Friday, October 7, 2011

Pay off


If something “pays off”, you see the result/ benefit of hard work or any effort.
Red rover: In this game, kids form two opposing lines and attempt to "break through" each others’ line


1. The many hours I spent trying to understand pieces of texts and songs in Spanish, with the help of an English-Spanish dictionary, definitely paid off when I went to live in Central America. I found that I had a good base of vocabulary to draw on.

2. “What you put in is what you get out”, “You reap what you sow”, “A penny saved is a penny earned”, “Practice makes perfect” and many such expressions, talk about the worth of putting effort in now, because it will pay off later.

3 The share price of the company “Apple” is now sitting at about $377. 37. Apple’s share price in December of 1980 was just $2.75. If you had invested in Apple at that time, 30 years ago, then your investment would have paid off many times over by now.


4. I can see that for many of my students, watching TV series and movies in English, listening to music, surfing the internet etc… has paid off for them. They get a lot more English stimulation that way, and their English skills grow considerably. Try to incorporate English more and more into your daily routine or entertainment.

5. Brazil has slapped (put) heavy import taxes on everything coming into the country. Besides that, for example, the overwhelming majority of the cars driven in the country are made locally. These decisions have really paid off as Brazil’s position as an economical force on the world stage continues to increase.

6. If you do regular exercise and follow a healthy diet over a long period of time, it will undoubtedly pay off health-wise. You will look and feel so much better. It’s hard work but it will pay off.

13 comments :

  1. Tell us about some effort that you have made that has paid off for you.

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  2. Nice! If I had commented here before, I wouldn't have written "make up" in that one! By the way, I didn't find "make up" here in the blog. Maybe you could write about it. =]

    Thanks!

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  3. Hi Marcos,
    yes, I just did a search for some comics with "Make up"... so I will make a post on Wednesday about that phrasal verb... first I need to post an expression on Tuesday.

    There are at least 4 different meanings for the phrasal verb, "Make up" that I can think of right now:
    (1) To invent a story/ lie
    (2) to comprise/ compose
    (3) to reconcile
    (4) to compensate for

    I will make a double post with #s 1 & 4.

    Thanks for the suggestion.
    Have a great weekend,
    abs,
    Frank

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  4. Good!

    The first item reminds me of a Law & Order episode where a guy is being charged with a crime and then he says to Olivia:

    - This is true, I'm not making this up!

    I've also read/ heard of item 3 a few times as the opposite of "break up" when it comes to relationships. But when I was writing that comment on the other post nothing of it came to my mind. =]

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  5. Exactly... he is telling her that he is not "inventing"/ fabricating a story or lying.

    Holy crap Marcos! You have a good memory!... either that, or you keep a notebook with you when you watch TV!

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  6. Actually, there are some sentences that are repeated all the time in these TV series, like:

    Law & Order - Put you hands up/ on your head!
    - You were supposed to be at home!
    - I'll be there in a minute!

    Dr. House - Sarcoidosis! LOL (In fact, I don't know what Sarcoidosis is, but I'll look it up right away)

    and so forth...

    Maybe that's why I memorize some of them.

    I wish I could watch these series without the Portuguese subtitles, but everytime I try it, it seems like I started learning English yesterday. That's really disappointing.

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  7. I forgot to mention the most famous one from Law & Order.

    How do you find the defendant?

    - We find the defendant guilty/ not giulty! =]

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  8. Haha, Sarcoidosis!! I've heard it a million times but I've never bothered to look it up... All I know is that it sounds really bad!

    Hey Marcos, I have an idea... maybe you'd like to write a "Guest post" I could put on my blog about the different ways you have been learning English... What do you think? Would you like to give it a shot?

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  9. Wow! I'm shaking! haha

    In fact, maybe I will give it a try, but I don't think my vocabulary and writing skills will be enough to do this task. You'll probably have to correct a lot of things before posting. =]

    I'll think about it for the next hour while I'll be doing the dishes. LOL

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  10. In fact, maybe...

    I've gotten over myself!

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  11. No problem,
    take your time Marcos... and of course, I could do some corrections. I think the most important thing would be to talk about things from your perspective... and you've had a lot of interesting (and funny) things to say already.

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  12. Hey Frank, yesterday evening I worked a little bit on the guest post. Would you like to take a look?

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  13. Hi Marcos,
    I sent you my email via FB yesterday... did you get it? Sure, I'd like to take a look at what you wrote!

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