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Bar Hopping

Welcome to English as a Second Language Podcast number 104: Bar Hopping.

This is English as a Second Language Podcast episode 104. I’m your host, Dr. Jeff McQuillan, from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.

Today’s podcast is about going to bars and drinking. Bottoms up!

[start of story]

A bunch of my old college friends came into town for a few days and we went out last night, bar hopping until closing time. We started around 9 p.m. and were on our third bar when we closed it down. Some of us were starving and the rest of us were peckish so we decided to get a late-night snack. We didn’t want fast food so we decided to try to find a 24-hour diner.

We passed on a chain restaurant and went instead to a dive near downtown. The six of us went in and we sat at the counter. Since the place was dead, we had it to ourselves. One of my friends, Paul, got pretty rowdy and the waitress had to tell him to chill out. He was pretty hammered so we had to keep an eye on him. He was a lightweight and didn’t usually drink much, but he was bummed out about a fight he had had with his girlfriend and decided to get smashed. I felt sorry for the guy, especially since I knew that he would have a terrible hangover in the morning. I tried to get him to drink some coffee, but he just wanted to stay buzzed.

After we left the diner, I dropped everybody off at Paul’s, since I was the designated driver. They were all crashing at his place. I made my way home and fell into bed. It was good to see my old friends but I’m definitely getting too old to party like we did in college. As the old saying goes: The mind is willing, but the body is weak.

[end of dialogue]

Today we “go drinking.” “To go drinking” means to go drinking alcoholic beverages like beer or wine or some other type of alcohol. I began, instead of saying, “Let’s get started” before the story, I used an expression we use when we are drinking, that is, “Bottoms up! “Bottoms up” means that you take the bottom of your glass and you have to drink everything in it so that it is up – facing up. So that’s an old expression, “Bottoms up!” when you’re going to drink. It’s similar to “Cheers!” or other sorts of what we would call “toasts,” and a “toast” is something you say to someone or about someone before you take a drink, like “Cheers!” for example.

The story begins with me talking about how “a bunch of my college – my old college friends,” meaning my friends from way back. The expression, “a bunch” (bunch), just means “a group of” here. So, a group of my old friends “came into town,” meaning they don’t live here but they are visiting, and they came into town for a few days and we went out last night, “bar hopping.” “To go out” means, you probably know, to go to a restaurant or go to a bar or a theater. We went “bar hopping.” And “bar hopping” – “hop” – (hopping) “hopping” – “bar hopping” is to go from one bar to another bar, to another bar and you have a drink at one bar and then you go somewhere else and you have a drink at a different bar, and maybe if you’re lucky, you’ll meet someone at one of these bars. But we went bar hopping until “closing time,” and “closing time” is the time that the bar closes. So, in Los Angeles, I believe, closing time is 2:00 AM – 2 o’clock in the morning. In some cities in the United States, it’s 1 o’clock in the morning. Closing times tend to be – usually, not past 2:00 AM. Most bars – there aren’t any, or very few 24 hour bars in the United States. Legally, the bars have to close at usually 1:00 or 2:00 AM.

Well, I say, “We started around 9:00 PM and we were on our third bar when we closed it down.” To say “we were on our third bar” means that we had now gone to our third bar, and we “closed it down,” we stayed until closing time. Now, of course, there aren’t any bars open. So, I mentioned that some of us were “starving” and the rest of us were “peckish.” “To be starving” (starving) means to be very hungry and to be “peckish” means that you’re a little hungry. That word, “peckish,” isn’t as common in English anymore that it means to be not very hungry, but a little hungry. Because we were hungry, we went to get a “late-night snack,” and a “snack” (snack) is a little something to eat. “Late-night,” meaning it was very late in the night – actually, early in the morning.

I said we didn’t want “fast food” so we tried to find a “24-hour diner.” Well, “fast food,” two words, simply means restaurants like McDonald’s or Wendy’s or Burger King, any restaurant that serves food, usually, in a minute or two. They have it already prepared or if it’s a hamburger, they fix it very quickly. These types of restaurants are called “fast food” restaurants. A “diner” (diner) is sort of an old-fashioned restaurant. Usually, in a diner, there is a counter like a long table, and one side you can sit and on the other side are the people who work there and they also, usually in a diner, have tables like a normal restaurant so you can sit at the counter or you can sit at a table in a diner. And a diner sort of has traditional food that you would find – usually serves breakfast and there are several “24-hour diners” in Los Angeles. These are diners or restaurants that are open 24 hours a day.

Well, I said that we “passed on” a chain restaurant and went instead to a “dive” near downtown. “To pass on something” means to decide not to do it or to go there, so it could be anything that you decide not to do. “My friend offered me two tickets to go to the University of Southern California football game and I passed on the tickets. I decided I didn’t want to go.” A “chain restaurant” (chain) is a restaurant that is part of a larger group of restaurants. Again, McDonald’s is a fast food restaurant but it’s also a “chain” restaurant, and a “chain restaurant” would be any restaurant that is part – that there are more than one of those, usually a part of a big company. We went to a “dive.” A “dive” (dive), as a noun, means a restaurant or a bar or some place that isn’t very well maintained, maybe a little dirty, not the best environment to go to. A “dive” is a place that – it doesn’t have a lot of nice furniture and so forth. The verb of course, “to dive” means, for example, you jump into the water, you can dive into the water – doesn’t really have any connection here that I know of. When we use it as a noun, in this case to mean a place, it means a not very nice place.

So, the six of us went in to this diner and we sat at the “counter,” and I mentioned before that the “counter” is that place where everyone can sit next to each other and they’re all facing the same direction and there are people working on the other side of the counter. I said the place was “dead” and we had it to ourselves. When you describe a place as being “dead,” you mean there’s no one there, there are very few people there. “I went to the mall the day before Christmas and it was dead.” Well, no, that would never happen. Of course, it’s – instead the opposite of “dead” would be, in this case, not “alive” but “packed,” so if you say the store was “packed” (packed), you mean it was “full,” and the opposite would be it was “dead.” There was no one there. To say “we had it ourselves” means we were the only ones there.

One of my friends, Paul, got pretty “rowdy” (rowdy). “To be rowdy” means to be loud, to be bothering other people, and we sometimes use that word to describe, for example, crowds or people at a sporting event, say a soccer game. “The crowd got rowdy” means that they got loud and noisy and were causing problems. The waitress told my friend to “chill out” and “chill out,” two words (chill) out, you probably know, means to calm down, to relax. My friend was pretty “hammered” and so we had to keep an eye on him. When we say someone is “hammered” – “hammered” (hammered) is one of the many words in English to mean that they were drunk, that they had drunk too much alcohol. The technical word would be they were “intoxicated.” “Intoxicated” means you’re drunk, in this case. And in every language, there are many words to describe someone who has had too much alcohol and English is no different. “Hammered” is one word you can use. There are many others. “Smashed” (smashed), I use in the story “to get smashed” or “to be smashed.” “To get smashed” means to get drunk. “To be smashed” means to be drunk.

I said we had to “keep any eye on” my friend. That means we had to watch him, we had to make sure he was okay. This is a general expression to mean to watch over something. So, if you are at a café and you have your laptop there, and you say to the person in the next table, “Could you keep an eye on my laptop while I go to the restroom?” You’re asking them to watch it, and, of course, you come back from the restaurant and they’re gone and so is your laptop so don’t do that. The friend of mine I was talking about, I described him as a “lightweight.” A “lightweight” here means someone who can’t drink very much alcohol before they get sick or before they get drunk. The opposite of the “lightweight is not a “heavyweight.” You might think so. I don’t know if there’s a good opposite of “lightweight,” but a “lightweight” when it comes to drinking is someone who can’t drink very much without passing out, without going unconscious or getting very drunk.

My friend decided to get “smashed,” to get drunk, because he had a fight with his girlfriend – sounds like an old story, a familiar story. And he was “bummed out.” “To be bummed (bummed) out” means to be sad, to be very depressed, to be disappointed. That is to be “bummed out,” and sometimes people will just say, “I’m bummed,” and that’s an informal expression again, to mean I’m sad. In England, in Britain, they use the word “bum” (bum) to mean what we would call in the United States your “butt” or your rear, what you sit on. I was worried my friend would have a terrible “hangover” the next morning because he drank so much. A “hangover,” all one word (hangover), is if you feel badly or feel sick after you’ve drank too much. Often the next morning, you wake up with a headache and you may have a stomach ache. That’s called a “hangover.” It comes from drinking too much alcohol. Of course, none of our listeners of ESL Podcast would ever do that.

The friend of mine, I said, didn’t want to drink any coffee, and of course, traditionally, coffee is supposed to help you get over begin drunk. I don’t know if it does or not. But my friend said he just wanted to stay “buzzed,” and “buzzed” (buzzed) is just like “smashed” and “hammered.” It means intoxicated, drunk. I said that after we left the diner, I dropped everyone off at my friend Paul’s since I was the “designated driver.” The expression, “designated driver,” two words, is a noun that refers to the person who decides they’re not going to drink or drink very much so that they can drive everyone else from bar to bar and then to go home.

Places like Los Angeles, there aren’t very many possibilities for public transportation and a taxi would be very expensive so sometimes friends will say, “Well, you don’t drink tonight,” or, “Don’t drink very much so you can drive,” and this term, “designated driver,” has been around for about maybe 20 years. When I was in college, this was something that people were talking about.

My friends decided they were all going to “crash at Paul’s place.” “Crashing” or “to crash” means, here, to sleep, usually temporarily, for one night or a couple of nights. Someone who is visiting you from another state or city might say, “Can I crash at your place for a couple of days” – means can I stay at your house or apartment for a few days while I’m visiting. I said that it was good to see my old friends but that I was getting “too old to party like we did in college.” The verb here, “to party,” means, of course, to go out, have a good time, maybe drink. I end the story with an old saying, “The mind is willing, but the body is weak.” This means the mind, your brain or what you want to do – you’re willing to do something, you want to do something but your body isn’t strong enough. Your body is weak. And when you get old, you will know what I mean.

Now let’s listen to the story at native rate of speech.

[start of story]

A bunch of my old college friends came into town for a few days and we went out last night bar hopping until closing time. We started around 9 p.m. and were on our third bar when we closed it down. Some of us were starving and the rest of us were peckish so we decided to get a late-night snack. We didn’t want fast food so we decided to try to find a 24-hour diner.

We passed on a chain restaurant and went instead to a dive near downtown. The six of us went in and we sat at the counter. Since the place was dead, we had it to ourselves. One of my friends, Paul, got pretty rowdy and the waitress had to tell him to chill out. He was pretty hammered so we had to keep an eye on him. He was a lightweight and didn’t usually drink much, but he was bummed out about a fight he had had with his girlfriend and decided to get smashed. I felt sorry for the guy, especially since I knew that he would have a terrible hangover in the morning. I tried to get him to drink some coffee, but he just wanted to stay buzzed.

After we left the diner, I dropped everybody off at Paul’s, since I was the designated driver. They were all crashing at his place. I made my way home and fell into bed. It was good to see my old friends, but I’m definitely getting too old to party like we did in college. As the old saying goes, “The mind is willing, but the body is weak.”

[end of dialogue]

That’s all we have time for today. From Los Angeles, California, I’m Jeff McQuillan. We’ll see you next time on ESL Podcast.

ESL Podcast is a production of the Center for Educational Development in Los Angeles, California. This podcast is copyright 2005. No part of this podcast may be sold or redistributed without the expressed written permission of the Center for Educational Development.