English Idioms: RAIN

Spotlight English

Voice 1

Welcome to Spotlight. I’m Gillian Woodward.

Voice 2

And I’m Colin Lowther. Spotlight uses a special English method of broadcasting. It is easier for people to understand, no matter where in the world they live.

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Voice 1

The weather in the United Kingdom is weird. It changes a lot. It can be hot one day and cold the next. A few years ago, my cousins from Canada decided to visit. They wanted to know what the weather would be like in June. But I could not tell them because I did not know. I told them to bring clothes to keep them warm and clothes to keep them cool. But I also told them to bring a waterproof coat. I did not know what temperature it would be. But I knew one thing. It was going to rain.

Voice 2

It rains a lot in the UK. Sometimes the rain is heavy and sometimes it is light. But mostly it is constant. In most places, it rains over a hundred days a year. It rains even more in the far north. The Shetland Islands are the most northern part of the UK. There it rains more than two hundred days a year.

Voice 1

So, you would expect to hear us talking a lot about rain in the UK. We do. But the English language is a little like the weather in the UK. Its rules are difficult to predict. And when someone talks about rain, they may not really be talking about rain.

Voice 2

This is because we are using idioms. Native English speakers often use idioms in their speech. Idioms are words and phrases where the meaning is not clear from the individual words. These phrases are difficult for non-native speakers to understand.

Voice 1

Today’s Spotlight is on rain idioms. We explore seven common rain idioms. Most are not about rain at all. But these idioms will help you sound like a native speaker.

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Our first rain idiom is the phrase “come rain or shine”. This phrase means that you promise to do something whatever happens. I could say, “‘I will visit you come rain or shine.”’ This could mean that I will visit you whether it is good or bad weather. But it means more than that. It means ‘I will visit you whatever happens.’ It is a definite promise.

Voice 1

Our second English idiom uses two different phrases. English speakers from the UK say “It never rains but it pours.” English speakers from the USA say “when it rains, it pours.” The two have the same basic meaning.

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If one bad thing happens and then more bad things happen, you might use this idiom. If bad or inconvenient things happen again and again, you might say, “Oh dear, it never rains but it pours.” It is a way of saying that bad things are happening repeatedly.

Voice 1

This idiom has nothing to do with the weather. It could be a bright sunny day and you would still say, “It never rains but it pours.”

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So, if one sunny day a person could not get his car to start, then his computer went wrong, and then he had a power cut, he might say, “It never rains but it pours”.

Voice 1

Another English rain expression is “save it for a rainy day.” This means to save money or another resource for a future unknown and unexpected need.

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A person might use this phrase if her motorbike broke down. If she faced a big bill to repair it. She would be glad if she had saved money for a rainy day.

Voice 1

A fourth English rain idiom is to be “right as rain.” This means to feel well. It has nothing at all to do with rain!

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For example, say a person has been sick for a few days. He starts to feel a bit better. He might tell his friends, “I will be right as rain next week.” He is saying that he thinks he will feel normal the next week. The next week, he might say, “I am feeling right as rain.” It would mean he is feeling healthy.

Voice 1

Another strange idiom is to “take a rain check.” This is something that you say when you can’t accept someone’s invitation to something. But it also means that you would like to accept that invitation on another occasion.

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Imagine a friend asks you to meet her for coffee. You want to go, but you cannot. You are already busy that day. You might say something like, “I will take a rain check on that. I am already busy that day.” You would mean that you cannot go to coffee on the day your friend suggested. But your friend would understand that you would like to go another time.

Voice 1

The phrase “rain check” actually came from US baseball. When there was too much rain for a team to play, they would give spectators extra tickets. These tickets would be good for the next game. That way people could still watch the game they paid for.

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The sixth idiom is the phrase “to rain on someone’s parade”. It means to ruin someone’s plans or to make them less excited about those plans. Imagine a boy is going to a party. He is excited, because he thinks he is going to meet a girl he likes there. But you know the girl is doing something else. If you tell him, he might say something like, “You are really raining on my parade.”

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This phrase comes from real experience. The organizers will have to cancel a parade if it rains. The parade is ruined. If you rain on someone’s parade, you cause disappointment. It is the same feeling a person has if an event they looked forward to is cancelled.

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The final idiom for this program is “Raining cats and dogs.” Surprise! This idiom is really about rain. But cats and dogs are not falling from the sky!

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If someone says, “It is raining cats and dogs,” he means it is raining very hard.’ It is not just a light shower. It is a very heavy downpour.

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Experts do not know where this phrase came from. One of the earliest uses is in a poem written in 1710 by Jonathan Swift alled “A Description of a City Shower.” In the poem, the Irish writer describes a storm so powerful that it pushes animals from the rooftops. People talk about this kind of rain when they say “raining cats and dogs.”

Voice 1

In the UK people talk about the weather a lot. They always have something to say about it because it is always changing. The weather is a great topic of conversation. The idioms in this programme will not always help you to talk about the weather. But they will help you sound more like a native speaker. Practice these idioms as much as you can. Use them with your friends.

Voice 2

Did these idioms surprise you? Which idiom did you think was the strangest? We want to hear your thoughts. You can leave a comment on our website. Or email us at spotlightenglish.com. You can also comment on Facebook at facebook.com/spotlightradio.

Voice 1

The writers of this program were Katy Blake and Dan Christmann. The producer was Dan Christmann. The voices you heard were from The United Kingdom. All quotes were adapted for this program and voiced by Spotlight. You can listen to this program again, and read it, on the internet at www.spotlightenglish.com. This program is called, “English Idioms: Rain”.

Voice 2

You can also get our programs delivered directly to your Android or Apple device through our free official Spotlight English app. We hope you can join us again for the next Spotlight program. Goodbye.

Question:

Did these idioms surprise you? Which idiom did you think was the strangest?

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