Hello and welcome to The English Like a Native Podcast. My name is Anna and you're listening to Week 45, Day 3 of Your English Five a Day. This is the series that is dedicated to improving your overall English comprehension, your English listening, and expanding your vocabulary. So stick with me for the next 15 or so minutes and let's have fun. We start with the noun rumble, rumble. R U M B L E, rumble. Now, if you've been listening regularly, you might think, hang on a minute, we've had this one already. Yes, we had rumble not long ago, but we had the verb rumble. Now we're looking at the noun. So, as you can probably guess, a rumble is a continuous low sound. So previously we talked about the verb rumble, so you might say, my tummy is rumbling, but the sound that your tummy makes is a rumble. So you hear a rumble if something rumbles. Here's an example sentence,"With the window closed, the street noises were a distant background rumble." Living in London, it's quite common to hear the rumble of the Underground, depending on where you live. Now, I've been in a theatre where during the production, during the show, during the performance, you could hear the rumble of the underground train going past because it was close to where the tunnel for the Underground actually was. It was quite an unusual sensation to be deeply engaged in a story being taken on a journey by the actors to then suddenly be pulled out of it by this rumbling of the train passing by. Next on the list is an idiom and it is to have a frog in your throat, to have a frog in your throat. Yes, a frog, ribbit. F R O G. Frog. In your throat. T H R O A T. A frog in your throat. If you have a frog in your throat, then it means that you have difficulty speaking. Now it might be because you've got a sore throat. Maybe you sound a bit like this when you are talking because your throat is swollen and sore, but sometimes we just have a frog in our throat if we haven't spoken for a while, maybe we need to swallow or cough. Maybe there's some phlegm in our throat that needs to be cleared. So you might say,"Oh, hello. How are you? Excuse me. Sorry. Sorry. I had a frog in my throat just then. I've cleared it now. Let's carry on. How are you?" So it's just when you have difficulty speaking clearly. Here's an example,"I'm not sure I can give the presentation today as planned because I sound like I have a frog in my throat." Next on the list is the noun caper, caper. C A P E R, caper. A caper is a light-hearted escapade, so a little bit of activity that's quite playful, maybe a little bit mischievous, and it often involves slightly naughty behaviour, but it can be light hearted and playful. Sometimes it could be associated with being quite naughty, but it's an activity that's supposed to be playful or is often playful. Here's an example sentence,"The children were seen engaging in a caper as they sneakily covered their teacher's desk with balloons." Okay. Next on the list is the phrasal verb step something up. Now we've had step up a few times, but with very different meanings, and this is why phrasal verbs can be so tricky because they can have multiple meanings that are mostly unrelated to one another. So here's another meaning of step something up. To step something up can be to increase the amount of activity or the speed of a process in order to improve the situation. So for example, if I am clearing out my house because we need to do a big renovation and I need the house clear by lunchtime because that's when the decorators are coming and it's now 11 o'clock and the decorators are coming at 12. I'm never going to clear this house at my current speed. So I need to step things up. I need to increase the amount of activity. I need to increase the speed of the process in order to improve this situation. So I need to step things up. So here's another example,"They stepped up security in Paris ahead of the Olympic games." So they increased the security in Paris to make the Olympics more secure and run smoothly without any problems. Last on the list today is the adjective brutal, brutal. We spell this B R U T A L, brutal. Brutal, if you describe something as brutal, then it's cruel or violent or completely without feelings. So if you describe a person as brutal, then they're not empathetic. They're not sympathetic to your situation or your feelings. They don't feel anything. They just do something that's quite cruel, quite severe. So for example, if I work in a hospital and you have just literally two minutes ago given birth to a baby and it was a difficult labour, you've been in labour for two days, it was a difficult birth and rather than giving you any time to recover, I tell you,"It's tough. You're out. You need to leave the hospital right away." Well, that's just brutal, isn't it? That's absolutely brutal. I'm not being very sympathetic to your situation. I'm not being very empathetic to how you actually feel, how you're overwhelmed and exhausted and in pain. I just kick you out because I'm a brutal doctor. Of course, that's not ever going to happen. I'm a very sympathetic person in real life. I'm not brutal at all. Okay, here's another example,"The leader of the party was accused of being heartless after he introduced brutal measures to reduce benefits for the elderly and vulnerable in an effort to cut public spending." Okay, so that's our list for today. Let's do a quick recap. We had the noun rumble, which is the low, continuous sound that you might hear from a distant train or any type of vehicle passing, a noise that your stomach makes. Those kinds of noises. Then we had the idiom a frog in your throat. To have a frog in your throat is that croaky difficulty that you have when you try to speak, either because of a sore throat or dryness. Then we had the noun caper, which is playful activity, a light-hearted escapade, which is often a little bit mischievous. Then we had the phrasal verb to step something up, which is to increase the amount of activity or the speed of a process. And we had the adjective brutal, which is cruel, violent, completely without feeling. So, let's do this now for pronunciation purposes. Please repeat after me. Rumble. Rumble. I have a frog in my throat. You have a frog in your throat. Caper. Caper. Step things up. Step things up. Brutal. Brutal. Fantastic. What's the noun that might be used to describe playful mischief? A caper, yes. And if I start to speak but I have a bit of a croak, what could you say I have? I have a frog in my throat. Yes, absolutely. And then if a plane goes by, I would hear a distant what? Rumble. Yes. A distant rumble. And if the process that I'm currently engaged in is too slow, I need to speed it up, what phrasal verb could I use? I need to step it up. I need to step things up and get it moving. And finally, if I behave in a very cruel and unfeeling way, what adjective could you use to describe my behaviour? Brutal. Absolutely. Okay, fantastic. Let's listen out for these items once again in today's storytime. Sam worked as a security guard at a busy theme park. With the sun shining brightly, he stood near the entrance, ready for a day of excitement and adventure. The air was buzzing with laughter, screams, and the rumble of rollercoasters in the distance, where riders experienced thrilling heights and terrifying drops. As he scanned the crowd, Sam spotted a group of kids planning a mischievous caper. They whispered and giggled, and he could see one of them had a bottle of soda. Suddenly, a big splash of soda flew into the air as the kids erupted with laughter."Oh no, not another soggy shirt incident!" he thought to himself. Just then, a little girl approached him, her face a mix of excitement and worry."Excuse me, Mr. Guard," she said, her voice croaking slightly as if she had a frog in her throat."Uh, I can't find my mum!" Sam kneeled down and smiled."Don't worry! Let's find her together." He took her hand and they started searching through the lively crowd filled with families enjoying their day. As they moved, Sam realised that this girl's mum was not close and that finding her in the park on such a busy day was going to be difficult without help. He needed to step things up, so he radioed for assistance and got every member of staff searching. They also made a park-wide announcement over the tannoy, instructing the girl's mother to make contact with a member of staff. After 20 minutes, the girl finally saw her mother. A huge smile spread across the little girl's face as they were reunited."Oh, thank you, Mr. Guard!" she exclaimed. The mother was apologetic and insisted that she only looked away for a moment before losing sight of her daughter. It was a brutal reminder to always keep your child close in a crowded place. Sam waved goodbye, feeling proud of his role. Being a security guard meant he helped keep everyone safe while making sure they had fun. That was the best part of his job, along with the free rides every day after work! And that brings us to the end of today's episode. If you did enjoy it, please take two seconds to leave a like if you're watching on YouTube, or to leave a rating or review if you're listening through any other streaming platform. Thank you so much for joining me, and I do hope I get to tickle your eardrums again tomorrow. Until then, take very good care and goodbye.