Prince Charles touches down in Madrid

Prince Charles kisses the hand of Letizia, Felipe of Spain's wife, while Camilla looks on. Photograph: Juan Naharro Gimenez/Getty Images

 

Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall have touched down in Madrid for a three-day visit, with the crown prince, Felipe, as host and Spain's so-called "pink" gossip press in eager attendance. In the most popular photograph so far, Charles is captured kissing the hand of Felipe's wife, the former newsreader Princess Letizia.

The ABC newspaper's website is running excerpts from a British embassy cribsheet reminding the Spanish of links between the two countries: the princes have blood ties via Queen Victoria; 13.5m British visits to Spain each year; Heathrow is owned by a Spanish company and Athletic de Bilbao football club was formed in a 1898 merger between a team of expat Britons and a team of Spanish who learned the game in Britain.

Wednesday 30 March 2011

Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verbs are a group of multi-word verbs made from a verb plus another word or words. Many people refer to all multi-word verbs as phrasal verbs but  we have to make a  distinction between three types of multi-word verbs: prepositional verbs, phrasal verbs and phrasal-prepositional verbs. Now we'll just look at phrasal verbs proper.

Phrasal verbs are made of:

verb + adverb

Phrasal verbs can be:

• intransitive (no direct object)
• transitive (direct object)

Here are some examples of phrasal verbs:

	phrasal verbs	meaning	examples
				direct object
intransitive phrasal verbs	get up	rise from bed	I don't like to get up.
	break down	cease to function	He was late because his car broke down.
transitive phrasal verbs	put off	postpone	We will have to put off	the meeting.
	turn down	refuse	They turned down	my offer.

Separable Phrasal Verbs

When phrasal verbs are transitive (that is, they have a direct object), we can usually separate the two parts. For example, "turn down" is a separable phrasal verb. We can say: "turn down my offer" or "turn my offer down". Look at this table:

transitive phrasal verbs are separable		They	turned		down	my offer.
		They	turned	my offer	down.

However, if the direct object is a pronoun, we have no choice. We must separate the phrasal verb and insert the pronoun between the two parts. Look at this example with the separable phrasal verb "switch on":

direct object pronouns must go between the two parts of transitive phrasal verbs		John	switched		on	the radio.	These are all possible.
		John	switched	the radio	on.
		John	switched	it	on.
		John	switched		on	it.	This is not possible.

Separable or inseparable phrasal verbs? 
Some dictionaries tell you when phrasal verbs are separable. If a dictionary writes "look (something) up", you know that the phrasal verb "look up" is separable, and you can say "look something up" and "look up something". It's a good idea to write "something/somebody" as appropriate in your vocabulary book when you learn a new phrasal verb, like this:

• get up
• break down
• put something/somebody off
• turn sth/sb down

This tells you whether the verb needs a direct object (and where to put it).

phrasal verbs list 
A quiz

APRIL FOOL'S DAY

April Fools' Day is celebrated in the Western world on April 1st of every year. Sometimes referred to as All Fools' Day, April 1st is not a legal holiday, but is widely recognized and celebrated as a day which tolerates practical jokes and general foolishness. The day is marked by the commission of good humoured or funny jokes, hoaxes and other practical jokes of varying sophistication on friends, family members, teachers, neighbors, work associates, etc.

Traditionally, in some countries such as New Zealand, the UK, Australia, and South Africa, the jokes only last until noon, and someone who plays a trick after noon is called an "April Fool".[1] It is for this reason that newspapers in the U.K. that run a front page April fool only do so on the first (morning) edition.[2] Elsewhere, such as in France, Ireland, Italy, South Korea, Japan, Russia, The Netherlands, Germany, Brazil, Canada, and the U.S., the jokes last all day. The earliest recorded association between April 1 and foolishness can be found in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales (1392). Many writers suggest that the restoration of January 1 as New Year's Day in the 16th century was responsible for the creation of the holiday, but this theory does not explain earlier references.

 April's fool day is celebrated all over the U.K.

More about this day's jokes

Amazing British Kid Can Speak English in 24 accents

DON'T MISS IT!
While many people seem to only speak in other accents when drunk, this kid reveals himself to be an inadvertent dialect savant in this remarkable video. Within eight minutes, he masters two dozen accents used by English speakers. He says that the video is "mostly for his friends," but it's no surprise that such an impressive mimic has received so much attention on YouTube.


Source: The Huffington Post

ADJECTIVES FOR DESCRIBING PERSONALITY

TRY THESE QUIZZES ON LINE

Are plans to confiscate pupils' mobiles fair?

BBC News

WATCH THE VIDEO

Some pupils find it hard enough to concentrate in the classroom, without having the temptation of a mobile phone in their pocket. 

New proposals to allow teachers to confiscate phones from pupils and delete content, have met with criticism by the NASUWT and human rights organisation Liberty for being over-intrusive. 

The government insists the measures help assert the authority of teachers and will allow them to deal with problems in schools more effectively.

John Fairhurst, President of the Association of School College Leaders, and Isabella Sankey from Liberty, discussed the proposals with BBC Breakfast.

READ MORE

THE TRIP OF A PLASTIC BAG

Narrated by Academy Award-winner Jeremy Irons, this "mockumentary" video, filmed in the style of a nature documentary, hammers home the stark reality of California's plastic bag pollution situation.