RAMBLEMANIA 🗣️ 3+ Hours of English Listening & Learning with Luke [976] | Luke's ENGLISH Podcast - Learn British English with Luke Thompson

Hello listeners, welcome back to Luke's English Podcast.

How are you doing today?

I hope you're doing fine.

Welcome back to my podcast for learners of English all around the world.

This is here to help you get regular English input into your life through listening, and So join me as I talk to you in English which is clear, easy to understand, but not basic.

I do attempt to speak normally and naturally on this podcast in order to help you.

Become used to hearing the sound of spoken English and you can notice and pick up various phrases and bits of vocabulary.

Yes, I try not to make my English basic.

I try to speak in the same way that I would normally speak, but...

I think that yes, I think you'll find that my English is pretty clear and simple to follow and yet not basic.

This is what people often say in comments.

They comment on the fact that they can understand me easily.

And that's part of the plan, you know, that's part of the method.

I want this to be accessible.

I want this to be a way for you to connect with English in a meaningful way, for more than just 15 minutes.

You know, my episodes are quite long and this is an important part of your process for learning English.

Right.

So this is a rambling episode recorded and published in February 2026.

I will be talking for some time about lots of different things throughout the episode.

So coming up in this one, there'll be some responses to recent episodes.

I'll be talking about listener comments and things in response to some of the episodes I've published recently.

I'll tell you a few little stories and anecdotes and various other ramblings, including stuff relating to learning English with TV and radio.

All fingers and thumbs the expression fingers and thumbs, but I'll be talking about fingers and thumbs.

That is in response to a recent story that I told on the podcast.

Anyway, stuff about fingers and thumbs.

How I became a taxi driver on the streets of Paris.

What happened to my face and other comments about my appearance?

And if you're curious about that, just keep listening because everything will be explained.

How to speak English like Yoda from Star Wars.

So that could also be called the grammar of Yoda.

Also, are you aware of the existence of my other podcast?

Yes, I have another podcast.

Do you know about it?

What books do I have on the shelves behind me?

People keep asking me to share some of the names of the books I've got in my room.

And also some Lepster haikus haikus written by listeners in response to the episode from two weeks ago.

All right.

So all of that in one episode.

Feel free to listen to this in stages.

You don't have to listen to the whole thing in one go.

You can just listen for as long as you like and then stop and come back and continue.

If you get to the end of this episode, you will receive a special certificate from me, a certificate of achievement, which includes 100 bonus points for getting to the end.

There's a full PDF for this episode with all the notes that I'm reading from

That is available for you free.

You'll find a link for that in the description.

If you'd like to read some of the things I'm saying, read the notes that I'm using for this episode.

The PDF is linked in the description.

Like and subscribe.

If you like the podcast, subscribe, tell your friends and all the rest of it.

Right.

So let's go.

And let's start with the first point in my notes, which is all about using TV and radio series for learning English.

So here is a comment thread about using BBC radio or TV series for learning English.

So this is a comment that was left by a Lepster on YouTube post.

Called.

This is the person's YouTube name KKKK-T2C7D, which makes the person sound like a droid from Star Wars.

KKKK-T2C7D.

I don't know if that's, I don't think that's your actual name.

I'd be surprised if your parents chose that name.

What have you chosen?

The name for the child says the doctor or nurse in the hospital.

Have you chosen the child's name yet?

Yes, we've decided, haven't we darling?

We've decided to to call him or her kkk-t2c7d.

Fantastic, what a beautiful name.

I'm joking, of course.

This is just the person's username on YouTube.

Anyway, KKKK.

I'm just going to call this person KKKK to save time.

KKKK wrote this.

Hi, Luke.

Is BBC Radio 4 good for daily English listening?

And my response was simply yes.

Which shows I can be brief sometimes.

Yes.

So is BBC Radio 4 good for daily English listening?

And my answer is basically yes.

Now, that's not the end of the conversation, by the way.

The conversation, the comment thread did continue.

But I should just point out here. that there are various BBC radio stations that you can listen to.

It's not just the BBC World Service which is known internationally, but there are lots of BBC radio stations that you can get on the radio in the UK but which are obviously available online in the form of digital radio.

You can listen to BBC radio stations online on your phone with the BBC Sounds app, which you can just download free.

And you can also listen to BBC radio stations on your computer through the internet, right?

And these are just the radio stations that people in the UK would listen to.

They're probably the most famous, most popular radio stations in the UK.

But now, thanks to the wonder of the internet, the World Wide Web, you can listen to those radio stations too.

So do you ever listen to BBC Radio?

Do you know how to listen to it?

As I've just said, you can listen to all the radio stations and there are lots of them on the BBC website.

But the best way is via the app on your phone, which is called BBC Sounds.

This is an app that you can download on your phone.

Just check the app store for BBC Sounds, and you can download it.

And that's where you can find all the BBC radio stations and listen to them.

And there are various stations there, not just for music, but also lots of talkings. so let me just make this clear you can also listen to all the bbc radio stations on the bbc website bbc.co.uk no bbc.com slash audio slash stations and radio 4 is one of the stations on which you can mostly hear people talking Quite high level stuff.

For example, a news report every hour, but also discussion about the news and current affairs documentaries interviews, factual content and more.

The BBC described Radio 4 as inquisitive speech radio to make sense of your world.

Inquisitive in the sense that they are asking questions about current affairs and important, serious things going on in the world today.

Right,

So that's Radio 4, and KKKK is asking whether Radio 4 is good for daily English listening, and my quick reply is simply yes.

But KKKK is wondering if the English you can hear on Radio 4 is the kind of normal English people use every day.

And so the comment thread continued with KKKK saying...

Luke, I watched your episode called Stand Up Comedy, How BBC News Reporters Speak.

And in the episode you said that learners should not follow BBC News because news presenters don't speak like normal people.

And if someone copies their way of speaking, it can sound strange.

Right.

So KKKK watched a video of mine on YouTube, which is actually a record.

It's not an episode of my podcast, to be fair.

It's not a podcast episode, but a bit of stand-up comedy that I videoed and put onto YouTube.

And the main aim of that, it was me on stage doing some stand-up.

The main aim of that was just to make people laugh, right?

It was a piece of comedy that That was the main aim, rather than to make a very serious point about learning English with the BBC.

Although I do sort of believe it.

I do sort of believe the point, which is that...

If you're learning English with the BBC, watch out, because people on the BBC, like on BBC News reports, they don't sound like normal people, right.

They've got a certain way of speaking.

The English you hear in the news is not exactly the same English you hear from people in everyday conversations or conversations at work.

Have you ever heard that bit of stand-up that I... that I have on YouTube.

Have you ever seen that video?

If not, let me just play it to you now so you can enjoy it in all its glory.

So this is actually from a few years ago when I was doing some stand-up at the comedy store in Leicester Square, just off Leicester Square in London.

And so this is my stand-up bit about how BBC News reporters don't speak normal English.

Here we go.

One thing I miss about the UK is watching the TV.

I love watching the BBC News.

Just the way that they speak on the BBC, because they don't speak like normal humans.

Have you noticed?

For some reason, everybody on the BBC has to speak in this kind of voice.

Some of the words go down, other words go up for no apparent reason.

The whole report continues in this way.

It sounds factual.

No one really knows what the report is about, but the main thing is that it has to end on a very mysterious note.

It's true.

What's going on here?

It's true.

It's true, though.

I think there's three different BBC voices.

There's the voice in the studio, which is like, you're watching the BBC.

Everything's fine.

Everything's under control.

Here we are in the studio.

No problems.

The Queen's still alive.

Everything's fine.

That's the studio voice.

And then there's the radio voice, which is even more smooth.

You're listening to the BBC World Service.

I'm not wearing any trousers.

Here are the headlights.

And then there's the one where the reporter is outside, and that's...

Intense.

I'm outside and everything's dramatic.

I'm standing outside a building and my voice is up here because there's no ceiling to keep my voice in place.

My voice could disappear at any moment.

In America as well, they speak weirdly on the news.

Have you noticed?

It's not the same as the BBC version.

They've got their own special way of doing it.

For me, the American news always sounds more positive and glamorous than it should do.

You know, even when it's not appropriate for the story.

When the police raided the serial killer's basement, they discovered just a little more than they bargained for.

I'm not sure that's appropriate for that story.

Why is it so glamorous?

A lot of people learn English with the BBC, right?

A lot of people learn English, use the BBC, it's the standard.

If that's the case, watch out.

It might end up sounding a bit strange.

You can imagine, you're there with your friends, like you know, your native English-speaking friends.

You're talking about how hungover you are or something.

A typical English conversation.

Oh, God, I've got such a headache.

Oh, I hate myself so much.

I don't know why I'm doing this.

Do we have to do it too?

Yes, you do.

Fuckers, just no food.

Eating is cheating.

Just drink.

But we're supposed to enjoy it.

No.

Put beer in you.

Oh, I'm going to die.

Good.

Anyway, you're having a chat with your friends about how hungover you are.

One of your friends is a native, is a French person learning English with the BBC.

Let's call him Jean-Pierre.

Why not?

And you're like, oh God, I'm so hungover.

What about you, Jean-Pierre?

And Jean-Pierre says, the scene was one of devastation.

The hangover struck in the early hours of the morning.

Jesus.

Sounds tough.

Certainly factual.

What time did you get up?

Witness reports stated that I rose from my bed at approximately 10am before moving into the bathroom in a desperate bid to get my body clean.

Then commentators are suggesting I moved into the kitchen in order to consume what can only be described as a breakfast of champions.

Wow, thanks for the info.

Okay, so that's the routine, okay?

You got the idea that... they sound a bit strange on the BBC.

Some of you have heard that before.

And if you're learning English with the BBC, watch out, you might end up sounding a bit strange.

Now, I don't know if it's entirely true, to be honest.

I mean, it's kind of funny to talk about, but I'm not sure it's entirely true.

Although, you know, the way that people speak in a news report is not the same as the way that people speak online, in everyday conversation, right the the tone of voice is different.

You're listening to the bbc and on the bbc we speak like this there's a certain kind of serious tone, the intonation is certainly strange and this is, you know that's, this is the way it's done, and everything ends like that um, And also maybe the vocabulary that's used and the grammar that's used is just specific to that situation.

You know, English changes depending on the situation.

We use English differently.

I've done episodes about this in the past the way that English changes for different situations and different sort of modes of speaking or writing.

You know, the standards change.

And so if news is the only thing you listen to or read, then it's not necessarily the language that you can directly apply to conversations.

Although, having said that, It's definitely useful to be able to talk about what's happening in the world.

And in the news you learn a lot of rich vocabulary that probably most people most, let's say, native English speakers, will know.

These are the terms and bits of English that we use to talk about what's happening in the world.

You know, it's not entirely the case that learning English with the news is a bad thing.

I mean, it's got a lot of advantages, too.

Just like with most things, there are advantages and disadvantages to learning English with you know different types of materials in different situations.

There is no one single best method or best thing, except of course for Luke's English podcast, which is you know, obviously you know the ultimate podcast.

This is the way.

Anyway, let's go back to KKKK, who says so.

My question is do people on BBC Radio 4 also speak in an unnatural or unusual way, different from how British people speak in everyday life?

I ask because, even though their speech is very clear to me, that's the way that people on Radio 4 speak.

Even though their speech is clear to me, I'm not sure if it reflects real daily British English.

Again, I need to clarify.

On Radio 4 yes, there is a news report every hour in which people do speak in that news reader or news reporter kind of way.

But then the rest of the programming is different.

And you might find some content which is a bit more conversational in tone and a bit closer to the sort of everyday English that people use.

Right, so...

We will continue the comment thread with KKKK in a moment and I will answer the question as best I can.

But KKKK makes a very good point and asks a good question.

So what are the various BBC radio stations and how can you listen to them?

I mentioned that earlier.

Secondly, what different kinds of speech can you hear on the BBC? and I'm talking about BBC Radio.

Does BBC Radio represent the kinds of English you will hear from British people in everyday situations?

What radio stations should you or could you listen to?

And why would you want to do any of this when you have Luke's English Podcast?

Right, I'm just kidding there.

But anyway, back to the question.

Do people on BBC Radio 4 speak in an unnatural or unusual way different from how British people speak in everyday life?

So my response to this is like this.

Well, most people on BBC4 speak RP, and not everyone speaks like that.

So there I'm talking about the accent, right?

Okay.

So yeah, most people on BBC Radio 4 speak with received pronunciation and not everyone in the UK speaks like that.

Okay.

If you're looking at the PDF for this episode, you will see that there is a kind of I've put together a pie chart to represent the approximate distribution of accents in the UK.

Now, the numbers here are approximate.

They are estimates based on various sources, but this is not official census data.

So this is just like a a general idea of the distribution of accents in the UK.

And you'll see that the vast majority of people in the UK speak with regional English accents.

And there are many regional English accents In the north, in the south, in the midlands, in the west, in the east, in different parts, different cities, different areas.

Obviously, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland as well.

And so there's a wide variety of different regional accents.

65%, it says, 65% of people in the UK speak with...

Regional accents from England.

So you know we talk about Liverpool Manchester, sort of Yorkshire, the Midlands, East Anglia, the Southeast, the Southwest, you know all these different locations, the Northeast Northwest, these sorts of things.

In England, that's 65%.

Then you've got 12%.

Include just various Scottish accents.

So obviously, Scotland is the second largest country in the UK.

And there's a variety of different accents there, of course, which generally can be called Scottish accents from Edinburgh, Glasgow and other parts of the country.

6 sorry, 11.

Here is received pronunciation okay, which is that kind of generic accent that you might hear on the bbc.

I would say probably my accent is received pronunciation too.

Now rp or received pronunciation.

You got kind of There's maybe a grey area on the edges of RP, in the sense that you might have received pronunciation with some elements of regional accents in there too, you know, and you might have received pronunciation that is on the edge of being what we call heightened RP or kind of posh, upper-class English that you might hear from the royal family or something like that.

So RP is not a single defined thing.

There is a bit of variation even within that.

But basically, speaking RP is kind of like my accent or the accent that you might hear on BBC Radio 4.

But that's only 10-11% of RP. everyone in the country will speak with this accent.

Most people speak with some sort of regional accent.

We also have like Welsh accents, Northern Irish accents, Scottish accents, various regional English accents.

Yes.

And that's including Northern Ireland Wales, Scotland and England.

All those regional accents account for.

What is that?

Sort of 87%.

Okay?

87% of people will speak something that's not received pronunciation.

Then you've got about 2 estimated.

About two percent of people speak with this very high rp, which is what we consider to be a very posh kind of english accent that we associate with the royal family or other sort of aristocratic people or very upper class people, right?

So that gives you the sense, that It gives you an overall sense of the distribution of accents.

Most people speak with a regional accent, which is not the same as RP.

And I've done an episode about some of the main differences between standard British RP and regional accents.

I've done an episode about that.

Let me tell you what it is.

OK, so it is episode number 682, which is called Key Features of English Accents and Explained.

And in that one I explore the main differences between standard English pronunciation, received pronunciation and non-standard regional or colloquial accents.

How do people really speak in different parts of England?

And how does this accent differ from the accent you probably hear in English language course books and dictionaries?

That's RP.

So that was all about comparing the RP that you might hear from me or on BBC Radio 4 and the accents that you are much more likely to hear if you just go to England and meet people.

I mean, obviously it depends on the people you meet, but anyway you can see that it's something like 85 of people will speak with some kind of regional accent that's different to RP.

Now internationally.

This is from an international perspective like, for example, for many of you, when you consider British English or America, for example, when the Americans consider Britain and British English and the way that British people speak in.

It seems that most non-British people are familiar with RP as the standard form of English pronunciation.

This is what most people hear in most language learning materials course books, pronunciation guides and stuff.

A lot of British actors, the most famous British actors will speak with RP.

Not all of them.

You know, there are some people like Ray Winstone or who's the scouser?

What's his name?

He's brilliant.

Oh, dear.

Scouse, English actor.

Scouse means from Liverpool.

Stephen Graham, right?

Stephen Graham is an exception because he's got like this amazing Liverpool accent.

But on BBC Radio 4 most people do speak RP because this is that kind of middle or upper class English that we associate with the world of news, serious media broadcasting, formal English, university educated people, the world of politics and stuff like that.

You're more likely to hear regional English, that kind of everyday English, on other BBC channels, like maybe Radio 5 Live, which contains more chatty, conversational English.

It's more informal.

There's a lot of conversation about sports and current affairs and generally the tone is a lot more informal and you hear various accents and stuff on there as people call into the radio station.

The presenters have slightly non-RP accents.

Also on Radio 1... which is sort of normally for young people like teenagers or people in their 20s.

There's a lot of very contemporary pop music played on Radio 1.

Radio 2, also they play pop music and it's for a middle-aged audience.

It's a bit more informal and you hear different accents on there.

And Radio 6 as well.

BBC Radio 6 is all about alternative music and you are more likely to hear alternative Everyday English and a variety of accents there.

But going back to Radio 4, it is mostly RP.

But I think, you know, I think this is fine.

You know, even though only 10 of people speak with RP in the UK, does that mean that we should abandon RP completely or that you should abandon it?

Because you think well OK, if you don't listen to RP or use RP as your model, what kind of English should you use as your model, model or standard?

And you think well, all right well, shall I use a sort of like a East London accent, a sort of Cockney accent or something?

Or should I go for a Liverpool accent or Manchester accent or a Birmingham accent or a Welsh accent, or one of the Scottish accents or a Northern Irish accent?

You know, if it's not RP, what is it?

So, even though not only about 10 of people in the UK speak RP, there's no one single accent that dominates right.

I think that any accent is going to have up to 10% of the share of the chart.

Like, if you look at, let's say, a Manchester accent that's going to have less than 10 of the chart.

There's no accent that has the majority, you see.

So you might as well go for RP.

You know, like a Lancashire accent from the Greater Manchester area, for example, might take up less than 10 of the UK population in terms of accent distribution.

So you might as well pick RP as the accent that you listen to and copy.

Why not?

It's up to you, of course, but it makes sense to listen to RP as much as anything else.

Actually, the best thing is to try to hear all different accents and not be too narrow in what you listen to.

You need to try to hear a wide variety of different forms of English.

Because if you just focus on one, then when you get into a real world situation where you just meet someone who doesn't speak like that, you're going to struggle.

I always try to bring guests on my show in order to expand the range of accents you can hear in my episodes.

And I must continue to do that.

But going back to my comment.

Yes, Radio 4 is good for daily listening practice.

You do get news reports there every hour and the way they speak is a bit particular, but there are various different types of programme on Radio 4.

It's not all news.

Some of those programmes do involve quite specific or unnatural modes of speaking, for example, the news reports, or maybe politicians making speeches or interviews with politicians that sound like the way people talk in the world of business rather than in everyday conversation.

But a lot of programmes on Radio 4 are more conversational and therefore reflect natural speech patterns.

So My final point about radio stations and accents and what to listen to is this.

You should explore the different radio stations, listen to them all, see which ones you like and ultimately, listen to what you enjoy.

There's no one single universal best radio station, because different things will appeal to different people, right?

But you should listen to something, and you should listen to something involving people speaking in English right, obviously?

And ideally, you should listen to a variety of accents.

But ultimately, listen to something that you actually enjoy listening to so that you actually do it.

And that will probably involve something that you understand, something in which they talk about subjects that are appealing to you, something that has a person speaking in a way that perhaps, is the kind of way you would like to speak one day.

But also, just listen to Luke's English podcast.

You know, don't worry, I've got you covered.

So now, going back to my comment thread with KKKK, now we switch our attention to TV series.

Now, understandably, you might want to watch British TV series to improve your English.

But just like finding the right radio station, finding the right TV series can be difficult, especially if you're looking for that elusive best show for learning English, which might not actually exist.

There isn't really one single show that is the ultimate answer.

Now, some people say, well, Friends, of course, you should watch Friends.

A lot of people go for that, and fair enough, but you know it might not be to everybody's taste and uh obviously friends, is american english and if you're looking for british english then that's not the one for you.

But anyway, i'm going to say some of these things now i'm going to continue to make this point.

So um, kkkk said so.

I watched the office that's the uk version of the office and i found it very unclear.

It made me feel that the British accent is hard to understand.

Now I have to say KKKK, that you kind of made a little classic mistake there by saying the British accent.

And British people tend to get a little bit annoyed by this.

And in comments they will say there is no such thing as the British accent, which is a bit confusing at first.

But what they mean is there is no such thing as the British.

There is no such one single thing as the British accent, that there are many different accents.

So it's not the British accent, okay?

It's a British accent or British accents, plural.

But anyway, I watched The Office and I found it very unclear.

It made me feel that British accents are hard to understand.

Then I watched Friends and it was very clear to me.

Because of that, I thought the American accent is clearer.

Maybe you mean the kind of standard American accent or is it called general American?

I think it's called. that that is clearer.

However, I also watched Downton Abbey and The Crown, and their accents were the clearest for me, even clearer than Friends.

So my questions are... KKKK has a lot of questions, which is fine.

My questions are why is there such a big difference between the accent in the office UK and the accents in Downton Abbey and the Crown?

And in daily life, do British people speak more like Downton Abbey and the Crown?

Or would I sound strange if I spoke like that?

Similar to the issue with BBC News presenters.

Okay, so I'm going to read out my answer in a moment.

I suppose what I should say is that it's easy to exaggerate this problem of the fact that I mean I exaggerated it in my comedy clip that listening to BBC News is going to directly cause you to sound like a BBC News reporter in your everyday life.

I don't think... it's entirely the case.

And I don't think our English is directly influenced that strongly by those things.

I think most of the time when you're listening to a news report, you are aware that you're listening to news and you know that that's a mode of speaking.

And when you speak, you're much more likely to be influenced by just the general way that you would.

You're much more likely to be influenced by your own first language, first of all.

And I think you probably are able to, even subconsciously, make a switch in style between the style of a newsreader and the style of a person just having a conversation.

And that probably you can easily.

You can transfer the English that you pick up from the news into the form of a natural everyday conversation and that we subconsciously make those changes in style.

So it's not such a big problem, right?

And if you just watch Downton Abbey, you're.

Your English might end up sounding a bit upper class, but the influence is not going to be quite as strong as we might think.

But anyway, so my response was most people speak like they do in the office, I'm afraid.

Downton Abbey and The Crown are about the most privileged elites in the country.

And they are mostly set in the past, like over 100 years ago in the case of Downton Abbey.

And even super posh people today don't speak exactly like that, like the way they do in these TV shows.

They also speak quickly.

There's also a stylistic difference between the shows, which is important.

We're now comparing The Office, which is a kind of realistic situational comedy about everyday life in an office.

And Downton Abbey, which is about an aristocratic family from 100 years ago, and the sort of problems that they have had to deal with.

And The Crown, which is a dramatisation of the story of the British royal family.

And it follows mostly the life of Queen Elizabeth II through the 1950s 60s 70s, 80s and beyond and then follows the story of Prince Charles, now King Charles, and stuff like that right.

So there is a stylistic difference between these shows, which is also important in terms of your ability to understand the English that you can hear in them.

So The Office is supposed to be a very naturalistic documentary and is filmed as though we're quietly observing people, sometimes from across the room.

And as a result, the dialogue is unclear.

So it's not just the accents you can hear in the office that make it difficult to follow.

It's also the way that the show is filmed.

The dialogue is unclear.

OK.

The Crown and Downton Abbey, on the other hand, are filmed traditionally, and the dialogue is much louder and clearer.

The actors speak very clearly.

The camera doesn't move so much.

Everything's a lot clearer and more simple and presented in a very clear way.

So, even though most people speak like they do in the office in real life in the uk, it's not just the accents that make it difficult for you, it's the sound design of the show, the way it's scripted, the way the script is delivered in this natural sort of almost mumbly kind of way, and it's the way the show is directed.

So the style of the show might might make it hard to understand the english that's on display And, as I said earlier, there isn't really such a thing as the British accent.

There are many different ones.

You might watch Downton Abbey and understand it and think, wow, the British accent is easy.

But then you watch The Office and you think, oh, the British accent is difficult.

The fact is, these are different accents and also different styles of TV show.

Right, so let's actually listen to two samples of from The Office and from Downton Abbey, and we'll compare the difference.

Now, they're both British, but they have different accents and different styles of TV show.

So let's listen to a clip from The Office.

The clip I'm going to play to you is a scene where... Oh, what's his name?

I can't remember.

One of the members of staff, Keith...

Keith, who works in the office, is having an appraisal.

That means he's sitting down with his line manager.

In this case, that is David Brent, played by Ricky Gervais.

And Ricky Gervais' character is talking to Keith about his performance at work.

Keith was supposed to complete a questionnaire...

You know those questionnaires you have to do at work that you then show to your manager and your manager and you have a.

You sit down and you discuss, like the way that you work, your performance at work and your goals for the future.

It's like a six month appraisal or something like that.

So that's what they're discussing.

There's also a little clip of two of the girls in the office discussing having a chat over a cup of coffee as well.

Let's listen to some of this, and basically, can you understand what is being said?

Here we go.

Under strengths, you've just put accounts.

Yeah.

That's your job, though.

That's just... No, Keith, what...

I was sort of looking for your skills within your job, so is there anything else you could have put there?

Oh, OK.

Under weaknesses, you've put eczema.

You had a really fantastically welcoming buffet.

The wine was...

Something else.

Everyone's sort of quite friendly.

Yeah, everyone's... And Tim.

Tim seems nice.

Oh, yeah.

He's a good laugh.

I was just going to... Has he got a girlfriend or...?

Tim.

Why?

What's up with you?

I hate all the things.

Why, why?

Would you?

The equation.

Yeah, I know.

But, I mean, if you weren't, would he be...?

Right, you've left this section completely blank, Keith.

You haven't done the Q&A.

I thought that you filled that in.

No, no, no, no, this is aimed at you.

To what extent do you believe that you have the skills and knowledge to perform your job effectively?

And then you just tick one of the boxes.

Not at all, to some extent, very much so, don't know.

What would you tick?

10, then.

OK.

Question two.

Do you feel you have received adequate training to use your computer effectively?

What are your options?

They're always the same.

Always the same.

Not at all.

To some extent.

Very much so.

Don't know.

Don't know again.

Okay.

Do you feel you are given the flexibility to decide how best to accomplish your goals?

Do you want the options again?

Yeah.

Not at all.

To some extent, always the same.

Very much so.

Don't know.

If don't know wasn't there, what would you put?

Well, the option... Not at all.

To some extent.

Very much so.

Don't know.

Very much so.

Do you remember what the question was?

No.

OK.

Do you... We're going to leave that there.

Okay, right.

That was difficult to understand, I expect.

I mean, for some of you, you probably were okay, especially if you've seen it before.

But for many of you listening to that, it was probably quite hard to understand.

Let me try and break it down.

So basically yeah, so between David Brent, played by Ricky Gervais, and Big Keith, they're having this meeting.

And Keith is basically...

He's not talkative and he almost says nothing.

And so it's very difficult for David Brent to have this appraisal meeting with him, because Keith is virtually saying nothing.

He's kind of not contributing anything to the meeting.

And David Brent is asking him basic questions like, for example do you feel that you've received enough training to use your computer?

What are your strengths?

What are your weaknesses?

And Keith's answers are...

So minimal, it's like he doesn't care at all and he's making zero effort whatsoever in this meeting.

So what are your strengths, your strong points?

Keith says, accounts, accounting.

And that's just his job.

You know, that's just the job that he does.

That's not a strength.

And so David Brent says, well, I'm looking for the specific skills within your job.

And Keith doesn't respond with anything.

And then he says, what are your weaknesses?

And Keith's response to that is eczema, which is a pretty funny joke.

There's no laughter track here, so it's not obvious when things are intended to be funny.

But what are your weaknesses?

Eczema.

It's a pretty good joke, but it's difficult to notice that.

Maybe if you don't know what eczema is or if you couldn't hear the word eczema.

Eczema is a skin complaint.

It's a common skin problem that causes kind of red, itchy skin and you have to put cream on it to make it go away.

That's eczema.

So in terms of his weaknesses, Keith put eczema, which is not a weakness.

It's not a weakness at work, is it?

It's not like... Your weaknesses might be, I don't know...

Yeah, IT skills, the ability to use computers effectively, or maybe I don't know what else could be.

Organization, time management.

Time management might be a weakness.

Okay.

And the interview goes on and you know.

Basically the joke is that Keith is just a nightmare and doesn't say anything and is incredibly lazy.

And they get to a point in the questionnaire when there are different options.

And it's like, I agree.

I partially agree to a certain extent or not at all.

You know those multiple choice questions where you have to say to what extent you agree with something.

And then the fifth option is, I don't know.

And Keith always just says, don't know.

And he always forgets what the options are.

But it doesn't matter, because he always says I don't know.

So he's just a really strange and useless member of staff.

And then there's the little clip of the two girls having a little conversation.

And that's definitely difficult to follow, like really hard to follow.

You have to be very observant and understand what's going on.

Also, when it's not in context, it's difficult to understand.

But the two girls are sort of chatting, making small talk, talking about maybe a party they went to where there was wine.

And then one of the girls says, oh, Tim, Tim is a good laugh.

So they're talking about this guy in the office called Tim.

That's the character played by Martin Freeman on the show.

And she says, oh, what about Tim?

He's a good laugh.

And Dawn, who's the other girl is sort of shy about this, because the subtext is that Dawn and Tim actually fancy each other and there's a lot of like sexual tension between them and maybe in fact they are in love with each other.

This is a storyline that goes through the show dawn and tim.

There's like this incredible chemistry between them and obviously dawn, i think, really likes tim and tim really likes dawn, but they're not together And it's always like will they, won't they get together.

Dawn is either... She's engaged to someone else, so she's going to get married to someone else.

But it's clear...

She actually loves Tim.

And so this other girl is asking Dawn, what about Tim?

Does he have a girlfriend?

And Dawn is acting all kind of like oh no, Tim doesn't have a.

Oh no, he doesn't have a girlfriend.

And the girl says, what about you?

Would you go out with Tim?

And she says, well, you know, I'm already taken.

She shows her ring.

And the point there is that This other girl is interested in Tim, but Dawn is feeling very awkward about it because she actually loves Tim.

And so there's a lot of subtext going on that you have to observe.

But it's very, very difficult to understand.

It's difficult because of the way it's filmed.

So this is supposed to be highly realistic, and so things are sometimes unclear.

The director is trying to make it seem like we're observing the scene from a distance.

The camera is often far away from what's happening. and is moving around.

There's also the sound of general office noise in the background telephones ringing, paper being moved and stuff like that.

The dialogue is not clearly spoken and is usually mumbled, reflecting real-life office interactions.

It's supposed to look like you're sitting at one end or sitting at one of the desks in the office observing what's happening on the other side of the room and kind of eavesdropping on other people's conversations.

Also, the humour is not clearly signalled.

There's no point where it's kind of like, there's the joke.

You know, it's not clearly signalled.

It's subtle and it's about reading between the lines.

That's why it's really really difficult for learners of English to understand.

Also, I've said before that actually the UK office is not a comedy.

It's a tragedy and it should be watched like that.

And I say that because sometimes, you know, understandably learners of English go, right.

I want to learn English.

I want to learn British English.

So what are the most, what are the best British English comedy shows?

And you find the office and you think, right.

Oh yeah.

I watched the American office.

I know that one.

Let's watch the original, the British office.

And, um, It doesn't seem funny.

In fact, it's impossible to understand.

And it seems just really depressing because you expect some sort of lighthearted, positive upbeat comedy.

But in fact, it just seems really sad and weird.

Don't expect it to be a comedy.

Expect it to be a tragedy.

It's a sort of quite a deep character study, a study of...

In terms of Tim's character someone intelligent with a lot of potential, who is stuck in a horrible job in an office environment that he hates.

And it's the tragedy of the person stuck in a dead-end job that they absolutely hate that is destroying their soul.

And the tragedy of someone who is in love with someone who they can't really be with because she's with someone else, and things like that.

And it's also the tragedy of David Brent.

Who is this manager who prioritizes being popular with people and entertaining them over doing a good job?

And we just watch these things sort of play out.

Yeah, but it's not like an American comedy show.

Because if you expect something like Friends, if you watch The Office and expect something like Friends, which is full of bright, saturated colours, beautiful people with clearly defined personalities and obviously hilarious situations, very obvious points of laughter and good teeth, then The Office is not for you.

It's just going to seem confusing and not particularly funny.

The characters speak with modern everyday English accents, speaking spontaneously in a group often.

So they have to be quick.

So the English that you're hearing is very quick.

I think some of the scenes in The Office were improvised as well.

And dialogue that's improvised and is spontaneous is naturally going to be harder to follow than dialogue that was written in a script and is delivered as if someone has remembered lines from a script.

Spontaneous, improvised dialogue is going to include a lot of uh, false starts, incomplete sentences, people talking over each other, stuff like that.

So it's not difficult because it's british, but because of other reasons, for learners of english, this can be a very difficult show to understand.

Now let's turn our attention to downton abbey and we're just going to hear a clip um, a clip from one of the episodes of downton abbey, and this is where What's his name.

Is his name Lord Crawley?

The main character is sitting with his wife and his aunt, his great aunt, and they're discussing...

I can't remember exactly the details.

I think they are discussing what they should do about a butler, about a member of staff.

I think that's right.

So they're deciding who should take a specific job, as maybe the groundskeeper, who should be the new groundskeeper at the house, who should be the new butler, who they should take as the new butler?

A gardener or farmer, or something like that.

So they're discussing someone.

But just listen to this, see if you can follow this clip.

How can I still be here when all the young have gone to bed?

The motor's ready when you are.

When's Jarvis leaving?

I'm not sure.

It seems a poor return for 40 years of service.

Maybe...

He was your father's man.

To him, you were always the young master, never the chief.

Which does not alter the fact that now we must find someone else.

But you've already found him.

What do you mean?

Well, obviously, the answer to a thousand different questions is to give the position to Branson.

Well, if he's the agent, we can call him Branson again, thank heaven.

That's a mad plan.

It's not.

Tom and Matthew can work on the new ideas together.

They're the same age.

But what does he know of farming?

His grandfather was a farmer.

In a small way.

Which means he has more practical experience than Jarvis ever had.

Think of the child.

You cannot want your only granddaughter to grow up in a garage with that drunken gorilla.

Don't we owe this to Sybil?

I'll do it on one condition.

No, two.

First, Matthew must agree.

He will.

Second, you will both admit it when you realize you were wrong.

Oh, well, that is an easy caveat to accept because I'm never wrong.

OK, right.

So there you can see that in Downton Abbey, they speak much more clearly than on the office.

And everything's rather upper class and posh.

This is sort of heightened RP.

Hello yes, this is Downton Abbey, don't you know?

You know that sort of thing.

And there they were basically discussing um, someone who should take a new job, someone who should be should replace someone who's leaving, and uh, the aunt and the wife both think that Tom Branson Branston should be given the job.

And uh, the lord uh, is it the?

Uh, Lord Crawley is that his name?

I can't remember that.

He doesn't think Tom is the right person for the job.

Now, that should be, I expect that was much easier to follow.

Right, so this is also British, but everything is much clearer.

It's all scripted.

The characters give each other time.

The camera is static.

It's not moving too much.

And obviously the microphones are really capturing every little nuance of the voices.

Things move more slowly.

It's old-fashioned English.

They speak louder and clearer in heightened RP, which hardly anyone speaks these days, although RP is similar.

For learners of English this is much easier to follow, but probably not a very accurate reflection of how most people speak today.

And now let's turn our attention to Friends.

So Friends, this is modern, everyday English.

But again, it's not supposed to be very realistic.

Let me find a sample of Friends to play you.

All right, okay.

So in this clip from Friends you're going to hear Rachel talking to Chandler And the joke is basically she's got a newspaper which he can't see and she's clearly doing a crossword puzzle and she doesn't know an answer.

But instead of asking Chandler to give her the answer, she just asks him lots of other vague questions in order to find the answer.

Because I suppose she doesn't want him to think that she can't do the crossword puzzle.

And so she's trying to get the answer from him in another way.

And then Joey comes in and Joey has bought a gift for his for a girl.

But he bought the wrong gift because he's an idiot.

All right.

So here we go.

You know, we should all do.

Go see a musical.

Hilarious, right?

And you know which one we should see?

The 1996 Tony Award winner.

So this is obviously her trying to elicit the answer.

The crossword puzzle must be, you know, 1996 award, Tony Award winning musical.

And she doesn't know what it is.

So she's concocting this contrived conversation with Chandler.

You know, we should all go and see a musical.

OK fine, like i think the joke is that it's just a random thing to say and he's like uh okay sure um, which one?

And she says the 1996 tony award winner.

Because she's trying to get him to say oh, you mean, you know what?

Oh, you mean cats, you know?

Yeah, the 1996 tony award winner.

Do you happen to know the name of that one?

I don't know um greece rent yes rent okay, so when do you want to go what?

Oh, i'm sorry, i can't, i'm busy.

Hey man, it is so hard to shop for girls.

Oh yes, it is at office max.

OK, see the way the jokes are much clearly, much more clearly signalled.

Oh, it's so hard to shop for girls.

And he puts the bag on the table and Shonda goes, yeah, Office Max.

Office Max is a store where you buy equipment for your office, pens and paper and stuff.

Yeah.

OK.

So here in Friends the characters you know say their lines quite quickly but really clearly.

There's pausing for laughter.

There is a laughter track.

You can hear people hear the audience laughing, which signals where the funny things are.

And generally, the comedy is much more obvious and easier to follow.

It's still a good show.

Very good writing and performances by the actors.

But, you know, still, it's easier to understand than The Office, right?

Now, this isn't because it's American.

It's because of the style of the show.

The American version of The Office, because there is an American version as well.

The American version of The Office is somewhere between Friends and the UK version of The Office in terms of style.

So it's not as sort of naturalistic and subtle as the UK Office.

It's a bit closer to being like Friends.

Anyway.

So podcasts are the best though, aren't they, if you're trying to listen to something in English?

I still think radio or podcasts are better than TV or films for learning English, but everyone has different tastes and some people just prefer watching Netflix than listening to a podcast.

The visual element of a TV series can be an advantage because it gives you context and people just enjoy looking at moving images.

Don't they?

But it can also be a disadvantage, because in my experience the dialogue, that's the speaking in TV series and films, is often more difficult to hear and therefore understand, because shows prioritise the visuals.

There's more background noise, music and so on.

I often find that I can't quite make out every single word I'm hearing when I watch a TV series or a film in the cinema.

A lot of people these days watch TV, especially streaming, with subtitles on.

Because shows are just harder to hear.

We watch on our phones and the speakers aren't as loud, right?

The speakers on your phone or something are not as loud as on TVs the way that they used to be.

And there's a lot of other reasons, right, why people put subtitles on.

A TV series on Netflix has many other things happening, and the speaking in the audio track is just one of them.

On an audio podcast, however, it's just you and the sound of the person's voice.

It's much clearer and free of other distractions, which for me makes it obviously much better for learning English.

But again, everyone has their preference, and some people are just not podcast people.

But anyway, going back to KKKK... who wrote, thank you very much for your reply.

And at this point, listeners, I know what you're thinking.

You're thinking, Luke, but what is the best podcast for learning English?

If you think podcasts are the best, what's the best podcast for learning English?

Can you recommend one?

And yes, I can.

It's called Luke's English Podcast.

I don't know if you've ever heard of it.

Right, so that was quite a long section.

Bloody hell, that was just the first part of what I would plan to do in this episode.

Let's move on to the next section, which is all about fingers and thumbs.

And I just wanted to say that a thumb is a finger too.

Right.

Now here's a response to the Sherlock Holmes story that I read on the podcast recently, which was called The Engineer's Thumb.

Plus, I wanted to give a vocabulary point with a grammar error as well, which I will correct.

Can you spot it?

So here's a message that I got on the website, teacherluke.co.uk, from a listener called Lena.

And it goes like this.

Hi, Luke.

Thanks a lot to you and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle for this episode.

It was so gripping that I didn't stop it, despite I was planning to listen just for 10 minutes and return to work.

Did you spot the error?

I'll correct it in a minute.

Before listening to this episode, I thought that all the five things that I have on each hand are called fingers.

I was wrong.

They are called four fingers and a thumb.

Right.

So this is where I replied and I said yes, the thumb is called a thumb, but I want to clarify that it is also a finger.

OK.

We do commonly say that we have ten fingers, five on each hand, usually, right?

But the first finger has a special name, that's the thumb, okay?

If you ask a doctor, they will probably say you have five fingers.

If you ask a tailor or a glove maker, they might say you have four fingers and a thumb.

So in biological terms, we have five fingers on each hand.

The thumb is technically a finger.

But yes, that first finger, the thicker opposable one one is specifically called your thumb and is, of course, markedly different to the others.

OK, is it better than the others?

Well, it's certainly useful, the thumb.

So that's just what I wanted to say that The thumb is a finger too.

Now, a quiz for you.

Do you know what the other fingers on your hand are called?

Do you know the names of the other fingers?

So obviously, going from the thumb, starting with the thumb and moving across the hand, you've got the thumb.

What about the next finger, the finger that you point with?

The finger that you point with or the finger that you use to squirt a water pistol.

That finger is called the what?

The index finger.

That's right.

That's your index finger.

Then the next finger across, the longest one, the one that you use to insult people with, which is called giving someone the finger.

By the way,

Is that its main purpose?

Is that the main use of that finger?

Anyway, that's called the middle finger.

And then the next finger, which is the arguably slightly useless one, the one that it's difficult to move on its own.

Or if you move your Anyway, that finger there, that's the ring finger, because that's typically the finger that you wear a wedding ring on on your left hand.

But that's the ring finger.

So thumb, index finger, middle finger, ring finger.

And then the last one, the smallest one...

Sometimes it's called the little finger and sometimes it's called the pinky, right?

So there you go.

Thumb, index finger, middle finger, ring finger, little finger or pinky.

There you go.

Now, back to the grammar correction I wanted to make.

There was a grammar correction to make in Lena's comment.

Lena, I hope you don't mind.

So Lena wrote it was so gripping that I didn't stop it, despite I was planning to listen just for 10 minutes and return to work.

So the error there is the word despite.

Okay.

So we you've written here, Lena, despite I was planning and despite is not followed by a clause.

That's a subject and a verb.

In this case, subject is I was planning is the verb.

OK, so we don't say despite I was planning.

Now, if you want to use a full clause, I was planning, we would use a different word.

So we would say although or even though.

For example, it was so gripping that I didn't stop it, although I was planning to listen just for 10 minutes and then return to work.

Right.

So it was so gripping that I didn't stop it, although I was planning to listen just for 10 minutes, or even though I was planning to listen just for 10 minutes before returning to work.

Or if you want to use despite, then you have to use a noun or a gerund afterwards.

Right. not a full clause.

So that would sound like this.

It was so gripping that I didn't stop it, despite planning to listen just for 10 minutes before returning to work.

So it's although I was planning, even though I was planning, or despite planning.

Okay?

Right.

Now, the next section in my notes here, I've written, don't include this bit.

There isn't time.

But I feel compelled to include it anyway because I think it's a good opportunity to teach you a few expressions in English relating to fingers and thumbs, especially thumbs.

So here are some expressions with the word thumb.

One expression is to be all fingers and thumbs.

I'm all fingers and thumbs today.

Another one is a rule of thumb.

For example, as a rule of thumb, I don't like to do that.

Or to be under someone's thumb.

You know, he's under her thumb.

To stick out like a sore thumb.

Honestly, I felt so embarrassed.

I stuck out like a sore thumb.

To thumb your nose.

I thumbed my nose at everyone.

To thumb a ride.

For example, I didn't have any money for a taxi, so I thumbed a ride.

And thumbs up.

So I gave him a thumbs up to say thanks.

Now, here's a stupid story with all of those expressions in it.

Based on the story, can you notice the phrases, all fingers and thumbs, a rule of thumb, to be under someone's thumb, to stick out like a sore thumb, to thumb your nose, to thumb a ride and thumbs up?

Can you notice all the expressions in the story and can you work out what they mean from context?

So here is my story.

This is how I ended up becoming a taxi driver in Paris.

So I'll start by saying my bike was broken and I needed to fix it.

And I was all fingers and thumbs as I tried to fix my bike outside a local cafe here in Paris where I live.

As I said, I was all fingers and thumbs.

I kept dropping the spanner and accidentally sprayed oil all over my shirt and then dropped the spanner again.

And then in the confusion, I smeared grease all over my face.

As a rule of thumb, I avoid doing DIY in public.

It's too embarrassing and I can't swear if I hit my finger with a hammer or something.

But on this particular day, I decided to ignore all common sense and just chose to set up my improvised bike workshop right there in the street.

If the local Parisians judged me, then so be it.

I was actually trying to get to work and really didn't want to be late.

My boss had me under his thumb, always making me come into work first thing in the morning and telling me I had to be perfectly dressed, and demanding full lesson plans on his desk before every class.

So I was in a big hurry and in the end I decided I had to cycle to work on a bike that clearly didn't want to cooperate with me.

With grease on my face and one wheel missing, if that's even possible I stuck out like a sore thumb, especially next to all the stylish Parisians sipping espresso nearby.

In a moment of rebellion.

I thumbed my nose at the whole situation and declared loudly and hysterically this is fine, this is perfectly fine.

Bonjour, you bastards.

Then the bike collapsed completely, leaving me without a mode of transport.

So I thumbed a ride, only to be picked up by a robotic AI taxi driver.

When we finally arrived at work, the AI taxi driver gave me a thumbs up and then my boss hired him.

And I was told once and for all that I was being made redundant. replaced by a robot.

So I gave my boss the finger, took the car, and that's how I ended up becoming a taxi driver on the streets of Paris.

The end.

By the way, just in case you were wondering, no, that is not a true story.

So expressions with the word thumb explained from the story.

So to be all fingers and thumbs.

This means to be very clumsy and uncoordinated, especially when you're doing something practical with your hands.

In the story.

I kept dropping the spanner, spraying oil everywhere and smearing grease on my face instead of fixing the bike.

So secondly, as a rule of thumb, this means a general guideline or common sense rule, not a strict rule, but something that usually works well and normally like a way of doing something.

And I think it comes from the idea of measuring something with your thumb that your thumb is approximately about an inch wide.

And so you can sort of measure things, assuming that your thumb is about one inch.

So that's a rule of thumb.

So kind of a general guideline or common sense rule that you can apply to doing something.

But it's not a strict rule, but it's generally something that kind of works well.

In the story.

My rule of thumb is to avoid doing DIY in public because it's embarrassing and stressful, even though I ignore this rule on that day.

So as a rule, as a general rule, or as a rule of thumb, I don't like doing DIY.

That's fixing things like fixing my bike.

In this case, DIY means do it yourself.

So as a general rule, I don't like fixing my bike in the street, but I decided to break that rule on this particular day.

To be under someone's thumb, like the Rolling Stones song, this means to be controlled or dominated by someone with little freedom to decide things for yourself.

In the story, my boss controls my schedule, my appearance and my work expectations, making me rush to work even when my bike is falling apart.

So I'm under my boss's thumb.

My boss is very controlling.

To stick out like a sore thumb.

This means to be very noticeable in an awkward or embarrassing way, especially because you look different from everyone else.

So it's where you stand out in a really embarrassing way.

In the story, I'm greasy.

That's covered in kind of oily stuff that you might put on the chain of your bicycle to help it move more easily.

So I'm greasy.

I'm missing a wheel on my bike and surrounded by stylish Parisians calmly drinking espresso.

So I'm impossible not to notice.

So I was really obvious.

Number five is to thumb your nose at something.

And this means to show defiance, disrespect or rebellious humor, often in a childish or exaggerated way.

I imagine sticking your bringing your hand up to your face with your thumb extended.

So your thumb is touching the tip of your nose and your fingers, that you waggle your fingers as if you're going in and in.

It's like an insulting gesture that you could do to show defiance or to show disrespect.

In the story, I shout sarcastically that everything is fine. and insult the situation.

So maybe I don't actually thumb my nose in the story, but the things I say are essentially an act of thumbing my nose.

So it either literally means putting your thumb to your nose and waving your fingers around, or it means doing something that essentially does the same thing, but with other forms of behaviour.

So in this case I shouted sarcastically that everything was fine and I insulted the situation and possibly Paris, showing that I've stopped caring what people think.

And then to thumb a ride.

This means to hitchhike, meaning to get a lift, get a ride from a passing car, usually by holding your thumb out, holding up your hand with your thumb raised, holding your thumb out to passing cars to ask for a lift.

Hitchhiking.

In the story.

After my bike completely collapses, I have no transport left, so I try to get a lift and end up in an AI-driven taxi.

And then thumbs up.

Everyone knows this means approval, agreement, or a positive signal, giving someone the thumbs up.

Um... or giving someone a thumbs up.

In the story, the AI taxi driver gives me a thumbs up.

But ironically, this leads to my boss hiring the robot.

Maybe the boss thought this is the sort of positive person i need in my job, and also someone who will do exactly what i tell them to do.

Um, so the my boss hires the robot meaning gives him the job and fires me meaning dismisses me, and that's how i ended up becoming a taxi driver on the streets of paris.

I'm gonna have a drink of water.

What about you?

Cheers Right.

If I'm going to get through all of this, I'm going to need to be super quick.

What am I going to do about this?

I mean, do I have to just accept that this is going to be a super duper long rambling episode?

I think I do.

And many of you at this point will be thinking, fantastic, great.

Please bring it on, Luke.

We love the long rambling episodes.

Okay.

I don't know why it's a perpetual source of... what's the word for it?

A perpetual source of indecision on my part that I prepare these episodes that are so long, and I'm always taken by surprise at how long they take.

And also in the back of my mind, I'm thinking I shouldn't be doing such long episodes.

And then ultimately I kind of think, no, no, no, no, no, I will do long episodes.

That's just what I've chosen to do.

That's what people, a lot of people like, and that's how I'm making myself distinctive.

Anyway, here's some stuff about my appearance, which I probably should ignore, really.

But anyway, as I have said before, people sometimes comment that my face is different to what they expected me to look like based on the sound of my voice.

I've talked about this before, but it keeps on happening and this probably means that it's a fairly common experience of Lepsters who listen to me a lot and never see my actual face.

I'm talking about audio Lepsters in audio land listening to the audio podcast.

They listen to me a lot never see my actual face until one day they see me, probably on YouTube, and have to come to terms with the cognitive dissonance of seeing a face that doesn't match what they had in mind.

So I wonder if you have I wonder if you've never seen my face, what do you think I look like?

Right.

If you've never actually seen my face, what do you think I look like in your imagination?

What do I look like? and I invite you to write comments somewhere.

Or if you listened to me for a while before ever seeing what I looked like.

So if you know what I look like now, but before you first saw my appearance, if you listened to me for a long time without ever seeing what I looked like, when you finally saw me, was I different to what you expected.

Some people seem to expect someone older and fatter than I am.

That's what people seem to expect.

Apparently I have a fat voice, which I think someone even commented once.

And I have joked before that they probably expect Robert Crawley...

That's the character whose name I couldn't remember earlier, Lord Crawley.

I've joked before that they probably expect Robert Crawley from Downton Abbey.

In fact, I think that's specifically a comment that one of my listeners left for me once.

It was Chris Benitez, I think.

I don't know.

Chris, are you still listening?

Are you still out there?

Or have you moved on to other things?

Tragedy.

It's a tragedy if he has.

But I think it was Chris Benitez who commented that he thought that I would look like Robert Crawley from Downton Abbey.

And I think a lot of people have that kind of image in their mind or something.

But I actually look like Luca Modric. the football player, the Croatian football player.

But maybe that's not fair to Luka Modric or not fair to me.

I don't know.

But it seems that what my audience thinks I look like when they hear my voice is Robert Crawley from Downton Abbey, which is not really accurate because I don't have that kind of accent.

Not really.

But what my audience thinks I look like when they see my face is actually more like Luka Modric the football player.

Either that or people are shocked and taken aback at how ruggedly handsome I am and they have to open a window or splash cold water on their face or something like that.

And now, in case it wasn't obvious, then I should just point out that I'm joking here about that.

But anyway, let me know if you if you agree or disagree with this.

You know whether you agree or disagree with the idea that you expected Robert Crawley, but actually you've got Luka Modric.

Anyway, I got this message from Victoria, OK, which made me laugh a bit.

Here is Victoria's message.

Hi, Luke.

I'm so glad that I found your podcast and have been following it for half a year.

You're my first foreign podcaster, but I really cherish you.

But here is the problem.

I don't know if any of your listeners have faced something like this or if I am a huge weirdo.

Um...

I don't think you're a huge weirdo for this.

Maybe you're maybe maybe you're still a huge weirdo, Victoria.

I don't know enough about you to confirm or deny.

But anyway, let me continue Victoria's message.

She says, I really like your voice.

It's really charming.

No.

Yes.

I really like your voice.

It's really calming, relaxing, charming and so on.

So now, because I don't know what you look like, I'm afraid of forming an image in my head.

Question mark. question mark, double question mark, which meant that I had to go up at the end.

Not grammatically a question, so the question marks made me go up.

Anyway, while I'm listening to you, I usually do different stuff like walking, cooking or eating.

Not all at the same time, I hope.

Well, how would that work?

Walking, cooking and eating all at the same time.

You'd like just standing, walking down the road with some sort of cooking device.

And anyway, And during all of that, I don't know your appearance at all.

If I try to imagine it, it ends up being something like Giga Chad, ha ha ha, or just a really attractive man, I don't know.

Right.

So, listeners, let me explain the Giga Chad thing, if you don't know what that is.

So, Giga Chad...

This is what Victoria imagines that I look like.

GigaChad is an internet meme and slang term used to describe a man who is seen as the peak of physical attractiveness, masculinity and dominance, an almost unrealistically perfect male figure.

The term is a play on the name Chad, which internet culture uses to refer to conventionally attractive and confident men, especially in contrast to socially awkward or beta males.

There's a picture of a Giga Chad here.

I think this is actually a real man, if you can believe it or not.

So this is supposed to be...

A man who is at the peak of physical attractiveness, masculinity and dominance.

And the picture of the Giga Chad that I have on the screen.

Is that really the peak of physical attractiveness?

This guy, listeners, if you can't see the picture, it's on the PDF, but I'll explain it.

It's a man with like a big cheesy grin on his face, huge muscular shoulders like bulging muscles, a big thick neck and a chin covered in dark black stubble.

And the chin is so wide and his jaw is so square.

It looks like the back end of a Volkswagen or something like that.

He looks like half man, half dinosaur, really.

The size of his chin is I mean, it looks like something you could have in your living room.

You could sit on it like it's an armchair.

Imagine a guy with a big grin on his face and what looks like the backrest of a very comfortable armchair sticking out from the bottom of his face.

His hair is all slicked back.

He's got the smallest ears that I may have ever seen on a human.

And he appears to be staring off into the distance, a very straight nose, big bushy eyebrows.

This is apparently the ideal image of masculinity.

This is what... Is this what most women want?

Just a massive chin.

Just a vast, enormous chin and a jaw.

That makes the shark from the Steven Spielberg film Jaws, looked like a little goldfish in a swimming pool.

In a swimming pool?

A goldfish in a pond.

Anyway...

That's not me, is it?

Nope, that is not me.

To be fair, this guy looks like he's half horse or half dinosaur or something.

Maybe my nice microphone makes my voice sound like the audio equivalent of this man.

I don't know.

But anyway, back to Victoria's funny message.

She says so.

It's just a voice, like in movies or in thoughts, or even like God's voice.

It's up to you and your self-assessment.

So yes, it's Victoria.

Yes, my voice is just a disembodied voice, like a voice in movies, like the movie voiceover.

You know this summer, you know that guy in a world, that voice.

I don't think I'm quite there, am I?

In a world where, you know, in a world where people learned English through podcasts.

That movie voiceover guy or God's voice.

I don't think this is not God's voice because no, God's voice is like the voice in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

This is God's voice.

Let me play you the clip.

This is from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

This is when King Arthur is visited by God.

God appears in the clouds and gives him his mission, his quest, which is to find the Holy Grail.

And this, for me, is God's voice.

Arthur, Arthur, King of the Britons.

Oh, don't grovel.

One thing I can't stand, it's people groveling.

Oh, don't grovel.

Groveling.

Groveling is like when it's what the King Arthur and his knights of the round table are doing.

God has appeared in the clouds and they all get down and bow their heads down.

Oh, master, we are not worthy.

You know, and that's groveling.

You might grovel.

Who would you grovel to?

Maybe if you're a bit pathetic, you might grovel to your boss.

Oh, boss, I'm terribly sorry, master.

I'm sorry that I'm so sorry I'm late.

What can I do for you, sir?

That's groveling, right?

So God hears, oh, stop groveling.

If there's one thing I can't stand, it's groveling. oh don't grovel one thing i can't stand it's people groveling sorry and don't apologize every time i try to talk to someone it's sorry this and forgive me that and i'm not worthy what are you doing now i'm averting my eyes oh lord i'm averting my eyes oh lord meaning i'm not looking he's he's averting his eyes looking away as a you know a sign of respect but this is probably going to make god annoyed as well well it's like those miserable psalms they're so depressing now knock it off yes lord right arthur king of the britons your knights of the round table shall have a task to make them an example in these dark times good idea oh lord of course it's a good idea Behold, Arthur, this is the Holy Grail.

Look well, Arthur, for it is your sacred task to seek this grail.

That is your purpose, Arthur, the quest for the Holy Grail.

Right, so that's God's voice, I reckon.

Anyway, Victoria continues.

Actually...

So right remember, she's worried about seeing my face because she's concerned that it's not going to live up to what she imagines.

She says, actually, I'm really scared of finding out.

I know that you have podcasts on YouTube and I'm afraid that your face will suddenly appear in my recommendations.

It will be equal to kids not existing Santa Claus trauma or even worse.

Who knows?

All magic, all the magic will disappear, she thinks.

Victoria, you underestimate the magic of my face, Victoria, I have to say.

Anyway, she continues.

Even when I decided to write you an email, I stumbled.

How could I find your email address without Googling you?

I couldn't find it on your info card in Apple Podcasts.

So I had to ask ChatGPT to get this address.

I really hope it's the right one.

It was, Victoria.

It was.

I just got an idea while writing this letter.

I want to check how ChatGPT would describe your appearance if I explained the whole situation to it.

I think it would be entertaining.

Right, so Victoria's decided that she's going to ask ChatGPT to explain my appearance.

So, okay, let's see how ChatGPT described my appearance to Victoria.

So here's the first version.

After Victoria put a prompt in explaining the situation, ChatGPT went with this and it's typical ChatGPT, I have to say.

ChatGPT said, I'm going to use the voice of ChatGPT, which is going to sound like this.

Here's how I'd describe him for you, gently and without breaking the spell.

I imagine Luke Thompson, as someone you wouldn't notice immediately but whose presence slowly settles in.

What?

Someone you wouldn't notice immediately, but whose presence slowly settles in.

So you don't notice me straight away, but slowly over time you become aware of my presence.

It's just typical nonsense really from ChatGPT, this bit.

He has a calm, open face, soft but attentive eyes and an expression that feels thoughtful rather than loud.

Nothing sharp or flashy, more like a quiet warmth.

The kind of person who smiles slightly when listening and seems fully there.

He looks like someone who belongs in ordinary, peaceful places.

A cafe, a park, a desk with books.

Familiar, reassuring and a little timeless.

Okay, a lot of vague, slightly pretentious bollocks it feels like from ChatGPT there.

I think Victoria got a little frustrated and just said, just break the spells.

Just give me a simple description, she said.

She said, then I asked it to break spells and just give me a simple description of your appearance.

And at this point, Shatch EPT does that thing it does when you correct it.

It says, right, got it, straight, concrete, no poetic fog, but still fair.

Luke Thompson is a white British man with short brown hair, often slightly tousled.

So tousled hair means slightly messy hair, right?

Okay, it's fairly correct.

I am a white British man with short brown hair, often slightly tousled.

I've been worried that my hair is thinning.

Am I losing my hair?

That's what I've been thinking.

And I've also been thinking that video viewers are going to think that I've been losing my hair.

But to be honest with you, I've been feeling like that since my mid-20s.

I've always been aware that my hair seems kind of thin, but it's been exactly the same for something like 25 years.

So I don't know.

Anyway, it's normal for men as they grow older to start to lose their hair a bit, isn't it?

Anyway, often slightly tousled hair, and he usually has facial hair, either a beard or noticeable stubble.

Certainly true today.

I've got Noticeable stubble.

I've been letting my beard grow, meaning I just haven't been shaving it.

He wears glasses, which really suit his face and give him a thoughtful, teacher-ish look.

No, I don't.

I don't wear glasses.

I've never worn glasses.

His face is more friendly than sharp.

Rounded features, a warm smile and expressive eyes.

He looks like a normal, real adult man.

Yes, I am a real man, a real adult man, a normal, real adult man.

He looks like a normal, real adult man in his late 30s or 40s.

Casual and unpretentious.

Yet, no, yes, he is attractive.

Oh well, thank you ChatGPT, but not in a model way more in a sincere intelligent, slightly nerdy way that actually matches his voice very well.

And Victoria says, you wear glasses?

Question mark, question mark.

And then good luck.

Thanks for your work.

So yet again, everyone chat.

GPT just makes stuff up like about me wearing glasses, but the rest of it was, i guess, fairly accurate.

What do you think?

But anyway victoria, i was going to email you in reply to your message, but then i realized that you would see my photo in my reply because it's automatically included as an icon in hotmail.

When you receive an email from me in hotmail, i think you will see a little icon of my face.

So i left it alone and then chose to reply here instead.

Thank you for your amusing email victoria, i'm.

I just wanted to confirm that I don't actually wear glasses, but the rest is probably mostly correct, except that I have invisible eyebrows and a tendency to blush, for unknown reasons, at random moments.

Other than that, the description is pretty accurate, except for the huge scar that runs diagonally across my whole face after i was attacked by a wild badger on a camping trip in cornwall in 2007.

So except for the huge scar that runs across my whole face, it was pretty accurate.

Talking of my appearance, everyone listeners talking of my appearance.

You might have noticed This is for the video viewers watching this episode today.

You might have noticed that I have some red marks on my face.

Now, did you notice that, video viewers?

Audio listeners, don't worry about this.

It's not something that you need to see.

But I've been feeling a bit self-conscious today recently, because I've got these red marks on my face and maybe they're going away, but nevertheless, recording a video which is going to go on YouTube makes me a bit self-conscious.

When I have red marks on my nose which maybe people didn't even notice, I don't know, did you notice?

So I've got some red marks on the side of my nose and around my eye and you might be wondering what happened, and I have a feeling that I will get some comments about it in the Now.

If you're an audio listener, you can't see this, but it's not really very noticeable, but enough to make me feel self-conscious.

Basically, I have some red marks on the left side of my nose.

I got cut or scratched.

The skin got broken.

I bled a little bit, and now I have some scabs there.

So allow me to explain, right, to explain what happened.

But to make this perhaps a bit more interesting...

I'm going to make this a sort of true or false quiz.

OK, I'm not just going to tell you how it happened.

I'm going to turn it into a highly entertaining true or false quiz.

So I'm going to tell you four little stories about how this happened.

Only one of these stories is true.

You have to guess which one is the true story.

So basically, first, I was pecked in the eye by a swan.

I was pecked in the eye by a swan.

If you don't know what a swan is, I will tell you in a moment.

Second story is that I fell off my bike while riding through the streets of Paris.

The third story is that I got into a fight in a pub.

And the fourth story is that my son scratched me with his fingernails.

And I know what you might be thinking at this point.

You might be thinking, well, Luke, it's easy.

It's obvious.

Of course.

Of course, we all know that you were pecked in the eye by a swan.

It's what you might be thinking.

So let me tell you these four little anecdotes and you can decide which one is true.

So the first one is, I was pecked in the eye by a swan.

Is this what happens?

You decide.

This weekend with my family, I went to England and visited my parents.

Near my parents' house, there is a park, a large park.

In that park, there's a river that runs through the park.

The river goes next to the big castle near where my parents live.

On the river, there are various ducks and geese and swans.

So a swan is a kind of bird that lives on water.

It's a very large bird, a very beautiful bird.

They're very common in the UK in parks and places where there are rivers and bodies of water.

Castles typically will have water around them and swans often live on the grounds of castles, but also just in public parks.

Large white bird, white feathers, long neck, a kind of dark orange bill with a black blob on the top of it.

That's a swan.

Beautiful, majestic birds.

When we go down to the park usually we take some bread and we feed the ducks and all the ducks come and we feed them and geese and swans as well.

And the kids love feeding the ducks and it's just really nice, a nice thing to do.

So.

We went down to the side of the river.

All the ducks arrived and jumped up onto the side of the river and gathered around us to eat the bread.

And this family of swans came over and a couple of swans jumped up onto the riverside.

And I wanted to... feed the swans from my hand.

I wanted my kids to see the swans eating bread from my hand and I held out some bread and one of the swans came over and snapped the bread from my hand.

And then I was like joking around with my daughter and I said I wonder if I could get a swan to take the bread from my mouth.

So I put a piece of bread in my mouth like that, stupidly held my face towards the swan And this swan wandered over like this and it was moving its head in a strange way.

It was like moving its head from side to side like this and eyeing me up and looking me in the eye like that.

Its little eye out the side of its head was staring at me.

And I was there with this bread in my mouth looking like an idiot.

And the swan wandered over and stared at me out of its eye.

And the time seemed to slow down for a moment as the swan and me shared this moment.

And we stared at each other.

And the swan stared at me, stared right into my soul.

And then went like that and went to grab the bread.

And I don't know if it missed or if it did it on purpose.

But instead of grabbing the bread from out of my mouth, it pecked me on the nose.

It bit me on the nose.

And its beak scratched these scratches all down the inside of my nose.

And then it grabbed the bread and jumped into the water and disappeared.

I mean, I don't mean it just vanished.

It just swam away.

Right?

Okay.

Now, I don't know what was going on there.

Maybe the swan was like, you stupid human.

What do you think you're doing, trying to feed me out of your mouth like that?

I will peck you in the face to teach you a lesson.

Or the swan thought, that bread looks good, fair enough, but his nose looks even better.

Or the swan was just really bad at being a swan and missed the bread and ended up trying to bite my nose off.

I don't know, but that's The first story, is it true?

What do you think?

The second one is I fell off my bike while riding through the streets of Paris.

So I was on my way to work and I rented a bike in the street.

I don't actually have my own bike.

The story I told you earlier was not true, of course.

So I rented a bike and I was riding it through the streets of Paris, taking a shortcut through some back streets, and And a rat ran across the road and I swerved out of the way to avoid the rat.

And I slipped on a baguette and the bike slipped over and I went over the handlebars and I flew through the air.

Everything went into slow motion.

I was flying through the air and I landed on the Eiffel Tower.

And the top of the Eiffel Tower scratched my nose and scratched these marks all over my face.

So that's the second story.

I fell off my bike while riding through the streets of Paris.

True or not true?

You decide.

The third one is that I got into a fight in a pub.

So as I said earlier, I was in England this weekend staying at my parents' place.

And one of the things I like to do when I'm in England is to go to the pub because you know I don't get many opportunities to go to a nice English pub.

So I went down to the pub on Saturday night to have a pint and and soak up the atmosphere.

And I went down and there was quite a lot of people there.

I think there'd been a football match on TV or something.

The pub was quite crowded.

I found my way to the bar, ordered a pint from the barman.

And I was just getting ready to stand at the bar and enjoy my pint.

And when I went to grab my pint, I accidentally, with my elbow, knocked the arm of the man standing next to me.

And I spilled his pint of beer all over his arm, all over his leg, and all over his shoes.

And he was really angry.

And he turned around and he said, Oi, mate, did you spill my pint?

Like that.

Oi, did you spill my pint?

Oi, mate, did you spill my pint?

He was very angry.

He got in my face.

Did you spill my pint?

Like that.

And I was like, terribly sorry.

It's just an accident.

And for some reason I couldn't help kind of laughing like that because I felt so awkward and embarrassed and nervous.

I couldn't help sort of smiling and laughing, trying to laugh it off.

He's like, it's not funny, mate.

You just spilled my pint.

Like that.

And I was like, and he went to punch me, right?

He went to punch me.

And just as an instinctive reaction, I blocked it with the back of my hand and the back of my arm.

I blocked it like that.

And then sort of instinct took over, because I've seen so many Bruce Lee films that I just automatically bam, like that just

It was kind of like a one-inch punch.

Just bam, like that.

Punched him in the face and he went down.

He kind of went in slow motion.

And he landed on the floor like that.

And someone in the back of the pub went, Luke wins.

Perfect!

Like that.

But then he got up again.

He got up and everyone was like, mate, stay down, stay down.

Don't be an idiot.

Don't do it.

And he got up again and he grabbed pint glass from the bar and it was just like in that film train spotting.

He grabbed it and he glassed me in the face, which means that he he pushed the glass into my face and the glass broke and it cut the skin on my nose and around my eye and my my eye popped out.

So I went to hospital and they just stuck it back in again and sort of sprayed it with some disinfectant and they were like there you go mate, you'll be all right.

And I went back to the pub and I finished my pint.

And that's what happened.

So that's I got into a fight in a pub.

And true or not true, you decide.

And then number four is that my son scratched me with his fingernails.

Right.

So this weekend I wanted to take my son to the park, which is what I like to do, to help him burn off steam.

We go out to the park, we let him run around, he plays outside, gets some fresh air, or at least gets some air in Paris, if you can call it air and a bit of sunlight, if possible even in February.

Just get him out of the house in the morning so that he's a bit more calm in the afternoon and he'll be tired.

He'll have a sleep in the afternoon.

We can all have a break.

But for some reason...

I could not get him to cooperate with me.

He just was in one of those moods where I ended up chasing him around trying to get his coat on, trying to get him to put his shoes on.

And I just couldn't do it.

And he just wanted to do other things.

And I spent an hour Trying to persuade him to go outside with me, because if he doesn't go outside and go to the park, he starts to get a bit hyperactive.

He starts to get a bit cranky and it's difficult to make him settle down later on in the day.

So I was like, it's really important that we go to the park.

And finally, I managed to persuade him to go outside.

I said, let's just we don't have time to go to the park anymore because we've got to have lunch.

And then we're going out to a birthday party.

So we have to have lunch at a certain time.

And I was running out of time.

And in the end, I was like, right, we don't have time to go to the park.

Let's just go down into the courtyard of the building.

We can just play down there.

We'll bring the basketball.

We can just bounce the ball around and play down there.

So I finally persuaded him to go down.

And then he wanted to go to the park.

So after all this persuasion, he decided he wanted to go to the park.

And I said, no, you can't go to the park.

So we went out into the street.

I thought maybe we can just walk around in the street.

He can burn off some energy walking.

He didn't want to walk anywhere.

He wanted to go to the park.

I said we don't have time to go to the park.

Then I said let's go back into the courtyard.

He didn't want to go into the courtyard.

He didn't want to do anything I wanted him to do.

Finally got him in the courtyard.

We played around a little bit and then I was like, it's time to go upstairs.

We've got to have our lunch.

And of course, he didn't want to go upstairs.

So in the end, I had to grab him.

I had to grab the basketball and carry him up the stairs.

And he lost it.

He had a tantrum and he started kicking his legs and his hands were flailing around.

And he grabbed my nose with one of his fingers and he was scratching me and he scratched my nose.

And...

In the end I had to sling him over my shoulder like a fireman and grab the basketball with my other hand and march him up the stairs.

And he was very upset and he was crying and then it was OK.

I wiped the tears from his eyes and wiped the snot from his face and we had a cuddle and I lifted him up and put him in his chair for his luncheon.

In the end, everything was OK, but his fingers scratched the skin off my nose.

Yeah.

So so that's that.

And then you know, later I gave him his milk and we had a lovely time and I read him a little story.

And there you go.

Yeah, that's that's what happened with my son.

28 years old he is.

He's 28 years old.

Not really.

Of course he's not.

He's two.

He's two and a half years old.

But I always feel I have to make that joke every time I talk about him and his behaviour.

By the way, I don't like to give the impression that he's always like that.

Sometimes he is.

He's only like that sometimes.

Most of the time he's the most adorable kid.

But anyway, that's what happened.

My son scratched me with his fingernails and that's what happened.

Now, I will tell you the answer to this quiz.

I will tell you later in the episode.

So there's an incentive, an extra incentive to help you keep listening.

Not only will you find out the answer to this most exciting of quizzes, but also you will be able to get the get your certificate of achievement.

Remember that for listening to the entire episode.

Yes, this is turning into an epic.

But what do you think?

Pecked in the eye by a psychotic swan.

Fell off my bike because I crashed into a baguette and landed on the Eiffel Tower.

Got into a fight in a pub and then got glassed.

My son scratched me with his fingernails.

What do you think?

So I will tell you that later.

Time for a water break.

Another water break, listeners.

It's time for another water break.

If Darth Vader drank water.

No.

Would he?

I don't know.

Very thirsty I am.

That's Yoda.

Thirsty I am.

Anyway, talking of water...

Here's a message from Daniela in response to the life hacks episodes that I did at the beginning of the year.

Remember, science based life hacks to help you learn English.

One of them was stay hydrated.

Here's a message from Daniela.

Good morning, Luke.

I'm listening to your podcast since January 2025.

I should correct that and say I've been listening to your podcast since January 2025.

OK, so that present perfect continuous is the form we use to talk about how long from the past to now.

I'm listening to your podcast and how long I've been listening to your podcast since January 2025.

Since is the right word.

Since January 2025.

So Daniel has been listening to the podcast for over a year now.

I've been listening to your podcast since January 2025, and only recently I became a lep.

Right, I think you mean you became a plepster.

Because LEP, that's L-E-P, that's Luke's English Podcast.

You can't say that you became a Luke's English Podcast.

You could say that you became a Lepster, but I think you've been a Lepster since January last year.

So I'm assuming that you became a Plepster.

That's a premium Lepster.

So a premium subscriber.

By the way listeners, you could become a Plepster today as well, like Daniela, and sign up for Luke's English Podcast Premium.

It's available at teacherluke.co.uk slash premium.

That's where you get a whole host of extra stuff from me.

And it's not just like offcuts.

It's dedicated lessons about vocab, grammar, pronunciation practice.

You can find out more information at teacherluke.co.uk slash premium.

But become a plebster today like Daniela.

Her message continues, I found this on Facebook and I took a picture for you.

It represents, in one simple but very powerful image, the results of your two episodes science-based life hacks.

I hope you will enjoy it.

By the way, I hope you will enjoy it.

Yeah, I hope you will enjoy it.

The image is a picture of baby Yoda. with a caption.

Now, Yoda made an appearance in the Life Hacks episodes, didn't he?

I think I talked like Yoda for a while.

I can't remember the specifics, but it's a picture of baby Yoda Grogu, as he's actually called, from the Mandalorian TV series and soon in the cinemas, the Mandalorian and Grogu movie.

Will it be crap?

Who knows?

Um So.

Picture of baby Yoda and the caption says drinking a large amount of water every day helps you avoid other people's drama because you're too busy peeing.

Stay hydrated.

I don't know what the connection is between Yoda and this advice, but I suppose on the baby Yoda official Facebook page there are often like memes that have pictures of baby Yoda and then some wisdom.

In this case, it's drinking a large amount of water every day helps you avoid other people's drama because you're too busy peeing.

Stay hydrated.

I think it's probably true, isn't it?

You know, it's true.

Just keep drinking water and you will avoid other people's drama, because you will just be too busy in the toilet and you won't actually be part of it.

Good advice.

Good life advice.

Thank you for that, Daniela.

I was thinking, how would Yoda actually say that?

Now, baby Yoda doesn't really speak, but I'm talking about the original Yoda.

How would Yoda say that?

How would he say?

Drinking a large amount of water every day helps you avoid other people's drama because you're too busy peeing.

Stay hydrated.

How would he say that?

He would probably say, helps you avoid other people's drama.

Every day drinking a large amount of water does.

Because too busy peeing you will be.

Hydrated you must stay.

Right?

Or maybe he would say... Drink water every day you must.

Other people's drama avoid you will.

For too busy peeing you will be.

Hydrated you must stay.

Basically...

What does Yoda do to English?

Does he do this in your language as well?

If you watch Star Wars in your language, if it's dubbed into your language, when Yoda speaks, does he have strange sentence structure as well?

Because he does in English.

He basically inverts the normal subject verb object, sentence structure, putting the object first or putting the comment first and the verb last.

So you must learn patience becomes patience you must learn.

Or you are too old to begin the training becomes too old you are to begin the training.

I don't know when Yoda became a farmer.

Too old or a pirate.

Too old you are to begin the training.

He sounds like a pirate.

What happened to my Yoda voice?

Too old you are.

I forgot how to do Yoda's voice.

He just sounds like a pirate.

Too old you are to begin the training.

Right.

So I had planned to do a how to speak English like Yoda section here.

But since I can't do Yoda's voice today for some reason, I don't know if this is a good idea.

But you know what?

I'm going to do it anyway, because that's the general tone of this episode.

I'm not sure this is such a good idea, but I'm going to do it anyway.

Three-hour episode?

Not sure it's such a good idea, but what the hell, I'll do it anyway.

Famous Yoda quotes.

Here's some famous quotes by Yoda, just to give you a sample of his English.

The greatest teacher failure is.

So that's failure is the greatest teacher.

But he says, the greatest teacher failure is.

It's true, isn't it?

Certainly, in learning English, you've got to make mistakes in order to ultimately make correct English.

You've got to learn from your mistakes.

So failure is a great teacher.

Much to learn you still have, he says to Luke Skywalker.

Named must your fear be before banish it you can.

Your fear must be named before you can banish it.

Banish it means make it go away forever, which is true, right?

If you have fears, you have to name and shame your fears in order to then ultimately dominate them and banish them from your life.

Named must your fear be before banish it, you can.

If Yoda was a pirate...

Truly wonderful the mind of a child is.

The mind of a child is truly wonderful.

And so on and so forth.

So how to speak like Yoda?

Just for fun, you see.

Fun you must have, yes.

Study hard you must.

But have fun also.

Yourself you must enjoy.

Later than you think it is.

Those are not official Yoda quotes, but still true.

So the basics.

Yoda speaks English with weird scrambled word order inspired by object-subject-verb patterns and heavy fronting, which means putting certain parts of a sentence at the front because he's an alien and also he's supposed to be wise and mysterious, or something like that.

So in normal English, we usually go subject-verb-object.

You, that's the subject, must learn, that's the verb.

In this case, it's a verb phrase with a modal verb, must learn.

But the whole thing is the verb.

So you, subject, must learn, verb.

Patience is the object.

But Yoda, in his infinite wisdom, prefers to move what he considers to be the important bit to the front of the sentence, resulting in some idiosyncratic sentence structure.

So you end up with patience you must learn.

He also loves to split a modal verb from the main verb, sometimes putting the main verb at the start and then the object, then the subject and then the modal verb at the end of a sentence.

So instead of saying, you must learn patience, he might say, learn patience, you must.

Because he loves ending sentences with modal verbs, which is not something that is ever done, I think.

He also quite likes to do this with normal verbs, meaning sort of put the verb at the start first and then put the auxiliary verb at the end right,

So with normal verbs, I mean verbs without modal verbs attached to them.

And he does this by putting the verb at the start and then the object, then the subject and then the auxiliary verb at the end, right.

Which is normally do, maybe have, it could be be.

So for example, he says, "'Begun this Clone War has.'"

"'Begun this Clone War has.'"

This Clone War has begun.

Talk about the weather, English people do.

English people talk about the weather.

So, you get the idea.

You will become powerful, becomes powerful, you will become.

I eat small slimy creatures, eat small slimy creatures, I do.

Also, he likes short declarative sentences.

He doesn't ramble.

He delivers compact nuggets of wisdom.

So, he wouldn't be very good on a podcast, especially not this one anyway.

So, A normal statement might be like this.

I have to say and I've given this a lot of thought I think, in my opinion, that you're not quite ready to face this challenge just yet.

But Yoda would keep it simple and just say, hmm, ready?

You are not.

So he uses less grammar, but his statements have a bit more gravitas.

He also changes his questions.

So even questions get the Yoda treatment.

So a normal question might be, are you ready?

And Yoda would say, ready, are you?

And normal would be, do you fear the dark side?

And Yoda would say, the dark side, do you fear?

Yes, that's enough of that.

I'm going to move on now because I can't do that Yoda impression for very long without losing my voice.

But anyway, that was fun.

Let's move on to the next section that I plan to talk about here.

And that is this question.

Did you know that I have another podcast?

Did you know that?

Some of you are like, yes, we knew, Luke.

Yes, we know.

But some of you might be thinking, what other podcast?

No, I didn't know this.

What is it?

Pray tell.

Luke, what is the name of this other podcast?

What is it?

Is it also three hours long for each episode?

No, it isn't.

So it's called a phrasal verb a day, a phrasal verb a day.

And some of you are thinking, yes, Luke, I've known about that for years.

Are you still doing it?

No, I'm not.

But all the episodes are still there.

So just for people who didn't know about it.

I'm letting you know about it.

So it's called a phrasal verb a day.

And it does what it says on the tin.

The idea was when I first started it.

So I started it in January of what, 2014 or something like that.

And the plan was in January, I thought well, I've got plenty of time, because it's January and nothing's happening.

I think I'll embark on a really overambitious and impossible to achieve project, which is what most people do in January.

I think I'm going to Set myself a really ridiculous goal which will be almost impossible to achieve this year.

And it was the idea was I will record a mini podcast every day of the year and I will teach a different pod.

I'll teach a different phrasal verb in each one.

And at the end of the year I will have a 365 episode podcast, which will be a podcast, an essential resource for all learners of English in the world to help them learn phrasal verbs.

And they could learn a phrasal verb a day for a year.

And I got to 140 days.

I did that for 140 days.

And then I gave up because life became too busy and I couldn't keep it up.

So anyway, a phrasal verb a day, though still exists 140 episodes with a different phrasal verb in each one.

So I just wanted to give a reminder that this exists.

And also I wanted to give evidence that I can make very short episodes if I really want to, because episodes of a phrasal verb a day are just a few minutes each.

Some of them are even just one or two minutes long.

So this is a chance to learn lots of phrasal verbs from me and short episodes too.

Some of them are just a couple of minutes long.

This is a message from Alina on Spotify, a comment from Alina.

She said, I've been listening to your phrasal verb a day recently and it's amazing.

Thank you.

I was wondering if there are any more... episodes after episode 140.

And Alina, yes, there are about 10 more.

And I put them all together in one compilation episode.

So phrasal verbs 141 to I think 150.

I put them all together in one single compilation episode, which is available as part of the premium subscription.

You can find it labeled P52, a phrasal verb a day anthology.

Okay, so you can get phrasal verbs 141 to 150, I think in premium series 52 a phrasal verb a day anthology.

So if you want, listeners, if you want... episodes 1 to 140 free.

Just search your favourite podcast app for a phrasal verb a day and you will find it.

You can get it on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify and other podcast players.

It's not on YouTube.

But you should be able to find it on YouTube Music, I think.

Here's a flavour.

I'll give you a flavour of what you can expect.

So let me just play episode 34.

Huh?

Where is it?

What happened to it?

Okay, I've ended up at the...

Phrasal verb a day website on Libsyn, which is apvad.libsyn.com.

I'll share that on the document.

Right, so we can listen to episode 34, which is called To Get At.

The phrase is Get At.

You'll find a transcript linked.

Let me show you the transcript while we listen to the episode.

Hello everybody, this is Luke from Luke's English Podcast, and this year I'm going to teach you a phrasal verb every day.

That sentence went a bit dramatic at the end.

I don't know why.

Anyway, today's phrasal verb is to get at someone.

Well, not just someone, to get at something or to get at someone.

Several meanings.

The first one, means to suggest something without actually saying it.

Right?

To...

Yeah, suggest something without saying it directly.

So you're kind of alluding to something, implying something, but without actually saying it directly.

OK, for example, this situation.

Evening, Squire.

So your wife, your wife, she likes sport, does she?

You know what I mean?

Like sport, likes playing games.

Sorry, what are you getting at exactly?

There you go.

OK, another use of the expression to get at would be to get at somebody.

And that means to criticise someone again and again in a way that's kind of unfair.

All right.

Why?

Why are you?

I can't speak.

Why are you always getting at me?

Stop getting at me all the time.

Meaning stop criticising me, nagging me.

You're always getting at me, aren't you?

What have I done wrong?

Stop getting at me.

There you go.

So you've got one meaning to suggest something without actually saying it directly.

What are you getting at?

What are you implying?

Are you saying something about my wife?

No, no, no.

I was just making conversation.

But she likes photos, does she?

No, I don't mean likes taking photos.

What are you getting at exactly?

And the other one means... when someone criticizes again and again in a way that seems unfair.

You're always getting at me.

Can't you just leave me alone?

All right, there'll be another one of these tomorrow.

Don't forget to visit teacherluke.wordpress.com.

And don't forget, of course, to vote for me in the annual Macmillan Dictionary Award.

You can find a button to vote for that on my website.

Okay, there you go.

That's a little overview of the kind of thing you can get from a phrasal verb a day.

Pretty much every episode has got a transcript that you can get as well.

The transcript is usually linked in the episode description.

So that is a phrasal verb a day.

Just search your favourite podcast player and you can find it.

Right, moving on.

I've got to go out in about 10 minutes.

So this is going to have to be one of those ones where I pause.

And I want to.

The last part of this is going to be where I share haikus written by listeners of this podcast.

I've got a lot of haikus sent in in response to the episode part one that I did about haikus in English.

And I really want to share a lot of those haikus.

So that's coming.

I also have to remember to tell you the answers to the quiz and to give you your certificate of achievement when you get to the end of this episode.

Just think of all of the words that are going in to your brain while listening to this.

Think of all those poor people who have not listened to this and who are not getting that kind of English exposure.

That kind of familiarity with genuine spoken English.

Those people who don't listen to this, they're just not getting that.

They're not getting the benefits.

But you are.

Well done to you.

And thank you for continuing to listen.

The next section is called Books on My Shelf.

And I got a comment from TomGaming11, who wrote this.

Hi, Luke.

I hope you're doing great.

I am doing great.

Thanks very much.

Thank you very much.

If you're reading my comment...

Please share some of your book names that you have beautifully placed on your bookshelf behind you.

I want to read them all.

Thanks.

OK, I will tell you the names of some books and perhaps I can recommend one or two.

So let me do that right now.

I'm just going to go over to my bookshelf and pick out some book, tell you some book names.

I've changed microphone so I can walk around.

I'm going to just tell you some book names and maybe pick out a couple and tell you what they are.

Now I wonder if you can actually see.

If you're looking at the video version, what can you actually see?

I'm trying not to get tangled up with wires here.

There's so many cables, headphone cables and microphone cables.

Right, so in my room...

I've got two bookshelves on either side.

So I've got books on the right and books on the left.

Where shall I go?

Maybe I'll just... I'll start over here on the right.

And I've put books in this section that have mostly white spines just so that it looks a little bit nicer in the background.

I might mix the books up at some point, but I decided to go with white books directly behind me, just because I wanted it to look a bit more minimal in the background.

You know I wanted to create.

I wanted a background that was a bit more minimal, because I understand that the background in my videos is a little bit busy.

There's quite a lot of a lot of colours and things going on, and I wanted it to be a little bit more minimal, so I put books with white spines here.

Let me just pick out some books that I can perhaps recommend or talk about for a little bit.

I can have that, that.

Oh, what am I going to talk about?

This one.

I've got a mix of fiction and non-fiction books.

Um, yeah.

Okay.

So just from that top shelf, I've picked out four books that just caught my eye.

The first book I've picked out is a collection of, uh, stories by HP Lovecraft.

And, um, it's, it's called the call of Cthulhu and other weird stories.

HP Lovecraft was a sort of a science fiction writer from, I guess, about 100 years ago or the late 19th century.

Very, very...

A very, very influential writer.

The blurb on the back of the book goes like this.

The 20th century horror stories Dark and Baroque Prince.

That was written by Stephen King, that quote.

H.P.

Lovecraft remade the horror genre in the early 20th century, discarding ghosts and witches and instead envisaging mankind at the mercy of a chaotic and malevolent universe.

This selection of stories ranges from early tales of nightmares and insanity, such as The Outsider and Rats in the Walls, through the grotesquely comic Herbert West, Reanimator and The Hound, to the extraterrestrial terror of The Call of Cthulhu, which fuses traditional supernaturalism with science fiction, including the definitive, corrected texts.

This collection reveals the development of Lovecraft's mesmerizing narrative style and establishes him as a hugely influential and visionary American writer.

Short stories of horror and science fiction and stuff written in a very kind of wordy, kind of old fashioned formal English which is really really entertaining to read.

I mean, do you know about Lovecraft?

I would read a Lovecraft story on the podcast, but I find them a little bit sort of impenetrable, meaning a little bit difficult to get into.

Then another book I've got here is called The Hopkins Manuscript by R.C.

Sheriff.

I talked about this book with my mum on the podcast once when we had a conversation in the garden responding to listener questions.

And this is a book that my mum and dad actually bought this book for me.

And it's a fascinating story about.

Again, it's a sort of science fiction story, but it's Mostly like a human story, the story of a man's life and how his life is affected by an extraordinary thing that happens when he learns that the moon scientists

Studying the moon and studying the night sky have learned that the moon is going to crash into the earth.

And it talks about what happens before, so the lead up to that, what happens during the disaster and the consequences afterwards.

And it's a very interesting character study of what happens to this man and his life before, during and after a disaster like that.

The next book I picked out is called Beetlebone by Kevin Barry.

And this is an interesting novel which imagines a situation where John Lennon, I think in the 1970s, travelled to Ireland, and it describes the story from his point of view.

It's quite strange.

It says on the back of the book, he will spend three days alone on his island.

That is all he asks.

John is so many miles from love now and home.

This is the story of his strangest trip.

I think that in this book, in this fictionalized book, Lennon bought a little island off the island of Ireland and then planned to go there in order to escape from the world.

John owns a tiny island off the west coast of Ireland.

Maybe it's there that he can at last outrun the shadows of his past.

The tale of a wild journey into the world and a wild journey within.

Beetlebone is a mystery box of a novel.

It's a portrait of an artist at a time of creative strife.

It's also a sad and beautiful comedy from one of the most gifted stylists writing today.

It's actually a really interesting and quite entertaining book.

And if you're a Beatle fan, it's quite an odd little bit of sort of fan fiction starring John Lennon as the main character.

Really good.

Another book I've got here is George Orwell's Animal Farm, which is a classic that I think everyone should read.

I read this when I was a kid at school.

It was one of the books we all had to read at school.

And I think you probably know, most people will know that George or Animal Farm is a sort of an allegory which uses the context of a farm in which the animals rise up against the human owners of the farm and take control of the farm themselves, forming a sort of animal-led commune by the animals for the animals, where they all own the farm and they use it to live for themselves.

They run the farm and run it for the benefit of themselves and it's an allegory about, i guess, communism and it shows, through the events in the story, the way that power corrupts and it has some very interesting lessons about history and and about um, the yeah, the corruptive nature of power and maybe a criticism of the, The communist system that developed under Stalin.

More directly, or it's not directly stated that it's a satire of that, but it's generally known that that's what he was talking about.

So on the back of the book it says it's the history of a revolution that went wrong and of the excellent excuses that were forthcoming at every step for the perversion of the original doctrine.

So the original communist doctrine, the rules that were defined at the beginning were quite good, that there were universal rules where everyone was equal, everything was done for the benefit of everyone else, etc.

But then those rules got systematically broken as power became more and more corrupting.

And the famous line from Animal Farm is one of these rules that was written on the side of the farm building was all animals are equal.

And that is amended at some point in the story because the pigs take control of the farm.

Although it's sort of a commune, it's the pigs that are in charge.

And they slowly but surely take more and more power and enjoy more and more of the luxury and the benefits of the whole situation.

And you start to see that actually all animals are not equal and in fact the the line is all animals are equal.

But that is edited later and it says but some animals are more equal than others.

Um yeah, really good.

If you haven't read it, you should.

It's not too long, it's definitely readable.

I've got so many books here.

What else?

I can't explain them all, but i've got um hunter s thompson the rum diary, one of my favorite writers.

I've got George Harrison's book.

I Mean Mine.

I've got Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami.

I have David Crystal's book, Sounds Appealing, which is all about pronunciation.

Spell It Out by David Crystal, all about spelling in English.

David Crystal's book about the English language.

Roald Dahl's collection of Roald Dahl's short stories.

I've got a book called Electric Don Quixote, which is the story of Frank Zappa.

I've got various rock music biographies, Eric Clapton's book.

I've got a collection of Greek myths.

I've got the book Teach Yourself to Meditate by Eric Harrison, which I talked about on the podcast once.

The Macmillan Phrasal Verbs Plus Dictionary.

Brett Easton Ellis The Informers a series of short stories by the author Brett Easton Ellis, which was just an amazing book.

The stories are incredible.

The.

Also, I've got The Interrogative Mood by Paget Powell, which was recommended to me by a listener to this podcast once upon a time.

The whole book is just questions, only questions.

An entire book where every single sentence is a question.

I could go on, but I've got to leave.

I've got to go out now.

So I'm going to pause the podcast and maybe I'll tell you a few more book names from my shelf before going into the stuff about listener haikus.

OK, so I'm going to click my fingers and unclick them if that's possible.

And then we will continue.

And we're back.

We're back.

We are back.

Good.

Yes.

Testing.

1, 2, 1, 2, 2, 2, 2, 1, 2.

Yes.

This is definitely working.

Why is it that when anyone checks a microphone and I'm talking about sound engineers, people on a stage somewhere before a show are checking a microphone they always go 2 2 2 1 2 1 2 2, 2.

They never get to 3.

Why is that?

I don't know why.

One, two, one, two, three.

No, no, we're just going to stick with one and two.

That's all we need.

One, two, one, two, two.

Anyway, this is definitely working.

So what was I doing?

I was I was talking about books on the bookshelf.

I don't want this to last for too long.

So instead, what I'm going to do is just briefly mention some of the books which are on the closer shelf.

The one that perhaps what's the name of the commenter? what was your name?

Tom, Tom gaming 11.

Maybe these are some of the books that you've noticed in the past.

And you thought, Hmm, what is that?

So I've got the penguin English dictionary here.

Then I've got, um, I'm skipping over some books.

I've got Andy Summers book, Andy Summers, the guitarist from the police.

I've mentioned this book on the podcast before.

Uh, it's called one train later.

And I think it's gotta be one of the best rock and roll uh biographies that you can get.

Uh, because he as a guitarist he's interesting as a musician because he sort of like spans so many different genres and periods of music.

He sort of started in the early 60s, a lot like a lot of rock stars, but then went through the psychedelic stuff and then finally had a big career with in the kind of post-punk era in the 80s.

And that includes so many different moments in music.

His career includes so many different moments in music.

And also, he's a very good writer.

It's a great story about, basically about someone who was so committed to making it in a band, making it really big, so committed to a career in music and so committed to music that, in a way, he kind of

He neglected, that's the word.

He neglected other things and lost a lot of things in terms of family and stuff in his sort of ambitious pursuit of his musical goals.

So there's a tragic element to it too.

But also it's a story of incredible success becoming the guitarist in one of the big, in fact the biggest band ever uh in the world for for a moment in the eighties.

It's an amazing story of the rise and fall, um, and sort of, um, many different things.

Andy Summers.

One train later I've got a catch, a wave, which is uh, the life story, the rise, fall and redemption of the beach boys, Brian Wilson.

I've got lots of books about musicians and stuff.

Um, uh, Then I've got The Invisible Man by HG Wells.

Some short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle.

I've got The War of the Worlds by HG Wells.

I've got The Country of the Blind and other short stories by HG Wells.

The Island of Dr. Moreau by HG Wells.

Lots of HG Wells.

Lord of the Rings up here.

Then I've got Parklife by a writer called Rick Thompson.

Have you ever heard of him?

Yeah, that's my dad.

That's his first book, Park Life.

Park Life.

I've got a couple of George Orwell books down and out in Paris and London and a selection of his essays called Books Versus Cigarettes.

Um HG Wells.

The time machine, Cormac McCarthy.

I've got a few Cormac McCarthy novels in here.

Incredible writer.

This is the crossing.

Um, I've got David Sedaris me talk pretty one day, very humorous uh writer.

A couple of books of history uh, history of modern France.

Um Trevelyan's uh a shortened history of England.

The uh blacks nature guide book of birds, just um, just for all the bird watchers out there.

Various Cambridge dictionaries the Cambridge phrasal verb dictionary, Cambridge idioms dictionary, the Oxford word power dictionary and various others.

Um, I've got um, I've got.

Let's see, this is a book about the clash uh, the the band, the clash which you might've seen on my bookshelf before.

Um Easy Riders and Raging Bulls by Peter Biscond, which is a classic account of the Hollywood movie industry in the 60s and 70s.

A book of Tim Key poems called The Incomplete Tim Key.

That'll probably do.

Now, if you want episodes in which I pick some books from my shelf at random and actually read some passages from them,

Thank you very much.

Read out some pages from them because this whole thing about the books on my bookshelf it's probably more interesting when I take a bit more time and explore individual books in detail rather than just like reading out the titles of books.

It's a bit more interesting if I just maybe talk about just a couple of books and explore them in more detail and read some pages from them.

And that's exactly what you get from P64 and P65 a couple of premium series, that in which I explore books from the bookshelf and read pages from them and use them to teach you English.

There's also an old episode from the archive, a free episode called number 440.

Sorry, the name is this pile of books on my desk.

Episode 440, this pile of books on my desk. from a few years ago.

That's where I basically made a selection of books from my bookshelf and talked about them and read a few pages from each one.

So that's episode 440.

There's also, I should say, every episode of Jill's Book Club, which I haven't done for a while.

Jill's Book Club.

These are episodes with my mum where she shares a book that she'd like to recommend and we talk about the book.

We did a few episodes of Jill's Book Club.

You can check the episode archive.

Search for probably the word book and you will find those.

Um, yes.

So there you go.

Now we get to this part of the episode where I give my responses to the haiku that my listeners wrote.

Let me change microphone back to my normal microphone.

And here we are.

Can you hear a difference in the sound?

Can you hear a noticeable difference between the two microphones?

So the one I'm using now is the microphone that's mounted on the desk mount.

It's mounted on an arm.

The advantage of that is that I obviously, first of all, don't need to actually hold it in my hand.

It means my hands can be free.

But the other advantage also is that, in theory, you don't get a lot of handling noise.

Okay.

If I go back to the handheld microphone, here we go.

This is me speaking on the handheld microphone.

This one I mean the quality is pretty similar to the other one, but when I move the microphone in my hand you might hear some handling noise, right?

So that's one reason for putting a microphone in a stand like this.

You don't get the microphone handling noise unless I'm bump the microphone, which does happen sometimes.

Um, but a disadvantage is that i have to kind of stay close to the close to the microphone.

I mean i can move the microphone a little bit on the stand, but i i can't, for example, sit back too much because then i'm too far away from the microphone, Whereas if I use this handheld mic I can kind of sit back and move around a lot more and keep the microphone close to my mouth.

Are these interesting details?

I don't know if they are, but it just gives you a little insight into the thinking behind which type of microphone a podcaster would use.

I like the handheld one myself.

I actually really like using a handheld mic because I like being able to move around like this.

But I think that the one on the stand does sound a bit better.

And this is the one on the stand now.

Anyway, so...

Responses to the haiku in English episode, which was number 974.

And I'm going to give myself 25 minutes to finish this off.

Let's see if I can get this done within the next 25 minutes.

I say that because I've got a call at three o'clock, which is in 25 minutes.

So let's see if I can get this done by then, which will take us just over the three hour mark, I think.

Anyway, responses to Haiku in English, episode 974.

So, like I said at the end of the episode about writing with Fabio, that was the last one.

I was really impressed by the various haikus and short poems that listeners sent in by email or through the comments.

I said in that episode, maybe you can write a haiku in response to this episode.

And amazingly enough, a lot of people rose to the challenge.

Yes, I have some great writers listening to this podcast.

So here are as many as I was able to copy and paste from comments and messages from listeners on YouTube Spotify, my website and by email.

I'm going to share a lot of the poems and other comments and stuff that were sent to me.

I hope that I can include them all.

I think there are some that I might have missed.

So if you wrote a comment with a haiku or a poem in it and it wasn't included, then I'm very sorry.

I just maybe just missed it or something.

It was difficult to catch them all.

A bit like Pokemon or something.

Anyway, that's not the catchphrase for Pokemon, is it?

Pokemon, it's difficult to catch them all.

No, it's Pokemon.

Gotta catch them all.

Well, maybe I didn't catch them all in this case.

But anyway...

Now remember in that episode I had to stop because of the sound of drilling, hammering and stone cutting going on in the corridor and in the next room.

All the windows in the rooms on my corridor here where I do this.

They were all being replaced and the noise was too disruptive.

I had to stop the episode and I will do the rest in part two.

So I do have another episode set of haiku that I prepared, that I wanted to read to you, some really interesting ones that I wanted to read, teach you bits of English from and discuss.

So that's all going to come in part two, and I'm going to publish that at some point in the not too distant future.

I've got a few other episodes in the pipeline that I want to upload.

In the meantime, and then when the time is right, we will get haiku part two.

But anyway, here now are some of the haikus that listeners wrote.

Now, these haiku, you get bonus points for the 5-7-5 structure.

Do you think that's fair?

Maybe if you remember 575.

That means five syllables in the first line, seven syllables in the second line, five syllables in the third line.

For the purists out there, you get bonus points for any haiku that follow that structure.

But, you know, we're being a bit sort of loose with the rules here.

I don't mind if the rules are broken.

You know, basically any short three line poem is fine.

Some of the poems were more than three lines or less.

Doesn't matter.

Now, if you still have some inspiration, do send more.

Send write your haikus in the comments if you have more inspiration.

And in haiku episode part two, I'll read them out as well.

OK, so we'll start with Helen, who was the one who kind of kicked this all off in the first place.

Helen, her surname is actually pronounced Leclerc.

OK, so it's L-E-C-L-E-R-C.

But the C at the end is not pronounced, so not Leclerc, which I always thought it was.

But it's Leclerc, Helen Leclerc.

So this is the Helen from the episode, Canadian Helen.

She wrote an immediate haiku in response to the episode.

She listened to it on her way to work, driving in sub-zero temperatures in Canada, where often it does get really cold in the winter.

So this was her haiku.

Minus 21 this morning, in my car, the warmth of Luke's voice.

That's nice, isn't it?

Describing the freezing temperatures outside the car, but inside the car, the warmth of my voice.

Thank you, Helen.

Also from Helen, this message.

Hi, Luke.

I've just submitted these haiku to a contest organised by Snapshot Press in the UK.

A haiku competition.

I'm not usually a big fan of contests, but this one really appealed to me.

Out of all the haiku they receive, they will select 12 to create a haiku calendar, one for each month.

I really enjoyed the exercise of translating my haiku from French to English.

So here are the four haiku that she sent into the competition.

Number one, clothesline.

The wind tries to slip into a pair of pants clothes line.

The wind tries to slip into a pair of pants.

It's a nice image.

I mean, again, we have clothing hanging on a washing line.

In this case it's a pair of pants, which in I mean in British English that would mean underwear, which still works in the poem.

If in American English, that would mean a So either works.

But basically you can imagine a pair of, let's say, a pair of trousers hanging on the line, the clothes line, and the wind is blowing through the trousers, and trying to slip into a pair of pants, in the same way that you might try to slip into a pair of pants in the morning.

Try and put them on.

As the wind is blowing and blowing through these trousers, you can imagine the wind is trying to climb into or slip into a pair of pants.

Number two, breeze on the shore.

Breeze on the shore.

Leaving the novel for a moment to read the river.

That's nice.

So you can imagine that she's sitting on the shore or next to, in this case, a river, next to water, sitting next to a river, reading a novel.

And she leaves the novel.

So she puts the novel down in order to read the river.

So interesting way of describing just looking at the flow of the river, studying it, reading it, I suppose.

So just describing one of those moments where you might be sitting in a nice comfortable place outside in nature and one of those moments when you stop reading, you put the book down and you just observe the world around you.

And reading a book is often like that, isn't it?

You don't just read.

You often read stop, get distracted by something else, or just take a pause and enjoy the atmosphere of the world around you.

That's certainly the way it is for me.

Number three, morning encounter.

Morning encounter.

An encounter is when you meet something or meet someone.

Meet would be for a person to meet someone in the morning.

That might be maybe you meet someone in the street.

Oh, hi, how are you doing?

I haven't seen you for a while. you would encounter an animal.

So we don't meet an animal.

Hello, nice to meet you.

You're an animal.

Fantastic.

We don't meet an animal.

We encounter animals.

So morning encounter, all the forests of the world in the deer's eyes.

Morning encounter all the forests of the world in the deer's eyes.

Morning encounter all the forests of the world in the deer, in the deer's eyes.

Okay, that's four at the in the last line, but um Breeze on the shore.

OK, we're breaking the rules.

This is fine.

So anyway, morning encounter, all the forests of the world in the deer's eyes.

So this describes, I guess, a moment when she happened to encounter a deer right, which is this beautiful wild animal.

You know, like a deer, you know, a deer is reindeer.

Father Christmas, Santa Claus has reindeer.

Rudolph is a reindeer.

A reindeer is a type of deer.

So a deer is an animal that lives in the forest.

Morning encounter.

Maybe Helen was walking through the wood or walking through the forest, and she came across a deer which stood and looked at her.

And I like the way Helen, you've captured that sense of the wildness that you get from an encounter with a wild animal like that.

You look into their eyes and there's some depth of the wildness of nature, all the forests of the world in the deer's eyes.

With a pebble, this is number four, with a pebble, a boy blurs a lake and a mountain.

A pebble is a little round stone that you might find by the side of a lake.

With a pebble, a boy blurs a lake and a mountain.

So this is describing a moment when a boy has thrown a stone into the water and the lake.

The otherwise placid, calm surface of the lake is blurred or no longer clear.

And also the mountain is blurred.

But this would be the reflection of the mountain.

So we get this beautiful image of a clear, peaceful lake with a mountain in the distance reflected in the lake, and a boy has thrown a stone into the water and it has disturbed the surface of the water and also disturbed and blurred the image of the mountain which was reflected in that water.

Beautiful Helen.

Great.

Good luck with the contest.

Let's move on to Margarita, who wrote this.

I've just created something with a large dose of optimism.

It can be considered as a haiku.

It's about your last podcast.

The title, Thoughts on a Haiku.

Butterflies in the meadow.

The sound of drill.

I guess that should be the sound of a drill.

The sound of drill.

OK, we're not counting syllables.

This is fine.

So if you don't mind, I'm making a little correction.

The sound of a drill.

Right.

Butterflies in the meadow.

The sound of a drill, like the sound of a lawnmower.

Everything disappeared.

Butterflies in the meadow, the sound of a drill, like the sound of a lawnmower.

Everything disappeared.

Margarita, were you listening to the episode while you were walking through a meadow?

Or is this an image of your state of mind while you were listening to the podcast and the sound of the drill?

The sound of the drill in the background apparently didn't disturb you.

It just sounded like the sound of a lawnmower which, on a sunny day outside, you might hear someone mowing their lawn.

That's cutting the grass, you know, with one of those machines that you use to cut the grass.

That's a lawnmower with wheels on it.

Yeah.

That wouldn't disturb you too much if you were just walking through a field in the summer.

The sound of a lawnmower in the distance wouldn't disturb you too much.

So maybe Margarita's talking about that, that the drill wasn't that disturbing.

It just sounded like a lawnmower in the distance on a sunny day.

But then the last line, everything disappeared.

Yeah, I'm afraid that the drilling did cause me to stop.

The episode ended fairly abruptly.

Yes, Olga on YouTube.

Hi, Luke.

I've just looked out of the window and saw beautiful clouds moving in the frosty sky.

In a moment, I realised they were clouds of smoke coming from huge pipes of heating plants.

That's heating power plants.

And voila, here I am with my kind of haiku.

Clouds in the sky are smoke from a pipe.

Nature cries in a big city.

Yes.

When you realise those beautiful clouds moving across the sky are in fact air pollution being produced by big chimneys.

Nature cries in a big city.

That is quite a sad one.

Thank you for the podcast.

Enjoyed it.

You're welcome, Olga.

This next one is from G.Yagmur. on YouTube.

One haiku from me.

The man speaking to the screen drill voice comes from backside.

Listeners get angry.

I have to give you one correction there, Yagmur.

From behind, I would say from behind, not from backside, because your backside is something else.

The backside is another way to describe your bottom, your bum, your arse, your ass, your butt in American English.

Backside is your bottom.

So the man speaking to the screen, drill voice comes from backside.

No, drill voice comes from behind.

I would say drill sound as well.

Although maybe you chose to use the word voice.

Listeners get angry.

I hope you don't mind the correction.

Drill voice comes from backside.

Does sound a bit like a fart, doesn't it?

Maybe that was an intentional joke.

I don't know.

But it should probably be drill voice or drill sound comes from behind.

Meaning it came from behind me, the corridor behind me.

Maybe that was an intentional joke.

I don't know.

That does raise a question.

Have I ever farted on this podcast?

The answer is, well, almost certainly.

Was it audible, though?

Certainly not.

I'm a pod pro.

I'm a professional podcaster, remember.

By the way, sometimes you might hear sounds, these sorts of sounds.

Can you hear that?

I don't know if that's audible, but my chair creaks a lot.

I've got a very creaky, noisy chair at the moment and I really need a new one.

I keep trying to find a better, newer office chair for my podcasting room and I keep changing it.

I've had three of these office chairs.

None of them have been quite right.

One of these days I will get the right office chair, the one that's comfortable and also doesn't make a lot of noise. creaking and squeaking sounds like that right so if you ever hear noises like that let me just if you hear this listen right those sorts of things if you ever hear that kind of thing on the podcast you think wait what was that luke that was the sound of the chair creaking and definitely no other kind of noise all right uh manuela's 7182 on YouTube said, my favourite haiku from my university memories is the following one by Matsuo Basho.

And it says, add wings to a chilli pepper and it turns into a red dragonfly, which is interesting.

And actually, I looked into this and found... a little story about this haiku, which is nice.

This is from a blog called matsuobashouhaiku.home.blog, and it goes like this.

The story is this.

A haiku should be a teaching moment.

That is, it should make a point.

One day, when Basho and his pupil Takari Kikaku were walking through the fields, they spotted dragonflies darting through the grass and flowers.

Dragonflies are insects.

You tend to find them near water.

They're beautiful things long, slender bodies, wide wings, they're quite large and they fly around reed beds next to water.

And they're quite large things with long, thin bodies, a bit like a long red chili pepper with wings, in fact.

So they they.

They spotted these dragonflies and kikaku composed this haiku and looked to his master for approval.

He said behold a red dragonfly, remove its wings, a pepper pod.

And his master replied, but the dragonfly is dead.

Now this is how to create life.

And he re-wrote it.

Red pepper pots, add wings.

Behold dragonflies, which is perhaps in Basho's version the dragonflies don't get killed, which is perhaps more positive.

But they knew how to have a good time, didn't they, those haiku masters?

Now, this next one from H-I-J-O-L, I'm not sure refers to The experience of watching the video version of the Haiku episode, in which I was wearing a kind of green jumper, a green woolen jumper, which I'd bought recently.

And also, during the episode, my cheeks went red.

I started, I kind of blushed.

I wasn't blushing because I was embarrassed.

I don't know why, but on that particular day I found my cheeks were just bright red, for some reason.

So anyway, this haiku refers to that.

It goes like this.

Red cheeks, green wool, haiku from afar.

That's nice.

Red cheeks, green wool, haiku from afar, haiku from a long way away.

A long distance away, in this case from Canada, from the United States and from Paris.

That's my attempt to use japanese say the japanese version.

Um h i j o l uh said i intentionally used a 574 structure as i felt it allowed the haiku to leave a quiet aftertaste.

Thank you for such a lovely podcast.

Red cheeks, green wool, haiku from afar.

Very nice.

Toshimiban said, thank you for introducing us to haiku.

I live in Japan, Kanazawa, and make haiku every day.

I love Masao Kashiki and Yosa Buson.

Buson wrote or has written Chidi te nochi omogake ni tatsu botan kana.

Sorry about my Japanese.

And it goes like this.

Even after the peony has fallen, its shape still comes to mind as if it was still there.

So a peony is a kind of beautiful flower with lots of petals.

Even after the peony has fallen, its shape still comes to mind as if it was still there, which sounds like a meditation on grief.

It's my interpretation.

Like when you lose someone, when someone close to you has died, you can't come to terms with it because you still remember them.

You still have them in your mind.

You still feel the shape of them in your life, even though they are no longer there.

So in this case, even after this flower has fallen, its shape still comes to mind as if it was still there.

You still remember it in your mind.

It's a similar thing when you lose someone you love.

Tassir Abbas, waiting for my flight, people come and go, life goes on.

Waiting for my flight, people come and go, life goes on.

Which is an interesting little meditation on what it's like to sit in an airport.

And airports are strange in between places, aren't they?

Stas PJ9CX said, I'm making a podcast.

The sun is shining.

Someone's drilling.

It's just our life.

Yes, the life of a podcaster.

There's always someone drilling somewhere.

Sometimes it's near you, within earshot.

Sometimes, sometimes not.

Leila Akas wrote, I'm really enjoying listening to this chapter.

Thanks for it.

I'd like to share a haiku I wrote years ago for a literary call for submissions in Spain.

In English, it would be something like this.

Rain on the house where my mother was born, the threshold still dry.

Interesting.

The threshold is the like the wooden step at the bottom of the door that marks the line between inside and outside.

You cross the threshold when you go inside the house.

That's very interesting, that one.

I just wanted to make a correction.

You said, I'm really enjoying listening to this chapter.

Thanks for it.

We don't normally say thanks for it.

We would say, because thanks for it doesn't sound quite right in English.

It usually is usually too vague after saying thanks for.

Generally, it's more normal to say thanks for that.

Thanks for this, pointing back to something just mentioned.

Or we say thanks for, and then a noun phrase like thanks for your help, thanks for your advice, thanks for the information, or thanks for, and then a gerund thanks for doing it.

So I'm really enjoying this episode.

Thanks for doing it.

I'm really enjoying this episode.

Thanks for this.

Thanks for that.

Yes.

I'm not going to hit my 25 minute target here at all.

Corneliad 6702 said, listening to Luke sounds in the background.

Pleasure remains.

That's nice.

Even though there were these annoying noises, it didn't stop you from enjoying the episode.

Listening to Luke, sounds in the background, pleasure remains.

Hexo, I'm going to just call you Hexo, wrote this.

I don't know where the inspiration for this one came from.

But it goes like this.

The night before the execution is so short, so go to bed a little earlier.

That's quite dark, isn't it?

Or is it?

Is it dark?

Or is it ironic?

An execution is where someone is killed.

Maybe someone like, for example, someone who's committed murder and they end up being given the death penalty.

They might be executed in the morning, killed in the morning, but then that night will be very short, meaning maybe you can't sleep because you're expecting your own execution the next day.

The night before the execution is so short because who would be able to sleep?

So go to bed a little earlier.

Oh, that's a bit chilling.

It's ironic.

If you're being executed in the morning, you won't sleep.

You'll have a short night.

So go to bed early.

But that doesn't make sense, because you're bringing the execution time forward by going to bed early or you're losing more of your time awake or going to bed early would be fruitless.

Anyway, if you're listening to this, please explain.

Can you give us more information about what that haiku means to you and what your motivation was for writing it?

It's quite an odd one to share as well.

I feel like you wrote this one before, maybe?

I don't think this is a response to my haiku episode, but it's certainly an interesting one.

You know what listeners.

I need to pause the podcast again because I've got to take that call that is planned for me at three o'clock and I will just carry on when I'm finished on the call.

So I'm going to click my fingers again and I will see you once again when I've unclicked my fingers.

You can't unclick your fingers.

I mean, in the instant moment when my fingers have finished clicking, I will be back with you.

And we're back again.

OK, let's carry on.

So moving on to the next comment from Rita, who wrote, I'm not a poet, Luke.

It's just an attempt.

And it said, open yourself up.

Let them grow big and strong.

The love of life.

As always, thank you for your video.

Thank you, Rita, for that one.

This feels nice and positive.

What is meant by them in the haiku, though?

I wonder.

Open yourself up.

Let them grow big and strong, the love of life.

What is them?

Maybe this is my listeners.

Maybe this is your dreams.

Maybe this is, um, your English skills.

I don't know.

Open yourself up, let them grow big and strong.

The love of life sounds very positive though.

Uh, rude for on Spotify wrote this listening to him.

I wonder, does he wonder as he speaks listening to him?

I wonder, does he wonder as he speaks greetings from a fellow English teacher in Brazil?

Um, I wonder if, well, clearly I do wonder because I just literally just said I wonder.

But I mean, I wonder if you are referring to me.

I think you probably are referring to me.

And this is perhaps what you think while you're listening to me speaking.

Are you wondering if I wonder about things as I speak?

You mean, do you wonder if I wonder about the words I'm using or the grammar I'm using?

I think I do.

Yes, I think I do.

It's hard to understand the specific moment by moment thought processes that I go through while I'm speaking.

But yeah, definitely I'm wondering about my word choices, but I wonder which part of my brain those thoughts come from.

And I wonder also here I am wondering again.

I wonder if the way I think as a native speaker, the way I think about language at an almost subconscious level while I'm speaking, do those thoughts come from the same place in my brain as someone who's learned English as a second language?

Are those languages stored in different places?

Do we have different thought processes when constructing sentences in our first language compared to our second language?

You know, are we retrieving information from different places?

Is our first language much more intuitive and our second language does that draw upon more, more consciously learned rules and and words?

Um, you know what I mean?

Are we taking the language from the same places when we speak our first and second or third or whatever other languages?

Um, yeah, I, I do think about what I'm saying as I'm saying it.

And um, definitely definitely thinking about it, but I can't really.

It's not really a conscious process of uh, I'm not aware of a voice working trying to think about my word choices.

Anyway, that's an interesting thing to consider.

Felipe Miranda from Spotify said inside Luke's voice.

Outside, thin rain and drops of English fall into my head.

That's very good.

So it paints a picture because you're inside.

You're listening to my podcast outside.

There's thin rain, maybe drizzle or light rain or something.

I'd say light rain rather than thin rain, but that's OK.

And drops of English fall into my head.

OK, I like the way you've made the connection between the rain and the English, and drops of English fall into your head.

Talking about the, let's say, the acquisition process of learning English.

Very nice.

Anita on Spotify wrote a couple.

The first one was pandemic hit once.

Bored I was.

LEP saved me.

Yeah, I hear Yoda everywhere, including in that haiku.

I don't know if that's intentional, Anita.

Pandemic hit once, bored I was.

LEP saved me.

That would be saved me.

LEP did.

But now that I don't mean to make fun pandemic hit once bored.

I was LEP saved me.

I think that a lot of people can relate to that one Anita.

I think a lot of people out there discovered the podcast during the pandemic, during lockdown, when you had so much time on your hands and things to worry about in the world at large, but also a lot of time to kill and a lot of solitude, and A lot of people got bored and looked for things to keep them occupied.

And podcasts provided something, especially Luke's English podcast for a lot of people in the world.

So hit the like button if you agree with that one, if you relate to that.

And Anita's second one was using LEP is such fun.

All folks should do it.

I heartily agree.

Using LEP is such fun.

All folks should do it.

Yes.

Minos Mill wrote this.

Too long, they once said, back in episode 17.

After years, shorten.

Does that get bonus points?

Too long, they once said, back in episode 17.

After years.

Shorten.

You get bonus points for that because you've followed the 5-7-5 rule.

17.

I'll let you off.

That's technically 17.

That's three syllables, but I'll let you have it in two syllables.

17 can work as two syllables.

Too long, they once said, back in episode 17, after years.

Shorten.

My response to that is shorten?

Unlikely.

Quite the opposite, apparently.

So is this a criticism?

I don't know.

But people have been suggesting that my podcast is too long ever since episode 17.

And you'd think maybe I would listen to that and shorten my episodes.

But no, in fact, they appear to be getting longer on average.

Um, is this a problem?

I don't know.

I'm still wrestling with this whole idea.

And also, why is it that my episodes get so long sometimes?

You see what i'm the the to to bring you into my thinking about this that i do wrestle with this whole thing of long versus short.

It's not that i intend to make really long episodes, they just happen.

They just sort of happen by accident.

This wasn't meant to be over three hours, it just ended up being over three hours.

I i I feel like maybe it's a failing on my part that I can't discipline myself enough.

But also at the same time, I've just got so much to say.

I don't want to split this up into episodes because that will.

If I split this episode into, I could have done it into maybe three episodes.

I could have done the stuff about TV and radio.

I could have done the stuff about the haiku responses and then all the other stuff in the middle.

It could have been three episodes, but that's three weeks worth of content.

And I've got other stuff I want to publish next week and the week after that.

And so that's why I jam everything into one big episode.

I just have a lot of things to say and a lot of things to put out there.

And that's how these episodes end up becoming long.

I just try and cram too much in.

But anyway, you're still listening.

And that's the main thing, isn't it?

You're still listening.

You're still with me.

A lot of people have turned into skeletons with headphones, but you're still here.

So that's the main thing.

Right.

Moving on.

Valentina Bereva wrote this one.

That's inspired by the first haiku of the episode, which was something like...

The image, the reflection in my bathroom mirror resembles my father's face or something like that.

With every passing year, Luke more and more resembles Rick.

Not such a bad thing.

At Fuella Art, someone called my name.

Another girl approached the caller.

I stared for a moment, then walked.

Someone called my name.

Another girl approached the caller.

I stared for a moment, then walked.

That's good.

That captures quite a common experience that a lot of us have, which is where you are, let's say, in the street, and you hear someone shout your name.

Like, Luke!

And you go, ooh.

In this case, it's a girl telling the story, I'm assuming.

And a boy.

She heard a boy say or a man say her name.

She turned round and another different girl approached the caller.

So this is one of those situations where you hear someone call your name in public and you turn around oh, someone wants to talk to me and you realise.

The person was talking to someone else who has your name as well.

And in that moment, that little moment, you feel so lonely, don't you?

You feel all alone in the universe.

Oh, someone wants to talk to me.

Oh no, it's someone else.

Oh well.

It does feel a bit like when, I don't know, there's a person that you fancy.

Someone you fancy and someone you really want to be with.

And then you see them get together with someone else, someone else who maybe looks like you or something like that.

And you just kind of feel so unwanted in that moment.

User-PO4RD4IY9D, another catchy username, wrote this.

I'm Japanese, but I tried to write a haiku in English.

And it goes like this.

Snow covered ground.

Every sound absorbed by my soft crunch.

That's good.

That's very good.

I'm not counting the syllables.

I don't think it follows the rule, but that doesn't matter.

But that is very good.

Snow-covered ground, okay.

Every sound absorbed by my soft crunch.

Nice use of the word crunch at the end, which does refer to the noise that you hear when you step on freshly, freshly settled snow.

In the morning you go out, the snow is fresh and you walk in the snow and crunch, crunch, crunch.

This is very good.

It captures that characteristic sound of crunching snow.

And also the way everything sounds soft and muted when you're surrounded by fresh snow.

It's a strange atmosphere, isn't it?

Fresh snow.

You're outside, everything seems very quiet, quiet and close, and all you can hear is the sound of your crunching feet in the snow, and that sound seems to absorb all the other sounds around you.

Very good that.

Kathy Blazquez. wrote this, a few words that carry an important feeling.

I especially liked the haikus by Sanchez and Stevenson the one entitled The Earth Shakes, the one about the red poppy and the one about the T-Rex.

So here's Cathy's haiku.

A soft voice lures me into dreams of kind-hearted, talented and funny Brit.

That's nice.

She wrote, I'm too tired for syllable counting.

Thank you, Luke.

Don't worry, Kathy.

I'm not counting syllables either.

Thank you for the nice haiku.

A soft voice lures me into dreams of a kind-hearted, talented and funny Brit.

How lovely.

Here is one from Molly Tai.

Yes, the Molly type.

And it goes like this.

LEP, a blank canvas.

Luke is the artist.

English, a song.

LEP is the music.

That's nice, isn't it?

LEP, a blank canvas.

Luke is the artist.

English, a song.

LEP is the music.

Very nice.

That is the ubiquitous Molly Tai.

I say ubiquitous.

She used to comment on every single episode, especially on the website, and also is known for commenting on lots of podcasts for learners of English.

That's why I called her the ubiquitous Molly Tai.

And after maybe disappearing for a while, she is still there.

She's still there in the comments now on YouTube.

Hello, Molly.

Nice to have you listening.

Maria dot somewhere in Norway.

Maria dot somewhere in Norway, who apparently is somewhere in Norway, wrote this.

Hanging on Luke's every word.

LEP's learning strategy.

Yes, you've nailed it there.

You've nailed it.

That's the thing, right?

That is the learning strategy.

You're hanging on every single word, which is a tremendously flattering thing to know that people are listening and hanging on my every word.

Like, what's the next word he's going to say?

This is where you're hanging on.

You're listening very carefully to every single word, wondering what the next word will be.

Yes, this is the learning strategy that you're noticing constantly.

The way that I'm putting my sentences together.

You're noticing the way that I'm constructing my English discourse as I go.

You're hanging on every word.

This is your strategy.

Yeah, you nailed it, Maria.

Somewhere in Norway.

Another Maria.

This is Maria-WX7QM.

Everyone knows Maria-WX7QM, right?

Sun setting down the snowy hill.

Cold winter glance.

My home is near, sun setting down the snowy hill.

So she's walking down a snowy snowy hill, the sun is setting cold winter glance, looks up, she's cold.

She glances towards her house and she's happy to know, i suppose, that her home is near, where it's warm and dry and comfy.

This is Goa who wrote this on the website.

In a quiet dream, the ewe speaks.

Long live your son.

Did my lamb taste good?

Right, this one needs a little bit of explaining.

The ewe.

That's ewe spelled E-W-E.

A ewe, that is a female sheep.

That's right, isn't it?

A ewe is a female.

It's not a female goat.

No, a female sheep.

Right.

So in a in a quiet dream, the ewe speaks.

Long live your son.

Did my lamb taste good?

That is brilliant.

That's brilliant.

So this this tells a whole story for me.

And it's like something out of a horror film.

Kind of.

In a quiet dream.

So you're in bed.

You don't know what you you're in that weird in between space where you're lying in bed.

You don't know what time it is.

Maybe you've been lying there for hours.

Maybe not.

But you're in a half dream state or you're just waking up from a dream.

But anyway, you're in your dream, a sheep speaks to you and it's a sheep from well.

You don't know where this sheep comes out of, the comes out of the dream world, the astral world, to talk to you.

Maybe the face of the sheep comes out of the darkness.

It's the mother sheep, the you, and she says long live your son.

Okay, and you had lamb for dinner.

And you cooked lamb for you and for your son.

You lovingly prepared dinner for your child.

And it was roasted lamb and potatoes and peas.

You fed it to your son and you were glad to see him eat it. to build him up, make him strong.

But the mother sheep, the mother of the lamb, that's a young sheep that you ate for your dinner.

The mother sheep visits you in your dream and comes to you in the darkness and says long live your son.

Did my lamb taste good.

Now that could be either very scary and threatening, like the the the you is uh, maybe sort of angry hateful, malicious and haunting, or maybe the, the the you is somehow loving as, as if Lamb is.

There's a caring side where it's she's offering.

She's offered her own lamb to you.

So it could either be a generous sort of loving dream or something a bit more terrifying.

I kind of lean towards the terrifying side of things with that.

But that's good.

Yeah.

And Goa wrote, I just wanted to try one.

I was inspired by a quatrain by the Armenian writer Hovhannes Toumanian and I turned it into a haiku.

Cheers, Luke, and thanks so much for your work, Goa.

So that's inspired by the work of an Armenian writer, and Goa sort of turned it into this haiku.

But that's good.

That's got my, got my imagination going um.

Michael deschamps 804.

Hello luke, thanks for that amazing topic that i really love.

Here's my contribution, inspired by what happened yesterday in my country, in the southeast of belgium, and it goes v flight high in sky, lanky gray.

Sorry, start again.

V flight high in sky, lanky grey cranes.

Back to north green spring coming soon.

Inspired by the sight of seeing the flight of a group of cranes.

These are tall grey birds coming in a group, flying back to the north, And this signals the coming spring, the fact that spring is on its way.

And cranes like this fly in a V formation, like the way that geese fly in a V formation.

And a sight like that, I suppose, seeing a big V formation of large cranes lanky, tall cranes flying across the sky, is just an indication that spring is coming.

Very nice.

Yonella wrote this.

Putting my earphones in, listening to the pleasant voice.

Listening to?

Putting my earphones in.

Okay.

Listening to the pleasant voice.

Sad.

Abruptly stopped.

Yeah, that is the story of the haiku episode for sure.

Konstantin wrote.

I'm just back from my winter forest hike.

A walk in the forest in the winter.

It and your podcast inspired the following poem

I don't know if it can be regarded as a haiku.

A path winds through snow.

What awaits at the end of it?

A hare's lone track.

A path winds through the snow.

So this is a path that goes left and right and, you know, follows a curved route through the snow.

What awaits at the end of it?

So what is waiting at the end of the path?

A hare's lone track.

So the tracks of a hare, which is like a large rabbit, a hare's lone track.

So the evidence that a hare ran off into the, into the snow.

At that point the hair is an interesting animal because it does represent sort of the wildness of nature.

So this is just interesting.

A path winds through the snow.

What is at the end of it?

Well, it's the wildness of of nature, and the only, the hair, goes beyond the, the track.

And Constantine continues and says you're sowing the right seeds in the field of English learning, Luke.

And it's up to us to fertilise the soil, take care of the sprouts and collect the harvest in time.

Endlessly thankful for your work.

That is beautiful, actually.

What a beautiful image.

And I couldn't have put it better myself.

That's a really nice way of, that's a very flattering way to describe what I do.

That I'm sowing the right seeds, meaning I put the seeds on the ground of English learning, and it's up to you to fertilise the soil.

Take care of the little sprouts, the green sprouts that come out and collect the harvest.

Harvest all of the crops in time.

What a beautiful image.

Thank you for that.

Gustavo Ferreira.

Why can't I say that?

Gustavo Ferreira.

Oh dear.

I can't say your name.

What's wrong with me?

Ferreira.

Gustavo Ferreira.

I've been podcasting too long today.

Anyway, Gustavo said such an inspiring episode, Luke.

It literally stayed with me all week.

While cycling during my Monday commute and driving on Tuesday, I found myself lost in thoughts, of chords and melodies.

By yesterday evening it all finally came together.

I sat down with my guitar and wrote a song called Haiku.

The lyrics go like this.

I'm just going to read these.

But Gustavo, you need to record this song and send it to me, right?

But here are the lyrics.

It's a work in progress, apparently.

Your timelines are the drop and the glacier.

Stars, silence and crowds roaring a goal.

You'll be real, you'll be true, like dancing in the middle of carnival and looking at the sky when there's nothing left to say.

I write, erase, rewrite, erase again, and then a poppy blooms, and then, and then.

Thank you, Gustavo.

Write it.

Record that song.

Send it to me.

Here's one correction from a Japanese Lepster.

Sorry, I can't remember which Lepster it was exactly, but this is a Japanese Lepster who made a correction.

The correction was this.

The haiku that you explained, written by Katsushika Hokusai rewrite erase and then a poppy blooms.

It was actually created by Tachibana Hokushi, actually.

Apparently, this is quite a common mistake that people get this wrong, especially like English speakers get the Hokushi.

Hokushi confused with Hokusai.

So it's actually Tachibana Hokushi who wrote that one, not Katsushika Hokusai.

Vaguely similar names.

Tachibana Hokushi was the one who actually did it.

Andre.

I'm just going to go with the first names.

I'm trying to do this quickly now.

Yeah, we have haiku in the Belarusian language.

One of my favourites was written by Maxim Tank.

In English, it's something like this.

I bought a shell.

Now I am not alone.

I talk to the sea.

That's nice.

That's very nice.

I bought a shell, like a shell that you find on the beach.

Now I'm not alone.

I talk to the sea.

Which makes me think of when you pick up a shell especially if it's a large shell and you hold it to your ear, it sounds like you can hear the sea.

You hear a kind of... It sounds a bit like you can hear the waves.

It's actually the sound echoing around inside the structure of the shell.

Right, the sound bounces around inside the shell and it's, but it sounds like the ocean.

So in a way it's almost like you have this phone call connection to the sea.

I bought a shell.

Now i'm not alone, i talk to the sea.

That's very beautiful.

Uh, umita um wrote this a pond of knowledge.

Fresh luke's english podcast drill cannot spoil it.

Ah, thank you.

Alexi wrote inside out or outside in in a reversible jacket.

He has changed it twice.

That's my humble try.

Nice topic, Luke.

Okay, inside out or outside in, in a reversible jacket, he's changed it twice.

Very good.

Fabio Finch on Spotify.

A joke was told.

No one laughed.

A frog ran out of the room.

Very good.

A joke was told.

No one laughed.

A frog ran out of the room.

This sounds a bit like a reference to a certain famous joke that I've talked about previously on this podcast.

And I like the fact that the frog ran out of the room.

So the frog survived this particular situation.

Let's say I told a joke and no one laughed.

And the frog escaped.

So he managed to escape before I dissected the frog or explained the joke.

Anyway, Yonella wrote.

Oh, we've already had this one.

Putting my earphones in.

Sorry, we've had that one already.

Tariq Hamid said, soft wind in the trees, night whispers through empty streets.

Moonlight finds its way.

Nice.

Some of these I don't need to explain.

Luke from Poland on the website wrote three haiku.

First one, a stream of English.

The electric drill's sudden noise.

Joy fades in a flash.

Uh dreary, sleepless night.

A hint of English humor, sweet dreams at last, which speaks to the the the experience of a lot of Lepsters who, finding that they can't sleep at night, stick on a, an episode of my podcast and it kind of lulls them into a lovely deep sleep.

Um, And one with a kireji, a cutting word.

Just keep waiting.

Another episode nears.

Yes, I can grab it now.

That's very good.

Again speaking, talking about the experience of a Lepster who's waiting for a new episode to arrive.

Just keep waiting.

Another episode nears, meaning it's nearly here.

Yes.

Bing, there's the notification.

Yes, I can grab it now.

Very good.

Pierre wrote this.

Hi, Luke.

Great episode as always.

Here is his haiku.

Low on words.

Chasing a high haiku.

Gravity laughs.

I like that.

Pierre.

I had a little exchange with him in the comments section, but my instant interpretation of that was that this is a haiku about Pierre attempting to write a haiku, low on words, chasing a high haiku.

So he's got high hopes, trying to create a good haiku of high value.

Gravity laughs, so Gravity goes, ha ha ha ha, no, and drags him back down to Earth again.

Pierre said, I was going for a haiku pun joke hybrid.

I know, not the finest, but the inspiration came from hearing about a certain orange man.

And Pierre was making a reference to a certain American president there.

And I said, very good, but what is the reference to the mango Mussolini in your haiku?

And Pierre said I drew my inspiration from the Mango Mussolini, notorious for his limited vocabulary.

Number one, a haiku is short on words, and Mango is limited on vocabulary, hence low on words.

Number two he endlessly brags about his high IQ, which he clearly lacks, in my humble opinion.

Hence chasing a high haiku.

Ah haiku an IQ.

I see a pun on striving for richer vocabulary and higher IQ.

Using gravity as both physics, in terms of the science that he dismisses and probably doesn't understand, and metaphor, meaning reality, pulling claims back down to Earth.

So as a master, what do you think?

Well, I think you did great.

I think you did just great, Pierre.

Well done.

I think the haiku stands alone without needing any reference to the tangerine toddler.

For me, it's about the humbling feeling that you get when attempting to write a haiku.

But now I do appreciate the wordplay here, high IQ, high haiku, and so on.

But my interpretation was low on words, meaning those poetic phrases don't come.

But you're aiming high, which is nice.

It's nice the way you added an alliteration with high haiku.

But gravity has the last laugh as it brings you back down to earth with failure.

In this case, I think you tricked gravity somehow.

I think you actually managed to do it.

Bernard on teacherluke.co.uk said this.

Challenge accepted without A.I., Without anything AI invented, so these are Bernard's ones.

Soft whispering voice, rich source, always giving hope.

Time goes by, by, by.

This is my favourite.

Focus on all that matters.

Flowers everywhere.

How nice.

Haikus in my brain.

They, they were, I would say they.

Haikus in my brain.

They were dormant in my land.

Explode thou feeling now.

Thy, actually, I would say thy.

Old English meaning your.

Sorry, I've rewritten it a little bit, Bernard.

I hope you don't mind.

Haikus in my brain.

They were dormant in my land.

Explode thy feeling now.

That's nice.

So Bernard was obviously inspired by the haiku episode.

He got haikus in his brain.

He was thinking about haikus, which were dormant in his land.

They were sleeping.

They weren't in the forefront of his mind.

And now...

They explode his feelings.

So it's a nice description of being inspired by haiku that he hadn't really been thinking about before.

Light flows over grass.

The spider fights with water a day without you.

Wow.

Light flows over grass.

A spider fights with water a day without you.

That's very good, Bernard.

Light flows over grass.

So I'm imagining seeing a field in the morning, a field with long grass in it, maybe a meadow.

Maybe Bernard's gone for a walk in the morning and he's seen a field, long grass.

And long grass in the morning is often covered in dew drops, drops of water moisture from the night.

And...

You would probably see a little spider attempting to build its web or struggling in the grass that's covered in drops of water.

A spider fights with water.

So he sees this little creature struggling and he maybe even feels a sort of connection to that little spider struggling, because this represents how maybe how the writer feels every day struggling to come to terms with the loss of someone.

He feels like, as he struggles to deal with living another day without someone, he can understand what it feels like to be this spider struggling with the early morning drops of water on his grass.

Something like that.

And then Bernard's final one.

Wind blows through her hair and she smiles at me so shy.

The only photo.

This is another sad one.

Bernard suggests to me that i don't know if this is based on your real life or you're just being very creative and inspired today maybe, but this suggests to me that there's a photograph, and in the photograph you see a girl with the wind blowing in her hair.

She smiles.

In the photo she's smiling.

She seems shy.

This is the only photo of you that you have, of someone that you loved, And that actually reminds me of a YouTube video.

There's this YouTube video that pops up into my YouTube recommendations sometimes.

The video is filled with melodic, calming, ambient music.

And it is entitled, I Will Always Love Her.

And that's the title of the video.

The music is this lovely, calming, ambient music.

And there's just this picture of this girl.

And it's very much like the haiku you just mentioned.

A girl in maybe the top of a hill.

You can see a city in the background.

And it's like a photo that was quickly taken.

Maybe this is a girl that you were in love with.

The wind is blowing her hair across her face.

She's sort of smiling shyly.

She's very pretty.

It's the sort of photo that you would have of a girl that you fell in love with once, full of melancholic feelings, like looking at one remaining photo you have of a girl you fell in love with several lifetimes ago.

Let me actually go to that video right now because this is the music in the background.

I don't know if, during this video, during this episode I mean, I've actually played several YouTube videos that might cause this to be blocked on YouTube.

There might be copyright issues with this.

Anyway, this is the video I was talking about.

The YouTube channel is called I Still Miss Her.

And it's filled with videos like this, of this kind of soft ambient music, with pictures of this girl.

But the comments, the comments are fascinating.

I love reading comments on ambient music videos on YouTube because they're always like, really sort of how to put it, really not sad.

Sad is it?

Emotional.

For example, the first comment here is one thing I love about these videos is being able to read people's small confessions and feelings.

Exactly.

One comment here says, this makes me miss the girlfriend I never had.

And some replies, I'd rather miss the version of myself that never will be.

I lost the first love of my life to cancer yesterday.

We had both moved on and married and started families, but it still pains me.

We were in love during the highlight of our youth for almost 10 years.

I miss those times.

I feel bad for her family and kids.

Such a tragedy that so few are experiencing.

The sadness.

Sometimes I wonder what life would be like if things didn't end up the way they did.

Unfortunately, I'll never know.

All I can do is wonder what could have been.

Another one.

This is how I feel about my mother.

Rest in peace.

I wish you were still here today to see the man I have become.

This one says you might keep yourself busy with work all day, have fun with friends, but when you go to sleep at night, tears fall from your eyes.

Even your world, your dreams have been shattered, your heart is broken because of her.

Still, you want to see her happy.

Seeing her happy, you also want to see yourself happy.

You want to move on, which is something you can never do.

Wow.

While listening to this music, I dream of a life I may never have a normal life, I suppose.

Another one.

Brothers, we're all going to make it.

Stay strong and God bless you.

The pain will leave, but memories will stay forever.

There's a lot of heartbroken men out there.

I let her go.

Not knowing the value we held.

I was a naive kid and, looking back, she would have been perfect for me, but my arrogance is my undoing, as I found myself trapped in her grasp, unable to untie myself.

But that was back then.

Now I find myself in a vast desert, looking at the night sky, having all the freedom in the world but absolutely nobody to share it with, but with a few plants and a few critters.

I'm at peace, but at what cost?

Life is not always about loss.

You have to just move on and make yourself someone better for someone new.

Someone says, honestly, it's more than just a channel, more than just a YouTube channel.

Another one, I'm older now and hoped I was the wiser.

Heartbreak is still heartbreak, but the way I process has changed a little bit.

Win, I'll always love you, but I'm taking steps to not be in love with you anymore.

It will be a long journey, as it was the last time I felt this level of heartbreak, but life keeps on moving.

I wish our paths can cross again later in life, and we have what it takes to keep our love alive.

Goodbye, my best friend, former girlfriend and one of the sweetest people to grace my life in the last ten years.

Right, I think that's probably enough.

Yes.

So this seems like a good place to end the episode.

How are you doing, listeners?

Are you still with me or have you become a skeleton with headphones on?

By the way, you can get your skeleton with headphones on listening to Luke's English podcast.

Merchandise from the LEP merch store.

For example, the mug of the skeleton with headphones on.

TeacherLuke.co.uk slash merch if you want merch.

What about that quiz from earlier?

Remember what happened to my face?

Pecked in the nose by a swan.

Crashed my bike in the street and landed on the Eiffel Tower.

Had a fight with a guy in the pub and got glassed.

Or my two-year-old son scratched me in the face in an angry outburst.

Well, of course, it's the fourth one, as you well knew.

Everyone knew, didn't you?

You all knew that that was the answer.

The others were just a bit too far-fetched.

And you know from past form that my little boy sometimes... What's the word for it?

Assaults me.

I mean, I love him...

To the moon and back.

He is just amazing.

And he's growing up quickly and nowadays he's like a lot more talkative and uh, absolutely adorable and very very, very sweet.

But like most little boys or girls um, when he gets angry about something, if something doesn't go his way, then you know, things fall apart and he might have a tantrum and that involves kicking and kicking and flailing his arms and things like that.

So yes, it was my son who scratched my nose with his nails, which was awful, but that's okay.

He apologised, the little sweetie pie.

He said, sorry, daddy.

Yeah, so it's okay.

Right.

How are you doing, listeners?

Do you want your certificate of achievement for ending the episode?

Where is it?

I put a certificate of achievement in this document.

I'm sure I did.

Give me a second and I'll do that.

I'll make one appear on the PDF in just a second.

OK, there you go.

If you look at the PDF, the very last page, you will see a certificate of achievement and a medal.

It says.

This certifies that I've listened to this entire episode of Luke's English podcast and I have the right to claim my 100 points.

Signed Luke Thompson, podcast man.

There's even a medal there for you as well.

So congratulations to you for getting this far.

Thank you so much for listening to Luke's English Podcast.

If you enjoyed the episode, give me a like.

Leave a comment with your response to anything that you've heard me say.

Recommend the podcast to your friends.

This is an incredibly long episode.

No need to say more about that at this stage.

Thank you for listening.

I will speak to you next time.

But for now, it's time to say good bye.

Bye.

Thanks for listening to Luke's English Podcast.

And the usual moments of humour and fun.

Plus, with your subscription, you will be directly supporting my work and making this whole podcast project possible.

For more information about Luke's English Podcast Premium, go to teacherluke.co.uk premium info.

[A Rambling Journey: BBC Radio, TV Series, Accents, and Life Ramblings]-[RAMBLEMANIA 🗣️ 3+ Hours of English Listening & Learning with Luke [976]]

📋 Summary

Introduction: A Long-Form Rambling Episode

Learning English with BBC Radio and TV

The Anatomy of Fingers and Thumbs

Appearance and Identity

Yoda, Haikus, and Literature

🎯Key Sentences

📝Key Phrases

📖 Transcript

[A Rambling Journey: BBC Radio, TV Series, Accents, and Life Ramblings]-[RAMBLEMANIA 🗣️ 3+ Hours of English Listening & Learning with Luke [976]]

📋 Summary

Introduction: A Long-Form Rambling Episode

Learning English with BBC Radio and TV

The Anatomy of Fingers and Thumbs

Appearance and Identity

Yoda, Haikus, and Literature

Deep Learning with ListenLeap

🎯Key Sentences

📝Key Phrases

📖 Transcript

ListenLeap Brings You Into Real Context Learning