Hello and welcome to The English Like a Native Podcast. My name is Anna and you're listening to Week 50, Day 4 of Your English Five a Day. This is the series that gives you a healthy daily dose of English vocabulary so that you can be more expressive when you speak English and feel generally more confident. So let's start today's list with the noun spacecraft, spacecraft. We spell this S P A C E C R A F T, spacecraft. A spacecraft is a vehicle used for travel in space. Here's an example sentence,"All systems on board the spacecraft are functioning normally." Have you ever had a desire to travel in a spacecraft? Maybe you're an astronaut. I don't know how many astronauts listen to this podcast, but maybe you are. I can't even imagine what it must feel like to be weightless, other than comparing it to being in a swimming pool, when you're submerged in the water and you're kind of weightless and able to move around, but quite slowly. I wonder if that's how it feels. Okay, next on the list is the verb to man, to man. We spell it M A N. Man. To man something. This means that you operate something. So if you man a machine or a vehicle, then you are operating it. So I'm manning the vehicle. I'm manning the machine, means that you're running it. You're operating it. Here's an example sentence,"A team of volunteers is manning the phones, ready to take your donations." So if you are manning the phone, then you are operating the phone. We'd only really use this when talking about like a call centre or something where there are many phones ringing that need to be answered, which would be the case in a call centre. If it's a complaints department, and there are many phones and they're all ringing, then something has gone terribly wrong. That would not be a good day in that company if the complaints department are ringing off the hook, especially if there are not enough people to man the phones. That would be terrible. What kinds of vehicles have you manned in your lifetime? I used to be the tour bus driver. I was a tour manager for a theatre tour. I also obviously was an actor within many of the tours as well. Not always, but on all occasions, I was a driver because I'm a good driver. So I was a driver. And so I would always man these large vans full of our set and our cast. I would drive them around the country to different theatres. Next on the list is the verb drift. Usually followed by into, to drift into something. We spell this D R I F T. Now, this version of drift, because I'm aware we've had this before when talking about being in a boat, for example, to drift off to sea, but this version is about a situation or job that you end up in without having a particular plan. For example, I drifted into teaching English online. It certainly wasn't my plan initially. I was simply putting out material to help specific people and the path just opened up for me. It just kind of happened and I was enjoying myself and then one thing led to another, and I drifted into this particular career. Here's another example,"After university, he drifted into teaching English in Spain." Next on the list, we have the phrasal verb waste away. To waste away. This isn't nice. To waste away. Two words, waste, W A S T E. Away, A W A Y. To waste away. This is usually talking about a person who gradually gets thinner and weaker in a way that's very unhealthy. So if someone is looking quite slim one week and they say,"Oh, I'm on a diet." And then the following week they look even slimmer and the week after even slimmer. And you can see that they are not looking very healthy at all. And they're barely eating and they're looking too thin. And you think to yourself,"This isn't right. They're wasting away. Maybe I should call someone. Maybe I should speak to them. They're wasting away." Here's an example sentence,"It was so hard watching my mother waste away in her final year." Last on the list is the adjective dull, dull. We spell this D U L L. If something is described as dull then it's not very interesting, or exciting in any way. So you do not want to be described as dull, nor your presentation. Goodness, if someone says your presentation is dull, then you need to do some work to make it more exciting because a dull presentation will lose people's attention and won't be effective. There have been times in my life when I would describe my wardrobe as being quite dull. In this respect, I'm saying not my physical wardrobe, not the piece of furniture, but the clothes within my wardrobe. My wardrobe is quite dull. All the colours are quite dull. In fact, there are no colours in there apart from grey and black and white. Okay, here's another example sentence for you,"I stopped reading the book after a couple of chapters, because it was so dull." Alright, that's our five. Let's do a quick recap. We started with the noun spacecraft, which is a vehicle that you use to travel in space. Then we had the verb to man, which is to operate a machine or vehicle. We had the verb to drift and then into something, to drift into something. This means to get into a situation or a job without having any particular plan. We had the phrasal verb waste away, which means to gradually get thinner and weaker in a way that's seen as unhealthy. And we had the adjective dull, dull, describing something that's not interesting or exciting in any way. Okay, let's do this for pronunciation purposes. Please repeat after me. Spacecraft. Spacecraft. To man. Man. Drift into. Drift into. Waste away. Waste away. Dull. Dull. Very good. What's the verb I would use to describe operating the phones? Man the phones. Very good. And if I describe how I got into the situation that I'm currently in as an operator of the phones. And I say that I kind of found myself in this situation. I didn't have any particular plan to be here, but I am. What verb could I use to describe coming into this situation? Drift, that's right. I drifted into manning the phones for a living. And then over time I start getting quite thin and quite weak and I look quite unhealthy. What phrasal verb might you use to describe what's happening? I'm wasting away."Yes, poor Anna, she's wasting away. What's going on?" And I might tell you,"Well actually I have to lose weight because I'm going off to be in space." I don't know how those two are connected. That doesn't really make sense. But when I go into space, I'm going to use a very special vehicle. What noun would describe the vehicle that I'm going to use when travelling in space? A spacecraft. Yes, that one's easy. And when I return from space, you ask me what it was like, and I tell you that it wasn't very interesting in any way. I can't believe that would be true, but let's imagine. What adjective would I use to describe space? Dull. Yes. In this scenario, yes, I would describe space as dull. I'm almost certain that would be false, but there we go. That's our five, so let's listen out for these items once again in today's storytime. Astronaut is hardly the kind of job you just drift into. I worked hard to get where I am. Not everyone is capable of manning a spaceship like this one. You need years of training, and you have to pass very selective exams. Even then, the chances of becoming an astronaut are low. And yet, I'm bored. This is my confession. Space is, well, dull. There are no aliens. This is not Star Trek. I don't spend my days discovering new life on other planets. And it's hard up here, with no gravity. Your muscles start to waste away. I have to go on the treadmill for two hours a day to stop them from wasting away oh, boring. I'd rather go for a run outside. But of course, I can't just get off the spaceship whenever I want, not without a spacesuit. What you take for granted on Earth, I simply can't do. I won't go over how we go to the toilet. But let me tell you, it's not simple in zero gravity! Oh, the food is boring too, I'm not going to lie. It's not fresh like it would be on Earth. We eat mostly canned food. And yes, the views are nice, looking back down at our beautiful blue and green planet. But there are some good views back on Earth too. I miss them when I'm here. I also miss my friends and family. The loneliness makes this job tough as well. Okay, so I spend my days doing research and experiments but the days are long 16 hours! I suppose it's not like there's much else to do. But even the most interesting work gets boring and repetitive when you do it for so long each day. But as dull as the life of an astronaut is, I'd still rather be up in space manning a spacecraft than stuck in an office. And that brings us to the end of today's episode. I do hope you found today useful. If you did, please do take a second to leave a like if you're watching on YouTube, and if you're listening on any other streaming platform, I'd really appreciate a rating or review so that others may find this podcast too to help them with their English learning. Until tomorrow, take very good care and goodbye.