📕 Part 1: Spending time by yourself

This episode's vocabulary

Counter-intuitive (adj.) - something that is counter-intuitive does not happen in the way you would expect it to.

Extrovert (noun) - an energetic person who enjoys being with other people.

Hassle (noun) - (a situation causing) difficulty or trouble.

Fiend (noun) - someone who likes something very much or is very interested in something.

Sink a lot of time into sth - to invest a lot of time in something.

Isolation (noun) - if something is considered in isolation from other things that it is connected with, it is considered separately, and those other things are not considered.

Glut (noun) - a supply or amount that is much greater than necessary.

Coincide (verb) - to happen at or near the same time.

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Questions and Answers

R: Do you like spending time by yourself?

M: Actually, yes. It's a bit counter-intuitive because I'm always around people and I'm a bit of an extrovert, but there are times when I'm just by myself and getting things done with a minimum of hassle. And actually it feels great. I wish I could do it more in my free time for relaxation, but I can't usually sit still long enough for that, unfortunately.

M: How do you usually spend time when you're by yourself?

R: Oh, God. Well, actually, recently I've become a bit of a social media fiend, so I'm sinking a lot of my time into that with writing, and creating content, and scheduling, and collaboration, and all of the other aspects to that. So, oh, I also took up reading comic books last year. So I do that pretty often. I got through the whole series of the boys in one see.

M: What did you do last time when you were all by yourself?

R: Um, well, it might not have been the most interesting thing in the world, but I reorganized my room when I got shot of all my old clothes and I swept the floor and I caught up on all of my YouTube content creators. And it sounds boring, but I needed to stay home because we had the cleaner in and she was doing like the other parts of the cleaning. Obviously, I wasn't completely alone because the cleaner was there, but she was focusing on her job and I was focusing on mine, so I might as well have been by myself.

M: Do you think people are more creative when they're alone?

R: Absolutely. I wrote all of my books when I was in some form of isolation. And I do all of my writing for Instagram and the podcast, when I'm sitting at my desk just well by myself for lack of a better term. And there's this common phenomenon of people being struck by inspiration in the shower or while walking to work. And you don't usually do these things with other people or you shouldn't.

M: Would you rather spend time with your friends or just stay at home on your own?

R: I think on the face of it, this will sound a bit selfish, actually, but I'd like to be on my own for a while. I spent the last month reconnecting with people and there's sort of like a social glut that I'm working my way through now. It's not so bad, though, since this coincides with a lot of work coming up. So I guess that will be by myself a lot.

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Discussion

M: Thank you so much, Rory. So when we spend time by ourselves and again

R: You can spend quality time by yourself.

M: Totally, yes, spend some quality time by myself or people. They. Spend quality time by themselves or we spend time alone or we spend time on, I spend time on my own. Yes?

R: Yes. Yes. Let's move on to the next vocabulary point that I will agree to.

M: Yeah. So Rory said it seems a bit counter-intuitive.

R: Yes. Counterintuitive just means it seems like something would go one way, but actually it goes another way in reality. And I used that specifically, because one of our listeners wrote to me on Instagram and said, could you please use the word counterintuitive in a sentence. And I have. So there you go. If you write to me on Instagram and make a request for a piece of vocabulary, as long as it's sensible and band nine level, then I will include it.

M: Dear listener, amazing news. You can order Rory, you can like place an order of words for Rory. Wow. And Rory will use them. Wow. This is amazing. Cool. So if you want a word being used by the Rory, go to our social media and post the words or phrases. Right. With a minimum of hassle.

R: Yes. So hassle is just when things are complicated or made troublesome by something. But if you do something with a minimum of hassle, then it means there is very little to no trouble involved.

M: Yeah, you can say I'm just by myself and get things done with a minimum of hassle.

R: Or I can cook an omelet with the minimum of hassle.

M: Can you cook an omelet?

R: Well, I thought I could until recently, but then for some reason, my last omelet exploded on me and I burnt my hand. So maybe it's not something I can do regularly with the minimum of hassle. So this is why you shouldn't cook with your shirt off, basically.

M: No. You should just make fried eggs like all normal men do. Just fried egg, sausages, dumplings.

R: I just, I should just get a partner to cook for me, to be honest with you.

M: Yes. Delegated. So Rory is a bit of a social media fiend.

R: Yeah. So a fiend. If you're like a something fiend, then it just means that you're obsessed with something or you got really into something. So I'm a social media fiend because I've been... I think I've scheduled to post something on Instagram every day throughout April. There's like something almost every day. And there's also something for every weekday in May and then there's something every week in June.

M: This is how Rory went from zero social media to a bomb, explosion. Now he's everywhere now.

R: There's a lot of me on social media. Too much, perhaps, to be honest with you.

M: Yeah. So I'm sinking a lot of my time into writing like blogs, creating content if you sink your time into something.

R: Yeah. So if you think your time into something, then you are using a lot of your time to do it. But an activity you can sink time into it or it can be a time sink, which means it absorbs all of your time. For example, I could say that this podcast, while enjoyable, is not a time sink for me because it's not boring. I don't have to do that much for it, I think. But it's still fun.

M: Sweet. When we talk about spending time alone, we can mention isolation. So it's a kind of form of isolation.

R: And you can be in some form of isolation. So isolation is when you are isolated from people.

M: Locked down, quarantine.

R: Well, in my case, I like was living in Africa, so there weren't that many people around to begin with in northern Ghana. Oh, and I wrote another book when I lived in Sweden. No, I lived in the city, but I spent most of my time in my apartment writing and studying. And Swedish people are not very sociable, so.

M: Oh, good for you and for the book.

R: But not for them and their culture.

M: No. So Rory was sitting at his desk. To sit at my desk. Right or not my desk like your desk. Right. And everybody was mentioning the shower again, as you all know. Well, if you did listen to our episode about decisions, I think you do know that Rory who is looking at me in a weird way has a solution shower. Yes. You might wonder, oh, Rory, what is your solution shower?

R: You might not regularly think of me in the shower, but, you know, there you go.

M: Oh, now they're thinking of you naked, Rory. So. A solution shower is you go to Rory's place, you go to the shower, you take a shower and all your problems get solved by this shower. Yeah, you have the solution just popping into your head. Yes.

R: Yes. Next.

M: So you said that, like you are struck by inspiration in the shower, and some people get struck by inspiration in the shower.

R: Get struck by inspiration, inspiration strikes. It just means that inspiration comes to you, but instead of saying inspiration came to me, I was struck by inspiration.

M: That's nice. I was struck by inspiration. A social glut.

R: Well, a glut is an overabundance of something, usually you get a glut of food or a certain kind of product, but I was using it creatively because I had too much socialization. A social glut. So I have to work my way through it, which means I have to process all of these positive feelings now and be by myself for a while.

M: So we have I'm a bit of a social fiend.

R: Social media fiend.

M: Social media fiend, sorry. And I'm sort of a social glut.

R: No, I have a social glut.

M: I have a social glut?

R: Yeah, a glut is a time when you have too much of something.

M: Right. Or there's sort of a social glut.

R: But the social glut coincides with dependent preposition. Work, which means if something coincides with something, it means they happened at the same time, like we do when we say what a coincidence, quality, all of these other remarkable things that happen all the time, Maria.

M: Scotland freedom.

R: Exactly. And hopefully we provided you with a glut of gorgeous grammar and high quality vocabulary.

M: Buckets, buckets of HIGH QUALITY vocabulary.

R: For you to work your way through after you listen.

M: Do you listen to our podcast with your friends or alone? Oh yes. So listening to a podcast is a solitary activity.

R: It must be.

M: Solitary meaning like you do it alone. It's just for you. Quality.

R: Quality time.

M: Only for you. Thank you very much for listening. We do appreciate your time and attention.

R: And we also appreciate you using our vocabulary to get a high score in your exam. Band nine. What a coincidence. Quality. Scotland freedom. Have a lovely week. Bye!

M: Bye!

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