In the latest episode of the To Fluency Podcast, you’re going to learn 50+ English phrasal verbs that are used in everyday life.
On this page, you’ll find the audio version, the video version, and the transcript.
In this episode, you’re going to learn about a day in the life of a guy called Dave. In the story, I use over 50 phrasal verbs. After listening to the story, I’m going to teach you what these phrasal verbs mean and give you more examples.
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Transcript
This is Jack from ToFluency.com and welcome to this audio lesson where I’m going to teach you around 50 phrasal verbs, and I’m gonna do it in a way that is a little bit different than probably what you’re used to because we are going to listen to a story about a guy called Dave who lives a very interesting life, or at least I think it’s interesting.
And in that audio, which is only five minutes, there are 52 phrasal verbs. So what I want you to do in this lesson is this, listen to that story and try and listen for the phrasal verbs and to notice them when I’m saying them. And then continue with this audio lesson because I’m going to highlight and go through, which is a phrasal verb to go through, the various phrasal verbs that we use, explain what they mean, and where relevant, give you more examples.
And then after you’ve done that, I want you to then go back to the part of the audio which is going to just give you the story, so listen to the story again, because you’ll be amazed at how much better you understand it after going through the lesson. And then if you want to, as well, search for this on YouTube, 52 Phrasal Verbs To Fluency. Search for it in Google as well because I have a written lesson so that you can watch the video and also see the examples written down, written down, to write down something, which is a phrase of where we’re going to learn.
There’s some good ones here, some very common ones, some ones that you will only use in specific circumstances, and then some ones that I just think are fantastic that you probably don’t know. And a lot of those come near the end. Things like to write things down, stay out longer, to run into, cut back on, et cetera. So yeah, I hope you enjoy this lesson. Here is the audio story.
Today is Tuesday, or Tuesday in American English, and Dave’s alarm goes off at 4:30 a.m. As soon as he gets up he turns on the coffee machine, but today he has run out of cream. He usually likes cream in his coffee so he’s not had the best start to the day. But he drinks his coffee anyway and now it is time to work out. Now most people, if they work out in the morning they’ll just do a few exercises, but Dave is different. He sets off on his 20-mile run, breathing in the air as he runs along the oceanfront.
Again, his goal is to run 20 miles. After 15, he’s running out of energy and motivation, but this is Dave so he doesn’t give up. After his run, he bangs out 100 pushups without stopping. He takes a quick breath and then carries on doing another hundred, and then another. He gets home, turns on the shower, jumps in, dries himself off, and then has another coffee.
It’s now 10:00 a.m. and it’s time to focus on work. He opens up his computer, logs into his emails, and responds to his clients’ questions. In his inbox there are six speaking opportunities. He turns down five as they just don’t pay enough. He agrees to do one as it pays him exactly what he is after, but he has to iron out a few details. He remembers that he has a speaking engagement next week, so he looks up flights to New York, where the speaking engagement is, and he soon realizes he doesn’t have time to shop around for the best deal. So instead he fills out the form and books the flight business class. It’s now time to get on with writing his presentation. He doesn’t want to put this off until tomorrow or until next week.
Now in the past, he would have a cigarette while writing his presentation. But he gave them up a few years ago, because this is Dave, the new Dave. It’s time to prepare his lunch so he warms up leftover pasta from the night before. And once it’s ready, he digs in and finishes it within about three minutes. The afternoon is dragging on a bit so he makes another coffee. This time he adds in a little honey. He spends the rest of the afternoon finishing up his presentation.
Once that is done, it’s now time to chill out for the rest of the evening so he decides to text his friend to see if she wants to hang out for the rest of the day. She agrees and he heads out just before five and sets off for his friend’s house. He hasn’t seen her for a while so he’s looking forward to catching up. They grew up together and he’s worried about them growing apart so he’s very excited about seeing her. When he gets there, he pops in for a few minutes. They decide to eat out so they head out to this new, exciting restaurant. They order some appetizers. Dave is starving at this point so he wolfs them down. Sarah only picks at them.
They then go through the menu again and pick out a main meal to share. Sarah then knocks back a couple of very expensive cocktails, but Dave just drinks water. He’s trying to cut out alcohol during the week, which is pretty smart. Before heading back home, they decide to take a walk along the ocean and they actually run into an old friend from school who is there with other friends around a campfire. They decide to stay out a little bit longer. And then Dave drops Sarah off at her home and drives back home. When Dave gets home, he has enough time to write down what he has learned during that day in his journal. He then turns off the lights, gets into bed, and passes out immediately. Today has been a good day. Okay? So we had 53 phrasal verbs there.
I’m not going to go through each one in depth, but I’m just gonna repeat some of them now. So the first one, Dave’s alarm goes off at 4:30. So when something goes off it means it makes a sound. This could be your alarm on your phone. So my alarm is gonna go off at 5:00 a.m. tomorrow. I’m not looking forward to it, for example. But it could just also be a fire alarm or a car alarm. So your car alarm is going off. Could you turn it off? And turn off is another phrasal verb. The next one, as soon as he gets up. So to get up means to get out of bed.
He turns on the coffee machine. To turn on means to start it. You can turn on a light, turn on the TV, turn on anything, really, anything that has a switch. The next one is a great one, to run out of something. And in the story I said, he runs out of cream. Now, if I have coffee or tea, I actually gave up coffee a year ago now, but when I have tea, I like to put cream in it or some milk. So cream is that really thick style milk which is great in coffee and tea. But if you run out of something, it means you don’t have any remaining. So it means that you don’t have any left. And you can use this a lot in the present continuous. We’re running out of cream. We’re running out of time. We’re running out of gas. Let’s stop soon.
Now, Dave is a big fitness fan. And I said in the story, it’s time to work out. And to work out means to exercise, to exercise. An example is I haven’t worked out much this week. I haven’t worked out much this week. Now you don’t really use this for sports or walking. It’s mainly used when you want to do exercise, like go to the gym or maybe go for a run, as well, but mainly going to the gym. I then said he sets off on his 20-mile run. So to set off means to start a journey. So you can say, “We need to set off early tomorrow. “Let’s set our alarm really early. Okay?” So to set an alarm means to give your alarm the, to put it into your phone so it goes off at the right time. But to set off means to start a journey. In the story, he ran on the beach, or he went for a run on the beach, and I gave two phrasal verbs here, to breathe in the ocean air, to breathe in the ocean air. Feels good, doesn’t it, to breathe in the ocean air? So this means to inhale, to inhale something, like breathe in smoke, for example. And then the other one was he runs along the oceanfront. So to run along something means to run next to something. It could be used for other things like to run along the train tracks, to run along the road, to run along the river. Now, although he was running out of energy, which we talked about before, to run out of something, he didn’t give up in the past. He didn’t give up, and to give up means to quit, to stop doing something. Now we can use this a lot in sport. Like don’t give up now, keep going. Don’t give up now, keep going. But we can also use it for things like bad habits. Like I need to give up smoking. I need to give up fast food. And I gave up coffee, for example.
Next one related to working out is he bangs out a hundred pushups. So if you bang something out, it means you do something in a quick manner and you don’t procrastinate. You just get it done. It’s mainly used for sports. You won’t really use this much in everyday English, but if you’re watching a movie, maybe something to do with sport or to do with the Army and the Navy, then you might hear this, to bang out a hundred pushups. After exercising, Dave needed a shower. So what he did was he turned the shower on. So again, this means to start something, to turn the shower on, and then he jumped in the shower, to jump in the shower. And this just means to get in the shower. And I use this nearly every time I’m telling somebody I’m going to have a shower. I’m say, “I’m just going to jump in the shower.” And it does suggest that you’re going to have a quick shower, to jump in the shower. I’m just gonna jump in the shower. I won’t be long. So after getting out of the shower, he decided to do a little bit of work and he opens up his computer.
Now you can imagine this in your head. You can picture what is happening here. Imagine you have a laptop. It is in your bag and simply, you just open it up. So you don’t say open a computer, you say open it up. And you can also use this for presentations or files, like open up this file, open up this presentation. So open up something is used a lot with computers and work. Now the next thing he does is he logs into his emails. He logs into his emails. And this is where you enter your username and password to access your emails. And sometimes when somebody buys one of my courses I get an email saying, “I can’t log into my account. “I can’t log into my account.” So I help them log into their account. Now Dave is in demand for his services, but he turns down five offers. And to turn something down means to refuse to do it. So he turns down five offers. He refuses to do it. He says no to those offers. Now think about a job that you apply for, but it’s not quite right for you because of whatever reason, maybe they don’t pay you enough, you can say, “Oh, I have to turn that job down “because it doesn’t pay well enough. “I have to turn that job down.” Now the next one is fantastic for business English, to iron out a few details. So he has an offer, but he has to iron out a few details. And this means to resolve or to agree to some details. So often when you are agreeing to something, signing a contract, if you are an independent contractor, you might have to iron a few things out, which means say, “Okay, I’ll do it if you do this.” Or, “Let’s do it, but I need to do a bit of this.” So that means to iron stuff out. Now, the next thing he has to do is find some flights to New York. So he looks up flights to New York. To look something up, you probably already know this from using a dictionary and to look up new vocabulary in the dictionary, but we can use this for lots of things, to find information about or to research something. Often with my wife and I say, “Can you look up something for me? “Because you’re on your phone. “Can you look up what time we have to leave tomorrow?” So this just means to research something, to find more information about something. Now, Dave doesn’t like to waste time, so he doesn’t have time to shop around. He doesn’t have time to shop around. now to shop around means to consider several options and also to compare prices before making your decision. So when I am looking for some new soccer shoes, in the UK we call them football boots, I don’t like the term soccer shoes or soccer cleats. so football boots, I often shop around. And I usually, and this is another phrasal verb, I usually end up getting them on eBay because they’re a lot cheaper there. But I’ll look on Amazon as well and just other places. So to shop around means to consider several options before buying something, before making your decision. Now, after doing that, after doing his exercise and looking at flights and going through his emails, it’s now time to get on with writing his presentation. It’s time to get on with writing his presentation. So to get on with something means to spend your time doing something, to actually commit that time to doing it.
Another phrase here, if you say to somebody, “Just get on with it,” it’s a little bit critical. You’re saying, “”Look, you’re wasting time. “Just start, just start this thing, just get on with it. “Stop wasting time procrastinating “or looking up flights to New York.” And often when you procrastinate, you put things off. And in the story it said he doesn’t want to put this off until next week. So to put something off means to delay something. This is used a lot in everyday English. People will say, you know, “I keep putting off doing our taxes. “I keep putting off doing admin at home. “I keep putting off the laundry.” So this is when you just delay doing something because you don’t want to do it.
Dave is then feeling a little hungry, so what he does is he simply warms up leftover pasta. To warm something up means to make something warm, especially when it comes to food. So after cooking something, it goes in the fridge. If you have leftovers, like leftovers, and then you can warm this up again by putting it in the microwave or putting it in a pot and making it warm again. So a way to put this as a question is, “Do you want me to warm this up for you?”
I often ask that to my children if we have leftover food saying, “Do you want me to warm this up for you before you eat it?” I love this next one, the afternoon is dragging on a bit. Oh, it’s dragging on, today’s dragging on a bit. Now, if something is dragging on it means that time’s going slowly or things aren’t going as quickly as you like. So you might hear someone say, “Man, “this movie is dragging on,” which means that it’s just taking a long time to finish and it’s getting a little bit boring. So you can use this at school, for example, like, “Oh this afternoon’s dragging on a bit.” But he spends the rest of the afternoon finishing up his presentation. And this means to complete the presentation. Another example is I just have to finish up writing this email, then I can leave the office.
And then in the evening, it’s time to chill out, to chill out for the rest of the afternoon, rest of the evening. And this means to relax and to take it easy. You can also mean to not worry about something, like chill out, it’s not a big problem. Don’t worry about it. Chill out. He then calls a friend to see if she wants to hang out. So to hang out means to spend time together in a social way. And to hang out with his friend he heads out just before five. We use this a lot in everyday English.
To head out means to leave your home or your office to go somewhere else. It’s quite simple, but we use it all the time. For example, “I can’t speak right now. “I’m just heading out.” He’s excited to meet this friend because they grew up together. And to grow up together means that they spent their childhood together. And another example here related to my life, growing up in Northern England meant playing outside in the rain.
So I remember playing outside in the rain a lot because I grew up in Northern England. Now before going to eat out, which means to eat at a restaurant, he pops in for a few minutes. So to pop in means to enter someone’s house for a brief period of time. Another example is I’m going to pop round to Dave’s to pick something up. Do you notice that other phrasal verb there? To pop round, to pick up something. So we can use pop round as well as pop in.
So after getting their appetizers, which Dave wolfs down, which means he eats very quickly, whereas Sarah only picks at them, which means she eats them very slowly, they then go through the menu again. So this means to look at the menu again to see what’s on offer. And you might say to the server in a restaurant, “I’m not ready. I haven’t gone through the menu yet. “So I just need a little bit more time.” But after they do that, they pick out a main meal to share. So this means to choose something, to pick something out on the menu, to choose something. Another example is she takes forever picking out an outfit. She doesn’t know what to wear and she takes forever picking out an outfit. But Dave is trying to cut back on alcohol during the week. This means to reduce the amount of alcohol he drinks.
So another example is I’ve cut back on sugar recently, I’ve reduced the amount of sugar I want to eat. But what happens later on is they run into an old friend from school. So this, to run into somebody means to meet somebody you know by chance. I often say to Kate, “Guess who I ran into today?” And Kate is my wife, “Guess who I ran into today?” And then we play a little game. She will say, “Male or female?” I’ll say, “Male.” And then she says, “Oh, do we know them from football?” I say, “Yes,” and then she has to guess who I ran into. It’s a fun game. I like playing it. But after running into a friend from school they decide to stay out a bit longer, to stay out. So to stay out means to remain out of the home for a bit longer. Another example of that is I couldn’t stay out late on a school night when I was younger. I couldn’t stay out late on a school night. So we’re getting close to the end of these phrasal verbs now. Just stay with me because Dave dropped Sarah off at home. So to drop someone off at home means to take them home in a car.
A question you can ask is, “Can you drop me off? “Can you drop me off? “I don’t have a car today. “Can you drop me off?” And then Dave is one of those people who writes down what he has learned that day. So he keeps a journal. To write something down means to write it on a piece of paper. He then turns off the lights, which is the opposite of turn on. He gets into bed, which is the opposite of get up. And then he passes out immediately, which means to fall asleep straight away. I used to be able to just pass out when I was traveling. I could just pass out anywhere, just have a little sleep wherever I was, it was fun.
So those are the phrasal verbs that we learned in this lesson. Now if you want to see this in writing as well, just search for, ToFluency, which I’m sure you know how to spell by now, ToFluency, and then 52 phrasal verbs. So then you’ll be able to find this as a written lesson, too, so you can see exactly how to spell things. You can go through this slowly. And you can also watch the video as well on that page, or if you prefer, search for it on YouTube. And while you’re on my website, just click the blue box or the blue banner at the top where you can get a free book. It’s called “The Five-Step Plan for English Fluency” and it just goes through how to learn English in a meaningful way, where you are focused on using the right methods to improve your English. And it’s also going to give you the motivation and the resources so that you can actually think about your goals and think about how best to learn English in a way that’s going to be beneficial for you. So definitely check that out and then be sure to like this podcast, leave a review if you can, if you’re on a platform that allows you to do that, and share it with your friends. Okay. Thank you for listening and I’ll speak to you soon. Bye-bye. ♪ Do, oo, it, ah ♪
