Hello and welcome to The English Like a Native Podcast. My name is Anna and you're listening to Week 39, Day 4 of Your English Five a Day. This is the series that is dedicated to expanding your active vocabulary by deep-diving into five items every day of the working week from Monday to Friday. So, let's kick off today's episode with a verb and it is fascinate, fascinate. We spell this F A S C I N A T E. Fascinate. Fascinate. To fascinate someone is to attract and hold the attention of that person. So, if I am sitting in a restaurant with eight people, we're having a wonderful big dinner, but there's one person at the table that just continues to get my attention and hold my attention with their charismatic manner, with their interesting stories, and they're just fascinating. And I just want to learn more about them. Then that person is able to fascinate me. That person does fascinate me. Who fascinates you, or rather what fascinates you? Something in nature could fascinate you. Science might fascinate you. Most things to do with space and life fascinate me. Here's an example sentence, "The colourful butterfly fascinated the young child." My boys enjoy a bath most nights before they go to bed. And at different points, both children have been fascinated with the way that the water spins as it drains down the plug hole at the end of bath time. So I'll pull out the plug and I'll say, "Come on, boys, it's time for bed. Let's get out of the bath and get our pyjamas on." And I turn around. I go out of the room. I'll come back into the bathroom and one of the boys will be lying down in the bath staring at the whirlpool that has been created as the water drains out of the bath. They are fascinated. It fascinates them. It fascinates them, this wonderful pattern that the water makes as it leaves the bath. What fascinates you? Next on the list is a noun and it is grimace. We spell this G R I M A C E. Grimace. Grimace. A grimace is a twisted expression on a person's face. It usually expresses disgust or pain, or maybe you might have a grimace when you find something that's bad, a bit funny, so it's like wry amusement. So, when I was younger, there was a TV show called "You've Been Framed" and it would play a series of people's homemade videos. You find this kind of compilation now on YouTube all the time. And it's just a series of videos of people or animals doing weird and wonderful things or silly things or having accidents. And some of them are more focused on those kinds of cringeworthy moments where someone like maybe slips over and bangs their bum on the ice or falls off a motorcycle, but narrowly misses getting run over by a truck. And these are terrible moments. They're painful moments or frightening moments, but we find them entertaining to watch, especially if we know that in the end, the person wasn't badly hurt. And so that's kind of like wry amusement when you find amusement or humour in things that are a bit difficult or a bit painful. And so when you're feeling that way, when you're watching those kinds of videos, you might have a grimace on your face. Here's another example, "She made a grimace when she tasted the sour lemon." My boys are very clear with their facial expressions on how they feel about the food that I'm giving to them. And I'll often ask them to try different things, new and interesting foods and tastes and textures. And Jacob, my eldest, who is a little bit more fussy, he's more sensitive, I think, in his mouth. He will often wear a grimace if he is experiencing something that's quite rich or different to what he is used to eating or tasting. And, if he does grimace, then I say, "Just give it another try. Try it again." And if I see a grimace a second time, then I know it's probably not the kinds of food that he wants to have on his plate. Okay, moving on from fascinate and grimace, we have an adjective and it is harmonious, harmonious. We spell this H A R M O N I O U S. Harmonious, harmonious. Harmonious is something that is forming a pleasing or consistent whole, and I mean whole as in W H O L E, not a hole, like the hole that you dig into the ground. So, when a choir sings together consistently in a way that is complete, then they are harmonious. A harmonious relationship is a relationship where two people complement each other very well, and they have a very pleasing and easy way of working together. It's harmonious. Hopefully, you all work in a harmonious working environment where every individual person plays their part and when you work as a team, as a whole, everyone does their bit. So it works perfectly well. It's harmonious. Here's an example sentence, "The choir's harmonious voices filled the church." Next on the list is an idiom. We all love an idiom. And this is burn the midnight oil. To burn the midnight oil. Burn, B U R N, the, midnight M I D N I G H T, oil, O I L. To burn the midnight oil this means to work late into the night or to work very hard and for very long hours. When I was free and single, as in I didn't have children, and my only commitment was my work, I would stay up until I literally couldn't hold my eyes open any longer. I was a night owl and I would burn the midnight oil over and over again. So, I'd wake up early, start my working day at 9 am, and then I'd just keep going, keep going, keep going, and be still editing videos and writing scripts and making thumbnails at one in the morning. I was obsessed. So I was burning the midnight oil. You can't do this for very long. You burn out eventually. Here's an example sentence, "She had to burn the midnight oil to finish her report on time." Have you ever burnt the midnight oil? Okay, last on the list is the adjective immaculate, immaculate. We spell this I M M A C U L A T E, immaculate, immaculate. Notice how I pronounce that ending. It's not late /leɪt/. That's how it's spelled, but we say /lət/. Immaculate /ɪˈmækjələt/. If something is described as immaculate, then it's perfectly clean. Absolutely neat and tidy. Not just a little bit, but perfectly. So, if I describe the house as being immaculate, it never happens. It never happens in my house. But if I were to describe my house as being immaculate, then perhaps I paid for professional cleaners to come around and give it a deep clean. Like I said it never happens these days. If I describe a person as being immaculate, then they are very, very neat, very tidy. They don't have a hair out of place. They are perfectly groomed, gorgeous. Maybe they smell nice as well. They are immaculate. Again, not an adjective I'd use for myself, but let's do another example sentence, "Anna liked to keep her house in an immaculate condition, a near impossible task with her two children tearing about the place." That's our five for today. So, let's do a quick recap. We started with the verb fascinate, which means to attract and hold someone's attention. Then we had the noun grimace, which is that twisted expression that a person wears on their face when they're disgusted or in pain or when they are experiencing wry amusement. Then we had the adjective harmonious, which is forming a pleasing and consistent whole. Then we had the idiom burn the midnight oil, which is to work late or to work very hard for very long hours. And we finished with the adjective immaculate, which is perfectly clean, neat and tidy. So, let's do this for pronunciation practice now. Please listen very carefully and repeat after me. Ready? Fascinate. Fascinate. Grimace. Grimace. Harmonious. Harmonious. Burn the midnight oil. Burn the midnight oil. Immaculate. Immaculate. Fabulous! Let's now test your memory. Oh, I've just seen something really disgusting and my face is all twisted up. What noun would you use to describe this expression on my face? Grimace, that's it, a grimace. But then I hear the most amazing story that I can't stop listening to. It just holds my attention. What is this story doing to me? It's fascinating me. Yes. And then in the evening, I go to my choir practice, and we all sing together in a really pleasing way that just completes itself. What adjective could I use to describe this very complete and pleasing way of singing? Harmonious. Yes. Fantastic. The next day I spend the entire day cleaning my house because I want it to be perfectly clean, neat and tidy. What adjective would I use to describe this dream state? Immaculate. Absolutely right. And finally, I'm going to stay up every night this week, late into the night, and I'm going to work for hours and hours and hours. What idiom could I use to describe this work ethic, this plan? I'm going to burn the midnight oil. Very good. Okay, listen out for these items once again in today's storytime. Dr. Harold Finch, the town's most esteemed dentist, was ironically battling a terrible toothache. His immaculate clinic, always spotless and harmonious with a soothing hum of dental equipment, now felt like a torture chamber. One evening, after seeing his last patient, Harold slumped into his chair, clutching his jaw. He had been burning the midnight oil for weeks, trying to keep up with the influx of patients, and it seemed his own teeth were staging a rebellion. As he glanced at the X-rays of his molar, a grimace appeared on his face. The irony was not lost on him a dentist in need of dental care. He considered calling a colleague but was too embarrassed to admit his predicament. While waiting for the painkillers to kick in, he found himself fascinated by a documentary on ancient dental practices. Watching how people dealt with toothaches centuries ago, with rudimentary tools and herbal remedies, provided a strange comfort and distraction from his own throbbing pain. Just as he was about to doze off, the clinic door creaked open. In walked Mary, his long-time dental assistant, with a knowing smile. "Doctor, let me help you with that," she said. Harold, still grimacing, nodded gratefully. It seems even the best dentists need a little help sometimes. And that, ladies and gentlemen, brings us to the end of today's episode. Thank you so much for letting me tickle your eardrums for yet another day. I do hope you'll come back again tomorrow. Until then, take very good care of yourselves and goodbye.