Bob's Short English Lessons

Learn the Meaning of the English Term DILLY-DALLY and the Phrase TO GET MOVING

February 19, 2021 Bob the Canadian Season 1 Episode 95
Bob's Short English Lessons
Learn the Meaning of the English Term DILLY-DALLY and the Phrase TO GET MOVING
Show Notes Transcript

Read along to practice your English and to learn the English term DILLY-DALLY and the phrase TO GET MOVING

In this English lesson I wanted to help you learn the English term "dilly-dally." Now, this is an older word that sometimes old people say, but Jen and I actually use this term a lot. When you dilly-dally, it means you move slowly, or you, if you're supposed to be working, you're just laying on the couch. Sometimes our kids dilly-dally around when they're supposed to be cleaning their room. So that means instead of cleaning their room, they're just on their phone, or they're just laying on the couch doing nothing. It's not good to dilly-dally around. Oftentimes when I was a kid, my mum would say "Don't dilly-dally around, get to work, get your work done," and then I would get it done. So an older phrase, kind of a funny thing to say, or an older term, kind of a funny sounding term, but you should not dilly-dally around. When it's time to study English, don't dilly-dally, just get studying.

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The second phrase I wanted to teach you today is the phrase "get moving," and this is the opposite of dilly-dallying around. If you are doing nothing and you need to get a job done, you need to get moving. This is similar to the phrase, "Get a move on." I think I taught that phrase a few months ago. When you say to someone, "Get a move on," you want them to get starting, get started. When you say to someone, "Hey, get moving," it doesn't mean like physically moving. It can, but it usually means you need to get started. When I was a kid working on the farm, my dad would say, "Hey, let's get moving. "Let's get this job done. "The sooner we get started, the sooner we're finished." So I needed to get moving.

To review, the term "dilly-dally" is to sit around and do nothing when you're supposed to be doing something, and the phrase "get moving" means that you need to get started or you need to get going on a job that you need to do.

But hey, let's look at a comment from a previous video. This comment is from Cat's English and Cat's English says, "I have a knack for writing stories. "I have written some stories "based on my daughter's school life." And my response was, "That is awesome. "Writing is an awesome talent to have. "I wish I had time to write more."

So Cat, thank you for that comment. That is cool that you are a writer, or that you enjoy writing. For me, writing is something that I do enjoy doing as well, but it takes a lot of time. When I write something, I never feel like it's good, and I want to rewrite it a whole bunch of times, because I want it to be perfect before I let anyone see it or before I read it to someone. So I have done a little bit of writing, but probably not as much as you have, so very cool. I hope a lot of you out there enjoy writing. The enjoyment of writing goes along really well with learning English. It's good to have that skill when you're learning a language like English.

Hey, I have to apologize for yesterday's video. For some reason, the video got cut short. When something gets cut short, it ends before it's supposed to end. I'm not exactly sure what happened yesterday. As I was reading the comments, I noticed some people saying, "Hey, the video got cut short," or, "The video ended early." So I went and looked and there is like 12 seconds missing or something like that. I don't know what happened. I'll make sure that doesn't happen with this video today, though. I'll make sure that it doesn't get cut short.

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In this English lesson I wanted to help you learn the English term "dilly-dally." Now, this is an older word that sometimes old people say, but Jen and I actually use this term a lot. When you dilly-dally, it means you move slowly, or you, if you're supposed to be working, you're just laying on the couch. Sometimes our kids dilly-dally around when they're supposed to be cleaning their room. So that means instead of cleaning their room, they're just on their phone, or they're just laying on the couch doing nothing. It's not good to dilly-dally around. Oftentimes when I was a kid, my mum would say "Don't dilly-dally around, get to work, get your work done," and then I would get it done. So an older phrase, kind of a funny thing to say, or an older term, kind of a funny sounding term, but you should not dilly-dally around. When it's time to study English, don't dilly-dally, just get studying.

The second phrase I wanted to teach you today is the phrase "get moving," and this is the opposite of dilly-dallying around. If you are doing nothing and you need to get a job done, you need to get moving. This is similar to the phrase, "Get a move on." I think I taught that phrase a few months ago. When you say to someone, "Get a move on," you want them to get starting, get started. When you say to someone, "Hey, get moving," it doesn't mean like physically moving. It can, but it usually means you need to get started. When I was a kid working on the farm, my dad would say, "Hey, let's get moving. "Let's get this job done. "The sooner we get started, the sooner we're finished." So I needed to get moving.

To review, the term "dilly-dally" is to sit around and do nothing when you're supposed to be doing something, and the phrase "get moving" means that you need to get started or you need to get going on a job that you need to do.

But hey, let's look at a comment from a previous video. This comment is from Cat's English and Cat's English says, "I have a knack for writing stories. "I have written some stories "based on my daughter's school life." And my response was, "That is awesome. "Writing is an awesome talent to have. "I wish I had time to write more."

So Cat, thank you for that comment. That is cool that you are a writer, or that you enjoy writing. For me, writing is something that I do enjoy doing as well, but it takes a lot of time. When I write something, I never feel like it's good, and I want to rewrite it a whole bunch of times, because I want it to be perfect before I let anyone see it or before I read it to someone. So I have done a little bit of writing, but probably not as much as you have, so very cool. I hope a lot of you out there enjoy writing. The enjoyment of writing goes along really well with learning English. It's good to have that skill when you're learning a language like English.

Hey, I have to apologize for yesterday's video. For some reason, the video got cut short. When something gets cut short, it ends before it's supposed to end. I'm not exactly sure what happened yesterday. As I was reading the comments, I noticed some people saying, "Hey, the video got cut short," or, "The video ended early." So I went and looked and there is like 12 seconds missing or something like that. I don't know what happened. I'll make sure that doesn't happen with this video today, though. I'll make sure that it doesn't get cut short.

Hey, I wanted to mention a few things as well. One is that people were commenting on how beautiful all of the white snow is behind me and how they couldn't believe that it was still winter and still white here. Well, you'll notice I'm not wearing gloves today, and I'm just wearing actually a short sleeve shirt under my coat. It's starting to get a little bit warmer. It's still minus three right now. You might think I'm crazy for being outside in minus three weather with just a short-sleeved shirt on underneath my coat, but it's actually quite comfortable. I'll be honest, my fingers are a little bit cold, but you know, I'm Canadian. This is just what it's like in the winter. I think I've said that too many times. I'll see you next week with another short English lesson, have a good weekend.