Transcript of AE 1139 - 5 English Expressions for Everyday Use

All right, well, I better get out of your hair. What hair? I mean, I better leave you alone, let you get back to what you were doing. Oh, okay. You get my drift? What now? Whose drift? I mean, do you understand me? Sorta. Maybe it's time for me to teach you five new expressions. Only five? Isn't that a drop in the ocean? Hey, stop reading my notes.

G'day, you mob. Welcome to this lesson. Today I am going to teach you five new expressions in English that's going to help you sound much more natural when you speak it. If you don't know me, I am Pete, I'm the host of Aussie English and I've been helping people level up their Australian English for over half a decade now. So, if your goal is to take your English to the next level, this is the podcast and YouTube channel for you.

Before we get started, guys, don't forget you can grab today's worksheet. It's linked down in the description below so that you can download it, follow along, do the exercises, and really rapidly improve your English. And when you sign up to get this worksheet, you'll also receive all of my future worksheets for other English lessons just like this.

Also, every single expression that we cover today has been covered in its own unique episode on the Aussie English podcast. So, you can go and listen to that episode if you want to learn more about any of these specific expressions. Alright, without any further ado, let's begin. Number one: "To get out of someone's hair. To get out of someone's hair".

This expression means to stop being a nuisance to someone, to leave someone alone, to stop disturbing someone and let them get back to doing what they were doing. So, if I pop over to my mum's house, I'm unexpected, she didn't realise I was coming and she's doing a puzzle. After I say g'day and maybe, you know, leave her a present, she'll probably be like, look, I want to get back to the puzzle.

And I'll be like, "I'm going to get out of your hair". I'll let you get back to your puzzle, see ya, mum. "I'll get out of your hair." Imagine your neighbour drops in, comes over for a chinwag, wants to have a cuppa, right? A cup of coffee or a cup of tea. After 5 or 10 minutes of just catching up, the neighbour might say, "alright, it's been good to chat but 'I'll get out of your hair'. It's been good to chat, but 'I'll get out of your hair'."

I'll let you get back to doing what you were doing. I'll stop being a nuisance. "I'll get out of your hair." Expression number two: "Get the drift or to get someone's drift". "Do you get my drift? To get the drift." This is a good little informal expression, meaning to understand the basic meaning of what someone's saying. So, if you "get someone's drift", you understand what they're saying.

Here's two examples. Imagine you're a school teacher explaining a math problem to your class. Everyone in the class looks a little perplexed, they look a little confused, but one student gets it. They understand what's going on. So, if you ask the class, "does anyone 'get my drift'?" One student might put their hand up and be like, I got it. "I got the drift". I understand what's going on.

You can also use this when kind of subtly suggesting something, right? So, maybe you're a young man and there's a neighbour's daughter who's fairly attractive and you've been dating the daughter on the sly. Maybe a friend comes and says something like, are you two an item? Like, are you guys going out? If you want to be subtle, you might say, "we're pretty close, if you 'get my drift'." Right? If you understand what I'm saying. We're pretty close.

Wink, wink. Expression number three: "Knock yourself out. Knock yourself out". Like literally that would be, I guess, to punch yourself in the face and go unconscious. But here it's an invitation for someone to do what they've asked permission to do, for them to have a good time, for them to enjoy themselves. "Knock yourself out." Two examples. Someone comes over to your house for a barbecue, right? A barbie, as we call it, in Australia.

They walk in the door, and they say straight away, g'day, Pete. How's it going? And then, you know what, I'm thirsty. Mind if I grab a beer? All right. Do you mind if I grab one of your beers out of the fridge? You might say, "of course not. 'Knock yourself out'." Right. You're saying, of course it's not a problem. Go get a beer, have fun, enjoy yourself. Do it. "Knock yourself out."

Example number two: Maybe your daughter comes home one day. She's had a licence for a few months. She says she wants to borrow Dad's car, right? Mom. Dad. Can I borrow your car? I want to go see my mates. If it's not a problem, if it's okay, you'll just say, "yeah, 'knock yourself out'. Here are the keys. "'Knock yourself out', go drive and see your mates." "Knock yourself out."

Alrighty, guys, before we continue, can you do me a teensy-weensy little favour? If you're watching this video and you're enjoying it, getting value out of it, can you give the like button a little *boop* just to show the magical YouTube algorithm that you're enjoying it and hopefully get it to show this video to other English learners just like you. It really helps small channels like mine. Cheers.

All right, expression number four: "A drop in the ocean. A drop in the ocean." If something is "a drop in the ocean", it is a very small amount of something that is unlikely to make much of a difference. Two examples. Imagine you're saving up all the money in the world that you can get your hands on so that you can buy a Ferrari.

Right? It's been your dream, since you were a kid you want to buy a Ferrari. You want to be the proud owner of a Ferrari Dino, for example. Okay, so you've been saving your money, one day a mate comes over and says, you know what, I want to help out. They write you out a check and they say, here's 50 bucks. Because the Ferrari is going to cost probably, what, half a million dollars. "$50 is just 'a drop in the ocean'."

It's not going to make much of a difference at all to your savings and when you can buy the car, it's just "a drop in the ocean". Example number two. You've been trying to read the book Game of Thrones, right? The entire series, you're trying to get through it, but you're only reading a paragraph every single day. Considering the entire series is thousands of pages long, "every single paragraph that you read is just 'a drop in the ocean'."

It is a very, very, very small amount of the total number of paragraphs in the entire series. "Each paragraph is just 'a drop in the ocean'." Alrighty, guys, and expression number five, the last one here. You made it to the end, well done. "To be on a roll. To be on a roll." Now, here the idea is "rolling", right, as opposed to say, "a roll", which in Australia is kind of like a round sandwich.

If you're "on a roll", you're on a streak of success or good luck, right? You've been achieving some things again and again and again, doing really well. You've had good luck. You've "been on a roll". Two examples. One day you go out fishing and you weren't sure which bait was going to work. So, you just grab the, I don't know, some worms.

You've been chucking them on your hook, casting your line out, and every single time the line hits the water, boom, a fish jumps on the line, you reel it in, you catch a fish. You do it again, you catch another fish. If you keep repeating this process and having good luck, "you're on a roll". You're doing incredibly well. You've caught so many fish, "you're on a roll".

Example number two. Imagine you've gone to a party, right, with all your friends and family, and for one reason or another, you keep saying things that upset people. You don't mean to, but you keep upsetting people. You upset your sister, you upset your father, you upset your grandmother. Someone might come up to you and just say, "Pete, look, just stop talking. 'You're on a roll'".

Right? You've had here a lot of bad luck, the opposite of success repeatedly. So, it's almost used sarcastically here. In fact, it is used sarcastically. It's like, "Pete, just stop. 'You're on a roll. You're on a roll'. Wow, 'you are on a roll'."

All right. Before we get into the big exercise at the end here, guys, I'm going to show you the expressions we just went over on the screen here, and I want you to pause the video quickly and write your own comment using one or more of these expressions down below. This is a great way of using what you've just learnt to hopefully keep it in the noggin here, in your brain. Okay, so hit pause and I'll see you in a jiffy.

Welcome back. All right. So, today we're going to go through a little exercise here with the expressions that we've just learnt. In the last episode, we focused on turning statements into questions using inversions. Click the link up here guys, if you want to go and check that video out after we're done.

But in today's exercise, let's focus on changing the following sentences from the future tense "will + verb" to "is/are/am + going to, the verb". Okay? Hopefully that makes sense. So, we're changing between the two different future tenses. For example, "I'll go home soon" becomes "I'm gonna go home soon."

So, you can either anticipate the change that I'm going to make and try and conjugate the sentence yourself and then check the answer. So, I'll say the first sentence, give you some time, and then I'll say the second sentence and you can check if you've got it right.

Otherwise, just use this as a listen and repeat exercise where you focus on my pronunciation, intonation, rhythm stress, everything like that, and you just read out every sentence that I say. Okay? So, are you ready? Let's go.

"Alright, I'll get out of your hair. Alright, I'mena get out of your hair." Little note there. Did you notice how "I am going to" changes into "I'mena. I'mena." When we speak with connected English with contracted English in Australian English, we can say, "I'mena. You can say "I'm gonna" as well. But quite often we'll just contract it all down to "I'mena. I'mena get out of your hair."

"Will he get the drift? Is he gonna get the drift?" Good work. So, the interesting thing here is you may notice /h/ deletion. "Will he" becomes "will 'e". "Will 'e. Will 'e get the drift?" And with the next sentence "is he" becomes "is 'e". "Is 'e going to get the drift? Will he get the drift? Is 'e going to get the drift?" "I think they'll just knock themselves out. I think they're gonna just knock themselves out."

Some connected speech in there. "Themselve' sout, themselve' sout". We link that /s/ sound at the end of "themselves" to the start of the word "out" because it starts with a vowel sound. "I think they're gonna just knock themselve' sout." "It'll only be a drop in the ocean. It's gonna only be a drop in the ocean."

You'll notice some more linking there. "Be ya, be ya". We link those two vowel sounds, /e/ and /a/ with a /ya/ sound. Be ya, be ya, be ya, be ya." "Be ya drop in the ocean." And then with "drop and in" because "drop" ends with a consonant, "in" starts with a vowel sound. "Dro pin, dro pin, be ya dro pin the ocean. Be ya dro pin the ocean." And it happens with "the ocean" as well. We link it again with another /ya/ sound.

"The yocean. The yocean. Be ya dro pin the yocean. Be ya dro pin the yocean." Lots of connected speech there today. And the last one, guys, "if that happens, we'll be on a roll. If that happens, we're gonna be on a roll." Same thing here with "be on a roll", right? There's lots of connections in there. "Be yon, be yon" using that /y/ sound. "Onə, onə". The /a/ sound becomes a schwa. It links to the "N" at the end of the word "on".

"Be yonə. Be yonə. Be yonə roll. Be yonə roll. Be yonə roll." Great job, guys. Don't forget, if you want to improve your pronunciation, check out my Australian pronunciation course. The link will be in the description below or you can just go to AussieEnglish.com.au/APC. Don't forget to grab today's worksheet and if you want to keep learning with me, you can also check out this video up here. See you next time.