Colloquial English 2.2: Living with People

The episode opens with Katie asking "Where are we?" and the answer coming back: "In my bedroom." "That sounds a bit strange!" she admits — and then, sitting on the bed, she starts describing colloquial expressions for Tom to guess. All ten are about living with people, or living near them: the neighbours who shout, the flatmate who never hoovers, the shared pot of money that pays the electricity bill. It's an ordinary conversation about an ordinary irritation, which is exactly why the language is so useful.

What you'll hear in this episode

The unit is built around two guessing conversations. In the first, Katie leads Tom through the noise vocabulary. His neighbours "make a lot of noise", have "big arguments" and shout, so he gets making a racket quickly — and defines it nicely: "it hurts your ears and it hurts your head". Then comes keep it down!, which the two of them agree is strong: "it's not a very friendly thing to say", and really it means "Kind of, shut up. Really." Katie shows how to soften it with Could you please….

The night owl / morning person pair produces a good hesitation — the guess "A day person?" comes first, followed by "no I'm not sure" — and then party animal, with one of the speakers admitting to six nights out a week for four or five years, and joking, "No I'm a grandpa!"

In the second conversation, Katie talks to Laura, who is "a bit under the weather" but game: "I'll give it a go." Laura offers "Haystack?" before landing on pigsty, blaming the fact that "my brain's not working properly". She explains that hoover comes from "the most popular brand of...vacuum cleaners", remembers a parent insisting "It is not a hoover!" because it was "a sore point", and describes someone who enjoys hoovering because he can "hoover stripes" into the carpet. Kitty she gets instantly — "is it the kitty?" — including the kind you make for a weekend away, where the money comes back out "in liquid form".

Quick facts

Episode	Zapp! English Colloquial 2.2 - Living with People
Episode number	2.2
Pack	Colloquial 2
Level	2
Duration	19 minutes 54 seconds
Expressions taught	10

What you'll learn

The real skill here is register — knowing which of these you can say to whom. The workbook grades every expression 1 to 3, and the conversations show you why. Making a racket is safe with almost anyone. Keep it down! is a 3, and you can hear the two speakers working out that it's close to shut up, and that adding "Could you please…" changes everything. Piss someone off is also a 3, and Laura reacts to her own answer straight away: "a bit rude though". As she puts it, "you wouldn't use it in a...formal situation".

You'll also pick up how native speakers build these into real sentences: a real party animal, an absolute pigsty, Have you done the hoovering?, stick your nose into my business. Notice how hoover works as both noun and verb, and how pigsty takes intensifiers — total, complete, absolute.

Because the guessing format leaves gaps, you're doing the same work the guest is doing: hearing a definition and reaching for the phrase. The Meaning and Pronunciation sections then give you the answer, a model sentence and a beep to repeat after, so the expressions go into your mouth rather than just your notebook.

Vocabulary from this episode

keep it down! (3) – a way to tell someone to be quiet, quite direct and a bit rude
to make a racket (1) – to make a lot of noise
a party animal (1) – a person who likes to go to lots of parties and stay out late
a night owl (1) – a person who gets up late and goes to bed late, who likes the night better than the morning
a morning person (1) – a person who likes to get up early and has more energy in the morning than the evening
a pigsty (2) – a very dirty and untidy place
to do the hoovering (1) – to clean the floors using a vacuum cleaner
to piss someone off (3) – a very informal way to say, annoy someone
a kitty (1) – when people put in equal amounts of money to pay for a shared cost, (e.g. bills in the house) it is called a kitty
to stick your nose in (2) – to want to know or find out about another person's private life

In the workbook

The workbook for Unit 2 gives you the full transcript of both conversations, so you can read exactly how Tom hesitates and how Laura talks herself towards pigsty. Then there's the graded glossary, with the 1–2–3 politeness scale and its warning about level 3: "Don't use this with your mother-in-law!!!"

Two practice exercises follow. In Practice Exercise 1 you replace the neutral words in bold with a colloquial phrase from the unit — this room is a total mess, he really annoys me, can you make less noise? In Practice Exercise 2 you rearrange jumbled words into eight real sentences, including There's no money in the kitty and My neighbours are making a racket again. Answers are included at the back, so you can mark your own work.

This workbook is part of the Zapp! English all-in-one pack — every English conversation, every workbook, every exercise, for €39 in total.

Get the complete courseAll workbooks and audio — €39

Questions

Is keep it down rude?

It's direct. The glossary marks it level 3, and in the conversation both speakers agree it's "not a very friendly thing to say" and close to shut up. Add Could you please… if you want to keep the peace.

What's the difference between a night owl and a party animal?

A night owl simply prefers being awake at night. A party animal is out at pubs, clubs and parties, night after night. You can be one without being the other.

Why hoovering and not vacuuming?

Both are correct. As Laura explains in the recording, Hoover was a brand name that became the everyday word — and hoover now works as a noun and a verb.

Is the audio scripted?

The conversations are unscripted — real guesses, real hesitations, real coughing. The teaching sections that set up the tasks and give the answers are scripted, so the instructions stay clear.

Do I need the workbook to follow the episode?

No — the audio works on its own. The workbook adds the transcript, the graded glossary and the written practice, which is where the expressions tend to stick.

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