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Hello English learners, welcome back to another edition here with us at EnglishPod. My name is Marco

and I’m Erica

and today we are doing the third part of our old English series. And today we’re transported back to the 1970s.

That’s right. So we’re going to learn some 1970’s slang, some phrases that were really popular back in the 70s but are also still in use today.

Exactly. So it’s going to be a very cool lesson today. And before we start with the dialogue, let’s take a look at some of the words that we’re gonna find in vocabulary preview.

Vocabulary preview

Well, we have two words for you in vocabulary preview and they’re both found in the dialogue. The first one: roller rink

a roller rink

a roller rink

okay, so a roller rink, let’s break that down and let’s look at the first part.

All right, so roller, we might recognize this from roller blades or rollerskates.

Okay, so yeah, when you go rollerblading, rollerskating, those things that you put on your feet to skate

Right, wheels, not like a blade or a knife.

Exactly, so that’s roller and what about rink?

Rink is the place where you do skating

okay so if you go to a roller rink it’s this big area where everyone can roller blade or rollerskate

that’s right

okay and what about the next word?

a block

block

a block

okay, so this is a noun, a block

and a block is a part of a city that is surrounded by four streets.

Okay, so a city is made up of many blocks

yeah

and everyone lives on a block

exactly, so it’s a square within the city

all right, very good. So these are the two words that we previewed and we’re gonna listen to them now in the dialogue. We’re gonna hear two guys just talking about normal everyday things but we’re going to be listening to them in 1970s.

A: Hey man! How’s it hanging?

B: Hey man! Everything is just groovy baby!

A: Did you go to the roller rink on Saturday? I heard it was far out, man!

B: I wanted to, but I ran into this foxy lady that just moved to my block! I was chatting her up a bit and then we mellowed out at her place.

A: Right on, right on! Well, Jim went to the rink with Sherry and he said it was dy-no-mite! He was low on bread, but Sherry paid for everything.

B: Gravy! Jim is such a jive turkey man. He is always hitting me up for cash. Anyway, you wanna book and go grab some grub?

A: Yeah man, I’m starving!

Okay, groovy dialogue.

Yeah and really nice

All right, so some interesting language in here. Like we’ve said, it sounds a bit strange but a lot of this is still used today in modern English. So why don’t we look at some of these words in language take away.

Language take away

all right in language take away today we have the first word: far out

far out

that was far out

to be far out

okay, so it’s just another way of saying

cool

cool

that was nice

yeah

it was really cool

yeah

so they went to the roller rink. It was far out. It was really cool but the other guy couldn’t go because he saw a foxy lady

a foxy lady

okay foxy lady

so basically a foxy lady is a really good looking or sexy woman

right, commonly you would hear some men refer to an attractive woman as a fox.

Okay, so foxy lady. Now Marco can we say a foxy man? No, this is a phrase that you would only use for women.

Okay, so foxy lady

foxy lady

so after he met up with the foxy lady, they both just decided to mellow out at her place

to mellow out

to mellow out

okay, so mellow out, what does this mean exactly?

Basically just to relax.

Right, so to relax, to take it easy, to mellow out

so what did you do on the weekend?

Nothing, I just stayed at home and mellowed out.

Okay. All right and so the response to that was:

right on

right on

right on

right, right on, right on

and so basically they’re saying: okay, good, I agree

yeah, this phrase, you can see is good, yeah that’s nice or you can also say as well correct, I agree. So why don’t we listen to some examples of how we can use this word in other situations.

example 1

Right on, you got a high score. That’s amazing.

example 2

You got the job? Right on.

example 3

Jenny was right when she told me she thought Rick was no good for me. I should have listened to her.

Okay so I think that’s pretty clear. We can see how it means correct or also okay, good.

All right, right on. And now we also have another word that’s similar to far around, he said gravy

gravy

gravy

gravy

now if you look it up in a dictionary, it’s going to tell you something else, right?

Gravy is a sauce you put on meat.

Right, but in this case we say gravy is cool. It’s nice.

Yeah

all right, so gravy

that was gravy. Now, finally at the end of their conversation they said wanna book.

Okay, let’s book

book

so to book as a verb

yeah, interesting verb. It basically means to leave a place quickly.

Okay, so we have to book. The police are coming.

Right, or I gotta book guys. I’m late.

So, book, to leave quickly, to leave suddenly

Yeah and that word is used quite commonly today isn’t it?

Yeah, yeah. It’s used among like younger people. You would say, yeah let’s book. This party is dead.

Okay, great. So there’s a lot of pretty cool phrases in this dialogue, pretty groovy phrases. Why don’t we hear them again in context.

A: Hey man! How’s it hanging?

B: Hey man! Everything is just groovy baby!

A: Did you go to the roller rink on Saturday? I heard it was far out, man!

B: I wanted to, but I ran into this foxy lady that just moved to my block! I was chatting her up a bit and then we mellowed out at her place.

A: Right on, right on! Well, Jim went to the rink with Sherry and he said it was dy-no-mite! He was low on bread, but Sherry paid for everything.

B: Gravy! Jim is such a jive turkey man. He is always hitting me up for cash. Anyway, you wanna book and go grab some grub?

A: Yeah man, I’m starving!

Okay, so now that we understand these six words that we saw in language take away, it’s time for us now to take a look at some great phrases that we can use today in fluency builder.

Fluency builder

Okay, so at the start of the conversation, there was an interesting way he started talking to his friend, right?

All right, he said how’s it hanging

how’s it hanging

how’s it hanging

okay, so basically, how is it going

how’s it going, how are you. Now you noticed in the spelling that we do have a G at the end, ING, right?

Yeah, but usually you don’t really pronounce the G in this context cause it’s very informal, so how is it hanging

how’s it hanging. So he said everything was just groovy and then he started telling him about how he met a girl and he chat her up a bit.

to chat her up

okay, so to chat somebody up

so when you chat someone up, you talk with them, right?

Yeah, you’re making conversation

but it’s sort of, it’s more than just conversation isn’t it?

yeah you’re trying to be a little bit flirty and maybe saying nice romantic phrases or something like that

yeah. So usually it’s between a woman and a man

right

and it’s the man who chats up the woman.

Yeah, exactly.

So little bit of a sexist phrase here.

to chat someone up or to chat up a girl, right? Okay, so he was chatting her up.

That’s right and so they were talking about how Jim went to the roller rink but he didn’t have any money, right? Because Jim is always hitting his friends up for cash.

Okay, so to hit someone up

to hit someone up

so before we explain this word let’s listen to some other examples so then we can maybe understand the meaning.

example 1

Can you believe Patrick, he came up to me a month ago and try to hit me up for some money.

example 2

When I was a kid I used to always hit my dad up for lunch money.

example 3

This is the last time I lend you money. Don’t even try to hit me up for more.

All right, so when you hit someone up for something you ask for it.

So usually it’s to ask for money, right?

That’s right

okay so to hit someone up. And now for our last phrase: let’s book and let’s go grab some grub

to grab some grub

grab some grub

okay let’s break this one down. With the final word grub what are we talking about?

grub is an informal way of saying food.

Okay, so to grab some grub is to get some food quickly.

Yeah, let’s go get some food.

alright so maybe it’s time for us to grab some grub and while we’re doing that you can listen to the dialogue one last time.

A: Hey man! How’s it hanging?

B: Hey man! Everything is just groovy baby!

A: Did you go to the roller rink on Saturday? I heard it was far out, man!

B: I wanted to, but I ran into this foxy lady that just moved to my block! I was chatting her up a bit and then we mellowed out at her place.

A: Right on, right on! Well, Jim went to the rink with Sherry and he said it was dy-no-mite! He was low on bread, but Sherry paid for everything.

B: Gravy! Jim is such a jive turkey man. He is always hitting me up for cash. Anyway, you wanna book and go grab some grub?

A: Yeah man, I’m starving!

All right, so some interesting phrases and even though some of these words you may not really commonly hear anymore, they might still be used in movies or something that’s related to the disco era because it’s very very popular still, right?

Yeah, that’s right. Some of our more advanced users could even use a lot of these phrases in a kind of funny way to reference back to 1970.

Yeah, exactly. So it’s fun and well, you will use them or you will hear them from time to time, even today.

And remember if you have any questions about the language you hear in these lessons check out our website at Englishpod.com.

Exactly, we’re there to answer any questions and we’ll see you guys there.

Thanks for listening and until next time, goodbye.