Hello and welcome to The English Like a Native Podcast. My name is Anna and you're listening to Week 34, Day 2 of Your English Five a Day. The series that is focused on improving and expanding your listening skills and vocabulary. So, let's kick off today's list with a noun and it is satisfaction. It's actually quite satisfying to say the word satisfaction. Satisfaction. We spell it S A T I S F A C T I O N. Satisfaction. Satisfaction. Satisfaction describes that incredibly pleasant and positive feeling that you have when you get something that you wanted or you do something that you wanted to do. For example, I'm thinking about cherries right now. Every evening when I've put the children to bed, I have a craving for a dessert. I feel like I need a treat after my long day of work and then a few hours wrestling with the children, trying to get them fed and doing their reading and their homework, getting them ready for bed. So, I bath them and dress them, brush their teeth, dress them in their bedclothes, and then tried to settle them down. By the time all that is done and they are finally snoring away, I feel like I need a treat. I need to sit down, watch something on the TV and have something pleasant to eat. And usually, I'm craving cherries. So, cherries is my big thing. I have frozen cherries in my freezer and I will pop six or seven cherries into a bowl, sometimes with some yoghurt. And when I eat it, I get a great sense of satisfaction. So, what gives you satisfaction? Here's another example."We get a lot of satisfaction from volunteering at the homeless shelter." Alright, next on the list is another noun and it is completion. Completion. We spell this C O M P L E T I O N. Completion. Completion. Completion is the time when something that you are doing or making is finished. So, if I am working on a podcast episode, I have to plan it. I have to make sure that my recording equipment is ready to go. I have to actually then record the podcast and then it needs editing and uploading to the right places and everything else that goes with preparing for publishing. Once an episode is ready and it goes out to you, then it has reached completion. So, we usually couple this word with on, so on completion, that something will happen, like you might get a certificate on completion, or you might get a cup of tea on completion of this DIY job, or we might use upon, which is very similar, upon completion, or when you reach completion, or at the point of completion. Here's another example sentence,"All students will receive a certificate on completion of the course." Okay, next on the list is a verb and it is transform. I love this verb. Transform. We spell it T R A N S F O R M. Transform. Now to transform is to change something quite drastically. Usually, it's a complete change. So, if I go and change my cardigan. Then I look slightly different, but I haven't transformed. Whereas if I go from my morning look, when I've just gotten out of bed and my hair's a mess, I've got no makeup on, I haven't had a wash, I'm wearing my pyjamas and I look very tired. If I were to transform myself, then I could have a shower, wash my hair and style my hair in a really nice way. I put makeup on, put on an outfit that's just very glamorous or really corporate and look like a completely different person, then the verb transform would be suitable. So, I have transformed into a glamour puss, or I've transformed into a force to be reckoned with businesswoman. OK, here's another example."This part of town has been transformed in the last 20 years. It used to be a really unsafe area and now it's popular with families." Have you transformed lately? As an actor, I would transform on a regular basis into monsters or princesses, lonely housewives, all sorts of different things. Crazy frogs. Okay. So, let's move on. We've had satisfaction, completion and transform. Now we have another noun that I'm sure you're familiar with, but we're going to go a little deeper and it is the noun surprise, surprise. We spell this S U R P R I S E, surprise. I used to always struggle to spell this word because it doesn't sound how it's presented. It's that initial part of the word, S U R. We simply say,/sə/, surprise. Surprise, rather than/sɜː/, we don't say/sɜːˈpraɪz/ we just say/sə/, surprise. Okay, so a surprise is an event or something that happens that you didn't expect. A nice surprise might be a party, a surprise party being thrown by your best friend on your birthday or when you get the promotion or when you complete your degree or your PhD. They might throw you a surprise party. A party you didn't know was going to happen and then you arrive at the venue and everyone shouts,"Surprise!" But surprises can also be nasty as well. You might have a nasty surprise when you come down into your kitchen in the morning ready to make some breakfast and find that the ceiling has collapsed and there's just rubble and dust everywhere. And you think,"Oh, my goodness me, how am I going to make my marmalade on toast in this mess?" Or, if you have a cat, your cat might like to bring you little surprises, little presents on a regular basis. The cat might think it's a nice surprise. But for you, having a little dead furry animal on your floor or on your doorstep may not be a nice surprise. It might be quite a nasty surprise. Luckily, my cat hasn't started doing that yet. But if he did, I would have to say,"Oh, Socks. What a nice surprise. You brought me a mouse. Lovely. Thank you." Okay. Let's move on to our last item on today's list. And it is a noun and it's spare room, spare room, two words, spare room. Spare, S P A R E. Room. I'm talking about a room in the house. R O O M. Spare room. The spare room refers to a bedroom that is not in constant use. So, for example, I live in a three-bed house. That means there are three bedrooms in the house that I live in. One of the bedrooms is mine. One of the bedrooms is the children's room. They share a room. And then one bedroom is the spare room. It's also known as a box room because it's a teeny tiny little room. It's only big enough to literally have one single bed and a tiny little bedside cabinet. This room is reserved for guests. So, if my mother-in-law comes to stay, or even actually if I'm having a bad night's sleep, maybe the children keep coming in and disturbing me, I might disappear and go and hide in the spare room to get some sleep. That's sometimes what we use it for. But mostly we actually just don't dump some laundry in there that needs to be done. Just leave it there out of the way until I'm ready to tackle it. So, the spare room. Here's another example."Our spare room is too small to be a bedroom so we're going to use it as an office." Okay, so there we go. Five items today. We had a lot of nouns. We started with the noun satisfaction, that lovely feeling when you get what you wanted. Then we had another noun, completion, the time when something you were doing has been finished. Then we had the verb transform, which is to change something completely, usually in a good way. Then we had the noun surprise, when something happens that you did not expect. Then we had the noun spare room, which is a room that's available to use because it's not usually in use. So, let's now do this for pronunciation. Please repeat after me. Satisfaction. Satisfaction. Completion. Completion. Transform. Transform. Surprise. Surprise. Spare room. Spare room. Very good. Okay. What noun did I mention that is the time when something you've been doing is finished? Completion. And what verb describes a complete change? Transform. What do we call that space in the house that you can use when you need to because it's not often in use? Spare room. And what noun do we use for the pleasant feeling you get when you get what you wanted? Satisfaction. And finally, what noun do we use when an event occurs that you didn't expect? Surprise! Very good. Listen out for these items during today's storytime."Right love, my taxi's here, I'm off," Lorna said as she grabbed her bags."OK babe, have an amazing time," replied Andy. He gave her a kiss goodbye and watched her get into the taxi. She was going away for the weekend on a trip with some friends from school. Andy was home alone. But he had plenty to do. He had planned a surprise for Lorna. He was going to transform their spare room into, well, an actual room that they could use as a spare bedroom when friends came to stay. Right now, it was a big mess. They were using it to store things. Andy's plan was to move all the mess out and then paint the room. Andy made two piles one for things to keep and one for stuff to give away. It was hard work, but he focused on the satisfaction he would feel when he finished. He started painting the room. After a couple of hours, he took a break to let the paint dry. He was getting closer to completion. By the end of the day, he had finished painting the walls. Lorna was expected home the following evening, so he still had time to finish the room. The next day, he moved some furniture back in and decorated the room with pictures, posters and some of their photos. He added a plant. He cleaned the windows and hoovered the floor. The room looked completely different."Honey, I'm home," said Lorna as she walked through the door."How was the trip?" asked Andy."Great, but I'm tired," she replied."Before you go and rest, I want to show you something," said Andy. He took her hand and led her to the spare room."Did you really do all this?" She asked him."It looks amazing babe," she said and she gave him a big kiss. Andy was proud of his hard work and happy that Lorna appreciated his surprise. And that brings us to the end of today's episode. If you enjoyed it, then please take a moment to leave a like, a rating, or a review. And until next time, take very good care and goodbye.