Good morning, Plus Member. Welcome to another bonus episode. It's quite early in the morning so, I might sound a little bit hoarse. Or a bit groggy. That's a common word that we'd use. I'm a bit groggy this morning. Just when you feel a bit, a bit rough around the edges, like you haven't fully energised your body, your voice and your mind. You'd feel a bit groggy. You'd also feel quite groggy if you had had a late night, maybe you were out painting the town red, partying, going wild and it would leave you feeling a little bit rough in the morning and therefore you'd say,"I'm a bit groggy this morning." So, it's a beautiful sunny day today and I am doing this podcast wearing my brand new glasses. Yes, I'm at that age now where my eyes are starting to decline and I need glasses to be able to continue my work. So, hopefully I will read all my notes properly and I mean, that's how it's supposed to go, isn't it? But I am feeling a little bit disorientated actually wearing glasses. Some things are very clear and other things are quite blurry. So, I think it's going to take a few days to get used to them. Right. So, what am I doing today? I'm going to be deep diving into 10 items of vocabulary that popped up in yesterday's episode, which was the Amazing Inventions beginning with"C". Now there were some fabulous phrases that came up and the first one that I thought I would share with you today is rings a bell, rings a bell. Rings, R I N G S, rings a bell, bell, B E L L. We use this phrase a lot. If something rings a bell, then it means that it sounds familiar to you. You can vaguely remember something to do with it, but it's not a clear memory. So, for example, if you said to me,"Anna, do you know someone called Justin Bieber?" Imagining that I can't really remember who Justin Bieber is, but the name sounds familiar. Then I would say,"Oh, I'm not sure. The name rings a bell." The name rings a bell. Or if you are trying to remind me of a document that we were going through together three months ago, and I'm sure that I've never seen it before, but you're saying,"No, do you remember?'Cause we did this and we worked on this part of the document and then you did that part and I did this part. Do you remember? We worked in a really collaborative way. It was really good fun." I say,"Oh yes, that rings a bell. Oh yes, that does ring a bell. I think I'm starting to remember now." It's like inside your brain there are little bells and when you ring them it's bringing back a memory. Ding, ding, ding, ding. The memory's here. So, if something rings a bell then it's familiar to you in a loose and distant way. We often use it together with name. That name rings a bell. Right. So, next on the list is the word undergo. I think in the podcast that you listened to yesterday, we said that something had undergone many changes, and this is usually what you'll see with this particular word. To undergo usually means to experience something negative or some change. So, you undergo a transformation, or you undergo a terrible ordeal, or you undergo a series of surgeries, you undergo cancer treatment. You know, it's usually something unpleasant or change, big change. Okay, because we're using the word go, obviously when you change it for the tense, then it's going to drastically change. So, you're going to have undergo, underwent, and undergone, depending on the tense that you're using. So, I've undergone a big transformation within ELAN recently. I say I, not I, one of our courses has undergone a huge transformation. I decided that I wanted to completely overhaul, there's another word. I wanted to completely overhaul my level courses. And so, the B1 course is the first one to undergo the big transformation. And that's recently been released. And it's very exciting. It took a long time. But we are very pleased with the outcome. Have you undergone a big change recently? Okay, moving on. Next is the adjective highbrow. Now if something is described as being highbrow, then it's like calling it intellectual. It usually involves something serious or very artistic or complicated. So, if you describe a person as being highbrow, then that person is only interested in very serious and complicated subjects. But if you describe an event as being highbrow, then it's very intellectual. It's a very serious and upmarket event. Have you ever been to a highbrow event? Now before I used this adjective, we were talking about chess and obviously chess is very intellectual. It's a game of strategy. And the biggest and best chess masters out there are definitely very intellectual, very clever people. It's a complicated game, chess. I mean, it can be simple in some respects, but it's quite a complicated game. And so it is a game enjoyed by highbrow people. It's a highbrow game. Alright. Very different to Cards Against Humanity, which is definitely not a highbrow game! Alright. So, moving on from rings a bell, undergo and highbrow. Next, I've got the phrase set against the backdrop of. I chose this phrase just because it's slightly metaphorical. So, when you're in the theatre, the backdrop is a piece of cloth that is hung from the ceiling at the very back of the stage and the cloth is decorated in some form. So, it might be a plain black cloth that just hides the brick wall at the back of the theatre or it might be a white cloth or a sequined cloth. It could also be a cloth that has a scene painted on it. So, it might have the scene of a nice little picturesque village in France, or it might be a castle painted on it. And when you go to see a show in the theatre, you'll see all sorts of backdrops being put in, depending on what the scene is, of course. But we use this phrase in general as well, to suggest the context. So, if something is set against the backdrop of something else, then we're saying this thing is in this context. So, I might tell you,"I'm writing a story about a struggling single mum, but it's set against the backdrop of the Great Depression." So, obviously the story focuses on our character, the single mum, but the wider context, the backdrop to the story is her struggles in the Great Depression, during a great time of difficulty, economically, where, you know, society as a whole was struggling. So, it's how she navigates her way through that time, it's set against the backdrop of that time. So, I just wanted to make that a little clearer. The next phrase I wanted to bring up is a phrasal verb and it is knock out. This was used when I was talking about chess. To be knocked out. I was actually talking about chess boxing which is a very funny... oh, what's the word? A very funny addition to the game of chess. So, to knock someone out is to hit them in a way that causes them to lose consciousness. So, in boxing, this is something that people aim for. You try and hit someone so hard that they lose consciousness. I think it's terrible, but there you go. And yeah, they get knocked out. You could also be knocked out by a drug. So, if you're struggling with pain and you take some very strong painkillers, those painkillers might knock you out and they might make you lose consciousness. Which probably in that case would be welcomed. We could also use knock out in other ways. If I say knock yourself out, then it's like saying go for it. So, if you say,"Anna, I really want one of your chocolates from your box of chocolates." And I say,"Yeah, knock yourself out." Then I'm saying go for it. It's the same as go nuts, help yourself, you can go and have a handful of chocolates from the chocolate box, I don't mind. Knock yourself out. What else do we do? Oh, we say,"She's a knockout. What an absolute knockout." And that means that someone looks stunning, that you feel like you might lose consciousness because they look so good. But as an adjective, to be a knockout is one word. Knockout is one word. Whereas as a phrasal verb, to knock someone out, that is two words. Knock out. Right. We've had rings a bell, undergo, highbrow, set against the backdrop of, and knockout. The next word I wanted to bring to your attention is the word checkmate. So, if you are a follower of chess, then you'll know that checkmate is a position in which you have the other person's king in an undefeatable position. You basically got them pinned. They can't defend themselves. You are going to take them in the next move and there's nothing they can do. So, it's like death to them. It's the end to them. They are going to lose even though they haven't yet lost because you haven't yet taken the step. Having them in checkmate just says,"Look, I've got you. I've got you. I haven't taken you yet, but I've got you. You can't escape from this position." It's like having someone cornered. So, we do use checkmate outside of chess to describe when someone has been defeated or when a plan can't move forward. When you've created an environment where someone can't win. Checkmate. This is what I've done. And so you can't do that. And if I do this, then I'm going to win. So it's just an undefendable position, a position in which someone cannot win. You have them in checkmate. Next is the adjective allotted, allotted. This is one of those adjectives that it's not very common, but it is common. I think it's like the next level up, the next layer of vocabulary up. It's not something I'd expect my child to say, but I do hear it often. So, it's often coupled with time. So we hear people talking about your allotted time, or sometimes your allotted space on a piece of paper or something like that, in the allotted space. And allotted just means given, what's been given to you. So, you have 10 minutes in which to complete this part of the exam. 10 minutes is your allotted time. You have to complete within the allotted time. Or I've given you all a piece of paper. You all have a different size of paper. All your papers are various sizes. So, you must make your piece of writing fit within your allotted spaces, places on the paper. That's a terrible example. So yes, allotted time, allotted space. You might have been given allotted places on a dinner table. If you're going for a big dinner and everyone's got their place names on the table, you can see your name, a certain seat, and that's your allotted seat, your allotted space in which to sit. So, allotted is given, your given time, your given space. So far we've had ring a bell or rings a bell, undergo, high brow, set against the backdrop of, knock out, checkmate and allotted. The next phrase I wanted to highlight is brain versus brawn. This is very similar to mind over matter. Brain versus brawn and mind over matter. Although the second one has a slightly more implicit meaning. So, brain versus brawn is intellect versus brute strength. So, let's say that we take a very clever, but not very muscular man and why does it have to be a man? A woman, a very clever woman and a very strong muscular woman who isn't very clever and you put them both in a room and you say,"Okay, so you guys have to work out how to get the coin out of the locked box and there's no key in the room. So, you have to work out how to get the coin out of the locked box. The first person to get the coin out of the lock locked box is the winner." Then you're virtually, or literally, even, pitting brain against brawn. You're trying to see who can work this out. Is it going to be the clever person? Is she going to come up with a plan of action to get the coin out of the box? Or is it going to be the strong person who's going to use their strength to tear the box apart, to bend and warp the metal in order to create a space to get her hand in and take the coin? So that's brain versus brawn. Mind over matter. Mind over matter is similar, but it's usually suggesting that you think your way out of a problem. So, you use your brain to get past an issue, a physical issue. Mind over matter. Brain versus brawn. Actually thinking about it, they're not very similar at all, are they? They're actually quite different. Oh dear. It's funny how the brain works sometimes. Obviously at this time in the morning, mine isn't working so well. Okay. So, next on the list is a nice phrase: to look on the bright side. Sometimes you'll hear this shortened as you did in the previous podcast to simply on the bright side. You'd use this after talking about something that's quite negative, that something bad's happened or you've given some bad news, but you want to then highlight something good. So, you might say,"Hi. Unfortunately, the fun fair has had to be closed today because of the terrible weather. But on the bright side, they gave us some free tickets to go to the ice rink, so we can go skating if you like." Or,"I'm really sorry. We can't go skating because I've got a broken toe, but on the bright side, I do have three hours with nothing to do so, we can still spend some time together." So, on the bright side is just bringing in something good after announcing or discussing or hearing about something bad. And the last thing that I wanted to discuss is the phrase in the middle of nowhere. We use this a lot."Oh, I found this house in the middle of nowhere, and it was really beautiful." Or,"We were hiking in the middle of nowhere." And it strikes me as funny because you're never nowhere. You're always somewhere. But we use this phrase to suggest that something is kind of outside of civilisation And so, you could be out in the Peak District, an area of natural beauty where there's lots of hiking to be done, and you could be on a long hike and then someone asks you,"Oh, where were you last week?" You could say,"I was hiking in the middle of nowhere.""Oh, brilliant! Where exactly?""Well, I mean, I was in the Peak District.""Oh, the Peak District. That's lovely. Where did you stay?""I stayed in a B& B in the middle of nowhere." And so we use this phrase just to suggest that it's a space that's kind of open and there's not much going on there. You're in the middle of nowhere. So, if you are literally out on the Peaks and there's not much to see, there might be a few farmhouses dotted around, a few walls, a marked trail, but otherwise there's not much going on. There's no people. Maybe there's the odd pub every now and again. Then you'd describe that area as being in the middle of nowhere. Alright, so, we've had to ring a bell when something sounds familiar, but you can't quite place it. To undergo, which is to experience something, usually something unpleasant. We had the adjective highbrow when something is quite serious or intellectual or very artistic. We've had set against the backdrop of, when you're giving the context of the wider environment. We've had the phrasal verb knock out, where you make someone unconscious, usually with a blow, not a blow, like, but a blow, like a hit, a punch, a bash. Then we had the chess term checkmate that can be used outside of the game of chess that just means you've got someone in a position where they cannot win and they're stuck. They have no options. Then we had allotted, meaning your given, your allotted time, your given time. We had brain versus brawn, intellect versus strength. On the bright side, a phrase that you'd use to bring in a more positive thing to focus on. And then the last phrase we looked at was in the middle of nowhere, something you'd use to describe being outside of civilisation. Alright, well I do hope you found today useful. As always, thank you for listening and I hope to tickle your eardrums again next week. Until then, take very good care and goodbye.