good  diet and a morning walk can do wonders for your  

health or a daily walk will do wonders for your  mood a weekly date night will do wonders for your  

relationship so to do wonders for just means it  will be very beneficial it will be very good for  

that thing but we do like a bit of sarcasm here  in the UK and that's part of our humor we like to  

say things that just are the complete opposite  so dragging my leg dragging my whole body with  

my with my broken leg my spiral fracture all the  way into the school up to the the head office  

was not beneficial for my leg it was the worst  thing to do and it could have resulted in much  

worse damage and long-term issues but Nick used it  sarcastically and said oh they dragged you in with  

a spiral fracture in your FEMA that would have  done wonders for your leg he was being sarcastic  

ha yeah that was quite a significant break and saw  me in traction now here I said that this saw me in  

traction now here obviously saw is the past tense  of see here I'm I'm using it to mean the result of  

this was me in traction so I might say committing  a crime saw me in prison for 20 years taking this  

course saw me achieve my goals and getting a job  okay so we can use saw to mean resulted in this  

isn't a very common usage but this was a very off  the cuff unplanned conversation and it was used in  

conversation in the hospital for months what does  that mean intraction is when you're uh you know  

when you've got like the leg wrapped up and then  it's it's held up it's like suspended like like  

those cartoons that people get run over by trucks  here Nick used a phrasal verb run over he said uh  

the characters who get run over by trucks so to  get run over is to be hit by a moving vehicle so  

it runs you over or it runs over you but we say  you have been run over that person was run over  

I always say to my children don't run out into the  road you might get run over be careful you might  

get hit by a car yeah and they're just there in  the beds like like puppets neck yeah absolutely  

so I was stuck in bed and I couldn't roll over  because my leg was in traction um I got really  

bad bed SS oh it was really uncomfortable espe  like 11 years old I was going insane yeah yeah but  

then when I got into a wheelchair amazing and on  crutches I was like Speedy Gonzalez on I refer to  

a character here Speedy Gonzalez now I'm assuming  that everyone knows who this character is but you  

may not speeda Gonzalez is a cartoon character  from when I was a child back in the 80s who  

could run really fast that's why he was called  Speedy Gonzalez and so this little mouse is a  

character that comes up in regular conversation  when I'm talking about being fast I'll say oh I'm  

like Speedy Gonzalez running all over the place so  to run really really fast that's a a pop culture  

reference you couldn't stop me so it it really  stands out as one of my most significant um I used  

the phras of verb here stands out if something  stands out then it's a prominent thing so I'm  

talking about memories and I say this memory  stands out in my mind so I'm saying this memory  

is prominent I remember this particular incident  because it was so Monumental it had such an  

impact on my life it was very painful so I really  remember it this moment stands out for me this was  

a standout moment my most significant accident  I may have had many I broke my toe while I was  

with you didn't I yeah that was weird that we had  two small children at the time we had nappy bin  

bags and you put the nappies in this bin here this  might be a really obvious one but because American  

English is quite dominant uh internationally  I thought I should point it out a nappy in  

American English is a diaper so this is a nappy  we don't use diaper at all that we that's not a  

word that we use here we know what it is but we  don't use it in the UK and just keep on stuffing  

them in until it's completely full and then you  tie it off and you pull it out and it's big like  

a big snake of pooy nappies yeah Yu and um tie  off so to tie off means obviously to tie a knot  

in something but specifically to fasten something  or hold something usually at its end so we tied  

off the bin so this was a long bin full of nappies  nappies nappies that we'd stuff down when you fill  

it up you you get the end and you tie it off so  that each end has a knot in it and then we put it  

in the big bin outside for the bin men to collect  and so you then said I'll take it downstairs and  

I say I'm sure I probably very gentlemanly offered  you some help here Nick used the word gentlemanly  

I in a gentlemanly way I offered to carry the  bag for you now to do something gentlemanly it  

means you do it in a way that is in the manner  of a gentleman so you behave like a gentleman  

would which would be to be kind and considerate  and protective and helpful particularly towards  

women so he was offering to help me because I'm  a woman and he was saying I'll do that horrible  

job that slightly risky dangerous job and carrying  that smelly bag of nappies down the stairs because  

I can see you might fall and hurt yourself I'll  do it for you darling obviously I declined and  

broke my toe no no and I said well be careful and  you're like oh I'll trip over for this and I'm  

like well carry it properly the next thing I hear  ah my toe well I knew instantly because my when I  

fell my legs went out to the side and with our  little banisters going down that's what they're  

called isn't it the banisters going down the side  the rail the banister is the bit on the top it's  

the I guess the rails the rails yeah probably in  the banister the foot closest to the banister and  

the rails had caught like two or three toes had  caught and obviously I'd kept going but my toes  

were caught and I heard the crack I heard it and  I felt it and then when I looked at my foot as I  

came to a stop I looked at it and my toe was just  pointing out at a right angle to my foot all right  

here I mentioned the word right angle if something  is at a right angle then it it's at 90° that's a  

right angle so my toe was sticking out at 90° from  where it should have been it was at a right angle  

I like yeah that's definitely broken and it  was so painful I always think that in those  

situations when someone's dislocated something or  broken something to a point where it's really um  

sitting on the wrong angle that you would just  you're in pain anyway you just grab it and snap  

it back into place but I couldn't let anyone come  anywhere near me I was said do not touch it this  

is horrendous even when I got to the hospital I  was like don't touch my toe I think you have to  

do that within the first like 5 seconds before the  swelling sets like if here I use the phrasal verb  

set in so when something sets in it begins and we  usually use this um when talking about health so  

talking about swelling or disease or a substance  might set in rot in your house if you have a leak  

then damp might set in or dry rot might set in so  it's when something begins and starts to spread  

so when you have an injury it will slowly start  to spread until it really balloons up everything  

will become inflamed as those processes begin  so the swelling sets in if you cut your hand  

and you've got skin hanging off yeah the first  thing I do is just tear it off oh because if you  

leave it on it's it's like Perpetual longer term  just pain and discomfort it's better to just get  

it off we're going to talk about a very British  tradition afternoon tea and I'm very happy to  

joined by my very good friend Charlie hello hello  thank you very much for having me you're welcome  

I'm really really pleased that you decided to  join me today so Charlie how do you feel about  

afternoon tea well food in general is probably my  favorite topic to talk about an afternoon tea I  

like it very much um I suppose it's one of those  things that I don't have it's a treat for me and  

it's something that perhaps me and a family  friends will do on a birthday or like I say  

as a special treat rather than it being something  that I do regularly at home um but I have to say  

that life has got rather boring for me because I  try not to eat too much refined sugar trying to be  

healthy so that does change afternoon tea a little  bit for me um but the Joy of afternoon tea is that  

it's not all about the cakes well that brings me  very um nicely on to what afternoon tea actually  

consists of because some people may never have  experienced this tradition so afternoon tea as  

the name suggests obviously has tea as a a main  component but it also consists of sandwiches and  

scon and and pastries or cakes so let's start  with the origins of afternoon tea it actually  

started back in the 1840s with the Duchess of  Bedford Anna I believe her name was she was hungry  

between lunch and dinner and so she asked for some  sandwiches and some some Cakes and Pastries to  

be brought to her and she enjoyed doing this so  she did it again and again and eventually Queen  

Victoria dropped in she was obviously working  in high circles back then um back then as if  

she still survives now Queen Victoria joined  her and this then became a tradition because  

once the queen does something at least in  the past everyone took note so sandwiches  

now the sandwiches of an afternoon tea are quite  delicate uh as far as I know you tend to cut off  

the crusts and if you're having afternoon tea in  a restaurant or hotel they actually serve them as  

little rectangles is that your experience that's  true yeah crusts cut off and they're meant to be  

like finger sandwiches so it's also meant to be  very delicate very dainty and something that you  

can hold with one hand and eat in a very ladylike  fashion without necessarily spilling the contents  

down your lap or getting your face or fingers  all lucky absolutely because one thing we haven't  

mentioned is that afternoon tea really now is a  social thing isn't it it's about spending time  

with your friends and family or maybe even uh a  business event so you might take your clients out  

for afternoon te to discuss business so you don't  want to be there with a mouthful two hands on your  

sandwich having a mouthful of food and then trying  to discuss things so all very dainty very light um  

Savory part to the afternoon tea and also because  you're going to have dinner afterwards as well  

right so not eating cross I mean that just makes  me think of what my mom always used to say is that  

you have to eat your cross because cross make  your hair curly have you heard that I've heard  

that or that you'll get hair on your chest if  you if you do oh if you do or don't if you do  

if you do you'll get hairs on your chest yeah I'm  sure I've heard that before I obviously recognized  

that that was a load of rubbish so I enjoyed the  crusts I think I prefer the crusts more than any  

other part of the bread to be honest really yeah  especially if it's um like I love the end of the  

bread as well I know that's quite controversial  usually people you know fight for not having that  

the end of the bread but I I like the end of the  bread and yeah a really crusty crust do you know  

what the end of the bread is called it has a name  I only found this out recently no it's called the  

heel the heel of the bread I think I've got that  right I'm sure my listeners will now be Googling  

the end of the bread is it called the heel yeah  I think it's called the heel okay um yeah I only  

have that if we are running low on bread and  I'm desperate for toast or a sandwich then  

I'll have it if that's all there is but otherwise  it all tends to be thicker it tends to be thicker  

ER than the rest of the bread and I am someone who  loves a thick piece of bread I remember my family  

always used to um laugh at me and still remind me  of this of me of this to this day that when I was  

a little girl I was a little bit overweight when  I was younger and partly because I loved bread  

and butter and we would get unsliced bread so I  would come in and try and cut myself a slice of  

bread and it would start at the top like a A  Proper Slice you know quite thin and then it  

would just get thicker and thicker and thicker  like a wedge a wedge we used to call it a door  

stop and then I'd put butter on it and I was  happy in heaven absolutely bread Heaven bread  

Heaven white bread butter massive wedge very  happy do you eat much bread now no I think in  

order to in order to maintain a weight I suppose I  recognize that for me and this is purely personal  

bread I I can't enjoy too much bread I love it and  I have it again as a special treat but I do enjoy  

gluten-free bread there is so many varieties out  there actually that brown bread so I don't allow  

myself to have too much but when I do have it I  am reminded of yeah good times when I was younger  

so if you are enjoying afternoon tea what kind  of uh filling would you expect in a sandwich so  

generally you can expect things it depends on  where you're going but usually you'd have was  

it salmon and cream cheese M you'd have maybe  egg mayonnaise cucumber sandwiches oh cucumber  

sandwiches cucumber it sounds it sounds so wrong  but it's so good but you've got to have them fresh  

you've got to have have them at the time that  you're making them because otherwise the liquid  

the the moisture from the Cucumber gets into the  bread and it makes it soggy and we don't want that  

we don't want soggy sandwiches don't want soggy  sandwiches coronation chicken that's another one  

I've seen quite a few times yeah that's kind  of like a a curried chicken isn't it that was  

actually invented for the Queen's coronation  yeah yeah absolutely with apricots in it dried  

apricots it's delicious I'm a vegetarian but um I  can still enjoy it with fake chicken um but yeah  

so delicious it's definitely worth a try yeah and  prawn mayonnaise of course yeah P mayonnaise yeah  

and with the egg you mentioned egg mayonnaise and  that could be like egg and Crest it would be egg  

mayonnaise with Crest or um egg mayonnaise with  tomato sometimes yeah yeah and then you might have  

a hammer mustard just a basic kind straightforward  or a cheese sandwich cheese sandwich cheese and  

tomato but again it's I suppose it's also making  sure that say with the egg you've got to have the  

mayonnaise and things like that to make sure  it binds together so again when you're eating  

it it's not all falling out all over your lap  no now thinking about cucumber sandwiches I  

for a very short time I don't know if you know  this Charlie I worked uh at Buckingham Palace  

I didn't know that you didn't know this so this  was actually after we were at Uni together and  

uh when I first moved to London I was very poor  I'd been a student for years and had no savings  

moved to London to come and do my Master's and  uh it just took all the work that was available  

to me which involved you know doing waiting on  jobs so being a waitress and and a Hostess and  

things like this and I ended up working for  a company that supplied the weight staff for  

the Queen's Garden parties wow and so I spent  a summer serving you know some very important  

people uh in the in Buckingham Palace Gardens and  the they served cucumber sandwiches there and it  

had like a a mint uh kind of like like dressing  on it as well it was absolutely delicious and the  

thing with cucumber sandwiches is they have to  be on White Bread it's definitely a white bread  

sandwich well at least that's how the queen has  it really yeah yeah and it was so structured as  

well for the queen when she would come out they'd  be saying right the queen will appear at the door  

at 1205 so that's when the tea must the the pot  must be boiled and then she will make her way  

through the crowd talking to people and by 12 um  13 she'll be taking her seat and this is when her  

tea bag must go in and it must sit in her in her  teacup for I don't know she probably didn't have  

bags actually I didn't prepare her tea but um it  was very rigid the the schedule for serving her  

tea and and food wow so yes that's what I think of  when I think of cucumber sandwiches is is royalty  

yes it's definitely seen as a very Posh you know  people would say oh that's quite Posh yeah having  

cucumber sandwiches yeah and you take the skin  off the Cucumber don't you so that's yeah at least  

that's how we did it there and um moving on after  our little selection of sandwiches you move on to  

the next part which is scone or scone there's  a lot of controversy about how you pronounce  

this word is it scone or is it scone how do you  pronounce it well to be honest with you I think  

I've said it both ways several times in my life  but I think scone is what I tend to go with mhm  

yeah well from what I'm told that is the majority  rules so the majority of people do say scone and  

that's considered the most correct way to say  it but some people do say scone and that's okay  

too now with your scone you will have jam and  cream that's the custom you can't have a scone  

without jam and cream but the question is in what  order do you put the jam and cream onto your scun  

it's definitely different isn't it is it Devon  and Cornwall they're the ones that determine  

you know some will say in Devon it's one way  and Cornwall it's the other and I don't know  

the answer to that but I would probably say  I don't have the cream I have to say but if  

I was I'd probably put that on first because  it's like the butter right and you put the  

butter on a sandwich first and then the cream so  that's what that's what I would do but I think  

it's personal preference I'm really impressed  that you know about the the the Devon and the

cornball thing there but um the answer to your  question is Devon they say that you should put  

the cream on first so anyone in Devon would  suggest cream goes first and the jam goes on  

last but if you're in corn wall they say that the  jam goes on First and the cream goes on afterwards  

I think I'm like you I think I put the cream on  and then the jam yeah yeah do you spread it or do  

you use a spoon oh I use a spoon yeah but then  I do flatten it out with the spoon so it's not  

too messy it's funny because I don't like cream  and I will not have cream with anything else it  

has to be a part of the scone yeah okay yes you  know I'm just a jam straight jam and the has to  

have raisins it has to have raisins none of the pl  scone a fruit scone some of the plain stuff yeah  

so you can have a fruit scone which is got raisins  currents in it or um a savory scone I think it's  

referred to if it is if it isn't a fruit scone  it's a savory scone or you have cheese scone oh  

you can get had oh yeah scon with cheese now so  what' you do with those put butter on them butter  

or you can have a sort of cream cheesee and chive  spread oh very nice and do you like your scone  

warm I do yeah yes yeah I mean I will accept a  cold scone but if it can be warmed delicious yeah  

because they can be quite dry I think it can dry  your mouth out but if they're warm they're just  

a bit softer and they melt a little bit more in  your mouth yeah I'm getting hungry now I know me  

too so after that if you're not completely full by  this point then you're going to move on to the the  

cake or the pastries I think traditionally it was  just cake so you'd have um a Victoria sponge if  

it was uh summertime and you'd have a fruit cake  some form of fruit cake if it was wintertime but  

from experience when you go and have afternoon tea  these days they will have a selection of variety  

of all sorts of different pastries or cakes and  they're usually quite small little delicate things  

very beautiful very hard to finish at all so I  always need a doggy bag to take away the leftovers  

it's funny that it's called a doggy bag for those  of you listening who have no idea what I'm talking  

about if you're eating at a restaurant um or  a cafe and you haven't finished your food but  

you you're done and you need to go because you're  full or because time is pressing you can ask for  

a doggy bag and this means that they'll take the  food and place it into a takeaway box or bag so  

that you can take it home and finish it off later  it's called a doggy bag but it's not for dogs no  

and it makes it sound horrible I know well it's a  very nice thing very nice thing because the food  

is so delicious and sometimes it's even better  the next day or cold and plus you don't feel like  

you're insulting the restaurant by not finishing  your meal yeah absolutely and usually you pay a  

lot of money for for the afternoon tea so you  don't want to was anything but um do you have  

you're a really good Baker actually aren't you  you bake your own cakes I do I I like baking I  

wouldn't say I'm great there are some things that  I'm better at than other things I feel like I'm  

known for my Christmas cake and I have orders now  at as I'm coming up to Christmas people put their  

orders in for my Christmas cake which is a very  heavy fruit cake with then a layer of maip pan and  

a layer of icing over the top of that but with a  very special ingredient yes Brandy there's quite a  

little bit of and I think that's probably why mine  is so popular is because I'm a little heavy-handed  

with the Brandy so you're not allowed to drive  when you have a slice of my Christmas cake so  

I really enjoy making that sponge I'm not so bad  with merang I've never mastered the art of merang  

ever what do they do they just end up sticky or  or not Rising properly burning them just yeah not  

not but I I think out of cooking and baking so  making more Savory things and baking sweet stuff  

I definitely prefer the sweet stuff I think it's  my decoration at the end that perhaps is a little  

lacking The Taste the flavor is good the decor  ation I remember I tried one year to make my  

sister a cake and I was going to decorate it like  Hansel and grettle and so what I wanted was to  

make a roof out of cereal so say like Weetabix or  shredded wheat or something to make it look like  

a thatched roof then I was going to have sweets  around the window frames all of these things and I  

had this perfect idea in my head what it was going  to look like and it looked nothing like that the  

cereal kept on falling off the roof oh no yeah  and just everything that I had in mind you know  

it just it looked like a mess it looked like an  absolute mess so but tast good it tasted good yes  

so we enjoyed the taste and Harriet sort of raved  about how good it tasted but there were no photos  

bless I made Jacob's my son Jac 's first birthday  cake because he has a dairy allergy as you know  

and I wanted to make the most delicious cake but  because of the dairy allergy I had to I think I I  

used banana to bind it or something um and I put  it in the oven and the instruction said you need  

to put a knife into it when the time is done and  then if the knife comes out clean it means the  

cake is cooked all the way through I know where  this is going I know where this is going okay I  

kept putting the knife in and pulling it out and  it kept coming out sticky and I was like oh no so  

I kept putting it back in the oven for a little  more time a little more time until eventually  

it had been in the oven for twice as long as its  original baked time and I thought this can't be  

right and it was starting to go black and hard  around the outside thought this is just burning  

so I took it out and I cut cut it in half and I  let some cool and I tried some and and uh it was  

it was delicious and then I realized the reason it  was sticky is because of the banana it was always  

going to be sticky but I now burnt the entire cake  so what I had to do was like carve a wedge off the  

top and off the sides just to save the softer  stuff on the inside and then I think I used  

green icing to to decorate it because all green ah  you know the kind of softer not the hard icing oh  

you know like you mix with butter but I used like  a yeah it was a mess it was a mess and so I bought  

a cake to go alongside it for the guests and lo  and behold hardly anyone tried my cake oh I would  

have tried it I love banana cake and actually  not eating sugar bananas naturally sweeten the  

cake without having Che sugar and it's amazing  plus you know and you can hide a multitude of  

sins with icing so I would have tried it oh thank  you I tell you what is great actually that we've  

recently discovered is putting a mashed banana in  your porridge have you ever done that no yeah it's  

great when you're cooking the porridge mash up a  banana throw it in mix it in as you're warming the  

porridge through and it just oh it's absolutely  amazing we did it once just by Chance the other  

day because we always experiment with flavors of  our porridge and now I don't like porridge without  

a banana mashed into it it's lovely plus it's a  good thing to do with bananas that are going quite  

Brown yeah you know when on if you were just  to cut it up it would be a bit gross but yeah  

mashing up it's great the other thing you can try  as well is mashing a banana with an egg and frying  

it as a pancake that's really good too yeah yeah  we do that sometimes um we tend to have very messy  

breakfasts lots of cooking and and mixing that  goes on anyway we're digressing let me pull us  

back and to the most important part of afternoon  tea which is tea of course now some people will  

serve L gray and um in most places you would also  expect English breakfast tea but what do you like  

English breakfast or L gray I am definitely  an English breakfast or Builder tea kind of  

girl I do like gray but I just feel it's a little  bit too fragrant for me I yeah English breakfast  

all the way yeah absolutely yeah English breakfast  is definitely the most commonly um consumed tea in  

the UK it's funny you said Builder tea because  when people say Builder tea to me I think about  

how strong the tea is a builder tea is when the  tea bag has been in for a very long time and it's  

almost like the spoon is standing up on its own  because it's so thick yeah oh well then that's not  

me CU I like my tea quite milky right yes I know  we we have a friend who it was is from Yorkshire  

a mutual friend and I remember getting into a lot  of trouble with her once because when we went to  

the theater together we were going to share a  cup of tea because we didn't have time to have  

one each and you know those little um packets  of milk you can get the little pots that that  

come sealed I put the whole thing in I put you  know this whole tiny little pot of milk into the  

she went crazy at me she was so cross with me  because typically up north in Yorkshire they  

like their tea like Builder's tea very very  strong and I it wasn't even strong like weak  

enough for me but my she got really cross with  me so I vowed never to share a cup of tea with  

anyone ever again well it is personal preference  isn't it Everyone likes their tea differently I  

don't like my tea bag to stay in the cup for too  long once the water's in because I don't like it  

strong at all I can taste when the tea bag's been  in for too long um if the tea bag stays in for a  

very long time we call the tea stewed yeah so  if the tea is stewed then for me it's quite  

bitter and in fact there's a brand of tea called  Yorkshire Tea so we have things like PG tips tle  

tea and Yorkshire Tea and tley tea tends to be  naturally stronger they might use a different  

um type of Tea Leaf or maybe they put more tea in  the bag but it is a stronger tasting tea isn't it  

um but when you're having afternoon tea they  tend not to use tea bags if you're somewhere  

really Posh they'll have loose leaf tea and this  is where it's not in a bag it's um well what is it  

it's like in a strainer isn't it that you you  put the loose leaves into a strainer and you  

pour the water through the strainer yeah so the  the loose leaf herb the tea is put into the tea  

into the tea pot with the water and then you have  your teacup and you take this strainer that you  

place over your teacup then you pour your tea and  then the water obviously goes through the strainer  

into your cup and then the loose leaf the tea is  then caught in the strainer but you have to make  

sure that you definitely do that because there is  nothing worse than taking a mouthful of tea really  

in that the loose the herb the loose leaf tea is  still in the cup floating around yeah that's not  

that's not good nice yeah when you accidentally  split a bag yeah you're making yourself a cup  

of tea that's just not nice upsetting it's very  upsetting yeah now um some people like to have  

milk obviously you like a lot of milk so you'd  have milk in your milk jug and then you'll have  

a little bowl of sugar I'm assuming you don't have  sugar in your tea I don't have sugar now you can  

have sugar or sugar cubes that's always cute and  they give you that little the metal tongs to take  

your cubes out of the little sugar pot and then  plop it into your tea yeah so yes and and in some  

places they might say one lump or two yeah so it  could be a lump of sugar a lump of sugar or a cube  

of sugar yeah um I don't have sugar either we're  both quite healthy in that respect we actually  

both worked in the same place didn't we we both  worked as the dental receptionist uh for a dentist  

in London when we when we both lived in central  London uh which I always think is quite unusual  

I think you maybe put me on to the job when you  were leaving yeah I think so yeah um but I think  

when you work in a a dental setting you can't help  but become hyper aware of what things are really  

good for your teeth and what's really not good for  your teeth yeah plus you get bad looks from the  

from the staff and the dentist if you're sitting  there eating sweets or chocolate or something yeah  

yeah absolutely so some people might have lemon  in their tea have you ever experienced afternoon  

tea where they brought out slices of lemon for  you to have that's usually with vanill gray so  

I think I don't know I think it's I don't know  it's more or less common but usually you would  

have L Gray tea without milk and a slice of lemon  in it mhm mhm um I've had it it's refreshing it's  

nice but I think I'm programmed to think sort  of tea should have milk apart from I do like a  

peppermint tea or or a green tea so I wouldn't  have milk in those but um but I'm not a fan of  

the El Gray with lemon no peppermint tea is my  bedtime drink so once I've got the children to  

sleep we try not to eat after 6:00 so we  eat dinner with the children between 4:30  

and 6 and then we take the children up and start  the bedtime routine and I tend to emerge at like  

8:30 9 o00 after they're down and uh then have  a cup of a large cup of peppermint tea just to  

you know have something soothing but that's not  um got any fat or calories in so that I'm kind  

of on this like like this intermittent fasting  I need to get 14 hours of no no calorie intake

and yeah it's really nice I love peppermint tea  fresh mint tea as well that's quite nice I like  

having that when you're away and they bring you  the the peppermint tea fresh mint tea and then  

when they pour it so like if you're in um I think  it's Moroccan the Moroccan thing turkey where  

they lift the water up high they lift the teapot  high is they're pouring the the liquid into your  

cup it's air or something yeah but it's just so  it's just very cool watching you know that that  

is a tradition the way that they have their tea  it's very cool yeah yeah I did watch something  

yesterday about the etiquette of stirring your  tea so we tend to just turn off teaspoon in a  

circular motion but apparently if you're following  proper etiquette very Posh etiquette I think you  

do something like 612 so you're almost running  the spoon across the cup rather than spinning it  

around that's supposed to be good to help the  sugar dissolve and not to spill I don't know  

sounds unusual then you have to take the spoon out  and then Glide it like along the rim of the cup in  

order to get rid of any drips right and then place  the spoon on the saucer rather than just pull it  

out and drop it down onto the saucer obviously  taking excess tea with you just yes slide it slide  

the the the spoon along the the rim of the cup to  get rid of those extra drips place it down when  

you have a cup and saucer because it's not typical  now in in a British home to drink tea with a cup  

and saucer we drink tea from a mug which we just  refer to as a cup but it's a mug technically but  

when you do have a cup and saucer do you hold the  saucer up to your to your face up to your chest  

and then lift the cup off the saucer so you have  it close in case of a drip or do you just lift the  

cup off the saucer leaving the saucer on the table  it's really interesting actually now you're saying  

that I think what I do depending on who I'm with  and where I am will depend on my demeanor do you  

know what I mean and how I hold myself if I feel  like I'm in a rather Posh place um then I probably  

will I will change the way that I eat to be more  refined more refined more ladylike shall we say  

so in that case I probably would bring the saucer  up as well and and hold the um handle handle thank  

you with my finger fingertips and then bring it up  to my mouth and then pinky little pinky showing no  

apparently you shouldn't do that apparently that's  it's the opposite yeah of what you think it means  

but yeah so I I do I do do that but if I'm with  friends or I'm just having a coffee somewhere and  

they've brought it to me in a cup and SAU so then  I will probably even stick my fingers through the  

handle grab the mug or grab the cup and then  drink it that way so it completely depends on  

where I am and and what I'm doing and what's  expected of me what version of yourself you're  

portraying to the world yeah absolutely I'm not  trying to be not myself but I just recognize in  

certain places and situations there should be a  level of I say etiquette and things like that and  

expectation of behavior isn't there yeah um I  think that the cup and saucer is ideal for holding  

a biscuit so if you and actually particularly if  you are not sat at a dining table if you are um  

maybe sitting on a lounger or a couch or in chairs  but there's no maybe you just have a side table  

but if you if you're holding your your little  saucer and you've got your little biscuit on  

the side and then you can your biscuit if that's  allowed your te did you see the queen do it at  

Buckingham Palace did she oh thought I thought  you were saying did you see the queen do it or  

you're asking did I see the queen I'm asking no  I I wasn't really able to watch the queen eat and  

drink that was she she would go to her own kind of  um Marquee that was only um she would have special  

vetted a servant waiters and people to look after  her and I was looking after people like Margaret  

Thatcher and other VIPs but not her okay um so  I didn't see whether she dunks her biscuit I'm  

sure she probably does in private did Margaret  did Margaret Thatcher dunk a biscuits well we  

didn't serve biscuits with the tea they had their  they had their cucumber sandwiches and their their  

pastries May why you can't dunk a pastry that  would just be messy no no that's too far Anna too  

far now afternoon tea drinkwise obviously tea you  would never really see people drink coffee but how  

about alcohol have you ever have you ever drank  like champagne or some sort of sparkling wine  

with afteron tea oh yes absolutely it's oh it's  lovely it's because again like I say it's often  

for a special occasion a birthday or something  like that so to have a glass of prco now I'm maybe  

controversial but I'm more of a prco fan than I  am a champagne fan so yeah a glass of pra when  

you first sit down and that could be quite nice as  well before the the sandwich the food comes out is  

to sit and enjoy a glass of prco first and have  a che loosen you up loosen me up absolutely yes  

I think they call is it he tea it's a different  name when you have alcohol oh right I mean I've  

heard of high tea but actually that's something  to look up I don't know the difference yeah you  

have different versions interesting you mention  about being controversial with prco but I think  

actually prco is everyone's goto in the UK because  it's cheap it's cheaper and you know unless you  

can afford to buy champagne on a whim and have  that as part of your afternoon tea champagne is  

reserved for very special occasions otherwise  because it's so expensive and actually I think  

someone of of an average pallette who doesn't  taste wine for a living wouldn't really be able  

to tell the difference between champagne and prco  I might be saying something very controversial  

here but for most people prco it hits the spot it  does the job two very common phrases there and um  

yeah it's much more affordable so prco all the  way and obviously as we know prco from Italy and  

champagne from France but I always like to have  a piece of fruit in my prco so a strawberry or a  

raspberry just to offset the sharpness sometimes  yeah yeah I love it when the fruit's been in there  

for a while and you finish a drink and then I'm  very unladylike and I grab a spoon or a fork and  

I scoop out the fruit or if no one's looking I  use my finger to scoop the fruit out and then  

eat that I use my fingers fingers all the way  yeah yeah yeah so our afternoon tea obviously  

very yummy um very sweet and also because of the  like the Pomp and the the event that is afternoon  

tea you have to have a very nicely presented  table so you would often have like nice clean  

white tablecloth which is always a worry with  me because I tend to make a bit of a mess um  

and you might have um a place mat or one of those  large dining plates and then your actual plate on  

top which I never really understood but actually  that large dining plate is acting like the place  

mat isn't it um and then you'll have your napkin  which will be a cloth napkin not a paper napkin  

and that will be nicely folded maybe held with  a a napkin ring which is just a a ring of metal  

to hold it nicely my mom used to do the paper  napkins but she would fold them in like a fan  

you know design and have it in the glass or um  put it out on the on the plate I remember at  

Christmas or on Sunday lunches sitting there for  ages folding all these napkins to make them into  

fans that was always fun I've never been around  to yours and had a fan napkin I think I'm going  

to make sure that you do that from now on well  now the children are getting older and getting  

in control again and we can have nice meals  once more um and then we talked about these  

these cups and sauces and it would be the the  best Crockery would come out it's the stuff  

that gathers dust in the cupboard most of the  time but if you're hosting a meal or afternoon  

tea at home then you'd get your fine china out  of the cupboard dust it off and show it off um  

and then it's always nice to offset everything  with a bunch of flowers isn't it I love flowers  

yeah always always got to have fresh flowers  fresh ones as well beautiful and I think people  

are going crazy now for table decorations I know  that whenever I'm having a dinner party or having  

a party of any description I will pay particular  attention to how I dress the table because I want  

it all to look just look really pretty and it  to be part of the experience as well and I think  

when you go to a restaurant or a special place  to have an afternoon tea it it is part of the  

experience is how the table's dressed and also  how they deliver the food comes in tears as well  

you have plate for your sandwiches at the bottom  and then the next tier up tends to be the scon or  

nowadays you can have things like Savory muffins  and things like that so they'll add an extra an  

extra level to that then you can have the cakes  on top of that and again they come out beautifully  

presented and yeah these are called cake stands  the with multiple teers so you have the plates  

layered up on these lovely cake stands yeah yeah  fantastic and you talked about you know different  

places that you might experience afternoon tea  we've already spoken about restaurants but some  

hotels also offer this experience as well so even  if you're not staying at that hotel you can book  

in to go and have this experience of afternoon  tea in their restaurant um and notable places in  

London for those of you visiting the capital um  are Cl the Ritz Selfridge's and seavoy so these  

places do very Posh and probably very expensive  afternoon tea have you ever been to any of these  

places uh have I I feel like I do you know it's  awful I can't remember I feel like I have been to  

one place but I can't remember the other thing  to say is that you have to dress appropriate  

if you go in jeans and you're looking quite  scruffy they will turn you away which I think  

in some sense it's quite nice because I think it's  nice to have a sense of occasion and it's nice to  

make an effort and have standards and things like  that so I think I I'm I'm a fan of that so formal  

attire or is it semi- formal sem semi- formal so  you you don't have to obviously go in a ball gown  

and uh top patn Tails but you'd have to wear nice  trousers and you I think you can actually wear  

jeans but you know Smart Ones where you're they're  tailored and you've got the rest of your outfit is  

put together so you have to look presentable gosh  it' be embarrassing to be turned away wouldn't it  

it would be I think they do it very I think my  brother's been turned away oh really yes um and  

I think they do it very nicely they they're  very kind about it but they say perhaps it's  

not appropriate or do you have something else  and I think trainers you're not allowed to wear  

trainers they may have changed things now but I  know traditionally and years ago when I perhaps  

would have gone you did have to present yourself  accordingly but one of the best places actually  

I'm going to say two places that I've been to  the best for afternoon tea this will tell you  

a lot about me you already know what I'm like but  my sister and I went to I think it's called lady d  

crazy cat Emporium right where you have afternoon  teeth surrounded by cats now some people will be  

sitting there going that's very unsanitary and  that sounds gross but it's right up mine and my  

sister's Street and you you walk in and you get a  table and then all around you is decorated purely  

for cats so you'll have a tree in the middle of  the room that has branches that the cats can walk  

along and then you've got loads of cat beds all  over the place um and I remember Harriet and I  

getting there and being all fussy about the cats  like oh so cute and just wanting to stroke them  

all the rest of it but then the food came out  and we were like right forget the cats let's  

concentrate on what's important and it was a  delicious afternoon tea really delicious not  

just because of the cats but the food was really  yummy that's interesting I wonder how much of your  

positive experience and the positive environment  actually informed your taste buds and your  

perception of the food because it can be altered  by you know your mood and your um experience of of  

the surroundings yeah this is this true it's true  but I do think the sandwiches were extra specially  

delicious right they also gave you a choice so  I think I chose all vegetarian options and they  

had lovely things that I'd not had before like  sundried tomato and humus it was really really  

yummy and um they came in little rolls as well  rather than just the slices of bread so it's  

just a little bit different and I think we had  a few more Savory Savory treats as well but it  

was really yummy and then the other place that I  went to was up north again new Yorkshire visiting  

a friend and the reason I think I like this  afternoon tea because there was nothing delicate  

about it at all the sandwiches were full on huge  sandwich doorsteps yeah you then got a choice of a  

kich or a pie and then you had a slice of cake so  you absolutely needed a doggy bag by the end but  

I just thought now I'm getting my money's worth  this is this is amazing but you certainly wouldn't  

want your dinner afterwards it wasn't afternoon  tea in that sense no no well I am so certainly  

feeling hungry now after talking about all this  food especially when you mention pie because I am  

a northern girl at heart and you can take me out  of the north but when you when you bring up the  

subject of pie I just my stomach's like give me  what's your favorite what's your my well I mean  

I am What's the phrase I was a vegetarian and  then I wasn't a vegetarian and now I'm trying  

to be vegetarian again but taking small steps  so I'm trying to cut out U red meat for example  

and any processed Meats like or Smoked Meats like  bacon and hams and things like that so I just eat  

chicken and fish at the moment but phasing that  out um but my favorite pie is like Steak and Ale  

pie or meat and potato which they don't do down  here we don't have meat and potato pies in the  

South um but they I think they're just really  rich and filling p i mean Pi is generally are  

quite you know filling they're quite comforting  heavy um meals but yeah the the richness of of a  

a steak steak in kidney or a steak in L pie with  the gravy oh it's just delicious well they call it  

comfort food don't they because it's traditionally  something you'd have on a cold day to warm you up  

and like you say it's the hug in a food you  know it's a way of feeling comforted as you  

said absolutely absolutely well well Charlie thank  you so much for joining me and talking to me about  

food and tea and in particular afternoon tea we'll  have to get together and do it together absolutely  

definitely yeah yeah I'll take you to Lady Diner's  crazy cat in for I would love to go I'd love to  

go I actually saw it on the news and um remember  thinking how wonderful an idea that was so yeah  

I'd love to do that right we'll do that this  is Nick and I talking about clothing let's get

uh so Mr fashion Easter um I want to ask you  about clothes no how do how do you do you think  

you're the kind of person who cares much about  clothes about how you look your appearance so I  

recognize the importance of clothes yeah they're  very important yeah you stay out of trouble if  

you got them on yes but uh they're not high  up on my priority list work is important it's  

definitely important but compared to some of the  people at work um and we all know the people in  

our own offices right yeah some people love  it well really kind of get dressed up to the  

nines yeah yeah yeah and um so I work in I work in  banking and don't hate me so you're in an office  

environment London where everyone kind of you  know yeah tries to look good yeah and there's  

def def itely a fashion yeah which I don't really  subscribe to so you just rock up in an old suit  

that you've had for how long it's pre pandemic  do you think that you used to care more um about  

your clothing before was there a time where you  cared more about how you dressed obviously now you  

don't I think I think for me as life has changed  I don't go out anymore I don't socialize as much  

anymore because I'm more settled I have a family  of got you got a family yeah you're giving up a  

bit right it's not that I've given up it's just I  I I think now it's more about being practical and  

being comfortable because when you've got young  kids you know you constantly picking up after  

them you can't be in like tight clothing and you  know skirts and stuff it's just not practical like  

young boys they want to be picked up and thrown  around and throw up on you and stuff they throw  

up on you when they're young not this age now but  I just think my priorities have changed and what  

I need from my clothing has changed I don't need  to impress so many people and you know yeah maybe  

I have just let myself go a bit but has has it  changed for you so I remember at University had  

you know guy friends and girlfriends and some of  the some of my female friends um once said to me  

um yeah I you know you're so into your Fitness  and you care about you know you the way you look  

and and and you care about your hair I had I had  more of it then um yeah I just don't understand  

why you don't don't seem to care very much about  your fashion and I thought it's a bit mean no I  

can't you know I think about the clothes I wear  and stuff and then somebody else said it and then  

like another person said it and I was like wow I  don't think I've got good fashion okay but then  

you know it in the work environment before  the pandemic when everyone would be in the  

office 5 days a week then your suit game is quite  important you have to wear nicer suits and and I'd  

go with people in my team who were really into  their their suits and and their kind of city boy  

fashion and stuff they into their GES and very  much into like their High ties aile is um like  

a jacket without any arms on okay but it's not  a puffer jacket a puffer jacket is like what a  

rude boy might wear but a Gile is what somebody  in the outs might wear when they go skiing or  

something like that okay I'll have to put that you  know and things that people would wear I think I  

know what you mean I'll look it up and it and it  works quite nicely with um if you wear like a a  

a shirt and a tie and you have a Gile and you  go out it's not too cold then you know it looks  

all right it's like a winter waste coat right  I guess okay but that you know there's almost  

there's loads of there's loads of memes on  social media about people that work in the  

city in London or in New York that are walking  around with their gay on and all that kind of  

stuff so I'd go with people that that were in my  team that were very much into their they'd say  

look I'm going to go and you know talk to somebody  about like getting a tailored suit or something  

and do you want to come I said oh I'll come and  have a look and then I kind of get pulled into  

it and we look at fabrics and they're like no no  no you're you're the manager you need to look at  

this come on let's get the more expensive one  oh really and they kind of egg me onto it a  

little bit it's very common now that you can go  and buy a suit off the peg which means that you  

go into a shop you know in the UK you might go  to John Lewis marks and Spencer then you might  

get one from Tesco now as well and so you'd  get um and you you can get a nice suit but  

they're built for standard physiques okay right  and and it's changed a little bit recently now  

because you you don't just buy a shirt so I went  and bought some shirts the other day and they had  

a standard fit a loose fit a tailored fit and a  skinny fit so they they're recognizing more now  

that you can choose like diff that basically more  than one body shape yeah there's not just a dad  

bod that people working in an office needs a suit  when you go to actually get a properly tailored  

suit then you can make sure that you pick the  fabric that you like and they'll and they'll make  

sure and for me it's quite important so I remember  when I went for my college prom I went to go and  

get a like a tux and the and the guy said you know  do you want a tailored suit or do you want one off  

the Peg and I was like well I'm a student so I  just have one off the Peg and he said I I'll just  

measure for you and I was doing a lot of exercise  actually this would have been University end of  

University I think and he measured me around the  chest and he measured me around the waist and he  

went you're going to really struggle and I was  like why and he said there's normally there's  

at the most about a five or six in difference  between your chest and your hips and yours is  

10 wow um and so cuz I got yeah so cuz I was doing  a lot of exercise and so I had a bigger a bigger  

more more muscly chest and and back and things but  I've still got a waist because everything with a  

guy right that classic physique comes down quite  tight and that was at a time when they'd only sell  

one SI size shirt and it was normally for you know  did you ever older guys did you ever get wonderweb  

and like iron an extra seam well I did adjust your  own clothes I did that last week did you yeah so  

I bought a new pair of trousers and I bought them  off the off the peg too long and they're a little  

bit too long so just folded up Bit Of wonderweb in  in the seams yeah i read it in notice that happen  

looks great yeah really nice fantastic yeah  so outside of the office and the suit what do  

what what do you and what do men generally wear  in the UK what we looking at so it depends on  

age right very very age dependent because of the  different types of Lifestyles and stuff that have  

in their wardrobes and things trousers number one  just Ultimate Classic obviously jeans jeans same  

for everybody in the world right pretty much  everywhere in the world I live in my jeans or  

my dungar yeah yeah so great you know hardwearing  comfortable you know you can brush dirt off them  

and all that kind of stuff right it's all all  good stuff and they look good and they look good  

as long as the elastic is not gone and you've got  like a saggy bottom which I tend to have most of  

my jeans or holes in them and things so so jeans  and then you know if you're my sort of age and you  

know chinos is quite a big thing chinos is like is  halfway between jeans and and like suit trousers  

and nowadays post pandemic suits are less of a  thing you know smart casual chinos is what you'd  

wear a lot of people might wear them out to a bar  in the evening to dinner you know if we went out  

for a for a dinner or something then I'd probably  wear chinos yeah um look good with really make an  

effort for me yeah really step it up right and  and then what you wear on your feet has got a  

bigger range I'd say right so you got you got  like running trainers then you've got um fashion  

trainers so they could both be Nikes right but one  of them are are much thinner and smaller one of  

kind of the classic Nikes and things or another  brand um and then you've got like boat shoes  

and uh like leather shoes and you can wear all of  those in like a relatively like casual sort of way  

yeah then when you got leather shoes I mean black  leather shoes are a bit smarter brown leather  

shoes you can wear with chinos and things that I  probably wouldn't you probably wouldn't ever seen  

me wearing my black leather shoes and anything  other than a suit yeah you do like shoes don't you  

like trainers you got quite a lot of trainers yeah  I I think I put yeah I do like I you hog so much  

of the shoe rack the family shoe rack is taken  up by like four pairs of trainers yeah like you  

don't need four pairs of trainers on the shoe rack  so I'm always kind of putting them back upstairs  

out of the way but if there is right we got squash  shoes yeah and then we've got our gym kns and then  

I've got casual kns and I've got brown shoes that  I wear for work I don't have gym shoes and squash  

shoes my my squash shoes are my gym shoes I don't  have a separate pair of training trainers just my  

shoes I hate shoes I need them and they're  important but I not very good at buying shoes  

or matching shoes with my outfit so I just kind  of would just go for the easiest option as long  

as it's flat and comfortable I don't really do  heels do you do heels sometimes do you know what  

some guys wear big quite big heels now you know  they're concealed heels in shoes get a to get a  

little bit more even stuff out it's interesting  it's changing a lot well yeah I mean I guess that  

you know there's a bit more like the popularity  in social media around like some of these like  

conversations around what guys and women want  and I think guys are realizing that women like  

guys that are taller than them and then they wear  tall heels and guys are like well guess I wear  

some bigger Hills not good for your posture not  good for your posture knees yeah yeah things are  

changing on the shopping on the shopping front  as well right so where do you buy your clothes  

cuz you tend to just bulk buy you like right and  now need some stuff and just go and buy a load of  

stuff in one go and then don't shop well you know  you don't like lots of people will pick things up  

as they go like they'll get something every month  they'll pick up a top here a pair of trainers  

there different sales going on you don't you'll  go for like two years and buy nothing new until  

there's holes in your stuff um and your things  are falling apart and then you go I need to go  

shopping and then you just bulk byy but what do  you do do you prefer to go into store and actually  

see and feel the things that you're buying try  them on yeah so you know a bit of a non-standard  

physique like is quite important for me to go and  try stuff on but part part of the reason so since  

you've known me I think part of the reason why  you think that I sort of bulk by stuff is more to  

do with the circumstance that we're in yeah right  and actually tied to two children not able to the  

house exactly so you know I have to literally say  I have to go and get some of these stuff now now  

because of a specific thing that's coming up yeah  like you know work at the moment has meant that  

I've needed to focus a little bit more on updating  some of my wardrobe for work and making sure that  

I've got smarter things and so because I haven't  had really had much of an opportunity to do that  

or money outside of childcare yeah um the dra it's  meant yeah it's meant that there's been a bit of a  

a pulse really of of trying to go and get stuff  because of that challenge as well around well I  

could I go into town a few times a week right to  go go into go into Central London but in order to  

be able to go somewhere that's not just one or two  shops near work on the way home I've got to go to  

a very different part of town so it's a choice  then between do I come back and help you with  

the kids and see the children before they go to  sleep or something or do I just say well I'm not  

doing any of that tonight because I'm going to  go shopping go shopping for 2 hours cuz that's  

probably what it's going to take even though I'm  already in town and so I end up buying more stuff  

online but and then just either crossing my  fingers it's going to fit or probably almost  

inevitably going well it's not that bad and then  put it in the cupboard and never wearing again  

yeah yeah we definitely need to have a big sort  out I think just go through everything and and  

decide I I'm always doing a sort out I think your  wardrobe could do with a a good she just want some  

space she's got her she's had her eye on it since  she's seen it well uh I think we'll leave it there

uh so Mr fashion Easter um I want to ask you  about clothes at the very beginning I said  

Mr fashionista if someone is described as a  fashionista then it's someone who is really  

interested in fashion they follow the trends  and the latest style and they try to replicate  

that in their own wardrobe so if you're a fashion  Easter then you're really interested in fashion

no how do how do you do you think you're the  kind of person who cares much about clothes  

about how you look your appearance so I  recognise the importance of clothes here  

Nick says I recognise the importance of clothes  if you recognise something it's not just a case  

of seeing something and it be familiar to you in  this context to recognise something is to accept  

that it is true yeah they're very important yeah  you stay out of trouble if you got them on yes but  

uh they're not high up on my priority list work is  important it's definitely important but compared  

to some of the people at work um and we all know  the people in our own offices right yeah some  

people love it well really kind of get dressed up  to the nine here I said to get dressed up to the  

nines if you get dressed up to the nines then it  means that you really get dressed up so it's not  

just a case of chucking on a T-shirt and a pair of  trousers it's really wearing your smartest nicest  

clothes because you want to look good you want to  make a good impression often we get dressed up to  

the nines to attend an event or for a specific  purpose yeah yeah yeah and um so I work in I  

work in banking and don't hate me he and Nick said  don't hate me after telling us that he works and  

within a bank the reason he says don't hate  me is that there generally is in this country  

probably in other countries as well a dislike  for the bank and bankers as there is a dislike  

in general for politicians this idea that everyone  who works in authority and controls the laws and  

the money these people are just all corrupted and  evil and terrible of course in reality that's not  

true there are many good will honest hardworking  people who work within government and within Banks  

you can't tar everyone with the same brush but  generally there is a o you work in banking so  

that's why he said don't hate me I'm a nice person  and I can vouch for that so you're in an office  

environment in London where everyone kind of you  know yeah tries to look good yeah and there's  

definitely a fashion yeah which I don't really  subscribe to here Nick said there's a fashion  

that he really doesn't subscribe to now you'll  understand the word subscribe in the context of  

YouTube and other social media platforms if you  subscribe to a person or a channel then you are  

following them you're saying yes I want to follow  this person and see more of their content which  

if you're not subscribed to my Channel please  do click on that button in this context he's  

saying he doesn't subscribe to a fashion so this  means that he doesn't agree with or or support  

that particular Trend that particular thing that  particular fashion so if there's something that  

you do not go along with an opinion or a belief  that you do not follow then you could say I don't  

subscribe to that so you just rock up in an old  suit that you've had for how long here I use the  

phras of verb to rock up if you rock up at a  place then it means that you arrive you turn  

up it usually has a sense of being quite relaxed  and confident and just kind of turning up normally  

I would use this if someone was turning up maybe  late and not seeming to care that they're late  

or turning up in inappropriate dress but just  having a sense of being relaxed and uncaring he  

just rocked up we've all been here since 8:00 a.m.  working really hard and you just rock up at 10:  

a.m. without even saying good morning it's  pre pandemic do you think that you used to  

care more um about your clothing before was there  a time where you cared more about how you dressed  

obviously now you don't I think I think for  me as life has changed I don't go out anymore  

I don't socialize as much anymore because I'm  more settled I have a family I've got you got a  

family yeah you're giving up a bit right it's not  that I've given up it's just I I I think now it's  

more about being practical and being comfortable  cuz when you've got young kids kids you know you  

constantly picking up after them you can't be  in like tight clothing and you know skirts and  

stuff it's just not practical like young boys they  want to be picked up and thrown around throw up  

on you here's another phrase of verb throw up this  basically means to vomit they throw up on you when  

they're young not this age now but I just think  my priorities have changed and what I need from  

my clothing has changed I don't need to impress  so many people and you know yeah maybe I have just  

let my myself go a bit but has has it changed for  you to let yourself go is to no longer care about  

yourself and your appearance and your health so if  you let yourself go then you've probably gained a  

few pounds in weight I don't have a beard but if  you do then youve probably stopped shaving so your  

hair has grown out maybe I haven't I haven't had a  trim or even brushed my hair for a while maybe I'm  

not washing maybe I'm not as hygienic I don't know  why I have to do my armpits at that point to Let  

Yourself Go is just to stop looking after yourself  so you probably don't look as good as you normally  

would you don't feel as good as you normally  would if you let yourself go you stop caring so  

I remember at University had you know guy friends  and girlfriends and some of the some of my female  

friends here Nick talks about his guy friends  and girl friends and then later repeats and  

says female friends so it's quite an interesting  interesting thing that we have here where we talk  

about our boyfriends and our girlfriends and they  are usually our romantic Partners so a boyfriend  

would be the male romantic partner a girlfriend  would be the female romantic partner so if I talk  

about my boyfriend I'm talking about the person  I'm intimately connected with who I live with  

and share my life with but you can also refer to  your male friends and your female friends so the  

people you're just friends with but when you're  talking about their gender you can also refer to  

them as your boy friends and your girl friends  but it becomes very hard to understand just  

from ear the difference so if I'm talking about  my boyfriend and my boyfri you can't tell the  

difference context doesn't really help you in  this case so what we tend to do is say my male  

friends or my guy friends and you'd normally say  my female friends although a lot of girls do say  

my girl girlfriends but it is difficult to make  that distinction so I just wanted to point that  

out so you can be aware of that and then you have  to be you know really listening very carefully to  

work out what the relationship is um once said to  me um yeah I you know you're so into your Fitness  

and you care about you know you the way you look  and and and you care about your hair I had I had  

more of it then um yeah I just don't understand  why you don't seem to care very much about your  

fashion and I thought it's a bit mean no I you  know the word mean means in this context unkind  

or cruel so if I am making myself a nice dessert  and I make one for my eldest son and my youngest  

son but I don't make one for my partner he might  say hey why have you not made me one and I'd say  

because I didn't want to you've let yourself go  you're a bit fat and then you say that's a bit  

mean and he would be absolutely right that is  mean that's unfair that's unkind and of course  

I wouldn't do that I think about the clothes I  wear and stuff and then somebody else said it  

and then like another person said it and I was  like wow I don't think I've got good fashion  

okay but then you know in the work environment  before the pandemic when everyone would be in  

the office 5 days a week then your suit game is  quite important okay here Nick talks about his  

suit game now this is not a common phrase you  don't need to learn this but what he's doing by  

adding the word game after suit is he's suggesting  that getting dressed up is like a game so when you  

go into work you are playing at being smart and  sophisticated and intelligent it's all a game  

like The Game of Life the game of work the game of  love and here he's talking about his suit game so  

he's introduced that idea that sense of everyone  competing to look good to look the part to look  

like they belong in the bank in London so it's  not a common phrase but he's talking about the  

game of getting dressed up and looking the part  his suit game you have to wear nicer suits and  

and I'd go with people in my team who were really  into their their suits and and their kind of city  

boy fashion and stuff they into their GES and very  much into like their high and ties aile is um like  

a jacket without any arms on okay but it's not a  puffer jacket a puffer jacket is like what a rude  

boy might wear but a Gile is what okay here Nick  mentioned being a rude boy now he doesn't mean a  

boy who has no manners it's not about being rude  a rude boy is a term for a subculture like section  

of society a group usually young teenagers often  this idea of them being quite StreetWise cool  

maybe rebellious I don't understand enough about  what makes someone a rude boy I I guess you could  

tell by their fashion the kinds of people they  hang around with I don't know he also mentioned  

city boy before that and a city boy is someone who  is very much part of the city culture the business  

City culture trying to look the part wearing very  smart suits or designer shirts and nice shoes and  

going out to the bars and the clubs and partying  hard working hard just trying to run the rat race  

basically somebody in the Alps might wear when  they go skiing or something like that I'll have  

to look that up you know and things that people  would wear I think I know what you mean I'll  

look it up to look something up is a separable  phrasal verb and it very simply means to look  

within a reference book or to look on the internet  to find some information so if I don't know what  

a word means I will look it up if I want to learn  more about someone who's applied for a job within  

my company I'll maybe look them up on the internet  see if I can find something about them on LinkedIn  

or um any other social media platforms and it and  it works quite nicely with um if you wear like  

a a shirt and a tie and you have a Gile and you  go out it's not too cold then you know it looks  

all right it's like a winter waste coat right  I guess okay but that you know there's almost  

there's loads of there's loads of memes on social  media about people that work in the city in London  

or in New York that are walking around with their  gay on and all that kind of stuff so I'd go with  

people that that were in my team that were very  much into there they'd say look I'm going to go  

and you know talk to somebody about like getting  a tailored suit or something here we hear tailored  

suit a tailored suit or anything that's tailored  has been made specifically for a purpose so if I  

had a tailored suit or a tailored dress it would  be a dress that has been measured and fitted  

specifically to my body so often men get tailored  suits suits that are specifically made and sized  

to them and do you want to come I say oh I'll  come and have a look and then I kind of get  

pulled into it and we look at fabric if you get  pulled into something you are encouraged and you  

are made to participate usually against your will  I mean it's not like forcing you like kidnapping  

you and forcing you to do something but it's  like with strong encouragement and maybe some  

light-hearted blackmail you are being pulled into  something you're encouraged to participate and  

they're like no no no you're you're the manager  you need to look at this come on let's get the  

more expensive one oh really and they kind of  egg me on to it a little bit egg me on they kind  

of egg me on now to egg someone on or to egg on  someone is to encourage them with words come on  

you can do it yeah come on to give them words of  encouragement to try and get them to keep going  

or to do something that they're not really Keen to  do it's very common now that you can go and buy a  

suit off the peg here Nick says off the peg this  phrase means to take something that's literally  

already ready to buy hanging on a peg within a  shop so it'll be on a hanger hanging on a Peg  

and you take it off and take it straight to the  checkout and buy it so it's all ready you don't  

need a tailor to make it for you which means that  you go into a shop you know in the UK might go to  

John Lewis marks and Spencer then you might get  one from tesos now as well and so you'd get um and  

you you can get a nice suit but they're built  for standard physiques the word physique just  

basically means your body shape we talk about  muscular physiques that would be a body that  

is muscly basically lots of muscles a standard  physique would be the kind of average physique  

that you see that most people have although is  there ever really a standard physique okay righty  

and and it's changed a little bit recently now  because you you don't just buy a shirt so I went  

and bought some shirts the other day and they had  a standard fit a loose fit a tailored fit and a  

skinny fit so they they're recognizing more now  that you can choose like diff the basically more  

than one body shape yeah there's not just a dad  bod that people working in an office needs a suit  

dad bod a dad bod is the body of a dad the idea  is that once you become a father you're so busy  

looking after baby and mom the house everything  that you aren't able to look after yourself  

anymore you Let Yourself Go you stop going to the  gym you stop exercising you snack more cuz you're  

so tired and so you start to become less toned  and have more of a tummy so you have a dad bod  

when you go to actually get a properly tailored  suit then you can make sure sure that you pick the  

fabric that you like and they'll and they'll make  sure and for me it's quite important so I remember  

when I went for my college prom I went to go and  get a like a tux a prom a prom is like a function  

a big dance event that you have to celebrate the  end of your time within an educational facility so  

um Nick said he had a prom at college and then  he thinks that actually it was at University I  

had a prom at the end of my University degree so  after 3 years we had a prom so it was a big not a  

ball but a very formal dance event there's music  there's food there's drink everyone wears their  

gorgeous gowns and the men wear their suits that's  a prom and Nick actually talked about wearing his  

tux a tux is short for tuxedo and the and the guy  said you know do you want a tailored suit or do  

you want one off the Peg and I was like well I'm a  student so I just have one off the Peg and he said  

I I'll just measure for you I was doing a lot of  exercise actually this would have been University  

end of University I think and he measured me  around the chest and he measured me around the  

waist and he went you're going to really struggle  and I was like why and he said there's normally  

there's here Nick said and I was like we use this  some people use it more than others we use this  

to say how you said something to say what you  said and how you said it so if you're literally  

repeating or giving a very clear indic ation as to  what your response was when you're telling a story  

about something that happened then you might use  this phrase so I was like what and she was like  

yeah and I was like No And she was like yeah and I  was like that's unbelievable and she was like you  

don't even know the half of it at the most about  five or six inch difference between your chest  

and your hips and yours is 10 W um and so cuz i'  got yeah so cuz I was doing a lot of exercise and  

so I had bigger a bigger more more musly chest and  and back and things but I've still got a waist cuz  

everything with a guy right that classic physique  comes down quite tight and that was at a time when  

they'd only sell one SI size shirt and it was  normally for you know did you ever older guys  

did you ever take get wonderweb and like iron an  extra seam wonderweb wonderweb is it's something  

you buy in the store wonderweb is the brand and  it's a product that you can use to stick material  

to material so it sticks Fabrics together wonder  where this specifically designed to help you to  

tailor your clothes a little bit so usually if  you've got very long trouser legs so your trousers  

are too long or maybe your sleeves are too long  you would put it's basically like a glue a dried  

glue that you that's in a ribbon and you place it  on the fabric and you fold the fabric over and so  

that you've got the glue in between but it's dry  so it won't stick and you get your iron and you  

steam you put hot steam onto the fabric and it  melts the glue and instantly sticks the fabric  

to the other fabric so you create a new seam  and a seam is where in clothing where material  

meets material and then is sewn into place so for  example um here I probably got a seam here um on  

this top I've got a seam for decoration here and  a seam here you have seams down the sides of your  

trousers probably have a seam in the side yes I  do and one on here well I I did your own clothes I  

did that last week did you yeah so I bought a new  pair of trousers and I bought them off the off the  

peg too long and they're a little bit too long  so I just folded up Bit Of wonderweb in in the  

seams yeah it in notice that happening looks great  yeah really nice fantastic yeah so outside of the  

office and the suit what do what do what do you  and what do men generally wear in the UK what we  

looking at so it depends on age right very very  age dependent because of the different types of  

Lifestyles and stuff that have in their wardrobes  and things trousers number one just Ultimate  

Classic obviously jeans jeans same for everybody  in the world right pretty much everywhere in the  

world I live in my jeans or my dungar yeah yeah so  great you know hardwearing comfortable hardwearing  

when something is hard wearing then it isn't  easily damaged so jeans are hard wearing because  

you can't easily rip or wear down jeans you know  you can brush dirt off them and all that kind of  

stuff right it's all all good stuff and they look  good and they look good as long as the elastic is  

not gone and you've got like a saggy bottom so  here I talk about the elastic not being gone and  

having a saggy bottom if you describe elastic  as being gone or um something that's functional  

being gone what I'm saying is it's done it's not  working properly anymore so in this the elastic  

has lost its elasticity so it's no longer tight  and stretchy it's actually quite loose it doesn't  

pull back anymore so when your elastic has gone  your clothes normally become loose and saggy  

when something sags it means that the effects of  gravity just allows it to drop down it's no longer  

tight it's saggy which I tend to have most of my  jeans or holes in them and things so so jeans and  

then you know if you're my S of age and you know  chinos is quite a big thing chinos is like is you  

may have noticed that Nick was um saying chinos  is where chinos jeans and trousers are all plural  

so actually Nick should have said chinos are as  as you would say trousers are jeans are because  

they're plural here it's just a very common  happens all the time native grammatical error  

sometimes or very often in spoken English  natives make mistakes and we just accept it  

you'll be surprised how many mistakes that native  speakers make don't look at that and go what rule  

am I missing you're not missing a rule we're just  breaking the rules so stress less just accept  

halfway between jeans and and like suit trousers  and nowadays post pandemic suits are less of a  

thing you know smart casual chinos is what you'd  wear here Nick said says that post pandemic suits  

are less of a thing now here when he says it's  less of a thing he's saying it's less important we  

talk about things being a big thing or a big deal  meaning it's important or it's not a big thing  

it's not a big thing it's not important don't put  a lot of weight or pressure on it so here he says  

pandemic suits are less of a thing they're less  important and then he says you know smart casual  

chinos is what you'd wear smart casual is phrase  given to the style of clothing that's required  

for a particular occasion or event so if you  see that there's a party going on and you're  

invited to the party and then it says smart cash  or smart casual then it's saying these dress in  

smart casual attire so it doesn't have to be super  smart tuxedo full suit it should maybe be smart  

trousers and a shirt no tie no jacket or maybe  a jacket but no tie don't make it really formal  

a lot of people might wear them out to a bar in  the evening to dinner you know if we went out for  

a for a dinner or something then I'd probably  wear chinos um look good with really make an  

effort for me yeah really step it up right here  the phrase step it up means to make more effort  

to do more to raise the bar which is another idiom  to bring up your level so if I'm at the gym I'm  

on the treadmill and I'm doing a casual walk I  I might want to step it up a bit I might want  

to make more effort so I go into a jog and then I  might want to step it up again and go into a fast  

run and then a Sprint until I'm falling off so to  step it up is to take it up a level to try harder  

to achieve something more and and then what you  wear on your feet has got a bigger range I'd say  

right so you got here Nick says what you wear  on your feet has got a bigger range I'd say now  

when you add I'd say or I would say to a statement  either before or after the statement then you're  

basically letting the listener know that it's  your opinion not something that you know as fact  

you got like running trainers then you've got um  fashion trainers so they could both be knes right  

but one of them are are much thinner and smaller  one of them kind of the classic Nikes and things  

or another brand um and then you've got like boat  shoes and uh like leather shoes and you can wear  

all of those in like a relatively like casual sort  of way yeah then when if You' got leather shoes I  

mean black leather shoes are a bit smarter brown  leather shoes you can wear with chinos and things  

that I probably wouldn't you probably wouldn't  ever see me wearing my black leather shoes and  

anything other than a suit you do like shoes don't  you like trainers you got quite a lot of trainers  

yeah I I think I put yeah I do like I you hog  so much of the shoe rack the family shoe rack  

is taken up by like four pairs of trainers hog to  hog something is to take more than your fair share  

or to hold and hoard something so you keep it  for yourself so that no one else can have it for  

example if we are sitting watching TV together and  we have the remote control to control the TV and  

we have a big bowl of popcorn so we're watching a  movie or something or we're flicking through some  

different options and you hold the the remote  control and you don't let me have a say and you  

hold the bowl of popcorn and you're eating it and  you're not letting me get access to the Bowl then  

you are hogging you're hogging the remote control  and you're hogging the popcorn so I might say stop  

hogging stop hogging the popcorn give it here  in this case I said that Nick was hogging or  

that he hogged so much of the shoe rack a shoe  rack is like a set of shelves specifically for  

shoes so we have two shoe racks in our Corridor  our entrance hall where we enter the house take  

off our shoes put them on the shoe rack and then  I say that the family shoe rack is taken up by  

it's something something is taken up by then it  is used by it is given to so I could say my time  

is taken up by the children and my work my time  is consumed is used by the children and my work  

there's no spare time for me yeah like you don't  need four pairs of trainers on the shoe rack so  

I'm always kind of putting them back upstairs  out of the way but if there is right we've got  

squash shoes and then we've got our gym kns and  then I've got casual kns you see brown shoes that  

I wear for work I don't have gym shoes and squash  shoes my my squash shoes are my gym shoes I don't  

have a separate pair of training trainers just my  court shoes I hate shoes I need them and they're  

important but I not very good at buying shoes or  matching shoes with my outfit so I just kind of  

would just go for the easiest option as long as  it's flat and comfortable I don't really do heels  

here I say I don't really do heels do is replacing  the verb where and we often use this I don't do  

canteens so if you're not someone who likes to eat  in a canteen you might say I don't do cantens or  

if you're someone who doesn't like to ride on a  bus you might say oh I don't do buses if I don't  

like taking the lift I won't take the lift which  is like the elevator I'd rather walk down the  

stairs because I'm a little bit scared of lifts so  I'd say I don't do lifts instead of saying I don't  

ride or get into a lift do you do heels sometimes  do you know what some guys wear big quite big  

heels now you know they're concealed heels in  shoes get more to get a little bit more height  

even stuff out it's interesting it's changing  a lot well yeah I mean I guess that you know  

there's a bit more like of a popularity in social  media around like some of these like conversations  

around what guys and women want and I think guys  are realizing that women like guys that are taller  

than them and then they wear tall heels and guys  are like well guess I wear some bigger heels  

good for your posture not good for your posture  knees yeah yeah things are changing on the  

shopping on the shopping front as well right so  where do you buy your clothes cuz you tend to just  

bulk buy you like right now I need some stuff and  just go and buy a load of stuff in one go here on  

the shopping front what I'm talking about here  is the topic of shopping or on the subject of  

shopping so I'm saying look while we're talking  about shopping where do you buy your clothes so  

on the shopping front I might then say um changing  the subject on the relationship front how did your  

date go the other night on the uh diet front did  you manage to make that amazing chili con car the  

other day so you're just using the word front to  replace subject or topic bulk buy means to buy  

in bulk if you bulk buy then you buy something in  a great quantity in order to save money so if you  

know that you're going to be using lots of toilet  roll because you have lots of little people in the  

house who are going to the toilet several times  a day then rather than just buying six toilet  

rolls it might be cheaper for you to buy 20 toilet  rolls so you bulk buy buy a load of stuff in one  

go in one go just means at the same time if you do  something in one go you do many things at the same  

time well you know you don't like lots of people  will pick things up as they go like they'll get  

something every month they'll pick up a top here  a pair of trainers there different sales going on  

you don't you'll go for like two years and buy  nothing new until there's holes in your stuff  

um and your things are falling apart and then you  go I need to go shopping and then you just bulk by  

but what do you do do you prefer to go into store  and actually see and feel the things that you're  

buying try them on yeah so you know a bit of a  nonstandard physique like is quite important for  

me to go and try stuff on but part part of the  reason so since you've known me I think part of  

the reason why you think that I sort of bulk  by stuff is more to do with the circumstance  

that we're in yeah right and actually tied to two  children not able to the house exactly so you know  

I have to literally say I have to go and get some  of these stuff now now because of a specific thing  

that's coming up yeah here Nick made a mistake he  said I have to go and get some of these stuff now  

and that just is a good example of how when we're  speaking we don't know what we're going to say  

it's just coming out of our mouths at the moment  that we're thinking it and so I think what Nick  

was about to say was I have to go and get some of  these things but then he changed to say some stuff  

but got confused didn't quite get the sentence  out right and said some of these stuff so that's a  

mistake like you know work at the moment has meant  that I've needed to focus a little bit more on  

updating some of my wardrobe for work and making  sure that I've got smarter things and so because  

I haven't had really had much of an opportunity  to do that or money outside of chare yeah um the  

dra it's meant yeah it's meant that there's been a  bit of a a pulse really of of trying to go and get  

stuff because of that challenge as well around  well I could I go into town a few times a week  

right to go go into go into Central London but in  order to be able to go somewhere that's not just  

one or two shops near work on the way home I've  got to go to a very different part of town so  

it's a choice then between do I come back and help  you with the kids and see the children before they  

go to sleep or something or do I just say well I'm  not doing any of that tonight because I'm going to  

go shopping go shopping for two hours cuz that's  probably what it's going to take even though I'm  

already in town and so I end up buying more stuff  online but and then just either cross my fingers  

it's going to fit to cross your fingers is to do  this it's to hope that something will or will not  

happen so you normally State what you want and  then say cross my fingers that it will happen so  

in this case he's hoping he's Crossing his fingers  that the clothes that he's bought online will fit  

or probably almost inevitably going well it's not  that bad and then put it in the cupboard and never  

wear it again yeah yeah we definitely need to have  a big S out I think just go through everything and  

and just side to sort out or to have a sort out  means to go through things with the intention  

of putting things into the right place so tidying  things up but also potentially downsizing removing  

some things getting rid of them perhaps so it's  to organize and clear things up you sort things  

out I need to have a big sort out of the playroom  there's lots of toys now that are for my younger  

children and my children getting bigger now so I  would probably sell some of the things that are  

still really nice and maybe give some things to  charity maybe pass some things on to friends with  

younger children and babies I'll have a big sort  out I also said to go through to go through is  

another phrasal verb and it means to methodically  search through things again with an intention of  

organizing or getting rid of things you go through  it in an organized way I I I'm always doing a sort  

out I think your wardrobe could do with a a good  she just wants some space she's got her she's had  

her eye on it since she's seen it he and Nick  said that I had my eye on it if you have your  

eye on something it means that you're watching  something because you desire it so you're waiting  

for something to become available or you're  waiting for an opportunity where you can take  

something because you want it well uh I think  we'll leave it there well I hope you enjoyed that  

if you did find any value in this lesson today  then please give this video a like be sure to  

subscribe and why not leave me a comment to tell  me which word or phrase you found most interesting