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Conversational Vocab

Hi, Aaron here. I’m now going to talk about the vocabulary and phrases that Dan and I used in our conversation about Fauja, the elderly marathon runner.

what a coincidence

One of the very first phrases that is mentioned right at the beginning is “what a coincidence.” Dan asks me, “How many marathons have you run?” and I say, “I’ve run exactly zero,” and Dan says, “What a coincidence.” This phrase is really useful. The word coincidence is a combination of the prefix co-, which means together or with, and the word incidence, which is like a happening or an event. Basically, a coincidence is when two things, two happenings, two events, are related in a very surprising way; and that’s the key point - it has to be unexpected, surprising.

Let me give you a few examples. Let’s say you meet someone and you’re talking to them and you suddenly discover that their birthday is coming up, and you say, “Oh, well my birthday is coming up too. When’s your birthday?” and they say, “Oh, my birthday is July 10th,” and you say, “Oh my god, mine is July 10th. What a coincidence. That’s amazing! What are the chances of that happening?”

Or let’s say I’m going to New York this summer and I tell my friend, “Hey, I’m going to New York in August,” and he says, “Really? Me too,” and I say, “Oh really? When are you going?” and he says, “I’m leaving on August 2nd,” and I say, “I’m leaving on August 2nd, too! What airline are you flying with?” and he says, “Oh, I’m flying with Café Pacific,” and I say, “Oh my gosh, me too. Are you leaving in the morning?” “Yeah.” “Wow, I bet we’re on the same flight. What a coincidence! That is such a coincidence.” So, that’s how you use it.

Now, here’s the difficult part. Dan said it, but he wasn’t surprised at all. He actually meant the exact opposite of what the words mean, “what a coincidence,” so he wasn’t surprised. Dan knows I don’t run marathons and I know that he doesn’t run marathons, so when I say zero marathons and he says “what a coincidence,” he’s actually saying the opposite of what the phrase means. When you do that, it’s called using irony or being ironic. People often do this.

Let me give you a few other examples of what this might sound like. Let’s imagine that you’re going on a picnic and you’re hoping the weather will be nice and warm and sunny, but when you walk out of the house in the morning it’s raining and gray and the wind is blowing, and you say to yourself, “Oh, what a nice day. What great weather we’re having,” and really what you mean is the opposite. Or if you’re at dinner and you’re wearing a brand new expensive jacket and the waiter spills coffee all down the front, you can look down and say, “Oh, thanks a lot. Man, thank you so much for that,” and basically what you’re saying is the opposite of what you mean. That’s irony, and Dan was being ironic when he said “what a coincidence.” So, that’s the first phrase, “what a coincidence.”

still at it - still going strong

A bit later, Dan is talking about Fauja and he says, “He’s over 100 and he’s still at it,” and I say, “Yeah, most people die before they hit 89, so here’s a guy who’s 100 and he’s still going strong.” These two phrases are very similar - still at it, still going strong. We use it, again, when we’re very surprised that something is still actually working or still actually happening or still doing something beyond the limit of what we think is normal. In Fauja’s case, he’s 100 years old and he’s still at it; he’s still running marathons, he’s still at it.

Another example: Let’s say my friend Frank is building a shed in his backyard and he started at 8:00 in the morning and now it’s 3:30 in the afternoon and I say, “Where’s Frank?” and my other friend says, “Wow, he’s still at it. He’s in the backyard. He’s building that shed,” and I say, “Wow, really? This late? Man, he’s a hard worker. He’s still at it.” That’s an example of how we might say that.

Or, let’s say a retired teacher who’s still teaching classes out of her house, we can say, “Yep, she retired 10 years ago but she’s still at it. The students are still coming to her house.” Like going strong. I have an old Macintosh from 2004, I believe. It’s now 2013, so it’s really old, but it works. It’s still going strong; I can still use it. It’s a little slow, but it’s still going strong. So, that’s how we’d use that phrase, “still going strong” or “still at it.”

tops

We are talking about lifespans a few lines later and Dan asks, “I mean, what’s the average lifespan?” and I say, “Maybe it’s 80 in some places,” and Dan says, “80 tops,” and I say, “Yeah, tops.” We can use this word “tops.” We can throw it on to an estimate of some kind of measurement or level. For example, if you see a child and the child is playing the piano really, really well, at a professional level, we can look and say, “Oh my gosh, look at that kid. Look how amazing she plays the piano. How old do you think she is?” and it’s like, “Wow, I don’t know. She looks awfully young. I’d say maybe 10 years old, or 12 tops.” So, that just means the upper limit; at the most, she’s 12 years old.

Or, “What’s the speed limit around here? I notice there are a lot of cars driving really fast,” and I say, “I think a lot of people are speeding. I don’t think it’s very high. It’s probably, I don’t know, maybe 30 kph, 40 tops, but people are going 50 or 60.” That’s how you can use it.

Let me try and think of another example. If you’re bargaining for a price and you want to buy something and you’re at the market, let’s say you want to buy a new shirt and the seller says, “Well, you’re going to have to give me 50 dollars for this,” and I say “50 dollars for that shirt? Man, no way, I can’t afford that. I was hoping to pay, I don’t know, 15 or 20 tops.” That just means that’s my upper limit is 20, so I hope that guy comes down on his price. So, that’s “tops.” Remember that. Try and use it.

precipitating factor

A little bit later in the conversation, I am talking about Fauja and I say, “One of the things that impressed me about this story was the fact that one of the precipitating factors in Fauja deciding to take up marathon running was this tragedy that happened to him.” What is a precipitating factor? That’s kind of a long and difficult word to pronounce - precipitating factor - but basically it just means the thing that triggers an action, the thing that starts a movement or some kind of action. Another word for it would be ‘catalyst’. These are actually words that come from science and medicine.

Let me give you a few other examples

of how we could use this term “precipitating factor.” Let’s imagine there’s a man and he’s very old and he’s having many health problems and he’s been sick, in and out of the hospital fighting a variety of different illnesses, and then suddenly one winter, in the cold, dark part of winter, he catches the flu - influenza - and they do everything they can to help him, but it kills him. We can say that even though he had all these different illnesses, the flu was the precipitating factor in his death; that’s the thing that actually caused his death.

Or, let’s say there’s a married couple and they’re having many problems with each other; they’re arguing a lot and they’re not getting along, they get in flights easily, they’re not happy with their relationship. Both of them have thought about divorce, but neither of them wants to initiate it - it’s troublesome and it’s stressful - so they just continue onward for years like this, and then eventually the wife finds out that the husband has been having an affair with another woman. Uh-oh. Now that’s the precipitating factor; that’s the thing that gets her to finally take action and get a divorce. That’s the precipitating factor, an affair with another woman. So, that’s how you would use that phrase.

pathetic

A little bit later…we’re moving on to the next word; it’s “pathetic.” Pathetic. Have you ever heard that term before? This actually has two meanings. In the conversation, Dan says, “And just to show you what a pathetic runner I was, I would run three miles and that was really difficult for me.” Basically, what Dan is saying there is that he is a terrible runner, he’s a miserable runner, he’s inadequate, he doesn’t have the skills to actually do it…to a fault. It’s a very negative meaning, pathetic. That’s one meaning.

Let’s say you make an investment of money into something and you’re expecting your investment to grow at 10% per year, and after two or three years you look at your return and only 2% came back, and you’re very disappointed and you say, “Wow, that was just a pathetic return on my investment.”

I’m a teacher and sometimes I ask my students to write essays - this is another example - and 95% of them try their best and they write good essays, and there’s always a student or two who just doesn’t make an effort. The essay is really short and it’s full of spelling and grammar mistakes, and it is obvious that the student put in no effort at all; in fact, the effort was pathetic. It was just a pathetic effort. That just means really, really poor, really, really bad.

The other meaning of the word pathetic can mean something that evokes - which means brings about - sadness or pity or sorrow; it can make you feel really sad. If you’re walking down the street and you see this little puppy dog and it’s obvious that the puppy dog has no home and it’s losing its hair and it’s got fleas and it’s just hungry and very depressed, you can say, “Oh, that poor little dog, how pathetic.” It just means you really feel bad for it. But that’s not the meaning that we used in the conversation. So, “pathetic.” What do you know that’s pathetic? Have you seen any pathetic movies recently, with terrible actors and a poor story? Yeah, pathetic. Try and use that one.

fanning the flames

A little bit later, “fanning the flames.” This is when we’re talking about the news and the mainstream media and in response to Dan I say, “News reporting is a big one because I think the mainstream news media played a very big role in fanning the flames of this fear and ignorance through their reporting because fear sells, unfortunately.”

What does this mean, fanning the flames? Basically, if you imagine a fire burning and your goal is to put out the fire, or at least let it burn out on its own, the last thing you want to do is give the fire more oxygen by blowing on it or fanning it with a fan so that air gets to it. That will actually make the fire worse. Anytime you have a situation that is undesirable or a potential source of conflict or some sort of bad situation, you don’t want to add to it; you want to let it die down or even put it out, if possible. So, that’s what fanning the flames mean.

In this case, the media is contributing to already a problem of fear and anxiety and ignorance, and they know that and they just continue to make people more afraid and give them information that’s not helpful to the situation.

Let me think of another example. Let’s say the neighbor next door to you has complained about noise from different neighbors, not just you, so you know that person is very sensitive to noise. Well, if you decide to have a really loud party, you’re just fanning the flames of that situation. You’re making it worse. You are exacerbating it. So, don’t fan the flames unless you want to create a bigger problem.

How cool would that be?

There’s another phrase that Dan uses. He’s thinking about his own life and he says, “I’m 39 now, and I was thinking how cool would that be to be able to say that I’m in the best shape of my life at 40?” This is a good phrase that you should try to remember and use, “how cool would that be?” Basically, anything you imagine that is really, really good, really cool, really nice, you can use this with. For example, the opportunity to meet my favorite movie star and have dinner with him, wow, how cool would that be? Or, if I could get in a spaceship and go to Mars and visit Mars and come back a year later, wow, how cool would that be? Or, if I could go back in time and place a bet on that horse race that I saw last weekend, how cool would that be? Anything you imagine that would be kind of amazing or fun or interesting, you can use this phrase with. It’s a good phrase to use.

stick to

The next one is “stick to.” Stick to. This is one that I used. Dan and I are talking about making a commitment to exercising and staying in shape, and I say, “Because we’re so busy and so many things are happening in our lives, how are we going to stick to this?” Basically, that means how are we going to commit to this and continue doing it without stopping? That’s really important. If you want to achieve a goal, you have to stick to it. You have to accomplish all the steps along the way. You can’t relax or it will never happen; you have to work toward it. You have to stick to a diet if you’re on a diet. If you have an exercise routine, you have to stick to it to be successful. Any commitment you make, you have to stick to it. You can even use this as a command to someone, “Hey, stick to it.” Stay with it, keep going, don’t stop, stick to it. Make that commitment, and make it a strong commitment.

bucks

Here’s another one, “50 bucks.” We’re talking about how much money we should lose if we didn’t complete our goals and Dan says, “How about 50 bucks?” and I say, “Okay, that’s reasonable,” so Dan says, “50 bucks. If

I don’t do it I owe you 50 bucks, and if you don’t do it you owe me 100 bucks.” He’s just making a joke there, but I’m sure he’d take the 100 bucks, though. Bucks, that’s just another word for dollar.

You can use this, “How much is the new car?” “Oh, it’s too expensive. I can’t afford it. I need something that costs about 5000 bucks. I can’t afford 30,000 bucks. I need something that costs 5000 bucks.” One buck, 100 bucks, 1000 bucks…it just means dollars, that’s it.

Now, why? Why do they call it bucks? I don’t know if this is true, but I’ve heard this before and I’ve also read it on Google that a long time ago, in the late 1700s, early 1800s, when the United States was a very, very young, new country, people traded the skin of a deer - because a buck is a male deer - and that was a form of exchange. Before they started printing money on paper, they used deer skin for their currency. That was a way that they exchanged value was through these deer skins, and that’s why they were called bucks. That sounds reasonable to me. Anyway, you’ll hear that a lot, people saying bucks.

the honor system

Here’s an interesting one, “the honor system.” Dan says, “Let’s use one of those online tracking tools, and we’ll just do it on the honor system.” What is the honor system? Well, really it’s not an actual system. It sounds like a system, but it’s not. All it means is based on trust. So, we sometimes talk about using the honor system - let’s use the honor system, let’s do it on the honor system - and it just means through mutual trust, that everyone trusts everyone else to tell the truth and not to cheat. You can’t cheat. It’s on the honor system.

One example that I can give you from my own neighborhood is right down the street there is a neighbor who has an organic vegetable patch, and she and her husband grow lots of organic vegetables for their own consumption, they eat them, but they can’t eat all of them and so they often put portions of vegetables that they can’t eat, that they’ve grown too much of, on a little table outside their house. There’s a box there and they put little prices on the vegetables, so if you want some of their vegetables you can just walk up and you can take them and you put the money in the box, so that’s based on the honor system. Of course you could walk up and just take the vegetables and not put the money in, but that would be stealing and that would be dishonest. They trust the neighbors and any passersby, so they do it on the honor system and it seems to work really, really well. So, that’s good. If you can do things on the honor system, it’s a very, very good feeling.

That’s all for this conversation. I hope that was helpful. If you have any questions, please post them in our forum or send us an email.