LEARN ENGLISH: How to talk about people & events in the past

77,173 views ・ 2024-05-14

English with Ronnie


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

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Hi there, it's Ronnie, going to teach you a lesson about using the past tense.
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A lot of people struggle with the past tense
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because there's so many verbs, there's irregular
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verbs, there's regular verbs, "ed" verbs, and a lot of the times when we're focused
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too much on the conjugation of verbs, we kind
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of forget to use other ways to actually use
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the past in regular conversations, which is
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my goal with you, to help you speak naturally
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so you don't sound like a person that doesn't speak English very well.
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I want you to sound as natural as you can, and this is a really interesting thing that
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I've been thinking about for a while is how we use the past tense in kind of a strange
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way.
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So, this is a grammar-based lesson on using the past, but there's some cool connections
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here.
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Let's look at our sentences, first of all.
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The blue sentences are written in present tense.
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I would say, "He is such an asshole."
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Because our verb is "is", we know this is present tense.
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And "such an asshole" means they're not
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really cool, not a really good person, okay?
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But if we wanted to make it past, we would say, "He was such an asshole."
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So, again, simple past, we're changing "is" to "was".
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And, hopefully, through this, when I'm giving
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you these examples, you're thinking, "Wow,
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why would I say 'He was such an asshole'?"
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Okay?
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Let's look at number two.
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We always go to the park and make fun of rollerbladers.
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Do you know what this means to make fun of someone?
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Ha-ha.
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If you make fun of someone, it means that
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you take delight or joy in weird things about
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people.
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So...
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Or bad things.
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Let's say that someone's wearing some weird
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clothes, or someone falls someplace, or they're
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doing something that you think is weird, you
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would make fun of them, like, "Oh, that's
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weird.
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Ha-ha.
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That's weird you do that."
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This is how bullying starts.
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So, you can make fun of rollerbladers, that's fine.
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We always go to the park and make fun of rollerbladers.
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This sentence is in simple present, because we have "always" and we have the verb "go".
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If I wanted to make that past, I would say,
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"We would always go to the park and make fun
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of rollerbladers."
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This past tense of the verb "will", "would",
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the auxiliary verb, is indicating to me that
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it's something that we did in the past as kind of a hobby.
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It's my hobby to do that.
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We can talk about people's jobs.
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I can say, "Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, I know, Kelly.
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She is an undertaker."
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So, when we talk about people's occupations or their jobs, we use the verb "to be", and
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again in the past, "Oh, yeah, yeah, she was an undertaker."
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So, why would we use the past tense to speak about people like this?
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What's happening?
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There are two reasons.
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One of them is maybe the person has died, or the person's dead to you.
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Maybe the person you're speaking to is talking
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about an ex-boyfriend or an ex-girlfriend
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or an ex-friend.
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So, if I'm having a conversation with someone
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and they said, "Oh my god, Kevin was such
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an asshole", hmm, this has two things that are going to happen in my brain.
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Either Kevin's dead, or we no longer talk to Kevin, and he's still an asshole, maybe,
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but the relationship with the speaker has changed.
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Let's look at this example.
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"Oh, we would always go to the park and make fun of rollerbladers."
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We're reminiscing or thinking about things in
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the past that we would do with this person.
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Maybe this is a good thing about a past relationship.
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"Oh, my ex and I, you know, we broke up, we would always go to the park, it was great."
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So, when people are using the past tense to
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speak about someone, those are the two reasons.
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"She was an undertaker."
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Now, she could be retired, or she could be
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dead, or, you know, your ex-girlfriend could
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have been into that stuff and been an undertaker.
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Another thing that we use in English to talk
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about habits, like "would", is we use "used to".
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"Oh, you know what?
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You know, we used to go to the cemetery."
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So, I'm talking about things that we did habitually,
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things that we did together on a regular basis.
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And in English, again, I use the simple present.
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We go to the graveyard.
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This tells me...
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And by the way, "graveyard" and "cemetery", not very different.
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Oh, hey, Trevor.
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What are you doing there, buddy?
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He's the keeper of the graveyard and the cemetery.
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We go to the graveyard, something you do on a regular basis.
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Every Tuesday, we go to the cemetery and we run.
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Or every Friday, we go to the graveyard and we check out the birds.
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We go birdwatching in the cemetery, see some crows.
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But if people are using the past tense, you're
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going to have to be careful, especially if
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the person's dead.
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It's very important to read your audience.
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If someone's like, "Oh, okay, um, tell me about your family.
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Okay, tell me about your dad.
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Uh, yeah, he was really cool."
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Uh-oh, he was cool.
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What happened to him?
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Is he not cool anymore?
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No.
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He's probably dead.
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So be very careful with this.
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You don't want to trigger someone or make them
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feel depressed or sad about what's happened.
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We also have some very interesting vocabulary
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that could be confusing if you didn't know
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how to talk about dead people, not exes.
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"Exes", by the way, means past boyfriends or girlfriends.
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We just say "exes".
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It's my ex.
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You could say "someone passed away" or "someone passed", and you think...
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Did they pass a test?
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Did they pass you on the street?
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No.
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This means that they're dead.
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So these are some different phrases that people use.
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It's kind of rude to say, "Oh yeah, he's dead."
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Like, whoa.
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Okay?
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So, people try and use more polite phrases.
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You might hear someone say, "Oh yeah, we lost him last year."
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You lost him?
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Well, did you find him?
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Where did he go?
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Is he okay?
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If someone says, "We lost someone", again, that means that the person's dead.
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More formally, "She's no longer with us."
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And then you think, well, where is she?
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Is she with someone else?
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No.
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If someone's no longer with us, again, it means they're dead.
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We have some slang.
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It's okay to joke with your friends, but make
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sure your friends aren't going through a death
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when you're doing this.
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First word is "croaked", like a frog.
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I don't know why.
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Frogs croak.
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It's the sound that frogs make, by the way.
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So, "Oh yeah, the old man croaked yesterday."
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He's a frog?
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No.
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Just means he died.
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Here's a really common one.
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"He kicked the bucket."
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Oh.
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Well, I don't know why that represents death.
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I've got some homework, or you've got some homework.
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In the comments, look these expressions up
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and tell me why in English we say "he kicked
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the bucket", because he's dead.
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Right?
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So, if he's dead, you can't kick a bucket, figure this out.
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And there's one, "He dropped dead."
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This has the suggestion that the person died
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suddenly, like, oh yeah, he was just jogging
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and he dropped dead.
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It's really strange the amount of people who
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are really fit, really healthy, and they're
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jogging and they die.
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Yeah, don't jog.
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Run fast or walk, but just don't jog, because you might pass out.
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And that's another thing.
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"Pass out", be careful, and "pass away".
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You don't say, "Oh yeah, my grandmother passed out last night."
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"Pass out" means you lose consciousness,
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but "passed away" means that you died, so...
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I know English is difficult, I know we've
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got these phrasal verbs, but one thing that's
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really important when you're speaking to people,
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pay attention and try and use the past tense
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naturally using expressions like "he was", "we would always do this", "we used to" to
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talk about habits, and make sure that when
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you're listening to people, if they're using
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the person in the past tense, that you focus
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on why they're doing this, like, oh, okay,
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I remember Ronnie's lesson, it's either an
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ex or a dead person, so be careful, but have
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fun.
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And for your homework, check out these expressions,
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and don't forget to visit your local graveyard.
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I'll be there, too, with Trevor, yeah, we'll
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be hanging out, you know, taking autographs
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and stuff, and maybe you can give me some popsicles when you're there, but...
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Or money, you know.
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I'm Ronnie, and I hope that all your days are wonderful.
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Yeah.
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