Problems & Difficulties: 10 Colloquial English Idioms

Katie sets up the first clue: you open an exam paper and it's on something you know nothing about. Amanda offers "I was thinking I'm stuck." — a perfectly good answer, but not the one Katie is fishing for. The expression she wants involves a creek, and a paddle that isn't there. Over eighteen minutes the two of them work through ten colloquial expressions for problems and difficulties, with detours into Pandora's box, molehills and a can of worms.

What you'll hear in this episode

Katie is sitting in Thomas's flat, challenging Amanda to guess as many colloquial expressions as she can, and she describes situations rather than giving definitions. Amanda gets up shit creek from the setup, then adds a useful detail: she has never heard the longer version, saying "Oh I haven't heard that before." and "No we just say up shit creek."

The next clue produces a good false start. Amanda guesses "Well, if we're talking about shit..." and offers in deep shit — which Katie accepts as a bonus expression before ruling it out with "This one doesn't involve shit." The answer is out of the frying pan and into the fire.

Amanda's explanations are often better than the dictionary. On the iceberg: "What you see...on the surface is very small, but below there's this huge, enormous mass of ice." On the molehill, exaggeration turns it into "Everest". She also interrupts to share a line she read that morning: "a pessimist complains about the wind. An optimist waits for it to change, and a realist adjusts his sails." Katie's verdict: "It's a nice thought to start the day."

In the second half, Katie leads Amanda to teething problems with a clue about babies, one of the hosts admits a personal vicious circle of being too tired to exercise and then more tired for not exercising, and haywire arrives alongside berserk and bananas after a week of internet trouble.

Quick facts

Episode	Zapp! English Colloquial 3.13 – Problems & Difficulties
Pack	Colloquial 3
Level	3
Duration	18 minutes 00 seconds
Speakers	Katie and Amanda
Recorded	Thomas's flat

What you'll learn

Because Katie never says the expression first, you hear something you rarely get in a course: an idiom being reached for. Amanda hesitates, says she has it "on the tip of my tongue" (the clue is hidden in her own words), guesses Pandora's box before a can of worms, and volunteers berserk and bananas before landing on haywire. That's how native speakers actually search for a phrase, and it's excellent listening practice in following someone who is thinking out loud.

You'll also pick up two things learners often miss. First, many of these expressions are usually shortened: up shit creek is said far more often than the full up shit creek without a paddle, and Amanda's reaction shows this varies between speakers. Second, haywire has a strong collocation — Katie asks, "Usually we use it for...sort of, machines, don't we?" — so a computer or a wifi connection goes haywire, and that's where you'll hear it.

The Meaning and Pronunciation sections then test recall in a specific way: you hear a single word (iceberg, frying pan, worms, creek) and have to produce the whole expression, then repeat it after the beep. There are also comprehension checks — is the tip of the iceberg about the small part or the big part? — plus one expression, to take something in your stride, that Katie and Amanda never discussed, saved for you to work out.

The expressions and what they mean

The workbook glossary rates each expression 1 to 3 for how informal it is. Level 3 carries a warning: "Don't use this with your mother-in-law!!!"

the tip of the iceberg (1) – a small part of something, compared to the bigger part that may be hidden
to make a mountain out of a molehill (2) – to make a small problem into something much bigger
to open a can of worms (1) – to do something which may open more problems / cause more difficulties
up shit creek (without a paddle) (3) – in a difficult situation with no hope of a solution
in deep shit (3) – in a lot of trouble
out of the frying pan, into the fire (1) – from one bad situation into another
a vicious circle (1) – one problem creates more problems, which then make the first problem worse
to take something in your stride (1) – to be calm and treat problems and difficulties as normal
to have ups and downs (1) – to experience the usual good and bad things life gives us
teething problems (1) – problems in the early stages of developing something
to go haywire (1) – to behave in a crazy way, particularly machines
berserk (1) / bananas (1) – crazy

In the workbook

The Colloquial 3.13 workbook gives you the full transcript of the conversation with Katie and Amanda, so you can go back to the moments where Amanda's guesses run ahead of the clues and see exactly how the English is put together. You also get the scripts for both Meaning and Pronunciation sections, the complete glossary with its 1–3 informality ratings, and two practice exercises with answers.

Practice Exercise 1 asks you to rearrange jumbled words into logical sentences — all / the / took / He / stride / in / his / problems becomes He took all the problems in his stride. Practice Exercise 2 is a matching task: five sentence openings such as "I thought it was finished but it was" and "It won't work," to be paired with five endings, including just the tip of the iceberg and it's gone haywire. Answers for both are printed at the back.

This workbook is part of the Zapp! English all-in-one pack — every episode, every workbook, €39, one payment.

Get the complete courseAll workbooks and audio — €39

Common questions

Is the audio scripted?

The conversation between Katie and Amanda is unscripted — that's why you hear the false starts and the wrong guesses. The teaching sections that set up tasks and give answers are scripted, so the instructions stay clear.

Can I really use "up shit creek" and "in deep shit"?

Both are rated 3 in the glossary: very informal, and they may upset or offend some people. Understand them, and choose your company carefully before you use them.

What level is this episode?

Level 3, from the Colloquial 3 pack. The individual words are easy; the difficulty is in the natural pace and the unfinished sentences.

How do I get the workbook?

The audio is free. The workbook comes with the all-in-one pack at €39, which covers every episode we've made.

What if I only remember a few of the ten?

Use the Meaning and Pronunciation sections as your test — one cue word, one whole expression — and come back to them a few days later.

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