M: Do you like meeting new people?

R: Sometimes. Yes. I think it depends on what sort of mood I'm in and what the new people are like, really. So if they're calm and personable and interesting to talk to, then I enjoy myself. But if they're complaining or not very interesting to talk to, I really struggle to make a connection.

M: How important are friends to you?

R: Extremely... I don't think I could enjoy my life without the people who are close to me. You need people in your life to enjoy it with. Otherwise, well, there's no point to it, really, is there?

M: Do you often go out with your friends?

R: Well, not as much as I used to. Sometimes we head down to the cinema or a restaurant, but I much prefer seeing them in their homes, where it's calmer and there are fewer randoms and distractions.

M: Where do you often meet each other?

R: Well, like I said, it's usually in our homes, more often than not. Though, I have been going out to a few restaurants of late, and that's been fun.

M: What do you usually do with your friends?

R: We usually chat and talk about our lives, which is often punctuated by the occasional music video or short video on YouTube. And if it's a hobby like rope climbing, then we talk about how to solve the various issues connected with that too.

M: Hey, friends! Rory, can we paraphrase friends? Can I say like people I know, close people? Or can I say acquaintances?

R: I feel like an acquaintance is just someone that you've met and you know, but he might not necessarily be your friend.

M: So if just I know some people, but not very well, I can say they are my acquaintances, but acquaintances is a formal word. Can I just call them friends? Oh, they're some friends of mine.

R: Yeah, um, I'm trying to think now of any, of any other way to say that. Your pals? Can we say pals? Is that okay?

M: Your pals. Yeah, pals like friends. It's more informal than friends. But pals, when we say pals, we mean girls or boys, right?

R: Oh, yes. In the same way some people use the word mate to mean friend. M, A, T, E.

M: Because it's interesting. In English, like, we only have this word friends, and we mean like, everybody. But in other languages, we have like, we might have different words to mean a close friend or like acquaintance. Yeah, but in English, like acquaintances is a very formal word. So friends, close friends, people, I know. You can say acquaintances, dear listener, if they are not your close friends, my pals, my people. And we enjoy meeting new people, or we don't enjoy meeting new people. You can say when, when I'm in the mood.

R: Or it depends on what sort of mood you're in, which means it depends on how you're feeling.

M: Yeah, if I feel like meeting new people, it's okay, right? But if I'm not in the mood, I don't like meeting new people.

R: Is that a conditional?

M: Yes, if.

R: Oh my gosh, it was two conditionals. Because I said if they're calm, personable and interesting to talk to, but if they're complaining and not very interesting, then I really struggle to talk to them or to make a connection.

M: Yeah, if you struggle to make a connection, it's difficult for you. Like we make a connection. We kind of meet new people and make a new connection. Who are personable people?

R: Oh, people who are personable are just easy to talk to and get along with.

M: Yeah, a personable person, a personable person having a pleasant appearance or character. Rory is intelligent, hardworking and personable. Here you can say, I don't think I could enjoy my life without the people who are close to me, so without my friends. And here we make, I don't think negative. I don't think I could enjoy my life without close friends.

R: Oh, we missed a good collocation for make though, you make a connection when you form a friendship.

M: We go out with our friends. Go out and do something. We hang out with our friends, like meet them, do something. So we can eat out. We eat out every week, or stay in, stay indoors. And you can say that sometimes we head down to the cinema. So sometimes we go to the cinema, or we head down to the cinema. Like head? Like your head, where your face is. Head down. And again, Rory, why do we have this strange English? Why it's this down to the cinema? Why it's not up to the cinema?

R: I suppose it could be head up to the cinema, to be honest. I've never really thought about it before, probably because the cinema is located down the street from where I live. Of course, it could also be along the street as well. So you can head along to the cinema as well.

M: Yeah. Or we head down to a restaurant, we go out to eat. If you stay in, if you stay indoors, you can say that I prefer seeing my friends in their homes. Or I usually go to their place. I go to their place, their place, their flat, their house, their apartment, where they live. So I prefer seeing them in their homes. And you can say like, well, we usually stay in. We don't go out, because there are fewer randoms. Randoms are people, right? Like random people.

R: But they're random people. They're not friends.

M: Because if you go to a cafe, you see a lot of like randoms, a lot of different people who might be disturbing. A random, an unknown or unexpected person, hmm. Actually, it's C1 word.

R: Is it? Oh, wow. So that's band seven or eight.

M: Yeah. And mind you, there are fewer randoms. Okay? Fewer, not less.

R: I mean, you could say less, that's a native-level mistake, surely. But if you say fewer, then people will be very impressed.

M: Yeah. So if you stay in, there are fewer randoms or distractions. Like in a cafe, different noises, strange people, fights. You know? I meet my friends in their homes, or I go to their places. We meet indoors, or sometimes we go to cafes restaurants. We can go to a park, to a forest, swim in rivers.

R: Maybe not at this time of year. It's too cold.

M: Ah, no? You don't do winter swimming.

R: Um, I've taken a break from it, just because we've been so busy. But now I've just realized how cold it is, perhaps it's best to wait until spring.

M: Yeah, just because there's ice. So I just don't go swimming. There's this ice on the river. You can use the present, perfect continuous, like lately or recently, I've been going to a few restaurants with my friends. So I've been doing this. I started doing it. I'm doing it, and maybe in the future, I will be doing it. So I've been going, I've been going, I've been going to a few restaurants. You can say we usually chat. We talk about our lives. We gossip. Gossip? You talk about private details of other people's lives, about celebrities, like, oh, she married this and that. So we enjoy gossiping about everybody. And Rory, here you've used the word punctuated.

R: Oh yes, but that's a, I'm gonna guess that's a C2 level way of using this word. So punctuated just means that it's a... I can't think of a really simple way to describe this actually. Oh, maybe I can. I was going to say, it just occurs regularly. But I didn't think that was, that was simple enough. But I've just checked the dictionary there, and it does say occurs at intervals throughout. So yes, it's something that happens from time to time, over a period of time.

M: Could you give us another example?

R: Well, usually when you're talking to your friends, it's punctuated by laughter. I would hope so anyway.

M: Okay. Yeah. So you can say that sometimes we watch music video or videos on YouTube, on YouTube. And also we talk about our hobbies, our issues, discuss our problems. And now, Rory, I'm gonna give you some activities which you can do with your friends. Your task is to choose an activity to do with your friends. Okay? And dear listener, you too, you should choose one or two activities that you want to do with your friends, and you might talk about them in the test. Also, you can paraphrase your friends like, oh, my girls. I enjoy watching YouTube videos with my girls. If you're a woman and your friends are girls. Or with my boys, for example. With my mates, with my pals. All right. So the first activity to do with your friends. Have an at home spa day, Rory. So you stay at home and have massages and manicures. You have your nails done by your friends. You have, like facial masks. A spa day. Number one. Number two, host a closet cleaning party. A closet is a wardrobe where you keep your clothes. So you kind of invite your friends, and you clean your closet from the things that you don't need, from your clothes. So you have some cocktails and... So these are the clothes I don't need, you know? Okay. Interesting. Number three, play some board games. So you play some board games like a monopoly, some over a drink or two. Number four, manifest your dreams with vision boards. So you invite your friends over, and you cut out different things from all magazines, and you put the pictures on this, I don't know, paper, big paper. And this is your life of your dreams. And you kind of, you make it yourself, you know?

R: So what runs with the shortlist one more time?

M: Okay, okay. So number one, it was a home spa day, then a closet cleaning party, where you get rid of the clothes that you don't need. Play some board games. Then manifest your dreams with a vision board. You create a life of your dreams. And the last one, make a time capsule. You have a capsule, and then you put 10 items in this kind of box, and then you bury it, you put it underground for 10 years, and then in 10 years, if you stay in touch with your friends, you just take out this capsule and look at the items. Ah, dear listener, I don't know. Oh, and bird watching, yes, you go to a park and watch some birds. Yeah, bird watching. So Rory, what's your choice? Come on.

R: The board games. That's easiest to set up.

M: Okay. No bird watching, no spa day, no? Capsule? No?

R: Not in this weather, no. And also just the time capsule. I don't even know how we would begin to go about setting that up.

M: Right, dear listener, now you have some ideas, and you can do something fun with your friends, like tomorrow. Okay? Yeah. And also I have a joke to wrap things up. So, Rory, why does Dracula have no friends? Dracula, you know, the vampire? Dracula. So why does Dracula have no friends? Because he's a pain in the neck. Dracula is a pain in the neck, dear listener. Did you get the joke? Did you get it? Dracula is a vampire, so he bites everybody, and usually, it's like a neck bite, yeah? And he sucks the blood out. So why does Dracula have no friends? Because Dracula is a pain in the neck. Where he bites people to suck their blood. Hahahaha. Rory, where's your laughter? Come on.

R: My laughter is pending. That was a terrible joke.

M: Okay. Thank you very much for listening, and we'll get back to you in our next episode. Bye!

R: Bye!

M: Actually, I've read the Dracula book. It's fun.

R: You have?

M: It's very nice. You know, dark, dark and this like Makamba, dark story. So dear listener, if you are, you know, in the mood for some, you know, darkness, yeah, feel free to read Dracula. Yeah, nice. Nice one.

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