Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Let's Master English Podcast #20

Hello, everybody. Today is Tuesday, and we have a brand new Lets Master English Podcast from Coach Shane. This week's podcast is really really interesting, so I'm into it. I will listen to it every day. How about you? Let's master English with Coach Shane!!!
Let's Master English Podcast No. 20 is about GLOBAL WARMING (sự nóng lên của trái đất). In this podcast we will listen to a news about greenhouse gases, a FACT from Country Shane, 4 great questions from listeners, and some other interesting things. I hope you will enjoy it.
To listen to the podcast, please visit this website:
hoặc

NEWS - Global Warming will KILL us ALL
While most of America experienced its coldest winter in decades, a new UN report announces that global warming will destroy us all. "If we don't reduce greenhouse gases, risks will get out of hand", said one of the report's authors. "We're all sitting ducks", said another. But hidden in the report, the scientists do concede that weather prediction has many uncertainties.
Some new words for you:
a decade n. thập kỷ (10 năm)
decades = hàng thập kỷ (20, 30, 40, 50, 60 năm hoặc nhiều hơn)
UN report n. báo cáo của Liên Hợp Quốc
to annouce something = thông báo điều gì đó (to say something, to trumpet something)
destroy v. phá hủy, hủy diệt
reduce v. giảm bớt, giảm thiểu
greenhouse gases: khí nhà kính (CO2,...)
risk n. nguy cơ, rủi ro
to get out of hand = mất kiểm soát
authors n. tác giả
sitting ducks = đứng chờ làm nạn nhận, trong tình thế nguy hiểm
concede v. thừa nhận
weather prediction = dự đoán, dự báo về thời tiết
uncertainties = những điều không chắc chắn, không rõ

COUNTRY SHANE'S FACT!
How're you doing everybody? This is Country Shane and I'm here to bring you the fact.
CO2, the global warming gas that everyone fears. CO2 levels in the atmosphere based on the last five hundred million years of earth's history are at their lowest level, at about 387 ppm that's parts per million. They've been as [??] as 7000 ppm. And over the last five hundred million years, the average CO2 levels are about 2800 ppm. So, 387 ppm ain't that bad.
This is been Country Shane bringing you the fact.
Q & A
In this podcast, Coach Shane will answer 4 questions from listeners. Those questions are great to learn. 
Question No.1: Hello, Shane. What do you think about the expression butt out, B-U-T-T O-U-T, butt out. Is it a rude or a gross expression? Is it a slang?
Question No.2: Hi, Coach Shane. What is the difference between dash and hyphen?
Question No.3: Why do you native English speakers feel so comfortable with using adjectives where adverbs are much better? For example, dig deep. But, grammatically I would say dig deeply. Another example, love me tender. I would say love me tenderly. Oh, it's good as usual. I would say it's good as usually.
Question No.4: I have a favorite song. I love this song so much. But it's difficult to understand. The song is sung by Lorde. And, its title is royals.
Let's listen to the podcast to know the answers and enjoy Coach Shane's performance singing the song "royals".
Have a good time listening to LME podcasts, everyone!

Easy English Expression 0032: to rain on someone's parade

Hello, everyone. Today's Easy English Expression is "to rain on someone's parade". What does it mean?

to rain on someone's parade = phá hỏng kế hoạch của ai đó

Mời bạn lắng nghe huấn luyện viên Coach Shane giải thích sau đây, chúc bạn một ngày cá tháng 4 (April Fool's Day) vui vẻ.



Transcript:

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to E-cubed (E3 – Easy English Expression). Today’s expression’s a little bit long. To rain on your parade. It could be somebody else. To rain on Shane’s parade. To rain on his parade. To rain on Tom’s parade, whoever. Now, first of all you need to understand parade. What is a parade? Well, here are some picture of parades. Ok. So, you see it down the street. There are so many people marching, a marching band. These are call floats. F-L-O-A-T-S, floats. And, yeah. Those are parades. OK. Now, sometime at parades, when I was young, they used to throw candy, to all the little children. All of them are great.

So, usually we have one parade, maybe two parades a year in small towns. I grew up in a small town, so we had two parades. We had the forth of July parade, which is America’s birthday. And then we had the Carnival, some others, uh the Homecoming parade. The Homecoming parade which is about football in high school. It was great fun. But can you imagine if it started to rain on the parade? That would be terrible. And that’s what this expression means. To rain on your parade means to do something terrible to your plan. You have some plans. You have a plan, a goal. You have some, something that you want to do. But, if it rains on the parade, your plans have been cancelled or denied or destroyed. So you have this great idea to do something. But if it rains, it’s been cancelled. So you want to have a picnic this Saturday. But it’s gonna rain on Saturday. Oh, no. It has rained on my parade. My parade would be the picnic, my great exciting plan. Do you understand? Listen to the conversation. It might help you.

What’s that? A present?
Diamond earrings. They’re for Sue!
Wow! Uh... I don’t want to rain on your parade, but Sue just got engaged.
What? Engaged? She’s gonna get married? What??

Poor guy. He wanted to give Sue diamond earrings. But, she’s in love with another man. What a shame. His parade has been rained down. Can you think of an example? If you can, put it down below. And I will see you next time. Bye bye.

Nội dung bài học:

Bạn hãy tưởng tượng một cuộc diễu hành (parade) cực kỳ hoành tráng để chào mừng một sự kiện gì đó đang diễn ra ở nơi thị trấn nơi bạn đang sống. Cuộc diễu hành mới chỉ bắt đầu được ¼, chưa đến phần quan trọng và hấp dẫn nhất thì trời đổ một cơn mưa lớn. Mọi người bắt đầu tìm nơi để trú mưa. Và cuộc diễu hành của chúng ta buộc phải hủy bỏ. Mỗi năm chỉ có một lần tổ chức diễu hành, nhưng nó lại bị hủy bỏ do trời đổ mưa khiến bạn vô cùng không vui.

Nếu bạn có một kế hoạch, một dự định, một mục tiêu đã được chuẩn bị kỹ càng, chỉ còn chờ giây phút đón nhận thành công thì bỗng nhiên có điều gì đó tồi tệ diễn ra khiến cho kế hoạch của bạn buộc phải hủy bỏ. Lúc đó bạn có thể sử dụng cụm từ sau đây:

TO RAIN ON SOMEONE’S PARADE = PHÁ HỎNG KẾ HOẠCH CỦA AI ĐÓ

Someone ở đây có thể là bất kỳ ai. To rain on my parade. To rain on your parade. To rain on his parade. To rain on Tom’s parade.