I'm feeling a bit below par...

So cold & flu season is here and many people are feeling a bit sick. So I decided to  present a few useful expressions!

below par

This means that you are not feeling as good as usual or normal. We use it when we feel a little tired or sick.

Glen: Hey Jerry, how's it going?

Jerry: I'm feeling a bit below par.

Glen: Oh Really? Why's that?

Jerry: I think I've been working too much...

Glen: That's too bad.

under the weather

Here's a similar expression we also use when we feel a little sick.  

Helen: How's your husband doing these days?

Jen: He's been feeling under the weather lately, he caught a cold.

Helen: That's too bad. Tell him I hope he feels better soon.

I hope everyone got their flu shots, remember to wash your hands and take care of yourselves!

Phil

Do blue eyes run in your family?

Today we will be looking at an idiom that is often used in a medical situation or when you are talking about your family.

~runs in the family

 This means that a characteristic is very common in your family.

Blue eyes run in our family.

Meaning many people have blue eyes in my family, my father, my grandfather, my brother, my cousins, my great-grandfather, etc.

Twins run in the family.

Meaning that many people in my family give birth to twins. My mother was a twin, my cousins had twins, my grand-father was a twin, etc.


This will sometimes show up when you talk about your family.

Alice: Your son is a fantastic basketball player!

Mary: Thanks, he's a chip off the old block. His father was an all-state basketball star in high school.

Alice: I guess it runs it the family!

A chip off the old block is an idiom used when talking about how kids resemble their parents. It is usually used by fathers to say their kids are just like them. 

To run in the family, is also commonly heard in medical situations:

Doctor: I'm sorry to say you have a rare genetic disorder...

Patient: Is it ichthyosis? My Father had that...

Doctor: Yes it is, it runs in families. Don't worry, it is just a skin condition that is easily treatable with modern skin creams.

Patient: Yeah, I know. Thanks Doc, I was just hoping it would skip a generation.

To skip a generation is when a characteristic that runs in families goes from grand-parents to grand-children skipping the generation in between.

Have a nice weekend,

Phil




 

scratch vs. scrape

Hi everyone, do you know the difference between:

scratch

and

scrape?

A scratch is usually caused by a nail removing a bit of skin, sometimes it doesn't even break the skin. It is from the verb to scratch　（かく） which is what you do when you are itchy（痒い）.

痒い時にかくね。

A scrape is not deep but it is quite wide. It is when something is dragged against something else and removes a layer. It is also a verb, to scrape.

In Montreal, during the winter you have to use an ice scraper to remove the ice from your car windows.

A: What happened?

B: This? It's just a scrape, I fell down skateboarding.

I was running and I slipped and scraped my knee.

A scraped knee happened to me a lot when I was a kid, I liked to run and play ^_-

Actually, when you're a kid and you get hurt you often run to show your Dad what happened. Many Dads will then say:

It's just a scratch.

Which means "It's nothing to worry about" it is a small problem. Usually when Moms say that they then kiss it to make it better ^_^

Have a nice week,

Phil

Plastic surgery

I will continue talking about medical topics today: plastic surgery.

Or sometimes it is called cosmetic surgery. In North America, the most popular types of plastic surgery are:

botox ボトックス

This is an injection (注射 - ちゅうしゃ) of a neurotoxin which kills your nerves to stop wrinkles (老いの波 - おいのなみ). It only lasts a few months and then you need to do it again.

A lot of movie stars get botox.

liposuction 脂肪吸引 (しぼうきゅういん)

This is when they suck the fat out of you.

A: Man, Bob's lost a lot of weight! Did he hit the gym?

B: Nah, I heard he got liposuction!

A: No way! He's looking good, I hope he can keep the weight off.

a boob job 豊胸手術 (ほうきょうしゅじゅつ)

This is casual English, it is also called a breast enlargement (medical term). Where the doctor will install breast implants to increase a woman's breast size.

My friend is thinking of getting a boob job but I told her she looks fine and doesn't need it.

a nose job 隆鼻術 (りゅうびじゅつ)

This is where someone will have their nose done. The medical term is rhinoplasty. In the west it is most often used to make your nose smaller. I think in Asia it is often to make it a bit more pointy.

Wow! She looks really beautiful since she got her nose job.

Those are the most common, you might also hear someone say:

A: I think she got a face lift!

B: Yeah, I think so too. Her wrinkles are gone but now her skin is too tight.

A: Yeah! She looks kind of scary...

A face lift is a surgery where they will lift your face up and tighten your skin to get rid of wrinkles.

In Asia, a lot of people have their eyes done. This is the surgery people get to have more western style eyes or bigger looking eyes.

Have a nice week!

Phil

Bacteria vs. germs

Hey everyone, here's a quick little lesson to start off the month. Do you know what the difference is between bacteria and germs? I am not talking about a detailed difference in the biological sense but about the difference in meaning in casual everyday spoken English...

...GERMS is NEGATIVE, it is used to talk about bad micro-organisms. In Japanese, you might say: 病菌 (びょうきん) or 黴菌 (ばいきん).

I hate germs~! They make us sick.

Oh, if you don't know, organism means a living thing like 有機体 (ゆうきたい) or 生き物 (いきもの). Probably it is closer in meaning to "yuukitai". A micro-organism is simply a very very small living thing.

BACTERIA on the other hand is more neutral, it could be bad or good.

I eat a special yogurt to give my stomach some good bacteria to help with my digestion.

I always use anti-bacterial cleaning products, I hate bacteria like salmonella!

Bacteria in Japanese is of course, バクテリア.

I hope you enjoyed this lesson, I will try and post a new one soon!

Phil

Opposites...

Looking at last month's list of posts I noticed that I forgot to write a blog in my opposites series, so I decided to write one today before January is over~! We are now in the middle of the cold and flu season so the opposites I will introduce today have to do with illnesses and health.

a runny nose水洟 (みずばな) < ----- > a stuffy nose鼻が詰まる (はながつまる)

This is really simple to use, when you're nose is running you can say "I have a runny nose" and when your nose is blocked you say "I have a stuffy nose". Often when your nose is runny you have to blow your nose. In Japan, many people think it is rude to blow your nose in public so they sniffle(ぐすん) a lot--western people find people sniffling non-stop REALLY annoying! We think you should just blow your nose~! ^_-

constipated (adj) 便秘 (べんぴ)< ---- > diarrhea (n)下痢が移った (げりがうつった)

Be careful we say "I'm constipated" BUT "I have diarrhea" because constipated is an adjective and diarrhea is a noun.

clean きれい< -------- > dirty きたない

To stay healthy you should try to keep your hands clean. It is important to clean your dirty clothes and handkerchiefs to get rid of any bacteria or viruses that might be on them.

hygienic 衛生的 (えいせいてき)< --- > unhygienic不衛生 (ふえいせい)

Eating food you dropped on the floor is unhygienic (un-hi-je-nic).

Washing your hands often is very hygienic (hi-je-nic).

Hmm, ok that is all for today, stay healthy~!

Phil

Medical words part 1

Ok, so here are some medical words for mikan-chan. This will be a two or three part series because there are alot of words used to talk about being sick.

So to get us started let's go over three words, sick, ill and injured.

Sick and ill are adjectives. So to use them you must use the verb to be and say:

"I'm sick."

"He's sick."

"They're ill."

They have the same meaning, the only difference is that ill is a bit of an older word so we don't use it so often. This means that ill sounds more formal than sick. "I'm ill" sounds a little strange, you should say "I'm sick".

Now, both ill and sick can be turned into nouns by adding the suffix -ness to them. So ill becomes illness and sick becomes sickness. They are now nouns so you must use the verb to have:

"I have a sickness."

"I have an illness."

Here, things change a little. They no longer have the same meaning. Their meanings are slightly different. Illness is used for physical conditions and sickness is used for mental conditions. Also, both are usually used to talk about SOMEONE ELSE or about the disease itself.

"His illness is spreading quickly."

"That sickness is highly contagious."

Oh, contagious is an adjective which means the virus or bacteria can easily be given to someone else.

Let's talk about getting into an accident and breaking your leg...

"I broke my leg so I have to wear this cast for two months!"

A cast is a wrapping made of plaster that stops you from moving your body so that the bones have time to heal. When you are hurt in an accident, we use the verb to injure. So, "I injured my leg when I fell down the stairs", you are not sick or ill... you are injured(adj).

Sick and ill are used for medical conditions caused by your body(ex: cancer, metabolic diseases) or by bacterias and viruses. Injured, is used when you break something in your body, usually by accident.

"Help! I'm injured, I can't walk".

Injury, is the noun form of injured. So;

"He has a head injury."

"Her injury is not severe so she will be fine in a few weeks."

Well, I think that is enough for now, drop by for the next part in this series!

Phil

I'm gonna throw up...

OK, today I am gonna talk about feeling sick and wanting to vomit. There are many many words for this in English and I will just cover some of the most popular...

vomit: this is a MEDICAL term, you will most often hear it in hospitals or from doctors.

Saying "I'm gonna vomit" sounds pretty strange.

puke or barf: instead you'd say "I'm gonna puke" or "I'm gonna barf".

These are both casual English but barf is a little childish.

throw up: "I'm gonna throw up" is the most popular phrase for vomit.

Now, before you get sick you might want to warn people. So here are some more useful words:

nauseous: causing nausea, sickening. It means you feel sick to the stomach and want to vomit.

ex: That roller coaster made me nauseous.

queasy: the same as nauseous but more casual.

ex: The sight of blood makes me queasy.

Many times we feel sick to our stomach because of a car, plane or boat. So we have some special words that cover motion sickness.

carsick: to throw up because of a car's motion

airsick: to throw up because of a plane's motion

seasick: to throw up because of a boat or ship's motion

You will notice that I often said sick, in English if you say "I'm gonna be sick" it means "I'm gonna throw up"!