Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 130, Allergic to Cats.
You're listening to English as a Second Language podcast episode 130.
My name is Dr Jeff McQuillan, your host, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
Today's podcast is about people who have problems when they are around animals, who are allergic to cats.
Let's get started.
When I was little, we had a family pet.
His name was Jupiter, and he was a kitten.
I wanted a cat more than anything else and finally my parents gave in and said that we could have one.
We went to the pound and saw dozens of cats of different breeds.
We went from cage to cage until we saw a little kitten at the back of one of the cages.
He looked scared, but when I picked him up he wouldn't stop licking my hand and I knew he was the one we would bring home.
When we got Jupiter home, I played with him all day.
What I noticed when I played with him was that I would sneeze a lot and I started getting hives on my arms.
My nose would also be runny, and my eyes would water.
I tried to hide these symptoms from my mother, but she noticed them eventually and told me that I was allergic to cats.
Even worse, we couldn't keep Jupiter.
That was a tragic day in my young life.
I thought I would never recover.
Then, a lucky thing happened.
Our neighbor down the street was willing to adopt Jupiter and I was able to visit him all the time, as long as I didn't get too close.
In the end, it wasn't such a terrible tragedy after all.
The title of this podcast is allergic to cats.
Allergic comes from the word allergy, A-L-L-E-R-G-Y.
And an allergy is when your body has a negative reaction to something.
Sometimes it's to the hair of an animal.
Sometimes it's to certain kinds of plants or flowers.
And what happens is often you will start to perhaps cough.
All of these, your nose can have a problem.
You can start sneezing.
Achoo!
All of these are possible symptoms, indications of an allergy, and allergic is the adjective that comes from the word allergy.
Well, today's podcast is about being allergic to cats, and cats and dogs, of course are very common for people to have as pets, And there are many Americans that have cats, sometimes many cats.
My sister has two cats.
Well, in the story, we hear about how when she was a little girl, they had a family pet.
And the pet's name was Jupiter. just like the planet Jupiter, J-U-P-I-T-E-R.
And this pet was a kitten.
And a kitten, K-I-T-T-E-N, is a small cat.
Sometimes we'll say kitty cat.
K-I-T-T-Y.
Kitty, kitten, these are all small, usually baby cats.
Well, the person in the story here wanted a cat, and finally, she says, her parents gave in.
To give in two words means that, for example, your friend is saying let's go to a movie.
Let's go to a movie.
And you say, no, I don't want to go to the movie, a movie.
And they keep asking and asking and finally you give in means, you say yes to someone who you were saying no to before.
So the parents in this story give in to their daughter, and that's how we would say it to give in to someone.
They give in to their daughter and get a kitten.
And they go to the pound and see dozens of cats of different breeds.
A pound, P-O-U-N-D, of course, can be a way of measuring how heavy something is.
I weigh a hundred and twenty pounds, for example.
Not really I wish I weighed a hundred and twenty pounds, but here the word pound is as a noun doesn't mean the weight or how heavy something is.
It means a place where animals who do not have an owner are kept.
And most cities have a dog pound or an animal pound.
So if the dog is found on the street or a cat...
They can be taken and put into this pound and the idea is that someone will then come and adopt the pet, and that's the word we would use to adopt a pet.
We also can adopt children, but here we use the same verb, to adopt.
So they go to the pound, and they see cats of different breeds.
A breed, B-R-E-E-D. for a dog or a cat or most any animal is the type of dog.
So, for example, it could be a German Shepherd.
That would be one type or breed of dog.
They look for a cat in the pound by going from cage to cage.
A cage, C-A-G-E, is where you keep an animal so that they don't leave or don't escape.
And they finally found a little kitten.
And the girl in the story picks up the kitten, and he wouldn't stop licking her hand.
To lick L-I-C-K means to take your tongue out and put it on.
Usually, for example for a cat, it would take its tongue and lick your hand.
So its tongue would touch your hand and get it wet.
Well, when they got the cat home, the girl in the story plays with him.
But she notices that when she plays with him she starts to sneeze.
S-N-E-E-Z-E.
To sneeze, as I said before, is to go... usually because there is something bothering your nose.
Well, not only did she start to sneeze, but she started to get hives on her arm.
And hives, H-I-V-E-S, are like little bumps, red bumps on your skin.
And again, that's one thing that can happen if you are allergic to something.
Well, the problems were just beginning.
The girl says that her nose would also be runny and her eyes would water.
When we say your nose is runny R-U-N-N-Y, we mean that there is liquid coming out of your nose so that you have to get a handkerchief, what we would call probably a Kleenex, which is a type of tissue, white tissue
So you blow your nose to clean it out.
But if your nose is running, that's what is happening.
If your eyes are watering, just like to water W-A-T-E-R.
When your eyes water, that means that once again there's liquid.
It's wet and liquid may be coming out of your eye.
It's kind of like crying, but it is because of an allergy.
Well, these are all symptoms of an allergy and a symptom, S-Y-M-P-T-O-M-S, symptoms.
A symptom or symptoms are indications.
They're signs.
There are ways that you can tell if you have a sickness, an illness, or some problem.
Here it would be symptoms of an allergy sneezing, a runny nose and notice, we can use runny here as an adjective.
A runny nose, watery eyes.
Once again, water becomes an adjective with a Y at the end, watery eyes.
These are all symptoms.
And what the girl finds out is that she is allergic to cats.
Well, she describes this as a tragic day in her young life.
And tragic.
T-R-A-G-I-C is something that's very sad, something that is very unfortunate, something very bad happens.
We say it's tragic, but it's very serious.
Well, she says this was a tragic day in her life.
She thought she would never recover.
To recover, R-E-C-O-V-E-R.
To recover means to get over, to get better.
So if you are sick, when you start to feel better, you are recovering.
Well, then a lucky thing happened in the story.
The neighbor who lived nearby or down the street down the street here would mean close to where they were living he was willing to adopt Jupiter.
And remember that verb to adopt, A-D-O-P-T, we use with animals as well as with children.
They adopted Jupiter and took him into their house, and then she could go visit the cat there.
She says at the end, it wasn't such a terrible tragedy after all.
And tragedy, T-R-A-G-E-D-Y, is the noun of tragic.
Tragic is an adjective.
It was a tragic play.
It was a tragic event.
And tragedy would be the noun.
We use that word, of course, in also talking about in the theater, when a play such as Macbeth or Othello, or a play by one of the great Greek playwrights ancient Greek playwrights such as Sophocles or Euripides has these great tragedies, plays in which something very terrible happens.
Well, nothing terrible is going to happen to you.
Let's listen instead to this story again at a native rate of speech.
When I was little, we had a family pet.
His name was Jupiter, and he was a kitten.
I wanted a cat more than anything else and finally my parents gave in and said that we could have one.
We went to the pound and saw dozens of cats of different breeds.
We went from cage to cage until we saw a little kitten at the back of one of the cages.
He looked scared, but when I picked him up he wouldn't stop licking my hand and I knew he was the one we would bring home.
When we got Jupiter home, I played with him all day.
What I noticed when I played with him was that I would sneeze a lot and I started getting hives on my arms.
My nose would also be runny and my eyes would water.
I tried to hide these symptoms from my mother, but she noticed them eventually and told me that I was allergic to cats.
Even worse, we couldn't keep Jupiter.
That was a tragic day in my young life.
I thought I would never recover.
Then a lucky thing happened.
Our neighbor down the street was willing to adopt Jupiter and I was able to visit him all the time, as long as I didn't get too close.
In the end, it wasn't such a terrible tragedy after all.
Remember to visit our website at wwweslpodcom for the script of this podcast and more information about our other podcasts.
From Los Angeles, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thanks for listening, as always, and we'll see you next time on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
This podcast is copyright 2006.
