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Vocabulary Lesson

Okay, welcome to the first Dear Abby letter and this one is called meddling mother-in-law. let’s get started, this is the vocabulary lesson for meddling mother-in-law, dear Abby.

Okay. Meddling mother-in-law.

Meddling, what does meddling mean? Meddling means to interfere or to cause a problem for somebody else. It means you get involved with another person’s life when you shouldn’t.

So, for example, the mother-in-law is causing problems for the wife. She’s doing things, the wife should be doing. She is causing problems for the wife’s life. She’s interfering, She’s sticking, we say sticking her nose in. Sticking her nose in. It means she shouldn’t be worried about this. She shouldn’t be doing something. But she does it anyway. So She’s a meddling mother-in-law.

Mother-in-law, of course, means the mother of your husband or wife, in this case, mother of the husband.

So it’s about laundry. So the mother-in-law is doing the wife’s laundry. Right? This is none of her business, she should not be doing the wife’s laundry. It’s not her own laundry. Since it’s not her own laundry, she’s meddling. She’s Meddling with the wife. She’s interfering with the wife. She’s doing things… she’s doing the wife’s job.

Okay, and the title says “wife ready to wash her hands of meddling mother-in-law.”

That’s another common phrase, to wash her hands of. Or to wash your hands of. To wash your hands of something or to wash your hands of somebody means your totally finished with them. You will never do anything for them again, you will never talk to them again, you don’t want to deal with them at all. You’re totally finished with it.

So wash her hands of mother-in-law means the wife is ready to completely forget the mother-in-law, break her relationship, not talk to her anymore, not see her anymore, nothing, she wants to wash her hands of the mother-in-law.

You could say maybe you’re tired of English or sick of English, so you say I wash my hands of English. It means you will never study English again, You’re totally sick of English, you will never do it again, never speak it again, never study it again. Hopefully, that’s not true, don’t wash your hands of English. Okay. Wife ready to wash her hands of meddling mother-in-law.

Down in the first sentence. Dear Abby, the first line says the mother-in-law is doing my laundry.

Laundry means dirty clothes. Laundry, dirty clothes that need to be washed. So if you do the laundry or do my laundry or do your laundry, it means you wash your dirty clothes. Doing the laundry means washing clothes. So the mother-in-law is washing the wife’s, family’s clothes.

And she says it started when she was on bed rest. That’s a the common phrase, to be on bed rest, to be on bed rest. It’s a phrase.

Learn the whole phrase. To be on bed rest means you must rest in your bed all day. You must stay in bed all day. Usually, because you’re sick or you have some physical problem, some problem with your body. The doctor says you need to be on bed rest. It means the doctor tells you stay in bed, rest in your bed all day. That’s what on bed rest means.

And she was on bed rest due to her pregnancy.

Due to means because. So that little phrase, two-word phrase, due to her pregnancy means because of her pregnancy. due to means because or because of. So she was on bed rest because her doctor said that you’re pregnant, you need to stay in bed and rest. you’re on bed rest.

Okay, she said she didn’t mind her mother-in-law would do an occasional load to help her out.

A load means an amount. A load is an amount. In this case a load of laundry, it means It’s the amount of clothes you put into the washer. So if you have some clothes, you put one group of clothes into the washing machine, that is one load of laundry. After you wash it maybe you have more dirty clothes, you put more clothes in the washing machine, that’s your second load. Load number two. If you have more clothes after that you put another one in, now you have three loads of laundry. So it’s the amount of laundry that goes into the washing machine at one time. That’s a load of laundry.

And then the wife says I didn’t mind that but now she does it any time she’s over to watch the kids.

So when she’s over to watch the kids. when she’s over, means when she’s visiting. We say hey come over to my house, come over to my house means visit my house. So if the mother-in-law, she says, she’s over to watch the kids it means she’s visiting to watch the kid. To help watch the kids. Come over or to be over, it means to visit.

Okay. And the woman says I’m very picky about my laundry.

Picky that’s with C, K… sound “k”… picky. You don’t say piggy with a G and that the little animal. Don’t say that.

You have to say picky with a strong CK sound…picky. She’s very picky about her laundry. It means she has very very specific ideas about how to do laundry. It means the laundry must be perfect, must be done exactly one way.

So for example, if I am picky about food, it means I will only eat certain kinds of food. The food must be exactly like I wanted. Le’ts say I’m picky about spaghetti. If they bring some spaghetti, some noodles, and I eat it and I say ohhh this noodle, it’s too hard, it’s too hard, and then the restaurant brings me more noodles and I say ohhhh these noodles are too soft, and then they bring me more noodles and then I say noodles are too hot, and they bring me more… these noodles are too cold.

Okay, it means I am very very picky about noodles. The noodles must be perfect for me. It means they must be one way only. They must be exactly how I want them. That means I am very picky about noodles. If I say Oh I don’t care hard or soft, hot or cold. I don’t care, doesn’t matter. Then I’m not picky.

Okay, this woman is picky about her laundry. It must be washed exactly like she wants it, a certain way. Maybe all the white clothes together, all the red clothes together, all the dark clothes together, must be this way. she’s very picky.

Alright and then in the next little paragraph of the letter, she says one time I told her not to do the laundry because I wasn’t done sorting it.

To sort, S-O-R-T, to sort means to organize. So it means you have a group of things and you separate them and organize. So separate and organize, equals sort, separating plus organizing, Both.

So you can imagine with clothes, you have a big group of clothes. A lot of clothes, a load of clothes and you look at them and say oh this is a red one and you put it to the left and oh this is a black one, you put it on to the right and oh this is white and you put it in another pile.

You are sorting them. Right? You’re sorting them by color. The white ones together, the red ones together, the black ones together, etc. So that means you’re sorting, you’re separating them and your organizing them. That’s to sort.

You can sort by size, all the big ones on the left side, all the small ones on the right side. Separating and organizing by size. Usually, with laundry we sort by color.

Alright, she said, my mother-in-law took it upon herself to do the laundry Anyway.

To take it upon yourself or take it upon herself, to take it upon himself. It means you decide to do something without asking. you don’t ask permission, you don’t ask if it’s okay, you just do it yourself without asking.

So she took it herself, she took it upon herself to do the laundry. It means she did the laundry, she decided to do the laundry but she never asked the wife is it okay? Is it okay? Can I do the laundry? Can I do your laundry? She never did that. She just decided, she did it. She took it upon herself without asking.

And the wife says the mother-in-law is very strong-willed.

Strong-willed means a very strong mind. It means you make a strong decision when you decide to do something you won’t change your mind. Nobody can change your decision.

So if I decide, I will eat pizza tonight and maybe you want to eat hamburgers and you say: no no AJ, let’s eat hamburger. And I say: no, Pizza. You say: please, come on, maybe… let’s eat something else, maybe we can eat Italian. And I say: okay, but only pizza. And you say: well, how about spaghetti? and I say: no pizza, pizza, pizza, only pizza.

I will not change, I will not change my mind. I am strong-willed. We sometimes say stubborn… stubborn is another word that’s very similar. Stubborn or strong-willed.

Alright and then next sentence she says, the mother-in-law does not respect our parenting.

Our parenting, parenting what does that mean? Parenting means how you take care of your children. The rules you have for your children, how you punish them, how you teach them all of that. Raising a child, we call that parenting. You can use it as a verb, to parent and it can also be a noun, parenting.

So she’s saying the mother-in-law does not respect their parenting, it means the mother-in-law does not respect their rules with the children. Their rules for the children. She does not respect how they teach their children, so the mother-in-law does not respect that, she does not follow their rules.

Okay and then finally mother-in-law often takes things the wrong way.

To take something the wrong way means to misunderstand it. Usually in a negative way. For example, if you say: AJ don’t take this the wrong way, but your English class is a little boring. And then I get angry and say: WHAT??? Why are you criticizing me? Why do you hate me? I take it the wrong way. You don’t hate me, you don’t want to be bad to me. You’re just suggesting something politely, but I get angry, I misunderstand. I don’t understand what you’re telling me, I decide that you hate me. I take it the wrong way.

So she’s worried, this wife is worried if she says something to the mother-in-law, if she says please don’t do my laundry. She is afraid the mother-in-law will take it the wrong way. The mother-in-law will think she’s attacking her, she’s criticizing her, she doesn’t like her. She will have a negative idea. She will take it the wrong way. She doesn’t want the mother-in-law to take it the wrong way.

Okay, that is all of the vocabulary for this dear Abby letter. I like the dear Abby letters because they’re very short but they have a lot of idioms. A lot of common conversational phrases, a lot of phrases you never see in textbooks or learn in school, but we use them every day in speech. So learn them. See you next time bye-bye.