📘 Part 3: Preparation and organization

This episode's vocabulary

To put something together (phrasal verb) - to combine people or things, or organize something.

Cleanup (noun) - the act or process of removing a dirty or dangerous substance, esp. when it has been left in the environment as a result of an accident.

Regularity (noun) - the fact of something happening or being done often.

To wing it - to perform or speak without having prepared what you are going to do or say.

Gathering (noun) - a party or a meeting when many people come together as a group.

To be answerable to someone - if you are answerable to someone, you have to explain your actions to them because they have the main control and responsibility.

To faff about/around (phrasal verb) - to spend your time doing a lot of things that are not important instead of the thing that you should be doing.

To get the hang of something (phrase) - to learn how to do something, especially if it is not obvious or simple.

Questions and Answers

M: Do most people prefer to prepare and organize an activity or just take part in an activity?

R: Well, given the stress involved when you have to put things like weddings and parties together, it's easy to see why more people attend them than sort them out. I mean, there's invitations to send out the actual event to manage and the cleanup after. Why would anyone want to do that with any regularity?

M: How do people feel when they are not well prepared for something?

R: Well, I imagine that comes down to the kind of person that you are or the personality you have. Some people don't mind just winging it to an event like a speech or a presentation when they know their subject matter inside out, but other people get so nervous if they aren't ready that they might even be physically sick.

M: Do people need others' help when organizing things?

R: Well, I imagine that depends on the scale of the event. No. If it's a small gathering of four or five people, how much help do you need exactly? And then, if it's something like a wedding reception, though, then you need to do a lot more, and might need a helping hand or two.

M: Does everything need to be well prepared?

R: I suppose that comes down to the expectations people have. If you're doing a job for people who have quite high expectations of you, then preparation will be fairly important so you can deliver a good job. But if it's just something for yourself, you can make a mess of it, and you're only answerable to yourself. So it might not matter so much.

M: On what occasions do people need to be organized?

R: Well, anytime they want to maximize their success, probably. In times when you need to get the most out of what you have to work with it's useful to plan in advance and get things ready so you don't waste time and resources faffing about.

M: How can parents help children to be organized?

R: I always think having a good example of living your values works best. So if you want people to be organized, you have to be organized yourself. Otherwise, what's the alternative? Just telling them won't work. They need to see it in action and live the experience to get the hang of it.

M: Yay. Thank you, Rory, for your answers.

R: No worries.

M: Organizing.

Discussion

M: So we take part in an event or activity. So we participate in something. And we also prepare and organize this activity. As a synonym, you can say we put together different activities. So we put weddings together, we put parties together, we organize them, and people attend them. So people visit these activities. Another synonym for organize different activities is sort them out. So people prefer sorting them out.

R: Organizing them.

M: Yay. And people send out invitations. They clean up after the events, and this could be a hassle, like trouble. Some people are well prepared for something, while others are not well prepared. They are messy, disorganized. And you can say that it comes down to the kind of person you are. So it depends on your character in a band eight, band nine way you should say it comes down to the kind of person you are or to a person's personality. Whinging. Did you say winging Rory?

R: Oh... Winging it.

M: Oh, winging, wing, winging it.

R: Yeah. If you're winging it, then you don't really have a plan. You do what... You don't really prepare. You just kind of feel what's right in the moment.

M: So kind of like to wing, because a wing is... Well, a wing of a plane, like birds have two wings. But to wing as a verb, oh, it seems like band nine, dear listener. Yeah. So to wing, informal, to wing it, to perform or speak without having prepared what you're going to say or do. For example, I didn't have time to prepare for the talk, so I just had to wing it okay? So just to think on my feet, unprepared.

R: Ooh, you could say that too.

M: Yeah. Could you give us another example with wing it?

R: I can't, because I never wing it. I'm always prepared.

M: Yay.

R: I had to wing it with that answer, though, because I wasn't prepared for that question.

M: Other people get so nervous that they might be physically sick. So when they're not prepared, they get physically sick. They are super nervous.

R: So here, if it's physically sick, then they are actually sick. They vomit. Let's not dwell on that.

M: It depends on the scale of the event. Scale? Like how big the event is. If it's a small gathering. Gathering? Meaning a party, an event, then you don't need any help. But if it's something like a wedding reception or a huge party for 400 people, then you need to do a lot more. And a nice synonym for the verb help is to give a hand.

R: Or to have a helping hand. Support.

M: Yeah, like people need a helping hand. So people need a hand in organizing a wedding. In organizing a wedding, right? I need a hand at my job. I need a hand with my job.

R: It could be, yeah. Or someone gave a helping hand. I need a hand with my job.

M: With my job, okay.

R: We are giving people a hand with their grammar and vocabulary.

M: Yay. When you want to say it depends on something, you can say it comes down to expectations people have. Like it comes down to something. And then a very good strategy is to use if. If... Then this. If, blah, blah, blah, then something else. And if you are doing... You are organizing something for people who have high expectations. So to have high expectations, to expect a lot from this party. You deliver a good job. So when you organize everything very well, you deliver a good job. So like you complete the job well, or you can make a mess of something. To be disorganized or mess something up. So make a mess of the party. People want to maximize their success.

R: Success with IELTS.

M: Yeah. To be successful all the time.

R: To be the most successful.

M: Yeah. And you need to get the most out of your work. And we say it's useful to plan in advance, in advance, and get things ready, get the job done, get things done. And Rory used my favorite phrasal verb, faff about.

R: Oh, yes, if you faff about, then you're just messing around, not doing anything important.

M: Absolutely. Some people prefer just to faff about, but others prefer to get things done.

R: But not me. I prefer to get things done. I don't like to faff about.

M: Yeah, Rory never faffs about, I faff about every day. That's my job. Parents should set a good example, so children are organized.

R: And they live their values. But if you live your values, it just means that you behave in a way that you would if you had these values, or if you value these particular things.

M: So children need to see it in action. So they need to see that you are organized, what you do to be organized. They need to see it in action and they need to see the experience to get the hang of it. Ooh... Nice one. To get the hang of something.

R: To learn how to do it.

M: It's an idiom.

R: Is it? Does that mean it's C-2?

M: It's C-2. Oh, yeah. Informal. Get the hang of something. Hang. Learn how to do something, especially if it is not obvious or simple. So get the hang of it. For example, you're learning, I don't know, a new program for your work, so I've never used this program before. Don't worry, you'll soon get the hang of it. Or you learn how to dance, it's difficult for you, well, I got the hang of it. Yay! Or like, oh, it's too difficult, I'll never get the hang of this.

R: Yes, you will.

M: And now. Rory's quiz time. Vocabulary Rory show.

R: Yes. This is the part of the show where I ask Maria some questions about the grammar and vocabulary I used in my answers, you can play along. So Maria, the very first question was about whether most people prefer to prepare an activity or just to take part in it. And for this one, I said you could easily understand the reasons that people had for things, but I didn't say that. I said something else.

M: It's easy to see why people do something.

R: Yes. So if it's easy to see something, it's not talking about seeing with your eyes. It could be, but here we're talking about it's easy to understand, so we are using the verb see in a very metaphorical way, which makes it closer to band nine. It's idiomatic. Nice. Then, you asked me a question about how people feel when they are not well prepared, and I used a word to describe just doing something with minimal or no preparation.

M: To wing it.

R: Or to just wing it. We are not winging this.

M: Winging.

R: Then, in question three, we talked about people needing help to organize things, and I said that they might need support, but I didn't say that. What did I use to describe the idea of getting support.

M: People might need a helping hand.

R: A helping hand or two.

M: Yeah.

R: Then I was asked if everything needs to be well prepared. And of course, it does. However, that was just for me. Other people might have different ideas about how a situation should be. But what do we call these ideas about how a situation should be?

M: Expectations.

R: Nice, and you can have good collocations with this, high expectations, low expectations, to set expectations.

M: Yeah.

R: Then we discussed the occasions when people need to be organized, and I used Maria's favorite phrasal verb. But what was that phrasal verb, Maria?

M: Faff about.

R: Yes, mess around, don't do what you're supposed to be doing. Our last question was about how parents can help children be organized? And I said that they could do two things to do this. But what was one of them?

M: Set an example. Set a good example.

R: Nice. And because you've got all of these correct, Maria, it's bonus question time. But I am extremely lazy with my bonus question today, because I gave one example of how parents could help children be organized, and you did say it. But do you remember what the other one was?

M: To be organized themselves. Oh, no, no, no. Leave, leave your values.

R: Yes. Good save. Fantastic, Maria. 100%. Well done.

M: Yeah.

R: And hopefully everyone else got 100% too. Thank you for listening!

M: Thank you very much for listening. Enjoy your life. Stay with us. Bye!

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