Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 457, Apologizing for a Bad Date.
This is English as a Second Language podcast episode 457.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
Go to our website at eslpodcom and download a learning guide for this episode to help you improve your English even faster.
This episode is called Apologizing for a Bad Date, a Bad Romantic Outing or Event.
This episode is a continuation of the story that we started in ESL Podcast 455.
So if you haven't listened to 455 Ending a Bad Date, you might want to listen to it to understand this one a little better.
Let's get started.
I really blew it last night.
I finally asked my neighbor, Fatima, out on a date, and she walked out on me in the middle of it.
I didn't blame her.
What an idiot.
What an idiot.
I had to call her to apologize.
Hello?
Uh, hi, Fatima?
This is Rob calling.
Oh.
Please don't hang up.
I need to apologize for my atrocious behavior last night.
I was a real jerk and I'm really, really sorry.
I appreciate the apology, thanks, but I have to go now.
Hold on one second, please.
I want to explain.
I thought I was boring you at the beginning of the date, and that's why I started in on the drinks.
I'm not normally a lush, really.
I was nervous and worried that things weren't going well and I thought a couple of drinks would loosen me up.
Okay, I understand that, but that doesn't excuse the groping.
Groping?
What groping?
You don't remember?
You insisted on a goodnight kiss.
I did?
It's all a blur.
I don't remember anything after you called me a creep.
No, I can't.
I deserved much worse.
After that I can also understand why you'd never want to speak to me again.
Is there any way I can make it up to you?
I really don't know.
I promise not to have a drop of alcohol.
I'll have to think about it.
And I'll have both of my hands tied behind my back the entire time.
Maybe.
Let me sleep on it.
At least it wasn't a no.
There's a glimmer of hope for a second chance.
Our story continues with...
Rob saying, I really blew it last night.
The expression, I blew it, or don't blow it, means don't make a mistake.
Don't screw it up.
If you say, I blew it, you're saying, I made a mistake.
I did something very poorly, very badly.
Rob says, I finally asked my neighbor Fatima out on a date.
To ask someone out on a date means to ask them to go on a date, often dinner, with you.
Rob asked his neighbor Fatima out on a date and she walked out on me in the middle of it.
To walk out on someone is a phrasal verb meaning to leave someone, usually two people who are together because you are angry or upset at them.
If you are having a meeting and the salesperson is walks out on the rest of you, that means that she was angry and she left the meeting.
She left you because she wasn't happy.
Well, Fatima was not happy about the date and she walked out on Rob in the middle of the date, while they were still eating.
Rob says, I don't blame her.
I don't fault her.
To make a good impression is to make another person think that you are a good person, that you are intelligent successful attractive, perhaps have a lot of money all the things that I am not.
That's making a good impression.
Usually you make a good impression the first time you meet someone or the first time you are in a certain situation.
Rob felt, however, that he was floundering a half an hour into the date.
So 30 minutes after they started the date, Rob thought he was floundering.
To flounder, F-L-O-U-N-D-E-R, means not to know what to do or say or to do or say the wrong things.
Someone who is floundering is not doing very well, making mistakes.
Rob says he's decided to liven things up a bit with a few drinks.
To liven, L-I-V-E-N.
Something up is a phrasal verb meaning to make something more exciting or more interesting.
Rob thought he was boring, so he wanted to liven things up.
By getting himself a few drinks.
Of course, drinking alcohol often changes one's behavior, sometimes for the worse.
Rob says he got carried away and got stinking drunk.
To get carried away at doing something means to do too much of something, so much so that it becomes a bad thing.
Taking something to the extreme.
Everything in moderation, as the Greeks said.
That is, don't have too much or too little of anything.
Rob clearly had too much to drink.
He says, what an idiot, talking about himself.
I had to call her to apologize.
And then we hear a phone conversation between Rob and Fatima.
Fatima answers by saying hello.
Rob says, hi, Fatima, this is Rob calling.
Fatima says, oh.
Clearly Fatima is not too excited to talk to Rob because, of course, he was an idiot.
Rob says, please don't hang up.
To hang up means to put part of the telephone back into the holder and end a call.
More generally, it means simply to end a telephone call.
Hang has several different meanings in English.
Take a look at our learning guide for some additional explanations.
Rob is asking Fatima to continue talking to him.
He says, I need to apologize for my atrocious behavior last night.
Atrocious, A-T-R-O-C-I-O-U-S means very bad, awful, terrible, something that's really bad.
It's atrocious.
I went to a restaurant yesterday and ordered some lasagna and it was atrocious.
It was terrible.
Really, it was.
Well, Rob had atrocious behavior.
He says he was a real jerk, a real idiot.
And he's really, really sorry.
Of course, when men make mistakes, they have to say they're really really really really really, really sorry.
And that's what Rob is doing.
Fatima says, I appreciate the apology.
Thanks, but I have to go now, meaning I don't want to talk to you anymore, you idiot.
Rob says, hold on one second, please.
The expression hold on one second or hold on a second or simply hold on means that you are asking someone to wait, to stop, not to do something, at least for a short period of time.
Often we say this when the person is trying to walk away or end a conversation.
We can also use this expression when a person is getting angry or starting to say things that aren't true and you want them to listen to you now.
Rob is trying to get Fatima to continue talking to him.
He says, hold on one second, please.
I want to explain.
He says he thought he was boring Fatima at the beginning of the date and that's why he started in on the drinks.
To start in on something means to begin to do something, to begin to use something.
You may tell your daughter it's time for you to start in on your homework meaning, get going, start doing your homework, you lazy daughter.
Rob says that he's normally not a lush, L-U-S-H.
A lush is a person who drinks too much alcohol, a person who can't control his or her drinking.
Rob says that he was nervous and he thought a couple of drinks would loosen him up.
To loosen up is a two-word phrasal verb meaning to make someone more relaxed, more friendly, more sociable, we might say.
If someone says to you, loosen up, they mean relax, don't be so nervous.
Rob was trying to loosen up.
Fatima says, okay, I understand that.
But that doesn't excuse the groping.
To excuse means to give a reason why something happened.
Usually, when someone says that doesn't excuse this, they mean that is not a sufficient reason, a good reason.
Groping is when you touch someone, usually with some sort of sexual intent.
If you are a man in a subway and there's a beautiful girl standing next to you woman if you try to touch her in some sexual way, that would be considered groping.
That would also make you a creep.
See podcast number 455 for a definition.
Well, Fatima says that Rob was groping her.
Rob doesn't understand.
Rob doesn't remember this.
He says it's all a blur.
Blur, B-L-U-R, is something that is unclear, something that is difficult to see or understand.
Rob doesn't remember it.
Fatima explains that Rob tried to kiss her and says, can you blame me for walking out?
Can you blame me for leaving?
Rob says, no, I can't.
I deserved much worse.
I should have gotten something worse, perhaps a slap on the face.
Rob says, I can also understand why you'd never want to speak to me again.
But Rob is trying to find a way to get another date with Fatima.
So he says, is there any way I can make it up to you?
To make it up to someone means to do something nice for someone as an apology for something bad that you had done earlier.
Fatima says, I promise not to have a drop of alcohol.
A drop is a very small amount of something, usually a liquid.
So he's saying, I'm not going to drink any alcohol, except maybe a beer or two.
But other than that, nothing.
Fatima says, I'll have to think about it.
Rob says, and I'll have both of my hands tied behind my back the entire time.
To have your hands behind your back means, of course, that you cannot do any groping or something inappropriate.
Fatima says maybe.
Let me sleep on it.
When someone tells you they want to sleep on something, they mean they want a chance to think about it more, at least one more day, and see what they decide.
To give them more time to make a decision.
Rob says, Glimmer is a very quick or short sight of something.
Here it means there's a possibility that Fatima will go out on another date with him.
A glimmer of hope means a small amount of hope, but still it's possible.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
I had to call her to apologize.
Hello?
Hello?
Uh, hi, Fatima?
This is Rob calling.
Oh.
Please don't hang up.
I need to apologize for my atrocious behavior last night.
I was a real jerk, and I'm really, really sorry.
I appreciate the apology.
Thanks.
But I have to go now.
Hold on one second, please.
I want to explain.
I thought I was boring you at the beginning of the date, and that's why I started in on the drinks.
I'm not normally a lush, really.
I was nervous and worried that things weren't going well and I thought a couple of drinks would loosen me up.
Okay, I understand that, but that doesn't excuse the groping.
Groping?
What groping?
You don't remember?
You insisted on a goodnight kiss.
I did?
It's all a blur.
I don't remember anything after you called me a creep.
You tried to kiss me, and I walked out.
Can you blame me?
No, I can't.
I deserved much worse.
After that, I can also understand why you'd never want to speak to me again.
Is there any way I can make it up to you?
I really don't know.
I promise not to have a drop of alcohol.
I'll have to think about it.
And I'll have both of my hands tied behind my back the entire time.
Maybe.
Let me sleep on it.
At least it wasn't a no.
There's a glimmer of hope for a second chance.
The script for this episode was written by someone who never flounders in her writing, Dr. Lucy Say.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us next time, right here on ESL Podcasts.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2009 by the Center for Educational Development.
