Clothes & Fashion Idioms: Zapp! English Colloquial 3.1

We set Amanda a challenge: Katie describes an English expression, Amanda has to name it, and every answer hides an item of clothing. It works better than it sounds. When the clue is "a piece of underwear for women", Amanda reasons her way there out loud; when the answer is put your thinking cap on, she gets stuck on "the brain, the head, the top of the head" and then laughs at herself: "That was a blonde moment there." Ten expressions, two rounds, and a lot of laughing in between.

What you'll hear in this episode

Katie and Amanda work through ten colloquial expressions in two conversations, split by short pronunciation practice.

The first round starts with below the belt — Katie sets it up by imagining she has said something mean, and Amanda talks her way in through "lowering...the tone of the conversation" before landing on the answer. Then to tighten your belt, which prompts a good aside about the current economy and the honest reply: "I can't tighten it any more." Put your thinking cap on takes a few clues. Then two ways to tell someone to calm down: don't get your knickers in a twist and keep your shirt on — with Katie throwing in "Calm down luv!" and a variant most course books miss, keep your hair on. Amanda's gloss is the memorable bit: "don't turn into the incredible hulk and rip it off".

Round two covers put yourself in someone else's shoes — where both speakers admit they don't always manage it — and all mouth and no trousers, which Amanda can't retrieve at first: "It's on the tip of my tongue." Then I'll eat my hat, alongside a family alternative one of the hosts remembers: "I'll go eat hay with a donkey". Finally a fashion victim, with it and fashion conscious, illustrated by 1980s photographs full of "awful, awful flowery jumpers and rah-rah skirts" — and the verdict, "But now I just want to burn those photographs."

Quick facts

Episode	Colloquial 3.1 – Clothes & Fashion
Pack	Colloquial 3
Level	3
Duration	15 minutes 45 seconds
Speakers	Katie and Amanda
Recorded	Tom's flat in Barcelona
Audio	Free
Workbook	Included in the €39 all-in-one pack

What you'll learn

Ten expressions, and — more usefully — a sense of how native speakers hunt for a word they can't quite reach. Amanda doesn't produce clean answers. She circles: "sort of lowering...the tone", "With their viewpoint", "Perspective", "it's literally, putting yourself in the other person's place". That paraphrasing is a skill in itself, and hearing it modelled at speed is worth as much as the idioms.

You'll also pick up how flexible these phrases are in real use. Get your knickers in a twist appears as an instruction ("Don't get your knickers in a twist!"), as a confession ("I get my knickers in a twist on a regular basis") and as a boast about self-improvement. All mouth and no trousers arrives as a half-finished sentence — Katie says "So we would describe this person as, all..." and waits — which is exactly how idioms turn up in conversation: someone starts them and expects you to finish.

The two Meaning and Pronunciation segments then put you on the spot. You hear a situation, complete the sentence yourself, and repeat after the beep. Where two answers work, both are given: "Calm down, calm down...." accepts either Don't get your knickers in a twist or Keep your shirt on.

Vocabulary in this episode

The workbook glossary grades each expression 1 to 3 for how informal it is — 3 meaning "Don't use this with your mother-in-law!!!" Among the entries:

below the belt (1) – Not fair, like saying something unkind when somebody is already in a bad situation. It comes from boxing.
put your thinking cap on (1) – To start thinking about a problem, to really focus on it and try and get the answer.
Keep your shirt on! (2) – Don't get too excited or get angry – stay calm.
to be / put yourself in someone else's shoes (1) – To be in another person's situation.
I'll eat my hat (2) – You cannot believe something is true.
a fashion victim (2) – Someone who takes fashion too seriously and so can look silly because they will wear anything if it's fashionable.
All mouth and no trousers! (2) – All talk and no action.
It's on the tip of my tongue (1) – I can't remember right now, but I know it and I'm about to remember it.

In the workbook

The workbook for this unit gives you the full transcript of both conversations with Amanda, so you can go back and see how each clue was built and where the guessing went sideways. It also has the graded glossary above, plus the scripts for both Meaning and Pronunciation segments with the accepted answers written out.

Then two practice exercises. Practice Exercise 1 is ten scrambled expressions to rearrange against the clock, without peeking at the glossary — "he's /trousers / mouth / no/ and/ all" and so on. Practice Exercise 2 asks you to rewrite six sentences using an expression from the unit: "Try and see it from her point of view", "I'll be very surprised if she gets that job", "Come on; think of an idea –quickly!" Full answers are supplied at the back, including the places where more than one expression fits.

The workbook comes as part of the Zapp! English all-in-one pack, €39 for every episode across the series.

Get the complete courseAll workbooks and audio — €39

Common questions

Is the audio scripted?

The conversations are unscripted — Amanda genuinely doesn't know what's coming, which is why she gets stuck. The teaching sections that set up the tasks and give the answers are scripted, so the instructions stay clear.

How rude are these expressions?

Mostly harmless. Keep your shirt on, don't get your knickers in a twist, I'll eat my hat, a fashion victim and all mouth and no trousers are marked 2 in the glossary: informal, best with people you know well. Below the belt and put yourself in someone's shoes are safe almost anywhere.

Can I use the episode without the workbook?

Yes. The audio is free and the pronunciation drills work on their own. The workbook is for pinning the expressions down afterwards.

What does keep your hair on mean?

Katie mentions it as an alternative to keep your shirt on — the same idea: stop getting worked up.

Which level is this?

Level 3 of the Colloquial series. Ten expressions in under sixteen minutes, at natural speed.

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